Ant-Man

Big things come in small packages. A cheesy line, but it certainly describes Marvel’s Ant-Man. We’ve known Ant-Man was on the horizon for perhaps as long as we’ve known of the Iron Man films, and yet it took until 2015 for the incredible shrinking Ant-Man to be released (and a further four years for me to ACTUALLY see the film). I’d be lying if I said that Ant-Man’s productions woes, be it delayed filming windows to multiple directors swapping in and out, had me worried about the quality of the film because frankly I didn't care... about the film, the plot or the announced cast. But, for some reason, I found myself sat on the couch ready to watch Ant-Man. So - could something that’s languished in development hell and been passed through many hands come out on the other side successful? The short answer is yes. Of course it did! It's Marvel for god-sake. For the most part Ant-Man succeeds in being funny, heartfelt, action packed and most importantly entertaining.

As Marvel has done in movies past Ant-Man is a super hero film wrapped in the trappings of another genre. The genre of choice this time is a heist film. We’re introduced to Scott Lang, played by Paul Rudd, a recently released thief, who’s chosen by enigmatic Dr. Hank Pym (Michael Douglas) and his appropriately prickly daughter Hope Van Dyne (Evangeline Lilly) to steal Pym’s former business partner and protégé’s shrinking suit and formula before it can be used for evil. Sounds pretty par for the course, because it ultimately is. Marvel has never really broken new ground when it comes to its plotting, but it’s never needed to. We’re given familiar story elements with a fresh coat of paint, and what a coat of paint it is. Like Marvel’s previous films this movie is packed with wit. It’s a very funny film. At times the humour undercuts the serious elements, or rather the serious elements undercut the humour. It’s difficult to say. The audience is told very early on not to take the film and its happenings too seriously and everything is done with a wink and a nudge. Whenever the film tries to get weighty and bring us a serious dramatic beat we’re left waiting impatiently for the next one-liner. Still, those moments are few and far between and the film is paced well enough that I was never bored.

Ant-Man has a curious power. The Ant-Man suit, powered by Pym Particles, allows the user to shrink down to the size of an Ant. We’ve never seen anything like this from the likes of a super hero movie which is refreshing mid-Avengers campaign. The fight scenes are exciting to watch as Ant-Man switches between big and small so effortlessly that you wonder if anyone could stand a chance against such a nimble and difficult to strike target. Ant-Man even gets the opportunity to fight an Avenger in this film which was a prelude to his appearance in Captain America: Civil War (which I had seen already). Ultimately Ant-Man is just another superhero movie but the way it’s presented is such a breath of fresh air that I decided to watch the movie's sequel Ant-Man and the Wasp shortly after this film finished.

We’ve come to expect quality with Marvel and Ant-Man is right in their sweet spot of humour, action and sympathetic characters. It’s not the best film Marvel has produced, but it’s still a film I am glad not to have missed, I just wish I had realised this sooner and seen it on the big screen.

The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part

Picking up right where the first film ended before jumping forward in time five years, The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part sees the city of Bricksburg destroyed by Duplo alien invaders and rebuilt as a gritty, post-apocalyptic wasteland called Apocalypseburg, forcing the population (with Emmet as the only exception) to adopt a dark and tough persona in order to survive. But after an alien from the Systar system named General Mayhem kidnaps Batman, Unikitty, Benny, Metalbeard and Wyldstyle, it's up to Emmett to rescue them and prevent OurMomAgeddon, teaming up with a battle hardened space pilot named Rex Dangervest along the way.

It's hectic start to the film, moving at a breakneck pace in order to get the actual story set up as soon as possible, and while that's understandable - everything before General Mayhem shows up is little more than wasted time in the grand scheme of things - it also results in an introduction that's simply not engaging and filled with too much meaningless action to really let you settle in to the movie. It's only when Emmett sets off to find his friends that The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part really finds its feet, at which point it becomes a hugely entertaining movie.

Which probably shouldn't come as all that much of a surprise given Lord and Miller's track record of smuggling real intelligence into concepts that would otherwise be entirely devoid of it, but it still feels a little miraculous when you see it happen right in front of you, expected or not. As with the first film, The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part is practically bursting at the seams with real purpose and genuine thematic weight. What was used in The Lego Movie is instead here used to explore some interesting and topical ideas, and while I'd hate to spoil exactly what ideas those are (half the fun of The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part is seeing exactly where it's heading), you can rest assured that the result is a film with far more on its mind than you might expect.

And that's great - it's always nice to see a film aimed at kids and families that has some real thought behind it - but it wouldn't mean much if The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part wasn't also a damn good film at it's core. Lord and Miller's script is just as funny, smart and endearing as that of The Lego Movie, rarely going more than a few moments without throwing a new gag or two at the audience, making great use of returning characters from the first film while also finding room to introduce some new ones too. With Richard Ayoade's overtly prim and proper Ice Cream Cone, Ben Schwartz' goofy Banarnar (a sentient banana peel) and Stephanie Beatriz' General Mayhem - but the best of them is easily Tiffany Haddish's Queen Watevra Wa'Nabi, a shape-shifting set of blocks whose musical number introduction is be a highlight.

And of course the whole movie is a real feast for the eyes, just as good looking as its predecessor thanks to the highly stylised animation in which almost everything on screen at any given moment is made entirely of Lego, still a novelty worth enjoying even now there have been 4 full films in this franchise. The only real complaint I can make of The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part (beyond the aforementioned rushed introduction) is that Mike Mitchell's direction here isn't quite as strong as Lord and Miller's was on The Lego Movie, meaning that some gags don't land as well as they might've with the duo directing - but it seems like such a minor nit-pick in the grand scheme of things that it's not really worth dwelling on. All said and done, The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part is nothing less than a thoroughly joyous time at the cinema and a worthy sequel to The Lego Movie in its own right.

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse

It's been a good couple of years for Spider-Man fans, which is something of a pleasant surprise when you consider the radically different position the character found himself in just four short years ago. Cast your minds back to the winter of 2014 for a moment – Spider-Man couldn't help but feel like yesterday's news, what with the newly crowned Marvel Cinematic Universe dominating the screen, the Raimi trilogy already being something of a distant memory and Webb's attempt to restart the franchise failing to ignite much passion in anyone but its most vocal detractors. Things weren't looking great for ol' web head – and yet since then, we've seen the character make his debut in the Marvel Cinematic Universe to much applause, star in his first good solo movie since 2004, make a hugely enjoyable appearance in probably the most successful and talked about film of 2018 and even star in his own critically acclaimed and highly successful video game. It's been quite the impressive turnaround – so really, I guess it's only fair that Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse ends continues that winning streak.

We follow Miles Morales, an Afro-Latino New Yorker teenager who (wouldn't you just know it) winds up getting bitten by some kind of radioactive spider and gaining superpowers. But this isn't your average origin story – after a plan to stop a dangerous experiment held by Wilson Fisk goes wrong, several other Spider-Folk are dragged into Miles' universe, all of whom will soon die from the side-effects of being in the wrong universe if they cannot get back to where they came from.

It's an exciting conceptual hook that helps Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse stand out amongst the crowd, but vitally, it's not a hook that ever threatens to overwhelm the film entirely. In fact, it could be argued that Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse is actually fairly restrained in this respect – it would have been easy (and I imagine incredibly tempting) to really cram in as many Spider-Folk as possible, but by keeping that number reasonable and ensuring that the real meat of the story centres on just three of them (namely Miles, Peter and Gwen), the film manages to perform a careful balancing act that ensures the multiverse concept neither overpowers the movie nor ends up feeling under-utilised.

The result is a film that manages to both have its cake and eat it too, indulging in all the fun weirdness that the multiverse concept brings while also telling a tight and well-focused story about a young man figuring out his place in the world. I had assumed from the marketing that Nicolas Cage's Spider-Noir or the adorably anime Peni Parker would end up being my favourite characters, but wonderful as they are it was actually Miles himself who ended up taking the top spot. But he's far from the only stand out character – virtually every other character in Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse leaves an impression of some kind, whether they be Jake Johnson's Peter Parker, Hailee Steinfeld's instantly iconic Spider-Gwen and others that would be mild spoilers to even talk about.

And it's funny too, which probably shouldn't come as much of a surprise given the talent involved – Phil Lord and Christopher Miller's fingerprints are all over this. They might not have directed it (that particular credit goes to Rodney Rothman, Bob Persichetti and Peter Ramsey) but one has to assume that Lord and Miller were very hands-on producers – it fits their style and sense of humour to a tee, filled with neat visual gags and open slapstick right alongside some character driven humour that never seems to miss, all of which only adds to the sense that Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse is an immaculately crafted movie on every level.

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse bursts at the seams with innovation and heart, it's a movie that demands your attention from frame one and never wavers in its commitment to earning, so consistently, fundamentally great. Even as a fan of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse is a fantastic movie that single-handedly justifies Sony's decision to hang on to the rights to the character. I can't see a film this different and daring coming into existence under the Disney banner, and if the price of that is the risk that Spider-Man could simply disappear from the MCU one day? Well, so be it. It's worth it, and I don't say that lightly.

Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald

From a film-making perspective it's bad - drab and unexciting in all the ways that instantly mark it as a David Yates movie - but from a Harry Potter perspective it's downright insulting, inserting clearly made up on the spot backstory where none is needed and (seemingly) altering established facts about this world and its characters on a whim. It's fan fiction-y and pandering in all the worst ways, and it ends with a reveal so deeply unearned by the film itself and totally at odds with the larger Harry Potter canon around it that I have to assume that the characters involved are either mistaken or simply lying, less my brain be turned to mush trying to figure out just what the hell J.K. Rowling was thinking. Making a film "just for fans" is easy - making a film that's "just for fans" that even the fans are going to hate is bloody hard, yet it's the one thing that Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald unequivocally succeeds at.

If I sound exasperated, well, that's because I am. Even ignoring the way that much of the film is effectively just unneeded backstory about characters you don't really care about, from a purely storytelling level, Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald is fundamentally dysfunctional, consistently failing to give the audience the information they need to be engaged in the movie that they're watching. Like almost all of J.K. Rowling's other writings, it's ultimately a mystery story at heart - but here, the mysteries that are central to the story are so poorly seeded by the film itself that there are multiple instances of the audience not knowing what the question even is until the answer is on-screen in front of them. Worse, even if these mysteries had've been set up better, the answers themselves only either raise more questions, or ultimately have very little impact on anything of importance.

Which means that for the vast majority of it's running time, Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald is downright directionless, never really feeling like it's started in earnest because it's either unable or unwilling to give you any indication of what this film is ultimately about or where it might be headed until far too late. With the benefit of hindsight, it's clear that at least part of Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald is Rowling's attempt to reckon with the return of fascism as a political force in the West and the rise of the alt-right, how the disenfranchised can so easily be seduced by a charismatic leader who offers supposedly simple, ideologically driven solutions to complex problems, and that's a noble goal - but frankly, Rowling isn't anywhere near as good a screenwriter as she is an author, and the resulting product can't help but feel flimsy and spineless (and maybe even naive) in comparison to what I imagine it could've been had it been fleshed out in novel form.

But the biggest problem with all this is that it's so easy to imagine what this franchise could've been in the right hands, so easy to see the potential that a prequel series about a young Albus Dumbledore and Newt Scamander travelling around the world doing wizard stuff (that eventually - not yet, but eventually - sees them moving against Grindelwald). I like Eddie Redmayne's Newt Scamander and Dan Fogler's Jacob Kowalski; I like Katherine Waterston's Tina Goldstein (even if she has almost nothing to do here); I like Jude Law as a young Albus Dumbledore; and much as it pains me to say, I even think that Johnny Depp isn't bad as Grindelwald. There is value here, entertainment to be found if you look hard enough. With a better sense of direction and someone who isn't David Yates at the helm, I do think that these films could've been an interesting entry into the Harry Potter canon.

The Grinch (2018)

For their eighth fully animated feature, Illumination and Universal Pictures present The Grinch, based on Dr. Seuss’ beloved holiday classic. The Grinch tells the story of a cynical grump who goes on a mission to steal Christmas, only to have his heart changed by a young girl’s generous holiday spirit. Funny, heartwarming and visually stunning, it’s a universal story about the spirit of Christmas and the indomitable power of optimism. Illumination’s take on How The Grinch Stole Christmas is as warm and sweet and comforting as a hot mug of cocoa that’s mostly marshmallow.

Those familiar with Dr. Seuss’ Christmas tale will recognise the opening all too well. We sweep and swoop over the town of Whoville—bustling with Christmas colours and sounds—as the introduction to the place and time of year is given through voice over. Feelings of familiarity trickle in, accompanied by a dynamic camera that grabs us by the hand to explore the town. In a movie that might seem uncalled for, the same-ness you might be expecting ends there. The core story is tried and true, but the slick pace of The Grinch doesn’t waste time showing us things we’ve seen before at length, and goes as far as to realign and shed what’s not important in this fictional land. As the happy town of Whoville busies itself preparing for Christmas, Academy Award nominee Benedict Cumberbatch lends his voice to the infamous Grinch, who lives a solitary life inside a cave on Mt. Crumpet with only his loyal dog, Max, for company. With a cave rigged with inventions and contraptions for his day-to-day needs, the Grinch only sees his neighbours in Who-ville when he runs out of food. Each year at Christmas they disrupt his tranquil solitude with their increasingly bigger, brighter and louder celebrations. When the Whos declare they are going to make Christmas three times bigger this year, the Grinch realises there is only one way for him to gain some peace and quiet: he must steal Christmas. To do so, he decides he will pose as Santa Claus on Christmas Eve, even going so far as to trap a lackadaisical misfit reindeer to pull his sleigh. But of course, we all know this classic story by now!

From the snowy opening alone it’s clear the animation style goes straight down the middle. The characters are simple and nothing stands out, but the textures in the snow and materials are delicate, bringing winter and the fuzz on the Whos’ faces to life. What’s most noteworthy is the fun direction. One of the blessings of animation is total control, and that’s something directors Yarrow Cheney and Scott Mosier make full use of. The delights of the swings, loops and circles that dance around the characters are enough to keep the visuals interesting, and even if they weren’t, the saturated colours and beautiful details of Whoville and the Grinch’s mountain peak would be. A lot of what The Grinch lacks in fully developed storytelling is made up for with pretty renderings that do well to distract.

Dr Seuss’ original work is short on side plots and additional details so this animated offering – like the 2000 live-action movie – finds ways to embellish and expand the story. Both offer an insight into the Grinch’s childhood loneliness to provide some motive for his lack of Christmas cheer, but this animated offering also adds in a side plot involving a rotund comedy reindeer called Fred and opts to give Cindy Loo-Who, voiced by Cameron Seely, much more agency than before, giving her a parallel plot of trying to make a Christmas wish for her mother come true. A big difference here is that the 2018 incarnation of The Grinch is immediately more sympathetic than any we’ve seen before. His mean-spiritedness is clearly conflicted, with numerous indications that he’s not the mean and nasty creature of previous versions. His dog Max, for example, is clearly loved and loves the Grinch in return and while he’s not the kindest of friends, the Grinch has friends in Whoville and he’s not the ostracised villain seen in other adaptations.

It’s exactly what you would expect, though, from Illumination, whose family-friendly animated offerings often skew young and cutesy and when it comes to that target audience, this film plays like gangbusters. The Grinch won’t be revelatory for anyone who’s seen on-screen translations before, but for a new generation of little ones it spreads a wonderful message of love and outreach. So although this film will be added to my annual December viewing list, it does not reach the level of the 2000s adaptation. Jim Carrey still holds the Grinch crown in my eyes. 

The Holiday

It's officially December, so I'm going to revisit one of my go to Christmas-vibes film. It's not my favourite, and I'm not always complimentary of it, but I do reach for it around this time every year. So let's dive in!

To list all the contrivances strewn throughout The Holiday would require more words than are warranted by Nancy Meyers’s festive batch of cinematic maple syrup. However, the kooky, heartwarming cutesiness peddled by this lovefest is—despite the film’s numerous references to, and accompanying desire to tread in the path of, classic Hollywood screwball romances—of a distinctly modern vintage. 

The Something’s Gotta Give writer-director’s painstakingly arranged tale involves the twin plights of neurotic American movie-trailer editor Amanda, played by Cameron Diaz, and clingy British newspaperwoman Iris, Kate Winslet. Iris lives in London, Amanda in Los Angeles, both are as different as can be. However, they have one thing in common; lousy relationships with men who take advantage of them. Feeling fed up, they agree to trade houses for two weeks and soon find themselves crossing the ocean in hopes of leaving their troubled lives behind. What they did not expect was to find love on the other side of the pond... Gag, I know. But in December, I love it!

The film's love interests/dreamboats take the form of Jude Law (for Diaz) and Jack Black (for Winslet), a superficially raw deal for Winslet that nonetheless works to her benefit once it’s revealed that Law’s book editor Graham is a hunk of blandness and Black’s film composer Miles is a witty, self-deprecating charmer. Of course, these guys have secrets and/or personality quirks that make them seem initially wrong and then ultimately ideal mates for their respective beauties. Yet stranger than The Holiday's by-the-books fantasy is its subplot involving Iris’s friendship with neighbouring senior citizen and Oscar-winning screenwriter Arthur, played by Eli Wallach, which, besides giving Myers the opportunity to pointlessly juxtapose the sight of The Good, The Bad and the Ugly star with an Ennio Morricone tune, both features an odd criticism of Hollywood’s obsession with opening weekend box-office figures, and adds a nauseating dose of sentimentality to the proceedings. While Amanda and Graham make a strikingly attractive but thoroughly dull couple, Winslet and Black’s credible chemistry partially makes up for the run-of-the-mill characters and implausible situations they’ve been saddled with. The duo’s genuineness, however, doesn’t change the fact that, for the sake of his career and the good of moviegoers everywhere, Black needs to stop with the improvised weirdo singing that’s become his worn-out trademark.

It may come as a surprise that I love this Christmas movie, and it is probably not for reason you think. Actually my love of the film is for the side-story of Iris and Arthur. As mentioned, Arthur is an elderly man, quite alone, Iris encounters in Los Angeles. Arthur is portrayed by the legendary Eli Wallach; who's career spanned over seven decades. He was a legend and to see him in The Holiday was a very sweet treat indeed. His scenes with Kate Winslet in the restaurant are poignant and amazing and will give food for thought for all of us who feel a little less confident at times. To me, the movie is worth seeing for those scenes alone.

Granted, the movie has, at times, painfully dull or overly-sentimental moments, yet my love for this movie does not diminish with each viewing. If you have not seen it, I urge you to do so. It is syrupy sweet, fitting the standard Rom-Com template, but it's a comfortable watch and surprisingly festive in feel. 

Halloween (2018)

40 years since Michael Myers, The Shape, first terrorised the quiet town of Haddonfield on Halloween night. Although audiences didn’t know it, John Carpenter’s Halloween was the start of something special when it hit the big screen in 1978. It not only introduced us to one of the most famous killers to be put to film, but it laid the groundwork for every slasher film that followed it. Sure, the rules it set were sometimes bent and occasionally broken, but its influence can still be felt in every masked killer horror film that has come out in the years since it made those rules. Four decades, seven – not always watchable – sequels, and a much maligned reboot later, Blumhouse, one of the biggest names in modern horror, brought Halloween back. And expectations were high. 

It’s been a long time since the kid with a penchant for masks and stabbing people found his way back to his home town, grown up, angry, and ready to take it out on any babysitter he could find. Now, having wallowed in Smith’s Grove Asylum for 40 years, an ill-fated bus trip to a new prison ends with a crash and Michael on the loose. Carving a bloody trail towards his hometown, The Shape appears to be single-minded in his need to finish what he started all those years ago and eviscerate Laurie Strode, the babysitter that got away. Unfortunately for the near supernatural serial killer, Laurie hasn’t been idly twiddling her thumbs for all these years; she’s been preparing herself and her now three generations deep family for this day and this upcoming fight.

Nearly ten years after the last film to don the name Halloween seemed to all but kill the chances of another, it has taken an unlikely pair to bring Micheal Myers back to the big screen where he belongs. Teaming up with Blumhouse Productions for this new entry in the series, screenwriter Danny McBride and Pineapple Express director David Gordon Green. The pair come out big and bold, not only showing that they have the balls to take on a project of this magnitude, but give us an hour and forty minute, scene by scene showcase on why they are the perfect guys for the job.

Refusing to waste its audience’s time, Halloween gets straight to the point with a trip to the soon-to-be closed down asylum where Aaron Korey and Dana Haines (Jefferson Hall and Rhian Rees), a pair of investigative journalists looking to resurrect the Myers myth try to interview, and subsequently taunt, our antagonist. Not to be discarded as a throw away opening, this scene gives us our first look in 40 years at Nick Castle’s The Shape and instantly shows us the man and his demeanour, without really showing us anything of the actual man as camera angles, fast edits and dirty windows disguise Myers as much as his mask has done in the past. For those thinking that we might get a killer we can sympathise with, a character flawed and needing nothing but a good hug, Halloween reminds you quickly that that isn’t the case. Michael’s first on-screen kill is cold and vicious and serves to show you that this might be the softer, nicer 21st century, but this killer didn’t get your memo. The film takes you to a place that many audiences would have thought off-limits until this point, as writers, producers, and the director flash you their platinum horror membership cards and show you they mean business. He's nasty, he’s brutal, and he’s wholly unforgiving of anyone that gets in his way. Once freed from the shackles that held him, he’s dangerous; once he has his mask back, all bets are off.

It doesn’t happen very often; horror is a genre much forgotten and abused and frequently used for quick cash, but Halloween is a perfect horror experience. Heavy on scares, atmosphere and fun kills; light on plot sag and story slowdown. You can get behind our soon-to-be victims as much as you can get behind the mythical monster chasing them and you can find yourself scared for these people and holding your breath in hope of a safe escape. Green and McBride know they owe everything to the 40 years before this and they show an unending respect for that heritage. They know that there is no 2018 iteration of this legendary series without the films that provided the roadmap to get here. They know this series doesn’t continue without the twists, turns, and frankly ludicrous left field moments in the lore, and whether they and fans want to admit it or not, without Rob Zombie’s much hated vision of The Shape, this film simply can’t exist. These gentlemen know this, and they treat that legacy with the respect it deserves.

There is plenty for newcomers and die hard fans alike: glorious kills, and nostalgic throwbacks that even get an old Halloween cynic like this writer a happy tear and a wry smile.