Reviews

  • Robot Overlords (2014)

    Robot Overlords (2014)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On TV, August 2020) “Not good, but better than expected” is a perfectly valid accolade in discussing science fiction films, especially those low-budget foreign productions involving a mostly teenage cast. In this case, Robot Overlords hails from small-town England, where the global tyranny of alien robot invaders means that people are confined at home and subject to occasional deep scans that suck the life out of them. Our heroes are a bunch of teenagers who somehow figure out how to turn off their tracking implants, leading to inevitable revolt. Coming in the middle of the Young-Adult dystopian craze of 2012–2016, and featuring an initial lack of polish reminiscent of Syfy specials, Robot Overlords initially looks as if it could have been much, much worse. Its science-fictional elements are both ordinary and thrown together without much refinement, and the dramatic beats can be seen coming well in advance. The film also features two veteran actors known for slumming: Gillian Anderson turns up as the sympathetic mom of one of the teenaged characters, while Ben Kingsley plays a human enforcer of the alien rule. But, happily, Robot Overlords eventually works its way back to competency—the action moves steadily forward, and the missteps are somehow tolerable. The small-town British setting is different enough to be interesting, and the special effects can keep things lively. By the time the action climax comes around, the film works well enough and leads to a wrap-up that doesn’t overstay its welcome. There are still plenty of conventional moments requiring quite a bit of indulgence from viewers, but the overall package is, again, better than expected.

  • Hua li shang ban zu [Johnnie To’s Office] (2015)

    Hua li shang ban zu [Johnnie To’s Office] (2015)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On TV, August 2020) It had to be done: a musical comedy set in a high-rise rented by a financial firm… in 2008 Hong Kong, as stocks were plunging without an end in sight. Directed by Johnnie To but written by co-star Sylvia Chang (from her own theatrical play), Office is a cool but not completely satisfying high-style movie musical. The corporate environment offers a nice thematic excuse to confront the cold steel-and-glass sets with the passion of the characters engaging in romance or revenge. The striking geometrical sets are gigantic, and perhaps overused. Not understanding Chinese means that it’s difficult to assess the songs: they’re not as immediately bouncy nor memorable as (say) many Bollywood movies, but I did like the techno-rock beats thrown in the mix. Still, Office remains a musical in the very classical sense, with characters singing their thoughts in ensemble songs. It may be a touch too dramatic to earn the moniker of a musical comedy, but it would hardly by the first musical to fail that check. Narratively, the ending does leave a few things hanging but not enough to disappoint. I clearly found Office to be interesting, but it’s just disappointing enough to fall short of satisfying.

  • Death on the Nile (1978)

    Death on the Nile (1978)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On Cable TV, August 2020) While I’m anticipating watching the 2020 version of Agatha Christie’s Hercule Poirot adventure Death on the Nile, I thought I’d have a look at the 1978 version first. As the first of the Poirot films starring Peter Ustinov as the Belgian detective, this film has layers of old-school charm. It’s obviously dominated by 1970s filmmaking techniques and stars; the image is mushy, the staging a bit stiff, and a wonderful star-studded cast includes Bette Davis, Mia Farrow, George Kennedy, Angela Lansbury (not in detective mode), David Niven and Maggie Smith—whew! The other layer is the 1937 setting of both the narrative and Christie’s novel: we are comfortably sitting with the upper-class characters as they board an old-school paddle steamer and float down the Nile, with murder in an enclosed location as their main shipboard entertainment. While not on the boat, the film indulges into some great location shooting in Egypt. The narrative is incredibly comfortable, running down the tropes of detective fiction all the way to a round-up of “the usual suspects” in time for the finale. Murder mysteries usually age pretty well, especially in a period setting and Death on the Nile is no exception. It’s not quite as compelling as its prequel Murder on the Orient Express, but it’s still a solid hit of murder mystery pleasures.

  • Sin-gwa ham-kke: In-gwa yeon [Along with the Gods: The Last 49 Days] (2018)

    Sin-gwa ham-kke: In-gwa yeon [Along with the Gods: The Last 49 Days] (2018)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On TV, August 2020) While The Last 49 Days was written and shot at the same time as its prequel The Two Worlds to form the Along with the Gods diptych, neither film is equal in impact. All of the unanswered questions from the first film are addressed here, but despite being a second half that multiplies the large-scale special effects sequence, the impact is somehow less grandiose than the first film. While the protagonist of the tale remains the impossibly perfect deceased hero passing seven trials on his way to becoming a paragon of virtue, the narrative does shift further to the three guardians as they have a story and stakes of their own. While The Last 49 Days does keep some interest, it’s a sequel of diminishing returns: it loses some of the focus of the first film, and has a tendency to lose itself in historical or domestic sequences. It does remain fun enough, though: dinosaurs attacking our heroes is not necessarily something we could anticipate. More successful as a conclusion to the first film than by itself, The Last 49 Days is a downgrade, but not a failure.

  • Sin-gwa ham-kke: Jwi-wa beol [Along with the Gods: The Two Worlds] (2017)

    Sin-gwa ham-kke: Jwi-wa beol [Along with the Gods: The Two Worlds] (2017)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On TV, August 2020) All right, this is interesting. Flawed, but interesting. Along with the Gods: The Two Worlds begins as a modern-day firefighter dies and finds himself in the afterlife, escorted by three guardians who insist that he’s a paragon of virtue. Tested through a series of trials meant to examine his life, our protagonist openly questions whether he’s the promised paragon, and his guardians have a lot riding on whether he is. The film’s opening is quite good, with a bit of suspense, mystery and humour—plus special effects. A lot of special effects, from the opening to the end of the film. They’re sometimes rough, but the imagination is there. Narratively, The Two Worlds isn’t as successful: the schematic trial structure is broken up by a (less successful) narrative mystery, but there’s a risk that the film is overcomplicating things as it advances. The film’s concept is stronger than the mid-level moment-to-moment scripting: the protagonist is a wet noodle without much personality throughout the film, and there’s a good argument to be made that the lead characters aren’t the dead person going through the afterlife, but his three guardians—they seem better developed, have clear goals, and their interaction gives them more lines than the nonentity lead. The ending is deliberately inconclusive, as tortured family dynamics come to light and the film finds no clear conclusion—but that’s fine, since Along with the Gods is meant to be a two-parter with The Last 49 Days following up The Two Worlds. We’ll see in the next film if it all comes to a satisfying conclusion.

  • Five Star Final (1931)

    Five Star Final (1931)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, August 2020) Considering today’s issues with social media, it’s either comforting or dispiriting to realize that every era has had its problems with then-new communication mediums… and that cinema has been there to chronicle the issues since the 1920s. Five Star Final takes us in the heated tabloid newspaper scene of the big city 1930s, when newspapers published multiple editions per day, and raced hard to outdo the competition in circulation. If sleaziness was the way to boost readership, then the answer was obvious. Here we have Edward G. Robinson as a two-fisted newspaper editor, not comfortable with the sensationalistic direction that his publisher requires, but reluctantly dragged into a sordid tale of public shaming with real consequences. Boris Karloff also appears in a few scenes as a menacing reporter. The film, being from the everything-goes pre-Code era, is markedly more interesting than many newspaper movies of later decades (and I say this as someone with an inordinate fondness for newspaper movies)—not to spoil anything, but characters don’t necessarily make it out alive of this story, and the attitude toward tabloid journalism is decidedly critical. Mervyn Leroy’s direction is relatively fast-paced, and there are a few flourishes here and there—most notably the use of split screen and fancy special effects at the time. It does make for a compelling movie, more for its time-capsule experience than a story that has been done in more recent years (albeit not from the Code years from 1935 to 1955) but still interesting, and not simply because it was nominated for a Best Picture Oscar.

  • And then there Were None (1945)

    And then there Were None (1945)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On TV, August 2020) As someone for whom Agatha Christie’s And Then There Were None was one of the Big Reading Experiences of High School, I’m always a bit weirded out by the movie adaptations that spare the characters at the end—wasn’t it the point of the book that, well, then there were none? Still, that’s the tack that Christie herself preferred, and it does make the ending surprisingly happy for fans of the book. Both the 1971 and the 1945 versions use more or less the same blueprint, although the 1945 version of And then there Were None is understandably in black-and-white. What’s perhaps more surprising is that this earlier version is a bit funnier than its later example—in typical stiff-lipped British humour, the film has touches of dark humour and characterization. I’m perhaps a bit too familiar with the plot to comment on anything but its deviations from the novel, but the premise does remain timeless and of interest to modern audiences. It’s not directed too badly; there are a few exteriors chosen to open up the film from studio interiors, and it’s short enough not to overlay its welcome—which isn’t bad considering the number of characters to kill before the end.

  • The Sunshine Boys (1975)

    The Sunshine Boys (1975)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, August 2020) In movie history, The Sunshine Boys is famous for reviving the career of George Allen, a vaudeville veteran whose first film career ended in 1939 before making a comeback decades later as (what else?) an elderly vaudeville veteran. He’s paired with Walter Matthau as the other half of a legendary duo now unable to even stand the sight of each other. After eleven years, a TV special appearance orchestrated by a well-meaning agent/nephew brings them together again, but it’s not a given that they’ll make it out of rehearsals. As with most movies directed by Neil Simon, there’s a powerful sense of place and time in The Sunshine Boys: Here we are in mid-1970s Manhattan in the universe of Jewish comedians (named deli sandwiches included), but always harkening back to the glory days of vaudeville. I’m fascinated by the history of American comedy, and The Sunshine Boys certainly delivers when it comes to showing how a declining elderly comedian lives his last years. Matthau has played some curmudgeonly characters during his career, but few are as spectacularly ornery as here—he effortlessly plays a character twenty years older than him, and oozes the kind of unrestrained crankiness that some old men develop. The beginning of the film can be trying if you’re not in-tune to the atmosphere—both elderly characters seem borderline senile, unable to deal with any normal social situation any more. It’s only when they come together that their minds sharpen up, even if it’s to trade insults. Allen is remarkable as the other half of the duo, with good comic timing and canny instincts: the sketch sequence does have its share of honest laughs, and the Oscar he won for the role wasn’t merely a reflection of a comeback story for the ages. (Allen would then go on to outlast several other actors by maintaining an active movie career until 1994, and keeping up appearances until shortly before his death as a centenarian in 2001—I’m old enough to remember when his name was synonymous with any joke having to do with elderly celebrities who would never die.) In the hands of a veteran playwright like Simon, The Sunshine Boys also slowly trade off jokes and insults for honest affection for the characters. There’s a point in the third act where the film seems to derail and get locked in a single room, but it eventually claws its way back to comedy and, happily, a bit of heart.

  • The Major and the Minor (1942)

    The Major and the Minor (1942)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, August 2020) I’m on a long road to see most of writer-director Billy Wilder’s movies, so it was inevitable that I’d eventually make my way to his English-language debut feature sooner rather than later. After all, The Major and the Minor is a perfectly entertaining romantic comedy, featuring none other than Ginger Rogers and Ray Milland. The fun gets started when the twentysomething protagonist, out of cash for a ticket home, dresses up as a little girl and doesn’t convince the ticket takers. Chased through the train, she finds refuge in the cabin of an officer and, from there, follows him to the military academy where romance blooms. While this was the first American film directed by Wilder, it was far from his first script, and his comfort in writing good, zesty yet comfortable material shines through: Despite a premise that doesn’t really hold up (there’s a limit to how much two tresses can make Rogers pass as a twelve-year-old), the dialogue is great and even the familiar engine of romantic comedies feels rejuvenated. The Major and the Minor is quite funny, and it does wait its own sweet time to deliver the romance promised throughout the picture—the mark of a great filmmaker.

  • Witchboard (1986)

    Witchboard (1986)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, August 2020) The 1980s were a weird time for movies, as the science of taking fads and making weird movies out of them was still being perfected. In Witchboard’s case, the fun begins when our characters grab a Ouija board and start messing around with messages from beyond. The heroine gradually gets possessed by an evil spirit, and it all naturally leads to more murders and a climactic confrontation with her boyfriend. Tawny Kitaen looks great in the lead role (she’s not much of an actress, though), while writer-director Kevin Tenney does manage to avoid a few typical flaws of low-budget films—notably by sticking to a straightforward execution plan and avoiding gore. This doesn’t necessarily make Witchboard a better film—but it’s not terribly irritating even as it slashes away at its characters and trods familiar ground. Saying that I didn’t hate it may strike many as damning praise, but it’s not—have you even watched other low-budget 1980s horror films?

  • Two-Faced Woman (1941)

    Two-Faced Woman (1941)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, August 2020) What a strange, strange idea—to put famous can’t-laugh Greta Garbo as the lead of an ordinary romantic comedy. Sure, the film has a pedigree—with George Cukor directing, Two-Faced Woman at least has some baseline quality. But Garbo? She’s miscast so badly—in the role of a woman who pretends to play her own (fictional) twin sister in order to get her husband back—that she retired after this film. (Her retirement wasn’t completely due to Two-Faced Woman’s commercial flop—but it did not help.) This being said—ah, how can I say—I liked the film anyway. For one thing, the classic oh-so-serious Garbo isn’t my favourite; and for another thing, I’ve always had a soft spot for silly over-the-top comedy. Combine those things, and Two-Faced Woman isn’t so bad after all. Sure, the film is a bit mishandled (some of it due to hasty reshoots to placate censors) a bit broad, a bit inconsistent. But it’s still a high-concept romantic comedy, and this is one of the rare films where being unfamiliar (or unsympathetic) with the filmography of its star may be a benefit. I do think that another comedienne would have been better (as in: looser, funnier) than Garbo, but the film itself is worth a look and a few chuckles.

  • Lola (1961)

    Lola (1961)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, August 2020) I’m not a big fan of writer-director Jacques Demy, and going back to have a look at his first feature Lola doesn’t endear me any further to him. A characteristically unfulfilling romance with a twisted cast of characters, it’s about a young man falling in love with his ex-girlfriend, except that she pines for her own ex, and another man also pines for her. At least, with Anouk Aimée in the lead, we can understand how that character can have three lovelorn men revolving around her. The rest of the film is considerably fuzzier, which should not be a surprise to anyone with a good knowledge of Demy’s filmography. It’s quite French Nouvelle Vague, except without much of the playfulness found in other comparable films. Romantic, for sure, but not comforting at all.

  • Chopping Mall (1986)

    Chopping Mall (1986)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, August 2020) In retrospect, it was inevitable that someone would seek to combine the 1980s robot movie craze with the slasher horror of the beginning of the decade. Of course it had to be from Roger Corman’s production company. In Chopping Mall (retitled from Killbots), we head back to the very recognizable Sherman Oaks Galleria for a night of terror as three couples of teenagers sneak into the mall for a night of horizontal mattress bouncing. Alas for them, the mall has just introduced robot sentries and a freak thunderbolt has just switched the robot’s main directive switch from “apprehend” to “KILL, KILL, KILL.” The rest of the film plays out like your typical horror movie, as the number of remaining characters dictates how close we are to the ending—and how sexual activity will doom some characters sooner than others. The low-budget nature of the film is most clearly seen in the inconsistent staging of the action, the wobbly robots or the slap-dash way the script doesn’t even stick to the specifications it posits for its killbots. There are some unintentional moments of mirth, but a few very deliberate laughs as well. One of the highlights of the film comes early during a demonstration of the robot (anticipating Robocop’s ED-209 sequence by a year) in which we’re treated to a short cameo from Paul Bartel and the ever-cute Mary Woronov as their own Eating Raoul characters, cracking wise at the product demonstration in front of them. Otherwise, there isn’t much to Chopping Mall than a memorable but not exceptional techno-horror movie: ridiculous, cheap, short but with just enough distinction for it to be easily remembered. “Oh, yeah, that movie where robots kill teenagers in a mall…” Yeah, that’s it. Cinematic immortality of a sort. Also, a really catchy main theme.

  • Reign of the Supermen (2019)

    Reign of the Supermen (2019)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On TV, August 2020) Superman’s death can’t be left alone no matter the medium, and so the animated Reign of the Supermen follows the animated Death of Superman as if it had been planned all along. In the aftermath, four different supermen rise up, each claiming to be the successor to the Man of Steel (who, meanwhile, is regenerating in his Fortress of Solitude). But that’s not enough—we also need a new threat that the four supermen can fight, and for the real one to come back and prove that he’s the real thing. Considering that Reign of the Supermen is only 87 minutes long, that’s a lot of stuff to cover in a film and the pacing has this crazy go-go-go speed not helped in the slightest by contrivances and trite dialogue. As is often the case in those episodic DCAMU, the biggest fun is to be found in the details—such as, in this case, Lois Lane and Wonder Woman bonding over the disappeared Superman. It’s probably a mistake to see this as a distinct film— it’s really the conclusion to Death of Superman and watching it in any other context just feels unsatisfying. It’s not quite as good as its predecessor, but at least it concludes the narrative arc.

  • Swag Inc. (2019)

    Swag Inc. (2019)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On TV, August 2020) In keeping with many BET+ original movies, Swag Inc. is a mixture of low-low-low-budget filmmaking, apprentice actors, threadbare production means, quirky screenplay (due to lack of experience, not deliberate subversion), humdrum directing, beautiful actresses, amateur narrative structure and some undefinable but real charm. The threadbare plot has young men founding a dating service, then getting embroiled in professional and romantic complications, but since the film constantly zigs and zags uncontrollably from one tone to another, it can be hard to follow along. It’s not particularly good—the screenplay can be torn to shreds, the cinematography is utilitarian, the dialogue trite and the actors think a bit too much about what they’re doing. But, and that too is a part of the BET+ original movie experience, I kind of liked it. It’s not terribly ambitious cinema, but it delivers eye candy, smirks, romance and success for the characters. My expectations were low for Swag, Inc. and they were met. I can’t guarantee the same, however, if you go into this one as your first BET+ original movie.