Poor Things (2023)

I hadn't seen a Yorgos Lanthimos film until just a few days ago when I saw 'The Favourite' and having liked that film I thought I would give this film a go and I am glad that I did. The film is very strange but I suppose that was the point but I think that the strangeness was pitched just right as it didn't seem to strange for the sake it of but because it was part of the world that Lanthimos was creating. Just the idea of taking the brain of a baby and planting it in a grown woman is something that comes from a creative (if slightly weird) mind.

There was a sense of Wes Anderson throughout this film from the way the camera pans from side to side to how the places that Bella and Duncan visit. I would have been perfectly happy to spend the entire film on the cruise ship because outside looked beautiful and there was something lovely about the interior. Emma Stone is really good as Bella. When she is trying to learn things as she goes along she manages to make Bella comes across as a robot but also a child that gets smarter everyday. Mark Ruffalo gives probably one of his best performances since 'Dark Waters' and cones dangerously close to stealing the film as Duncan. Willem Dafoe is very likeable as God and even when he has clearly crossed the ethical line, he is still a likeable character and that is down to how Dafoe plays him. Despite getting a raw deal character wise, Ramy Youssef is very good as Max. Although after a while I did find myself questioning his intelligence when he still waits for Bella even though he knows what she has been up to.

Despite this being a very strange film and probably one of the strangest I have seen for sometime, it a superb movie. Emma Stone carries the whole thing and is supporting by some strong performances but make no mistake, this is an Emma Stone film and an early contender for film of the year for me.

One Life (2023)

I kind of knew the story of Nicholas Winton but only what was shown on 'That's Life'. The remarkable story was a mystery to me and over the course of the nearly 2 hours was something that I found totally mesmerising. Telling the story of how over 600 children were sent to the UK fleeing the Nazi's is something that could easily have become shmaltzy and sentimental but credit to the writing which was unfussy and just let the story move along at the pace that was right for this type of story.

Anthony Hopkins is amazing in this as the elder Nicholas Winton and the scene towards the end where he meets the adult version of the children he helped saved did get me teary eye. Johnny Flynn is also very good as the younger Nicholas Winton but has to do most of the heavy lifting plot wise. Helena Bonham Carter brings the sort of warmth to her performance that I remember in 'The King's Speech' and like that film this is a more stand there and be supportive which might be a bit unfair but it doesn't change the fact that she gives a stunning performance.

I really enjoyed this film and as the first cinema experience of 2024, I am glad to say that this the year has started off in great fashion. Not sure it will be everyones cup of tea but I enjoyed it from start to finish.

Godzilla Minus One (2023)

Godzilla Minus One is perhaps the final time I will go to the cinema in 2023 and I couldn't end the year on a better note. It's been six years since Shin Godzilla came out and this film seems to have come out of nowhere but is easily in my top ten of the year. Set at the tail end of the second world war, kamikaze pilot Koichi Shikishima pretends their is a fault with his plane and at that moment Godzilla strikes, the rest of the story sees Shikishima get his courage back to take on Godzilla with a new romance with Noriko and a baby girl that Noriko 'found'.

The main difference between Toho Godzilla films and Hollywood Godzilla films is that Toho is more about the humans and the effect that Godzilla has on them whereas Hollywood is about the destruction of places which isn't a bad thing but its nice to have different types of Godzilla films. Sometimes the human aspect of a Godzilla film hasn't always been the best. In the case of this film it is what makes it one of the best non-Hollywood Godzilla films for quite sometime. I have a great fondness for Shin Godzilla but this was a huge step up. I don't know if its because the setting was unusual for Godzilla films in that its set in the past but it worked to create a fresh feeling to the franchise.

Godzilla himself apparently only appears on screen for 11 minutes but its used effectively and due to the fact that the human story was interesting I found myself not being that fussed that we weren't getting enough Godzilla. I know this might be something other people disagree with me on but its a common complaint in Godzilla films but I think that the balance was just right in this. The Godzilla scenes were really well done and we have come a long way since the early days of the franchise and seeing Godzilla regenerate when a part of his face melted was really cool to see and even though we know that Godzilla never really dies they do end it in a way that I found satisfying even if Noriko's sudden return was a bit of a silly inclusion. 

I thought it was funny that one of the trailers that played before the film was Godzilla x Kong which looks tonally and thematically different to Godzilla Minus One and I have a gut feeling that GXK wont be as good as this film. Hopefully we get another Toho Godzilla soon and not in six years.

Napoleon (2023)

Napoleon is perhaps one of the last films of the year that could be my favourite film of the year. Having being at the cinema multiple times this year means I have seen the trailer for this film more times than I have seen any trailer.

The story tells of Napoleon Bonaparte and his rise and inevitable fall. Joaquin Phoenix (winner of Best Actor in the 2019 Movie Addict Awards) plays Napoleon and plays Napoleon as an arrogant but at times flawed person and he never seems to get to the stage of narcissist but does comes across as opinionated. I thought that Vanessa Kirby was really good as Josephine, its a tough role to play and yet she played it as if she was Napleon's equal even though it probably was as 

A lot of people have made a noise about this film lacking in historical accuracy. Here's the thing.....I dont care. If I wanted a more accurate version of Napoleon's life then there are probably 100's of documentaries on various streaming services to satisfying me. I want something more from a cinema experience and want something more for my £12. 

The battle scenes are the best thing about the movie and they are quite tough at times especially the first where a horse gets shot at with a cannonball was particularly tough but if there is one thing that Ridley Scott can do well then its action scenes and they are all really good to watch.

Does the film tell the story about Napoleon in a way that is close to what he was like in real life? No, Does the film do a good job of entertaining and giving a good idea of what he was like? Yes. I think the Napoleon in this film is probably a fair representation of what the man was really like. I think if people go into the film not expecting a historical documentary then they will like it a lot more.

By the way, whilst the film is very good it doesn't quite take top spot but it is a worthy runner up. This is one of Ridley Scott's better films which takes a so so screenplay and elevate it to something worth watching because of the casting.

Saltburn (2023)

Having being a fan of Promising Young Woman, I was keen to see what Emerald Fennell would come up with next. The story is that we follow Oliver Quick as he becomes friends with Felix and there is a world collide type plot going on. It's a case of the haves and the have nots and the have's taking pity on the have nots and trying to make themselves feel good about it.

There are a couple of times in the movie that I found myself being slightly uncomfortable (which is probably the point), the first is when after Felix......enjoys himself in the bath, Oliver then decides to drink the bathwater and seems to lick the plughole which was the first time that I was worried that the film was going to go into territory which would ruin my enjoyment of this movie. The second time came when after Felix dies and is buried, Oliver strips naked and goes on top of the grave. From a visual point of view its well shot but did make me wonder if the film was going to tip over into tasteless but mercifully it didnt....just.

I got a Parasite vibe watching this movie and I mean that as a compliment and whilst that film does it better this I thought that it invokes that film in a way that works and made me like this film more. Barry Keoghan was really good as Oliver and when the truth comes out about him, I still found myself liking the character. The moment when its revealed that Oliver's family are alive and well and not as bad as had been portrayed was a big moment in the film and that's when the film starts to change and go in a different direction. When we see how Oliver has manipulated events to get into the position he is now in, I still find myself liking Oliver but I suspect htat not everybody feels the same.

I thought that Jacob Elordi played the entitled Felix with a likeability that makes his downfall more impactful than it could have been. Richard E. Grant was the only person that I felt really sad about the fate of their character, Sir James was the closest to being a normal person and when he tries to buy off Oliver you want him to be able to get rid of the leech because he has lost so much in a short period of time.

I think that this film is better than Promising Young Woman but it shows Fennell growing as a film maker and I look forward to what she comes up with in the future. It takes what on the face of it would be totally unlikeable character and makes them likeable enough to care about and Barry Keoghan shows that his performance in the Banshees of Inisherin wasn't a fluke. 

Five Nights at Freddy's (2023)

So I was aware of the video game which I have played probably once but found it be fun and scary but that was several years ago so it was a worry that the film took so long to be made. The plot is that the film follows Mike who is given a job as a security guard at an abandoned family restaurant where the animatronics come alive. From what I can remember, the plot to the video game is quite simple so the film has to pad things out to get the film to running time and they do that by introducing a subplot where Mike’s brother was kidnapped when he was a kid and uses music to get into a sleeping state where he goes back to the day it happened to try and see if any clues can help locate his brother. 

I did enjoy this film, I thought that the film didn't really suffer from any pacing issues and the performances were quite good. I thought Josh Hutcherson was good as Mike who was trying to do his best in raising his sister but suffering from the guilt of what happened to his brother. Piper Rubio was very likeable as Abby and the ‘friendship’ she had with the animatronics was lovely to see and gave Mike a reason not go just destroy the animatronics.

There were things that didn't quite work for me such as Vanessa hanging around to the point where it was obviously quite early on that she knows more about what is happening or has happened at Freddy’s. Also the idea that Matthew Lillard’s character was behind everything at the restaurant seemed to be a little bit silly. Also I would have liked it to be a bit bloodier. I’m not the biggest fan of gore but I think that a little bit of blood can go a long way. I also thought the sub-sub plot with the evil aunt wanting the girl just so she could have the benefits seemed only to serve the fact that the film needed to kill some people and there was a limited number of characters.

It’s clear that there are going to be more films as this will have made its money back as Blumhouse is a dab hand at making things cheap and then making a big profit. Normally Blumhouse films aren't the best in terms of quality but I have to admit that I was surprised at how good the film was despite being from the same studio that gave us the most recent Exorcist movie. Not being a die-hard fan of the game, I cant say whether it honours the game but as a horror film it does what it needs to do even if it isnt successful in all areas.

Killers of the Flower Moon (2023)

Killers of the Flower Moon is one of the films I was most looking forward to because…..well it’s a Martin Scorsese film and we haven't had one of those since 2019’s The Irishman. That was a Netflix film and now one of the greatest living directors is still having to rely on streaming services to get films made and this does bug me but that's a discussion for another day.

The story sees Leonardo DiCaprio play Ernest Burkhart as he becomes involved with Mollie (Lily Gladstone) as Robert De Niro’s William Hale is trying to get his hands on the oil that the Osage people live on and the land they own. As the film starts the Osage people are murdered one by one and the film focuses on DiCaprio and Gladstone over the course of 3 and half hours. The running time is the biggest issue that I had with this movie. I went to the cinema to see this and thought that if the film had been 40-45 minutes shorter then it might have been better. The plot and pacing did not warrant the running time because Oppenheimer was roughly the same length and that was the best film of the year. I am prepared to watch the film again because the running time is the only criticism that I have and I think being in comfier surroundings will probably help me appreciate things a bit more. 

The performances are really good. Leonardo DiCaprio and Lily Gladstone are superb and I hadn't heard of Gladstone before this film but will be looking out for her films in the future. There is a quite determination in her performance which makes her instantly likeable and in the face of what DiCaprio’s Ernest does throughout the film. 

This is another very good film from perhaps one of the greatest living directors around. Whilst I have issues with the running time (which is a similar complaint to The Irishman) but I think that the performances and characters are much stronger than in The Irishman.