Hursto's five minute films

March 29th

Nowhere Special

Tick, tick . . . BOOM (streaming on Netflix)

Ascension (streaming on Amazon Prime)

House of Gucci

Summer of Soul (streaming on Disney +)

After months of build-up, the Oscars are done and dusted. Most of the contenders (and winners) have been reviewed by me in the last couple of weeks and months, but since then I've managed to catch a couple more. I must confess I was not very good at picking what would win. Overall a strong field, and hard to pick between many of the fine films. Great to see so much honoring of the deaf community, but not so great to see violence erupt on stage; the controversy surrounding that one will no doubt go on for a long time to come.

Nowhere Special

Dir: Umberto Pasolini

Length: 96 mins

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hLTQxSyT3mc

John (James Norton) is a 35 year old single dad who works as a window cleaner. He is terminally ill, with only months to live and is desperate to find the "perfect" family who will adopt his three-year-old son Michael (Daniel Lamont). In lesser hands this film could have fallen victim to overblown melodrama and sentimentality, but Pasolini keeps a firm hand on everything, to bring us a sublimely moving yet restrained and understated story. You cannot fail to be torn apart by the deep grief of the father knowing he will soon die and desperate to do right by his beloved son. The relentless interviews with prospective adopters, as cherubic-faced Michael sits on his father's knee, are gut-wrenchingly sad. John's attempts to explain why the mother has left, and what death means will surely have you in floods of tears, while the bond between father and son is immeasurably moving. Little Lamont is a screen revelation. Norton, scruffy, tattooed and unshaven oozes love and protectiveness for his child. It's often the "small" films that slip under the public radar, yet for me leave the deepest impression. This is one of those.

4.5 - wholeheartedly recommended

tick, tick . . . BOOM!

Dir: Lin-Manuel Miranda

Length: 115 mins

Streaming on Netflix

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YJserno8tyU

Imagine spending eight years writing a musical then having no producer pick it up. Imagine finally having one of your works recognized with four Tony awards, and becoming one of the longest-running shows on Broadway. Imaging dying at only 35 years of age, having never got to see the success of that show! That is the tragic story of Jonathan Larson (Andrew Garfield), the writer of the ground-breaking musical Rent. This film is based on the show Larson wrote before Rent, a semi-autobiographical musical in which he explores his passion to be part of the creative arts, and how to juggle it with the the pressures of relationships and friendships, while heading for 30! Set in the era of AIDS and friends dying, there is a lot of meaty content here, plus a brilliant array of songs which break the boundaries of traditional musical song-writing. Alexandra Shipp is wonderful as Jon's long-suffering girlfriend Susan, while Garfield, nominated for a Best Actor Oscar (but not winning), does all his own singing while giving what could be a career-defining performance. The convoluted time framework and story within story keeps you constantly on your toes, and the variety of narrative techniques, from traditional to alternative, works really well to make this an exciting, moving and energising film experience.

4 - highly recommended

Ascension

Dir: Jessica Kingdon

Length: 97 mins

Streaming on Amazon Prime

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TS64La58Dok

Want to see China from a new perspective? This could be the doco for you! Nominated for Best Documentary Feature (but not winning) at the Oscars, this is an already much-awarded film which presents, in a highly creative and visually dramatic way, China's "dream" - the pursuit of wealth, doing everything on a very large scale and being number one. At the same time we see the vast social disparities between the pathetically paid factory workers and those aspirants who are moving up in society by "branding" themselves on social media. The images move from people assembling sex dolls, to bodyguards undergoing brutal military style training, to western style butler academies, to vast assembly lines churning out horrific amounts of plastic goods, to meat factories and clothing factories on gargantuan scales, to women being coached in office etiquette, to people crammed into water parks like soldiers - every scene seemingly more bizarre that the previous one. All is accompanied by a eerily apocalyptic score, and yet no-one editorialises - the images just speak for themselves, revealing the director's perceptions and leaving the viewer to reach their own conclusions. This is revelatory and impressive film-making.

4 - highly recommended

House of Gucci

Dir: Ridley Scott

Length: 158 mins

Streaming on Amazon Prime, still in some cinemas

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1HAlmH_QI4Q

Another Oscar nominee which hasn't won, this is nevertheless a stylish and fascinating story of backstabbing and rivalry within an iconic fashion house. No need to be a fashionista to appreciate a powerful and true tale of just how ugly things can get when an ambitious young woman Patrizia (Lady Gaga), sets her sights on Maurizio (Adam Driver), son of Rodolfo (Jeremy Irons) one of three heirs to the Gucci empire. All hell breaks loose with Paolo (Jared Leto), son of Aldo (Al Pacino) creating rivalry, and revenge then being on everyone's agenda. The family dynamics are all a bit complex, and the film is a tad long, but as you can see, the cast is brilliant (even if, for my tastes, Driver is not the ideal actor for the role). The mish-mash of accented English is troublesome, but again Gaga proves what a brilliant actress she is, and having heavyweights such as Irons and Pacino brings every scene they are in up a few notches. Leto is also memorable as the erratic and eccentric Paolo.

3.5 - well recommended

Summer of Soul

Dir: QuestLove

Length: 118 mins

Streaming on Disney Plus and Hulu

Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=slFiJpAxZyQ

Awarded the BAFTA and now the Oscar for Best Documentary Feature this one's a winner, both as a historical document and a treat for music lovers. In 1969, as Woodstock happened and humans walked on the moon, a little known cultural festival was happening in Harlem. Over the course of seven or so weeks, 300,000 people attended to hear the likes of Stevie Wonder, Sly and the Family Stone, Mongo Santamaria. BB King, Gladys Knight and the Pips, Nina Simone, The Fifth Dimension . . . the list goes on and on. It was against a backdrop of huge social and cultural change, especially for Afro-American people. The word "black" replaced the word "negro", and people of color began to be proud of who they were. Harlem at that time was a melting pot of black, Latino, and more, and music was the glue that bound them together. Race riots against the police were common, and shooting of colored people ubiquitous (so what's changed?!) The film employs much concert footage that was shot but never shown for 50 years, while also interviewing people who today reminisce back on those days and what it all meant to them - both the music, the emerging black pride, and the social upheavals going on around them. Excellent viewing.

4 - highly recommended

Hursto's five minute films

Monday 28 March 2022

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