May 2nd
Top End Wedding
The Hummingbird Project
The Extraordinary Journey of the Fakir
The Chaperone
Long Shot
The Meaning of Vanlife

It's a thunderingly big week with six new reviews! As well as five cinema releases, for the first time I review an interesting doco that's screening on an on-demand channel. 

Top End Wedding
Director: Wayne Blair
Length: 103 min

© Universal - sweet romance with

 strong Indigenous themes

Lauren (Miranda Tapsell) and Ned (Gwilym Lee) are young lawyers in love. Lauren is a Darwin gal and is eager to be married in her home town. After a hastily planned wedding, they arrive in Darwin to learn that Lauren's mother Daffy (Ursula Yovich), a Tiwi Islander, has gone AWOL, leaving English father Trevor (Huw Higginson) broken-hearted and slumped in his pantry listening to sad music. Delaying  the wedding, Ned and Lauren head off on a road trip to find Daffy, a trip which leads them ultimately to the Tiwi Islands, and many answers about Lauren's estranged family.  Yes it's predictable, yes at times it's corny, with moments of tacky forced humour and it's not totally credible from their mode of speech that the two lovers really are lawyers . . but for me most criticisms are forgiven. The film has a truckload of heart, and is a wonderful showcase for parts of Australia many of us have never seen, and for the peoples who first lived there. The plot about white/indigenous romance is fresh, the scenery is a dream, and the wonderful use of non-professional Tiwi Islanders in the film's second half works really well and movingly. Wonderful too is the performance of Kerry Fox as Lauren's austere boss who rises to the challenges she is presented in organising the wedding logistics. Some of my colleagues have been mighty unkind to this, but despite my niggles, I found myself deeply moved by the family themes and the overall refreshing innocence of this story. 

3.5 - well recommended!

The Hummingbird Project

Director: Kim Nguyen

Length: 111 min

© Madman - trouble in the hot tub in this 
unexpectedly tense take of greed

Cousins Anton Zaleski  (Alexander Skarsgard) and Vincent (Jesse Eisenberg) work for a stockbroking house run by tough taskmaster Eva Torres (Selma Hayek). Succesful trades rely on being nano-seconds ahead of the competition. Leaving the firm, the cousins decide to strike out alone in an attempt to build a super-fast fibre optic cable from Kansas to Wall Street, in the hope they will make squillions. A film that features a lot of high-tech digging equipment is not necessarily going to appeal to many viewers, but somehow, with the help of a strong cast and a director with a good handle on wringing tension and creating atmosphere out of excavation, it works for me. The human side of the plot also has its intrigue; greed is often at the heart of this type of plot, but there is also a nice undercurrent of pathos - the guy who thinks he isn't really doing anything wrong, so driven is he to get his algorithms right, and the guy who is hell-bent on coming first, even at the cost of his own self-destruction. And nice, too, to see a woman behaving even more ruthlessly than the men. This won't be everyone's cup of tea, but it's a worthy techno-thriller.

3.5 - well recommended!

Long Shot

Director: Jonathan Levine

Length: 115 min

© StudioCanal  - An unlikely but engaging pair: 
Seth Rogan and Charlize Theron

Charlotte Field (Charlize Theron), US Secretary of State to bozo President Chambers (Bob Odenkirk), is resigning so she can run for first female president in 2020. On a whim she hires Fred Flarsky (Seth Rogen), who she knew way back when, as her speech writer. They are polar opposites - she is a cool, elegant figure on the world stage, he an outspoken, trouble-making scruffy journalist. How their unlikely pairing will pan out makes for some very funny, if at times not totally believable, story-telling. Is this a classic rom-com or a political satire? Well, it's a bit of both. It cleverly combines Rogen's trademark gross-out humour and biting one-liners with Theron's intelligent beauty, along with a plot that never hides its contempt for current US politics and corporate manoeuvring. It also has a surprisingly strong feminist sub-text. Once a viewer puts aside elements of scepticism ("would she really have done that?"), there is much to be relished in this intelligently scripted film which works on a multitude of levels. Chemistry is unexpectedly strong between the leads, while the many pointed digs at political corruption, social media, public image, political division and more work really well. This should be a better-than-average crowd pleaser.     
4 - highly recommended!

The Extraordinary Journey of the Fakir

Director: Ken Scott

Length: 92 min

© Icon - an odd blend of fantasy, refugee tale,  and
morality tale, with Bollywood overtones

Aja Patel (played by Tamil Bollywood heartthrob Danush) grows up in the Mumbai slums, making ends meet by conning people out of their money. After the death of his mother, and eager to trace the identity of his father he heads to Paris where he falls in love, then inadvertently gets transported out of France when he hides in an IKEA wardrobe. His adventures take him to Rome, England, Libya and beyond. Framed by the adult Aja telling a group of slum children his story, this is light-weight fare that entertains by virtue of its international cast, lovely settings, pleasing story, charismatic lead, and a couple of up-beat Bollywood musical numbers. There is something a little too saccharine sweet for me, and the plot's sub-text about the illegal immigrant situation feels a bit stereotyped, although director Scott sees it as a multi-cultural fable about expanding one's horizons and discovering one's identity. Still, for those who like their movies fun and fairly innocuous, it should please. (Aja's obsession with IKEA brand-names is one of the high spots of the film's humour - look out for it.)
3 - recommended! (only just)

The Chaperone

Director: Michael Engler

Length: 103 min

© StudioCanal - women are discovering themselves 

 in the flapper era

Writer (Julian Fellowes) and director (Engler) of Downton Abbey have adapted a popular novel into this handsome production which is part fact, part fiction. In the Roaring Twenties aspiring young dancer Louise Brookes (Haley Lu Richardson) leaves small-town Kansas for New York to audition for a modern dance company. The real life Louise  eventually achieved a measure of movie-star fame. According to memoirs, on her New York trip, Louise was chaperoned, but here the fiction begins. Seemingly conservative middle-aged Norma (Elizabeth McGovern) accompanies her young charge and while Louise pursues getting accepted into the company, Norma goes about examining her past via the local orphanage, where she meets caretaker Joseph (a lovely performance from Geza Rohrig). Again some critics are unkind to this film; for me it's a delightful period piece, which beautifully recreates the era, with an excellent soundtrack to boot. More importantly the two lead women are a great foil for each other, and as women in an oppressive era both throwing off constraints, it works very well. The elements of romance are touching, and the film's surprise ending is well ahead of its time. 

3.5 - well recommended!

The Meaning of Vanlife

Director: Jim Lounsbury

Length: 88 min
Screening now exclusively on STAN

© Cubic Films  - a paradise for Kombi lovers, 
minimalists and nomads

It's a bit like going back to the hippie era, as young folk (and a smatttering of oldies) gather in the US to meet one another and to celebrate their lifestyle. Vanlifers who have been communicating from Australia go over to meet their American counterparts and to make a film about the burgeoning movement. Vanlifers are folk who live and travel in smallish vans on the road, embracing a life of minimalism, adventure, and sometimes even running "normal" jobs from the road. It is certainly a homage to sustainable living, less materialism, becoming unplugged (though there is quite a bit of internet chat), and community building around the campfire. It's not a life for me, but the doco gives much food for thought and perhaps plenty of inspiration to clear out one's junk and live life more simply.
3 - recommended!