LIFE'S A BREEZE

Despite the title, life hardly seems like a breeze for three generations of this Irish family who live hand to mouth in a Dublin suburb.  The matriarch Nan is a bit of a hoarder so the rest of the family devise a plan to get her out of her House one day so that they can give it a surprise makeover as her 80th birthday gift. Out go 20 years of newspapers, stacks of discarded novels and piles of unworn clothes making the whole house looking un-cluttered for the first time ever.

They even splash out for a new bed but instead of being pleased that she no longer has to sleep on her old lumpy mattress Nan goes white as a sheet and demands to know where they dumped the old one. She claims that not only does it hold her life savings but that she has managed to stash away the unlikely sum of 1 million euros in it.

At first her three adult children, all of whom are unemployed, refuse to believe that she could have possibly accumulated so much, but knowing that this is their inheritance anyway they start to hunt the discarded mattress down.  The search takes them to recycling dumps and landfill sites across the whole region but  once word leaks out about their quest and is splashed across newspaper headlines, it turns into a major national treasure hunt with total strangers looking for this lost jackpot.

This very implausible story based on a similar real event in Israel ends up making a delightful bittersweet comedy about how the idea of a potential fortune changes people completely.  The wonderful veteran Irish actress Fionnula Flanagan plays Nan so beautifully, shrewdly keeping her cards close to her chest as her ham-fisted family muddle their way through the search, and through life in general. She bonds much more with her 12 year old grandchild Emma (superbly played by newcomer Kelly Thornton) who is the only one who even attempts to understand and respect this old lady for who she really is.

This easygoing feel good movie has all the warmth and humor that you come to expect from an Irish comedy and so much more.  Great fun.

★★★★★★★

MY OLD LADY

Mathias Gold thinks his luck has finally changed when
he inherits an imposing apartment in the center of Paris from his late father who he was estranged from for decades. Approaching his 60's, Mathias is a recovering alcoholic and after three failed marriages and three unpublished novels, he hasn't a cent in the bank, and had to scrape around to find the airfare to fly in from New York to claim his property.  What he finds in the Marais is a large two-floor apartment with a private garden that is worth several million euros, but it comes with an unexpected catch.

There amongst the once grand salons is a 92 year old Englishwoman Madame Girard who had sold the apartment to his father 40 years prior but under an archaic French property law as he paid less than the going rate, she not only gets to live there for the rest of her life, but also gets a monthly stipend too. Horrified and pleading poverty Mathias persuades Mde Girard agrees to let him stay in exchange for paying rent whilst he tries to think what to do next. A plan that doesn't meet with the approval of Chloe her daughter who also lives in this rambling dilapidated house.

As the story unfolds we learn that Mde Girard's relationship with Mr Gold Snr was not confined to the property transaction as they were lovers too for some decades.  As the plot thickens we get to appreciate that this frail looking ancient widow is a wily old bird who has a very full and happy past, something which seems to have completely eluded the icy unmarried Chloe or the bitter and self-loathing Mathias.

As Mathias tries against the odds to scheme to take control of the apartment he falls off the wagon and starts rapidly working his way through Mde Girad's impressive wine cellar, and at the same time Chloe is plotting to try and keep the status quo. They are both such unlikable characters that its impossible to have empathy for either of them even when they clumsily fall into a too convenient happy ending.

The playwright Israel Horovitz adapted his own play for this his movie directing debut and has left some of the very speechy monologues in which actors so love. Kevin Kline giving a beautiful performance playing the unhappy Maurice makes the most of the rants he gets to give, whilst the sublime Kristin Scott Thomas as Chloe does well with the little that she is given to work with.  The movie of course belongs to the old lady, as it should, as played so beautifully by Maggie Smith, the grand dame herself a mere 80 years in real life.  It is one of her quietest and most understated performances for years but it is still so powerful and compelling. Her character is  the only one who enjoys life and Dame Maggie subtlety ensures that we definitely know this.

It's this 'A' list acting and the location of Paris exquisitely shot in a dim dusky light that makes this otherwise 'thin' story jump on to a 'must see' list. Dame Maggie alone is worth the price of the movie ticket.

★★★★★★★★

THE SKELETON TWINS

Just as Maggie is about to fill her mouth with enough pills to ensure she shakes off her mortal coil. she gets a telephone call from a Nurse in a Hospital E.R. room telling her that Milo her twin brother has just attempted suicide. The news means that she puts her own plans on hold and flies out to L.A. to visit her sibling that she hasn't spoken too for the past 10 years.

Milo is just out of another failed relationship and cannot get an Agent, let alone an acting job, so is suffering from depression. Maggie on the other hand is a dental hygienist who is unhappily married to the sweet gregarious Lance who doesn't suspect for one moment that his wife is as miserable as sin.  When the twins meet in the hospital neither discuss their own predicaments and they cover their awkwardness at being together with funny banter like they shared in their childhood.

Despite their estrangement Maggie persuades Milo to come back home with her to upstate New York to recuperate but it turns out that she also wants him to be a buffer with Lance and her marriage. There is a clue as to how the twins reached this level of dissatisfaction with life when they have a surprise visit from their annoying new-age mother who had abandoned them long ago after their father had taken his own life.  

As part of trying to re-adjust to living in his old hometown Milo plays a visit to his old English teacher with whom he had an inappropriate relationship with he was the man's pupil.  Rich now has a live-in girlfriend and a teenage son but it doesn't stop him sleeping with Milo again which messes with both of their heads. Maggie meanwhile has taken to trying all sorts of classes to learn new skills ... the current one is scuba diving .... and she inevitably sleeps with each instructor before moving on again. Lance is blissfully unaware of anything going on under his roof and thinks that he and Maggie are trying to have a baby, where instead of being upfront with how she feels,  is secretly taking birth control pills.  When he discovers the truth and Maggie discovers that Milo has been seeing Rick again, all hell finally lets loose. The one thing the siblings now realize is that they are capable of hurting each other like no-one else can.


This terrific acutely written piece about two tortured souls trying to valiantly cope with the lives that they have ended up with is a sheer joy mainly because of the effusive humor that prevails throughout the whole piece. Directed and part-written by Craig Johnson who cut his teeth on the mumble-core hit 'True Adolescents' that starred Mark Duplass who turns up here with his brother Jay as Producers. What elevates the movie from a run-of-the-mill melodrama are the shockingly good performances from two ex SNL alumni Kirsten Wiig and Bill Hader whose familiarity with each other helped them create the most perfect chemistry as the siblings. We know from her previous roles such as in the blockbuster 'Bridesmaids' that Ms Wiig is a very talented actress but Hader's performance as a confused gay man was so pitch perfect and such a delight.  You would have to be made of stone not to be in aisles laughing at the hilarious sight of the pair of them outrageously lip-syncing to the 80's disco hit 'Nothing's Going To Stop Me Now' .

They are supported by Owen Wilson playing it straight as the cuckolded Lance, Joanna Gleason in an all-too-small cameo role as the ridiculously annoying mother, and Ty Burrell getting as far way from possible from his usual role on Modern Families to give a beautifully understated performance as the ex-school teacher Rich.

For a story that starts with two failed suicide attempts, this turns out to be an incredible funny and touching movie that I highly recommend.

★★★★★★★★
.

THE TWO FACES OF JANUARY

After a overly long gestation period this lesser-known psychological thriller from novelist Patricia Highsmith finally makes it to the big screen.  The year is 1962 and the story opens on the sunny steps of the Acropolis where two American tourists, Chester McFarland and his much younger bride Collette, are having fun enjoying the splendor of the Ruins, whilst nearby Rydal a handsome charismatic Tour Guide has a small group of young wealthy debutantes eating out of his hands.  At Collette's insistence Chester hires the guide to take them sightseeing although he quickly realises that the young man is not all he claims to be.

It turns out that neither is Chester, and the past that he is running from is far more complicated and filled with danger. That night a Private Investigator turns up at Chester's hotel room and threatens to expose him unless he repays the money he swindled from some Clients in a Ponzi-type scheme.  After a struggle in which he kills the man, Chester realises that he will need to quickly flee Athens before the murder is discovered.  So he turns to Rydal sensing that the young man will know someone who can get them new passports to replace the ones that the Hotel had taken off them when they checked in.

As they all need to hideout until the new Passports can be forged, Rydal suggests that they take the night ferry to the distant island of Crete. However when they arrive there the Hotel will not give them rooms without proper identity, so they  catch a decripit local bus into the remote heart of the island hoping that a more basic village inn would take them in regardless. As the journey gets more difficult and fraught the trio seem less elegant and assured particularly as there are strong undercurrents of mistrust developing between them, especially the two men.  Rydal seems fixated with Chester who he thinks off as a substitute figure for his father whom is estranged from, whilst on the other hand Chester suspects that the young man wants to steal Colette away from him.

Suspicion leads to treachery and the pace gets more frenetic as they try to keep one eye on each other whilst keeping the other eye looking out for the authorities in hot pursuit as they start catching up on them.  It's very clear that it's not going to end well for any of them. 

It's hardly a Hitchcock masterpiece like his adaption of Highsmith's 'Strangers on A Train', nor is it Minghella's take on the novelist's 'Talented Mr Ripley' but Oscar nominated screenwriter Hossein Amini in his directing debut does an admirable job keeping the tension level high in this gripping thriller. The moody cinematography is particular is superb adding a very dramatic visual look to this period piece. Whilst the lead actors Viggo Mortensen and Kirsten Dunst may not have a great deal of chemistry as a couple, they put in really fine performances as the troubled McFarlands that one expects from these two talented actors  The real joy however is Oscar Isaac who was completely mesmerizing as Rydal, and this following hotly on from his riviting  turn in 'Inside Lllewyn Davies' clearly shows that he is destined to be a major star.

★★★★★★★★

THE LAST IMPRESARIO

Gracie Otto's affectionate documentary on the charismatic and adventurous English theater and film producer Michael White is a movie long overdue. Despite his enormous contribution in a prolific career that spanned three decades he is as Anna Wintour succinctly put it, 'the most famous person that you've never heard'. Ms Wintour also so accurately summed up his rich and tumultuous career by describing him as 'a true Renaissance man'.

Michael 'Chalky' White was born in Glasgow in 1936 to wealthy immigrant Jewish parents who packed him off to Boarding School in Switzerland at the tender age of 7. This small shy boy who suffered from asthma and couldn't speak a word of French was something of a loner and although fiercely independent developed a skill in befriending everyone, a character trait that would end up changing his life.

From Switzerland he went to study at the Sorbonne which was followed by a stint as a Wall Street runner in the 1950's. Somewhere along the line this well-travelled young man discovered a passion for the theater and landed himself a job with the impresario Peter Daubney in London producing international theatre seasons.  At the ripe age of 25 White produced his first play in the West End.  It was not a conventional drama but a production of Jack Gelber's Living Theatre group called 'The Connection' and it depicted the life of drug-addicted jazz musicians. It had a mixed reception with its detractors up in arms about the debauchery on stage which showed men shooting up, something totally unheard of back in 1959 when every play was still censored by the Lord Chamberlain's Office.

It was however not the last time that White would break all the rules as he pursued anything avant-garde and different than the norm in a career in which he mounted 101 stage productions and produced 27 films.  He introduced London to art 'happenings' with Yoko Ono, contemporary dance with Merce Cunningham and Pina Bausch, discovered the ground-breaking 'The Rocky Horror Show', joined forces with Kenneth Tynan to produce the all-nude review Oh Calcutta', gave Barry Humphries aka Dame Edna Everage his first big break.  Then as his career moved into movies he produced 'Monty Python and the Holy Grail', John Water's 'Polyester', and the classic 'My Dinner with Andre'.

Otto starts her movie almost at the end when after casually meeting White at the Cannes Film Festival in 2010 she is intrigued about this charming septuagenarian who literally knows everybody worth knowing.  And what's more, they all totally adore him. From British royalty to the Hollywood A list via mega-rock stars to model superstars, White has hung out with them all, and many of them, including ex-wives and girlfriends, eagerly line up to give witness to althe joyous times they have spent together. Even Wintour the Ice Queen cracks a rare smile on her face when she talks about her times with White.

White's professional success (and sometimes failure) is because he is a gambler.  Unlike any of his peers he is  happy to take a chance on people and their productions simply if he believes in them, almost in the same way that he bets on horses too.  His personal 'sucess' is because he is an optimist and believes that everyone is his friend.  'Some people have cheated me, but I have no enemies at all.'

Now after a couple of strokes, although White refuses to acknowledge the aging process, he is obviously not in a good shape physically or financially.  Whilst he is happy to talk about his life (with the rare exception such as losing the lucrative rights to The Rocky Horror Show) he adamantly refuses to let Otto in to find out much about him as a man.  Several colleagues drop very broad hints that part of his present demise is due to not just the excessive partying but the use of recreational drugs, but Otto chooses not to pursue any of this.

His legacy will not just be all the thousands of photographs he took to chronicle his life with a whole galaxy or stars, or the correspendece with the rich anf famous that he had hoarded for decades.  It will be the way that his approach of leading with his heart and not his head completely propelled London into being a true world-class stage and discovering and giving a voice to such a remarkable array of talent.  It also helped that he was also a professional charmer.

The world is definitely a better place because of Michael White, the like of whom we will never see again.

★★★★★★★★

CALVARY

In the opening scenes of John Michael McDonagh’s rather violent drama (that I pervesely still insist of calling a black comedy despite its tragic ending), we see a Priest taking confession from an unseen man. “I first tasted semen when I was 7 years old’ are the first words out of his mouth and then he insists on giving very graphic details about how he was repeatedly sexually abused for the next five years. Why the man has decided to finally come to deal with this matter now is unclear, but what is without doubt is the reason he has decided to speak up.  He wants revenge and as he cannot exact this on the old Priest who perpetrated this as he is long gone, he has decided to kill the local priest instead.  He after all represents the Church who the man feels is completely responsible, so he tells the Priest to meet him on the Beach on Sunday afternoon one week from now so that he can kill him.

Somewhat unnerved by what he has heard the Priest goes about his usual business during the next week in this small Irish costal town whilst he tries to fathom out if he really is about to meet his Maker. The village is full of a cast of colorful and unbalanced characters that doesn’t help the Cleric’s search as too who has levied the threat at him. Could it be the manic local butcher who beats his wife up so bad that she attends Mass in oversized Chanel sunglasses to hide the evidence?  She makes no secret that her lover is the local mechanic and as an African Immigrant who he is definitely the only black man in the village. Then there is the local Doctor who makes no bones of the fact that he is a fervent atheist, or a local miserable millionaire whose wealth has been the ruin of him. There’s the seriously sex-starved young man who is looking for an outlet for his violent impulses, and an old American writer about to prepare for his own impending death.

The local Police Inspector is no help at all as he is busy being serviced by outrageous male prostitute that he must have had shipped in from the nearest big town, and the Bishop, like most high ranking men of the Cloth can only offer platitudes that are so useless in real life.

McDonagh uses this all as background for a lot of soul-searching about the faith of the Catholic Church in general, and their entrenched stance of not confronting their legacy of obscene and heartless child abuse in particular.  Everyone true to their Irish genetics has an opinion and needs to share it, and by the end although we cannot condone the extreme action that is possibly about to take place, we do at least get to understand it.

The movie works so brilliantly thanks to the powerful performance of Brendon Gleason, re-united again with McDonagh after their blissfully funny ‘The Guard’ (which is still the most successful Irish Independent movie of all time). Gleason is so perfect in this role written for him as the gruff overweight priest with his own unsettling past (his adult daughter pays him a visit after her latest failed suicide attempt).  He tries not just to reason with every one of his rather unbalanced parishioners but insists on seeing the best in everyone. Gleason’s Priest is convinced that his faith will see him through, and we believe him too.  We are both wrong.

Great supporting cast that included Chris O’Dowd as the mad butcher, Aiden Gillen as the atheist Doctor, Isaach De Bankole as the lover, M Emmet Walsh as the Writer, Gary Lydon as the gay Police Inspector and Kelly Reilly as the Priest's daughter.

And the reason that I insist on labeling this a comedy of sorts is because that as McDonagh showed us in ‘The Guard’ he has an inspired talent for getting such wickedly funny edgy humor out of the most bizare

of situations.

★★★★★★★★

THE RIOT CLUB

The atrocious unsocial behaviour of a group of very wealthy privileged college-age offspring of England's landed gentry whose utter contempt for the poor is matched by their assumed rights of trashing and vandalising other people's properties, seems a odd topic for a movie.  It's even more unbelievable when we learn that the current crop of top ranking Conservative politicians (including the Prime Minister) who are desperately clinging to their fragile grasp on power by claiming to be 'of the common man' were actually members of the outrageous private Club that this movie was based upon.

The fictional Riot Club was so named after its 17th Century founder, the lecherous young Lord Riot, who was stabbed to death for helping himself to another Oxford student's possession viz his wife. To honor his memory his peers decided to completely devote their undergraduate years to debauchery and excess in every sense as they hardly had to bother to study as they would be handed positions running the country on a plate the moment they left University.

The current contemporary crop of members are 2 short of the basic quorum of 10, so they trawl their nets looking for likely candidates. This bunch of utter snobs rigorously grill the two candidates that they think will fit and although both match the demands of this picky lot, they are totally different in character. Max is a good egg with the right family pedigree and is actually dating a working class girl, Alistair is a arrogant bad seed and as such is going to fit in perfectly with the Club's complete lack of morals.

Their disgusting initiation process leads up to the Club's grand banquet but as they have been banned from so many city restaurants and hotels after trashing them ruthlessly, they are having to resort to holding it in the private dining room of a rural pub way out in the country.   The Landlord is anxious to ingratiate himself with what he thought were a group of young entrepreneurs who were only too happy to over-pay him to dine there. The highlight of the supper was meant to be a 10-bird roast and a prostitute to service all of them.  When neither of these turn out as expected these nasty spoilt brats now completely drunk step up their raucous behavior a notch or two before they start destroying everything in the room. When the horrified Landlord comes into complain, he becomes the target of their sheer blood-mindless behaviour and they end up beating him into a pulp.

Based on Laura Wade's smash hit play 'Posh' which wowed the crowds in London's Royal Court Theatre in 2010 and still didn't harm the Conservatives in the election that year.  The movie version is directed by Danish filmmaker Lone Scherfig who has become something of a dab hand at what are such quintessentially English stories (her 'An Eduction' garnered 3 Oscar nominations), and she has made this somewhat ghastly story of violence somehow very compelling viewing.  It helped that she peppered the cast with the latest generation of 'bright young things' who not only are remarkably talented actors, but they are all damn good lookers too. They include Sam Clafin ('The Hunger Games'), Douglas Booth ('Christopher and His Kind'), Jeremy Iron's son Max ('TV's The White Queen'), Australian Sam Reid ('Belle'), Ben Schnetzer (also in 'Pride' right now), Freddie Fox (also in 'Pride'), Natalie Dormer ('Rush') and Holliday Grainger ('Jane Eyre').

It seems odd to concede that we are such a class ridden society and that although we are indignant that one small section of society still believe that their so-called superiority is a birth-given right to ride roughshod over the rest of us, we are nonetheless not surprised by any of their behavior. Whilst it may not shock us Brits that when push comes to shove this handful of aristocrats behave in a similar manner to that as football hooligans at the other end of the social scale, it will horrify most of America who want to believe that they are in fact all as well-bred and overly polite like the folks in Downton Abbey.

It's bloody and violent and morally abhorrent, yet immensely watchable.

★★★★★★★★