Review: High-Rise

Year: 2016
Director: Ben Wheatley
Screenplay: Amy Jump
Starring: Tom Hiddleston, Jeremy Irons, Sienna Miller, Luke Evans, Elisabeth Moss, James Purefoy, Keeley Hawes

Synopsis is here:

The blandly branded products that litter the flatly lit supermarket hint at Alex Cox's Repo Man (1984). The setting as well as the loss of mental faculties and civility hark back to Cronenberg's Shivers (1975). However, at the dark heart of Ben Wheatley’s High-Rise seems to nod more than once to The Shining (1980). It is much like Kubrick's adaptation in that it's an altered take on a well-known book. The isolated setting and claustrophobic feel also owe a lot to the auteur’s work. Only here, the ghosts in the machines and manic possession have little to do with the supernatural, they are man made.

Those who haven’t picked up J.G Ballard’s disconcerting novel, may find themselves at a loss to Wheatley’s new feature. A lurid tale of materialism gone mad, High-Rise follows Robert Laing, a grieving doctor who moves into a brand new, luxury High-Rise skyscraper with a broad band of professionals. Along with the other residents, he quickly becomes seduced in a world of all night parties, classist hierarchies and disintegrating social and moral etiquettes. The film is never truly explicit about why such a decent into madness would occur. Like all of Wheatley’s work, High-Rise slices at the specifics. Yet, like Ballard’s impish novel, it never feels hard to peer in-between the lines.

Those who know Ballard may feel that his caustic, matter of fact prose and eye for detail is lacking slightly. While kudos must be given to screenwriter; Amy Jump, for squeezing as much juice out of the orange as she can. There is, of course, as with so many novels, always text that can often help fill in the cracks and spike the imagination. Ballard’s canny way of getting his unhinged characters to justify the insanity as somewhat normal, is hard to replicate. It’s hard to imagine anyone being to get it right. Although I do feel that David Cronenberg, who dealt with Ballard with his adaptation Crash (1996), manages to capture the cynical, distancing tone and psychology of such characters a little better than Wheatley, whose High-Rise holds one or two elements within it not to have its viewer shirk with total despair despite its brutality.

That said, Wheatley along with his long time running cinematographer buddy Laurie Rose, not only capture the feel of the 70’s with flair, but capture the book images that I thought only resided within my head. The details in the design and setting along with the execution of certain sequences are near note perfect. The images linger long in the memory, as well as what they represent. Scenes such as the higher classes, debating with what to do with the rampant and primal filmmaker Richard Wilder (an excellent Luke Evans). Observing the richer types holding a high class party while having classical music covers of Abba tracks, nails the false belief that those at the top have over the bottom perfectly. That even popular culture must be "cultivated" correctly.

The decent into madness will lose some, but for me it was easy to tap into the film's observations on the culture of self. Looking at the behaviour in High Rise in both the film and book and watching at how politicians and celebrities act now feels even more relevant. Hell, watching High-Rise at times reminded me of the so-called "film twitter" at its most anarchic and base. A struggle between basement feeding bloggers (hello) and the "real" writers who only ever deal in snark.

Even the high-rise itself; a grinning beast of architecture, is the perfect metaphor for how many view today. Fear of our neighbours, modest grievances being the worst things in the world (first world problems). Classism running wild. High-Rise features much of this, although it's easy to see how some viewers will still question the logic of the film, despite the fact that even the characters themselves detail that reasoning accounts to very little.

The film does what decent Sci-fi should do. It finds the human element or as the cynical architect Anthony Royal (Jeremy Irons) remarks the “missing” element. High-Rise suggests that if given a utopia, our baser urges will help clamber to destroy it. I adore the fact that the film retains the book’s 70's setting, along with a white, middle-class population that still seeks to destroy itself. Not because I enjoy Caucasians tearing at each other, but because it highlights how easily the fear of the other is embraced. That if we're to have everything we ever wanted. We would still hunger. We would still rape. We would still destroy. All it takes is some decent time at the swimming pool.

Wheatley’s film is not only a return to form from his bizarre and distancing experiment A Field in England (2013), but it plays out as a cinematic representation of Marina Abramovic’s recent performance art, or even an update of Jane Elliott’s eye colour experiment. Ballard may still hold more acidity, however, Wheatley’s adaptation is a brutal reminder of how our desires of materialistic and the carnal can reduce us to the simplistic and primal beasts we try and hide with our so-called civility.

Review: Only God Forgives

Year: 2013

Director: Nicolas Windin Refn

Screenplay: Nicolas Windin Refn

Starring: Ryan Gosling, Kristin Scott Thomas, Vithaya Pansringarm

Synopsis is here

A quick glimpse of the trailer for Only God Forgives, Cannes’ most recent infant terrible, reminded me of something that veteran web film reviewer and general twitterholic Scott Weinberg mentioned briefly on one of his many rants on the current state of cinema. As I didn't save the tweet, I’ll do my best to paraphrase: “If there are no reviews, you’ll only have the marketing telling you what to watch.” I'm sure there was more to it than that. Possibly more swear words, but I digress. His point is important for the simple fact that as much as critics/reviewers/bloggers get a bad rap (particularly as we often appear to be out of touch with the general audience), their job is to merely inform a viewer.

This does not just mean tell someone if the film is good or not. While that is of course a large majority of what they do, they should also try and provide a certain amount of context around the film at hand. Internet commentators and keyboard warriors may feel differently, but a world without them would have even more people happily parting their well earned cash with whatever flick Hollywood would like them to consume.  Yes, I'm trying to prove my own existence here, but seriously, now that trailers and posters have stopped trying to tell you that the films released actually differentiate from each other, it’s nice to maybe have a heads up, even if you don’t agree with the writer.

Getting back to the reason why you’re on this page, Only God Forgives is the latest movie from Nicolas Windin Refn, whose 2011 feature; Drive, gained a fair amount of praise and profit from all quarters, including. If you take anything away from my review it’s this, if you see a trailer/poster for this film and see the words “from the director of Drive” anywhere on it...I'm warning you now. That’s the marketing and not the film talking. While there’s some slight thematic connections between the films (although this seems to lean more towards Refn’s Valhalla Rising), Refn leaves the muscle cars and typical convention behind. This isn’t in the same ballpark as Drive. It’s not really even on the same planet.

Sparse, violent and deliberately paced; Only God Forgives, like A Field in England and Spring Breakers, is more interested in exercising mood than narrative. If walls could talk; the cheerless and shadowy corridors that inhabit Refn’s film, would say little about the decidedly typical revenge plot situated within the films Bangkok setting. They would however, be screaming hellishly of the bleak and corrosive souls that walk amongst the blood red walls. I feel they'd have more to say than the two aforementioned films.

American ex-pat Julian (Gosling) finds himself forced to confront the killer of his morally devoid brother by his incestuous mother (Kristin Scott Thomas channelling the sorority sister of Norma Bates and Janine 'Smurf'Cody). The murderer; Chang, is a self proclaimed angel of vengeance, who takes it upon himself to deliver swift and brutal justice to those he believes deserves it.

The film is less bothered with telling the story; instead it tries to entrap the viewer inside nightmarish, neon drenched purgatory. These characters are soaked in the guilt that they've created. Visceral imagery of bound or amputated hands becomes metaphors for pleasure or protection being denied or taken.  Vithaya Pansringarm plays Chang with an all knowing mysticism that’s hard to shake off. After delivering his violent sentences, he performs sickly sweet karaoke to his fellow officers who watch in straight faced silence. In doing this; is he trying and claim repentance? The film leaves such questions for the viewer.

Will the viewer respond to Only God Forgives? Hard to say. For me, it starts off a little forced before becoming a little too full of itself once or twice. A neon-lit Thailand? A film set in Asia that deals with honour and vengeance?  Even the gloomy, never flinching face of Ryan Gosling makes a few of its elements feel a tad too commonplace.  

Yet throughout I found myself enthralled by its imagery and absorbed by the sheer absurdity. I found myself caught up within the rhythms of its dark, blistered heart. I caught glimpses of pity, drip through the lavish production design, perfectly framed shots and stained souls that wander these damp, darkened Bangkok halls. For those who are willing to let it in, they maybe something in the films dankness that they may be willing to embrace.  If the walls could talk, they’d tell you that their screams get muffled by marketing posters.  

Review: A Field in England

Year: 2013

Director: Ben Wheatley

Screenplay: Amy Jump

Starring:  Reece Shearsmith, Michael Smiley, Julian Barratt, Peter Ferdinando, Richard Glover, Ryan Pope

Synopsis is here

Ben Wheatley is a British director I really admire. A confident filmmaker who enjoys bending genres and challenging the typical ideals that British film often stumbles into. A Field in England; his fourth feature was one of the 2013’s entries I had a large investment in, purely based on the strength of his previous works. Even the idea behind it had me hooked. A black and white, psychedelic nightmare set during the 17^th Century is the type of English period drama I’ll happily get behind (do I look like I watch Downton?).

Much of A Field in England’s buzz stemmed more from its multi-platform release structure. The films makers decided upon releasing the film not only in cinemas, but on video on demand and DVD all on the same day. An idea that we’re slowly seeing more of (albeit in alternative forms: see Sodenbergh’s Bubble as an example) but never to this extent with a U.K release.  Questions were raised on whether this had to do with the niche aspect of the film, or if the film industry can really spark a trend towards such releases. Particularly as many have become more drawn to the idea of home viewing since the quality of their film going experience has been on the decline.  

I viewed the film coming back from work; I popped into my local supermarket and gained some credit on the stores very popular point system. For me it was easier for me to view it this way as the cinemas just due to time and travel. I love going to the cinema but I see the benefits.

However, A Field in England’s release structure seems more to be about casting its range as far as possible due to film’s obtrusiveness than starting a trend. The film’s black and white aesthetic is not the only thing that will put more casual viewers off. A Field in England clearly shows maturation of craft and boldness which British cinema needs, but at the expense of losing the connection carefully built from previous films.

The film feels reminiscent of the works of Ingmar Bergman, as well as the likes of Blood on Satan’s Claw (1970) and Witchfinder’s General (1968). The look of Michael Smiley’s O’Neill has shades of Vincent Price’s Matthew Hopkins written all over it. While the unsettling imagery of characters bound by thick rope against their will, is deeply rooted in folk horror. A sense of dread begins to form within the film. Something that the British horror of the 70’s and Wheatley’s own Kill List were much quicker at bring about. The first act often feels more of an exercise of form, than anything else. There is a sense of irony throughout the film as it uses its period setting and cast to cut into very seemingly modern question class and male bonding but none of it feels truly substantial, although Amy Jump does not get enough credit for an often witty script with some wry exchanges placed within it.

Some nice moments are scattered throughout (the tableau style poses, Shearsmith’s phenomenal body language) while more of the outlandish visions begin to seep during the second half with a more unsettling mood coming with it. Yet it all seems a tad too late. The sense of lost futility these men face can be felt by the time the film steps up a gear, but nothing hits as hard as the wedding sequence with Witchfinder General, in which the unfortunate couple of the piece make their own vows within a vandalised church, highlighting the conservative conflict that lies within the folk horror movement (see also The Wicker Man).

So I held my breath embraced the fear and let the Devil in and yet I came out relatively unscathed. Some of A Field in England still tickles me, and there’s good chance I’ll let more of it consume me on a second viewing. I'm not sure however, on whether this is because I brought it on DVD or not.