Against The Ice: The Bleak White North Of Greenland

Written by Luke Barnes

Summary

An expedition to Greenland soon turns into a life or death struggle for two men, played by Nikolaj Coster- Waldau and Joe Cole. Based on the 1909 true story.

I think this film is a remarkable tome to the human condition, both Coster-Waldau and Cole are giving it their all and you can really feel it in their performances, from the beginning both sink into their characters so completely that you forget that you are watching a film.

Moreover, the film maintained a strong sense of tension throughout, there were multiple moments where, pardon the trite overused phrase, I was on the edge of my seat. I thought the film for the most part was deeply enthralling and kept you engaged throughout, this was helped along by you caring about the fate of the explorers.

My main issue with the film was that though for the most part it did a good job of keeping you interested there was significant pacing issues resulting in slow moments that hurt the film broadly and that tested your interest in it, regarding this there are also a number of sub-plots that could have been cut down to save time as they really don’t add much of anything.

Overall, an interesting film that is dragged down by some aggressive pacing issues.

Pros.

Coster-Waldau

The tension

You care about the characters

Cons.

The pacing

It overstays its welcome

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Interview With Director/Editor Jacob Melling and Actor/Writer Amy Cotter: Fish Out Of Water

Written by Luke Barnes

I recently had the chance to interview editor/director Jacob Melling and actor/writer Amy Cotter about their new film Fish Out Of Water, which tells the tale of an anxious person, played by Cotter, trying to navigate the hellishly social world of the adult. In this interview we discuss issues of anxiety, poetry and early morning bathing . I hope you enjoy.

Q: What made you want to make this film?

JM: Post pandemic I was looking to do a low budget Independent film that really pushed myself creatively whilst having fun and working some creative like minded people. I had been wanting to work with my good Amy since previously working on a short film with her. She is a very talented poet and had sent me this poem called ‘Fish out of Water’ and reading it for the first time I found it so relatable, funny and truthful and I immediately knew it would be fantastic as a short film.

Q: Why choose to feature poetry so heavily?

AC: I wanted to make a film using a process and form I’d not tried before, with a written poem as stimulus and developing the film from there. We wanted to experiment with comedy and rhythm usually reserved for performance poetry and see if it would work. I was especially keen to work with a musician to mainly improvise in the studio, discovering Fish’s thoughts in music and culminating in a thoughtful and beautiful sound track. It was important to us to collaborate with a brilliant team of creatives to bring the characters and aspects of Fish’s world and worries to life. To the voice of her Friend to the credit song- each aspect as important as each other.

Q: The ocean serves as an apt metaphor, however, what inspired that visual element?

AC: We wanted to portray a calming dreamlike alternative world that contrasted to the dreary domestic anxiety of Fish’s reality. The ocean serves as Fish’s go-to ‘happy place’, where she can keep her head above water.

Q: What was the message of this film?

AC: I think there are any number of messages in the film, hopefully it speaks to whichever part of the viewer that needs soothing. I think it’s an intimate insight into social anxiety and shines a light on the domestic demons we face, sometimes on a daily basis. I also hope it’s an entertaining comfort to a generation unsettled by our growing strains and stresses.

Q: Do you have any funny on-set stories?

JM & AC: During the bath scenes there was a local festival going on so we had to keep restarting the dunking in and out of the bath. A lot of water was swallowed. It was a very joyful summer soundtrack to our luke warm morning of 4 hours in the bath- and VERY hard not to sing along to Sister Sledge.

Q: What was your favourite moment from production?

AC: My favourite part of production was probably getting into the studio to do the ADR and music. Playing the full film to our composer and seeing him improvise to it was magical! A culmination of everyones hard work right there, a very special moment seeing that happen. Also sighing and scoffing into a microphone for 10 minutes for the foley sounds is always fun!

Q: Future projects?

AC: We might develop the next part of Fish’s story, using everything we have learnt about merging poetry and filmmaking. I’d like to make more poetry shorts, different poets, different stories, and experimenting with this style of storytelling, so we are always on the look out for creatives and collaborators to work with!

Q: Do you have any advice for upcoming filmmakers?

JM & AC: If you have even a half formed idea that you want to develop, approach some like-minded dreamers, get a little team together and make it happen. We all need support and I’m so grateful that our tiny team got behind the poem and made it happen.

Keep making films! Keep creating. Keep pushing yourself. I’m nowhere near where I want to be as a filmmaker, but each film I make I learn from and improve. Each experience I also go on to make so many amazing connections and creative relationships just like I have with Amy and the rest of the team working on ‘Fish’.

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Fish Out Of Water: I Wish I Could Swim

4/5

Written by Luke Barnes

Summary

A tale of anxiety, woe and the ocean blue.

As some of you may know if you have been reading my reviews for a while, I like poetry. I have dabbled at it a fair bit in the past to mixed degrees of success, it’s a fickle thing. As such I am impressed that this film managed to condense its entire narrative into one poem, and that from that poem the film is able to go in many different directions and illicit so many different emotions.

I often found this film to be deep and surprisingly thoughtful, it made me smile as much as it made me think and broadly ponder. I thought the film was quite true in a lot of the things it was saying about anxiety disorder and the struggles those of us who have it have to go through. It felt very real and human.

My one critique of the film would be that it is too short. I mean that both in terms of I wanted more but also in that I think the film could have done with a few extra minutes to flesh out some of its themes and deeper meanings.

Overall, a beautifully unique film.

Pros.

How it covered dealing with anxiety

The emotion

The poem

The cinematography

Cons.

It is too short

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The Batman: Trying Desperately To Replicate Nolan

3/5

Written by Luke Barnes

Summary

A new emotional Batman, played by Robert Pattinson, is born. Is this Nolan? Not quite.

I will admit I liked this film more than I thought I was going to based on the trailers, there are a number of things that work here and a few major things that don’t, but to the positive first.

Jeffery Wright, Zoe Kravitz and Paul Dano are all terrific. Wright and Kravitz totally make the characters of Gordon and Kyle their own to such an extent that you can’t think about anyone else in the role. Yes, I do think these may become the definitive versions of these characters. Moreover, Dano is magnetic as Riddler and really makes the character come alive in a threatening, unstable way that has never been done on the big screen before, Dano’s Riddler is easily the star of the show.

Another positive is the world. This Gotham City feels very comics accurate; the deprivation and the despair are clear to see and inform the wider narrative of the film. Reeves very accurately captures the world of Gotham as it appears in the comics.

Now onto my issues with the film.

This film really suffers pacing wise, I did say when it was announced that the film was going to be on for close to 3 hours that it was going to be an issue and I was proven quite right. After a while the film starts to drag and even becomes boring, this obviously hurts it tremendously.

Additionally, the film is clearly trying very hard to mimic Nolan’s Dark Knight trilogy and as such goes hard with the uber realism and grit. However, unlike Nolan’s films this really doesn’t land and comes across as silly, baffling or simply not as intended. Examples of what I am talking about can be seen as Batman rarely talks to people instead he just stairs, this might have seemed like a cool idea but doesn’t work, moreover, whenever Batman walks anywhere he does it so slowly that anyone could easily just run away, a lot of the time it is not even slow motion he is just barely strolling along. Though Reeves thinks this makes for an intense on-screen presence it actually instead becomes a recurring joke.

Lastly, the emo hot topic Batman played by Robert Pattinson certainly won’t be to everyone’s taste, he wears copious amounts of eye makeup and acts like an angsty teen which at times does become grating, some of the lines are incredibly on the nose in this regard. Furthermore, I don’t think anyone will be coming away from this film saying what a great actor Pattinson is as he is really quite monotone throughout.

Overall, on the better side of fine, but not approaching truly good.

Pros.

Wright

Kravitz

Dano

Cons.

Emo Batman

The pacing

It tries to hard to copy what Nolan did

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Asking For It: Yikes

1/5

Written by Luke Barnes

Summary

The rape revenge-sub genre needs to end, or find something interesting to say.

Many people have called this a feminist film, however, to them I say is it? This film does nothing to advance the cause, or add to the conversation, it just shouts out a lot of things other films have already said about gender issues, but hopes that by being the loudest you won’t realise that this film actually has nothing new to say. It is barely knee deep.

None of this is helped by the fact that the characters are barely two dimensional and are written as hollow cliches, acting more as mouth pieces for regurgitation than as characters. The cast have all been talented in other things so I am left to either assume they either couldn’t be bothered here, or the writing wasn’t good enough to induce a good performance.

Moreover, the greatest crime of this film is that it is deeply boring and never really does or says anything that is worthy of getting your attention let alone keeping it.

A final question I have for you all is this, who was this film made for? Who is supposed to like it? Anyone? No one?

Overall, a poorly executed message film that will no doubt be forgotten about by next week.

Pros.

Hudgens has charisma even if her character is a horrendous cliché

Cons.

The message achieves nothing and is regurgitated

The cast are all barely two dimensional

It has awful pacing

It is boring and generic

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Blacklight: The Battle Against Retirement

2/5

Written by Luke Barnes

Summary

Liam Neeson continues to refuse to retire and stars in yet another disappointing action film.

Folks we are a long way from the days of Taken.

I remember when a Liam Neeson action film used to be a sight to see, there was a time when almost all of the films Neeson, wherein he was staring, were golden. Sadly those days seem long over. I admit as a Neeson fan there was still a little of that old Neeson charm to be found here, but it is wearing thin. That said if this film didn’t star Neeson I would have turned it off early and not reviewed it, he was the one thing that kept me going.

The plot of this film is deeply generic and familiar to the point of parody. All of the threads have been well tread by other better films, and the attempts at social commentary never seem to come together, it can’t seem to decide what it wants to say.

The rest of the cast outside of Neeson might as well not exist as they are given so little to do it would have made more sense to simply have Neeson just doing things and not interacting with anyone for the length of the film as they add nothing.

Overall, it is sad to see Neeson reduced to this.

Pros.

Neeson

It is watchable

Cons.

The plot

The wider supporting cast

It is boring and generic

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King Knight: Finding Your Flock

4/5

Written by Luke Barnes

Summary

Leaders of a Wiccan coven Thorn, played by Matthew Grey Gubler and Willow, played by Angela Sarafyan go through trial and tribulation as seeks from Thorn’s past seek to unseat them.

This is a bizarre film in the best way, there are so many out there, illogical things that happen that you can at times be baffled by, but in that strangeness comes the charm. Certainly this is one of the most original films I have seen in a while.

Moreover, I also think this film has a really lovely message about finding your flock and being accepting of other people. In many respects its themes of social isolation and living in a gilded cage really bleed through, hitting home and resonating .

I thought the cast was terrific across the board though I would say that Gubler was the stand out for me. I really bought the emotion of his performance and I thought the narrative about him being uncomfortable dancing really allowed for his character to go on a wonderful journey that had a very satisfying pay off.

Also this film featured Ray Wise, who is a personal favourite of mine, so that is a big win for me, any film with Ray Wise gains favour with me.

Overall, certainly one that will fly under a lot of people’s radar but one that is a must watch if you can find it.

Pros.

Wise

Gubler

The strangeness

The originality

Cons.

Mild pacing issues

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No Exit: No One Cared About This Film So Why Should You?

1/5

Written by Luke Barnes

Summary

Yet another deeply generic, thoughtless thriller that you have seen one hundred times before, maybe more.

Is this the standard of films coming out these days? Honestly whilst watching I found it quite hard not to go on my phone, or just do something else, there really was nothing in this film that kept me engaged or even remotely interested.

The performances all reek of a group of people brought together by a need to get another hot tub rather than by anyone caring about the project. Most of the cast keep one look on their face consistently throughout the film, such is the standard of acting on display here.

Some other reviewers have been angered by a scene in which a character snorts some cocaine as a means to gain strength, now I am not bothered by this because in a film as poor as this with a script and screenplay that both scream of being written over a weekend with the idea to crank something out I would not expect anything more.

Overall, clearly no one on the production side of things gave a damn about this film and it shows.

Pros.

It is short

Cons.

It is generic

It is way too familiar

The acting is awful

So is the writing

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Family Squares: Grief In The Time Of Covid

4/5

Written by Luke Barnes

Summary

A group of people gather together on zoom after the death of their Grandmother.

I thought this film was surprisingly effecting, there were a number of moments I had a tear in my eye or could feel myself welling up. On first appearance this film is sold as a comedy film and yes there are jokes, a few of which even make you laugh, but in my mind this film is far stronger as a dramatic piece about people dealing with life changes and loss.

The cast is all fairly strong across the board, all are able to be both light and affable and also to bring out the dramatic big guns when required, if I were to single one person out for special acting commendation it would probably be Judy Greer, I thought there were a number of scenes here where Greer really shined and stood out from the crowd through her dramatic work.

My one issue with the film is that the teams/zoom setting will quickly date it, as will all the copious references to Covid, I understand the desire to be topical, but it does become a crutch after a while narratively.

Overall, a warm, touching, sometimes funny film.

Pros.

The cast

Greer specially

The drama and the emotion

The pace

Cons.

The format as well as mentions to covid will quickly date the film

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The Family Stone: The Most Cringe Film Ever Made

0.5/5

Written by Luke Barnes

Summary

The very worst form of the meeting family for the first time plot.

This film was just awful, I know I complain a lot about films being cringe, but this film was so horribly, uncomfortably cringe in its character interactions that honestly I had to look away at times such was the awkwardness. I will stress to you that it was not good cringe, no, it was the very worst kind.

Moreover, this film has some deeply warped values as it portrays it to be perfectly normal for someone to be considering marrying someone else after knowing them for just one day, as well as saying it is fine to get bored of your current partner and then go out with their siblings whilst the two of you are still together. Not only does the film push this message it also acts like its normal, which last I checked isn’t the case.

In addition, most of the cast struggle to act and almost every single one of the interactions feels painful and stilted.

Overall, the only saving grace of this film was Luke Wilson and even he was wasted here.

Pros.

Wilson

Cons.

The cringe

Parker

The cast either can’t be bothered or are wasted

It has terrible morals

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