Django Unchained (2012)

You know what you’re getting yourself in for when you watch Tarantino. There’s mostly a lot of ridiculously amazing violence, a fantastic soundtrack, and a less than linear story. That’s also pretty much what you get with Django Unchained.

Django (Jamie Foxx), a slave in the pre-Civil War deep South, is unexpectedly bought and freed by German ex-dentist Dr Shultz (Christoph Waltz). Shultz needs his help to kill three brothers, wanted dead or alive by state authorities, and so claim their bounty.  Realising they make a good team, Schultz and Django spend the winter together bounty hunting with glorious style. Django is, of course, a natural with a gun and soon can imagine a future when he will have enough money to do whatever he wants with his life.

What he wants is to find and rescue his wife Broomhilda, whom he was separated from by evil plantation owners after they tried to run away together. Rumour has it that she’s now at Candie Land – one of the largest plantations in the area, owned by the mean and ruthless Calvin Candie (Leonardo DiCaprio). Candie spends a large portion of his time and his wealth buying and selling ‘mandingo’ fighters – black slaves who fight to the death for the entertainment and gambling pleasures of rich white men. Django and Shultz, realising that they’ll never manage to persuade Candie to sell Broomhilda if they ask directly, pretend to be interested in buying themselves a mandigo fighter, with the hopes of casually buying the pretty German-speaking slave as well while they’re there.

There are so many positive things that I want to say about this film, beginning with just how cool Jamie Foxx is. I realise now that I’ve never actually seen him in anything, although I first heard of him because of Ray and how awesome that’s supposed to be, and heard his name mentioned every now and again in connection with various films that I’ll never watch (Miami Vice, Valentine’s Day, Horrible Bosses). I think he’s brilliant.

The sleekness, cleverness, and overly-elaborateness of the bounty hunting plans by Shultz is also a joy to behold. Even if things go wrong, he remains calm and cool and just deals with it, with undeniable style. I know I’ve ranted on before about watching a smooth plan just work well and how good that is to see.

Leo. I will always love Leo, and I would like to make completely clear that this is not because of some silly teenage girl crush based on Titanic and Romeo and Juliet. That boy can act. Despite being nominated a few times, he’s never won an Oscar, or apparently any other important award, but surely has deserved some for some of his roles. What’s Eating Gilbert Grape being a prime example. He’s awesome in this too, and very nicely dressed as well.

Samuel L. Jackson. He’s so good!

The violence. It’s brilliant, and (mostly) comically OTT. There are a few moments with the brutality of the white slave-drivers where you really have to brace yourself for what you’re watching or look away if you really can’t take it, but I hope that these small parts don’t put anyone of seeing it. It’s worth it, even if it is uncomfortable.

The only bad thing that I can possibly say about this is Tarantino felt the need to appear in it, as he so often does. He managed to resist for both Kill Bill films, so why start again? He cannot act, and he’s very annoying, but never mind eh?

Overall – this film is gob-smacking, cool, and everyone in the world should watch it. Unless you really really don’t like violence – then you probably won’t like it.

The Killer Inside Me (2010)

I won’t lie, the first time I watched The Killer Inside Me I was really disappointed. I’d first read about its existence in a magazine about nine months before it was released and got really excited. And I mean really excited! A film from the point of view of a sadistic, misogynistic murderer – totally my thing!

Eagerly anticipating something for an extended period of time is usually a guarantee that you’ll be disappointed because it’s never going to be what you imagine. This wasn’t helped by the fact that I found it really hard to understand what was going on. It might have been the shoddy sound system in the cinema I was in or Casey Affleck’s strong Southern accent but I kept missing details. Key ones too – which aren’t repeated.

So I missed a lot of the plot and that was a bit annoying, but I did manage to get something completely different and unexpected out of the film – Jessica Alba being beaten about with a leather belt. Turns out, that’s awesome! There are a lot of short sex scenes in this film and most of them involve some manner of violence. That’s really quite cool to watch and The Killer Inside Me has lead to a drastic change in my chosen film genres since. Multiple repeat viewings of this film have ironed out any confusion over plot and fully cemented this as my favourite English-language film ever! Which is really quite a big deal.

Words cannot express how much I now love this film. If I’m in a film conversation with someone new I will 100% mention it at some point. And then re-mention it several times at later dates. Everyone I know is undoubtedly bored of hearing me bang on about how much I love this film and I want everyone everywhere to at least have some sort of opinion on it. Even if they don’t like it. But how could you not like it? There’s wilful evil, sex, violence and Jessica Alba’s bottom. What more could you possibly want?

The book’s really good too.

Being in first person we not only get to see all the evil doings of Lou Ford – a respected sheriff in a small town in Texas – but we get to hear his reasoning. His logic and that he just knew he has to kill this person, or that one. Ford’s a clever guy who listens to classical music and does maths for fun – he’s not some random idiot with a gun. That makes everything a lot more beautiful to watch. He’s calm, meticulous. Obviously more a little fucked up in the head but there we go. The overall effect is that of quite a soothing film, albeit with some shocking moments at odd intervals. Everything just happens without any kind of horrible stressy build-up and I really really enjoyed it. Watching it again recently has just reminded me of how awesome it is.

Director Michael Winterbottom’s other TV and film offerings include 24 Hour Party People, A Cock and Bull Story, The Trip, and (most importantly as far as I’m concerned) Trishna – a fantastic film based on Tess of the D’Urbervilles and set in India. You should see that too. Apart from The Trip (can’t stand Steve Coogan or Rob Brydon) I’m going to put a decent amount of effort into watching as many of his films as possible and I’ll keep a sharp look out for The Look of Love which is due to be released next year. It contains so many famous British actors and comedians it’s unrealistic for me to try to name them all (I’ll begin with Stephen Fry, Anna Freil, Dara O’Briain, Matt Lucas…) and tells the story of ‘porn baron’ Paul Reymond – sounds a little bit cool.

Watch this film! All of you! I want to be able to talk about it with you at some point.

God Bless America (2011)

I have a new hero. Joel Murray is not someone I’ve ever paid much attention to before, although looking back, he’s cropped up in a couple of things I’ve seen (Mad Men, Desperate Housewives) and he’s also in The Artist, which I have yet to bother to see. When Love Film finally gets around to sending it to me, I’ll look out for him – because he’s an impressive man. I’m reasonably sure his performance in this film borders on flawless and I was very pleasantly surprised to see such quality acting in a film that’s remained reasonably under the radar, for all its popularity.

In God Bless America Murray plays Frank – a tired, middle aged, divorced, recently fired, possibly terminally ill man with a growing hatred for the pile of celebrity gossip, prejudice, scare-mongering, and general crap that he believes America has become. Alone (again) one evening he retrieves his gun from a box on top of the bookshelf (why are they always in a box on top of a bookshelf?) and contemplates killing himself. Then he sees Chloe. Chloe is a rich, bratty, American teenager with her own reality TV show. With Frank, we see a quick flash of the programme – Chloe declaring boastfully that she rules her high school and screaming at her obnoxious parents for buying her the wrong car. After this, Frank rethinks his suicide plans. Why should he kill himself when there are so many better people to kill? Like Chloe for example.

Murray’s co-star in God Bless America, Tara Lynne Barr, is a new face for me. She’s been in a fair few things but usually single episodes of American TV series that I’ve never heard of. After a couple of shaky over-acted moments near the beginning, I really warmed to her in that comforting way of her reminding me of someone – but I can’t think who. She’s another person to keep an eye on in the future. Barr plays Roxy, a sixteen-year-old girl who meets Frank when he arrives at her school to kill the awful Chloe. Sympathising with his aims, she becomes his accomplis and they travel around America together imparting justice on those who ‘don’t deserve to live’.

There’s an extensive list of people in this category. I was doing well until they added ‘the givers and receivers of physical high-fives’. Well that’s me dead then.

For all their lack of care in their killings, they manage to get away with it for a ridiculously long time. You have to suspend your disbelief here for a while – I would like to think the police are a little more efficient than that at catching serial killers. It’s a detail I was quite happy to let go though for the sake of a better story.

While it doesn’t give you all that much to really think about or leave much of a lasting impression other than ‘well that was cool’, God Bless America might well end up on my list of classics – one of those that I’ll actually buy a physical copy of.

Baise-Moi (2000)

Under the guise of a film about female sexual empowerment Baise-Moi is really just an excuse for numerous gratuitous scenes of sex and violence. Excellent start. It’s in French, which takes any annoying American whiney element out of it. Even better. I don’t know about you but this was enough to sell it to me. A brief outline of the plot placed this film firmly on my ‘to watch – soon’ list.

Baise-Moi follows two young women, Nadine and Manu, as they travel through France on a sex-fuelled and thoroughly violent road-trip. After a chance meeting, their mutual hatred for the world and everything in it leads them to kill, first for money, then for fun and finally just for the hell of it. There’re a lot of guns, and a lot of blood, and a lot of sex.

Apparently my theme this week is ‘Is it a film or is it porn?’ - not hugely surprising for me but apparently this is my second film of the week to include the use of real hardcore sex scenes. Starring two real-life porn-stars Karen Bach and Raffaëla Anderson, Baise-Moi does not shy away from anything. There are scenes here which wouldn’t look too out of place in any proper porn film, and perhaps their inclusion is enough for some people to automatically class this as pornography – there has to be a line somewhere. For me though, this is definitely not porn. The music’s different. Or the lighting. Or the language… something. Something is there that definitely makes these scenes acceptable (if graphic) parts of film. Integral parts too as, at least in my opinion, anything softer would be at odds with the level of violence in the film. And toning down both the sex and the violence would render the whole film largely pointless. These women are angry and bored and drug-fuelled, and who wants to see a half-hearted, only mildly irritated with the world, semi-rampage?

For all this film promised (I had heard very good things about it), I found the beginning a little dull. It’s not hugely relevant, and the promised ‘violent gang-rape’ at the beginning was frankly a let down. In a very short film (only 78 minutes) they seem to waste a long time setting the scene. I forgot this after a while though, and was soon drawn into the plot. The film builds gradually, consistently and my opinion of it only improved as it went on. I did however start wondering how they were going to let it finish. Would they get caught? Would they make it over the French border? Would they both die in a massive gun-fight with the police a la Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid? I wasn’t sure any of these would satisfy me and I hate it when good films are ruined by terrible endings (blaming things on aliens being the worst cop-out ending ever). Never fear though, it’s all good and while the ending is abrupt, it felt fitting for a film with such momentum.

Irreversible (2002)

This film is the reason I joined Love Film in the first place, so it seems appropriate that it's the first review. Due to its rather... controversial nature, no one I knew had this on DVD, and asking people if they'd seen it began to seem overly-personal. No DVD shops seemed to stock it, and even Amazon failed me. Apparently Love Film doesn't have it either - that or they just didn't want to lend it to me.

As far as I was aware though, this was a key film for me to watch, given my rather odd taste in cinema. With ridiculously strong violence, a lengthy rape scene, and a camera that never keeps still I knew its reputation and was prepared (when I finally got hold of a copy) for a difficult couple of hours.

I was not prepared however, to feel bored. In the first quarter of an hour or so nothing happens. A man (Vincent Cassel) runs round a club looking for a man, with whom apparently he has a problem. The camera’s swirly and the music’s loud which gives a good atmosphere, but that’s only exciting for so long.

The film plays out, with the beginning of the film showing the end-point in the story. We discover the motivation behind the characters’ actions as we go along. The acting is great, and it’s definitely a good plot. Why, then, did I feel something was lacking?

Maybe it’s because it had such a build-up. I expected great things from a film I had heard about from several people as a film I ‘definitely had to watch’. Maybe it’s because of the extended ‘have you seen this man’ scene at the beginning. Maybe it’s because I felt the length of the rape scene actually detracted from its impact, rather than amplified it – the feeling of shock does wear off after a couple of minutes.

I did enjoy the film (if enjoy is the right word), but I was disappointed. I do agree though, it was a film I definitely had to watch.

2.5 Stars.