Reviews

  • Burke and Hare (2010)

    Burke and Hare (2010)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On Cable TV, August 2020) As of this writing, a decade later, it looks as if Burke and Hare is going to remain John Landis’ last film—and it doesn’t inspire regret as much as good riddance. That’s quite a statement considering that Landis’ early filmography contains such classics as An American Werewolf in London, The Blues Brothers and Trading Places. But he peaked early: A fatal accident on the set of The Twilight Zone got him tried but acquitted of manslaughter, an ordeal from which his career never really recovered. After a major hit with 1988’s Coming to America (a film whose true paternity is very much attributable to Eddie Murphy), Landis gradually retreated throughout the 1990s, directing flop after flop after flop until the movies got much smaller and less distinguishable. Landis’s filmography then focused on TV directing to such an extent that Burke and Hare was itself Landis’ first theatrical film in over a decade. It’s not a flop, but it’s not much of a success either: Taking on the real-life facts of 18th-century serial murderers for a fanciful spin, it’s a film that tries to make dark comedy out of morbid themes (cadavers-for-cash turning into a lucrative serial killing business), and it doesn’t succeed all that well. This is despite a good cast that includes Simon Pegg, Andy Serkis, Isla Fisher and others. But what can a cast do when the script isn’t up to the task? Despite the natural fit of the source material for dark comedy, Burke and Hare ends up feeling as if it’s one single joke stretched over the entire film, without much to keep things interesting. Maybe a straight thriller would have been better if a comic approach can’t get laughs. Maybe a zanier romp would have made this funnier. Or maybe this was just an ill-begotten project in the first place. While Landis gets to play with a credible historical recreation and some talented actors, Burke and Hare rarely shines. On the flip side, Landis now seems to accept what he should have done in 1990—retirement’s not too bad, and far preferable to undermining a filmography with a long tail end of flops and misses.

  • The Gate (1987)

    The Gate (1987)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On Cable TV, August 2020) There is a fascinating core to kiddy-horror film The Gate that disappoints more than it satisfies. It does have a lot of the same elements that made such a success out of Poltergeist: the numerous special effects imaginatively rendered, (including plenty of stop-motion) the sense of dull suburban reality collapsing against supernatural assault, the down-to-earth characters and the increasing dreamlike weirdness of the thrills… this should have been much, much better than it is. But the script and director Tibor Takács end up focusing so much on the young protagonists that, in doing so, they handicap the film to a milquetoast result that pleases no one. The kids will find it too spooky, the adults will find it too tame, and we end up far away from Poltergeist with similar material. I mean, sure, you can always show it to 12-year-olds to hook them up on horror, but such younger-audience fare should also be watchable by the entire family and there’s something in The Gate that simply doesn’t click as well as it should.

  • Pootie Tang (2001)

    Pootie Tang (2001)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On TV, July 2020) I’m about a generation too late at the Pootie Tang party, and a lot of it has to do with its reputation as a terrible movie. It’s not wholly undeserved, but the film itself is a great deal funnier than expected. Stemming from sketches from The Chris Rock Show and directed by then lesser-known Louis C.K., Pootie Tang is the kind of absurd satirical comedy that either falls flat or strikes a chord. It’s ingeniously dumb, as it revolves around a character (Pootie Tang!) meant as a parody of multi-hyphenates artists in the wake of the blaxploitation era. Pootie Tang (and please decline any drinking game in which the mention of the name is a trigger for alcohol consumption) is a rapper, actor and positive role model whose appeal is largely inexplicable to viewers but deeply felt by the characters in the film’s reality. Lance Crouther is pretty good in the lead role, while Robert Vaughn deliciously shows up at the antagonist, Jennifer Coolidge and Wanda Sykes provide some decent sex appeal, and Chris Rock goofs around in a variety of roles—plus many cameos big and small. Pootie Tang is almost aggressively stupid at times, but darn if I didn’t giggle during a good chunk of it: I liked the anti-corporate message, the semantic tour de force presented by the title character’s dialogue and the unapologetic weirdness of its humour. Don’t go in Pootie Tang expecting an ordinary, let alone good movie: you will know within moments if the absurdity of it all will grab you.

  • The Setup (1949)

    The Setup (1949)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, July 2020) Somehow, boxing and film noir often go hand in hand, or maybe fist-to-fist: The subgenre is filled with sweaty gymnasiums, high-stakes bouts, boxers attempting to go straight and shady promoters eager to fix matches. What works really well in boxing thriller The Setup is its attempt to tell, in real time, a story of sports manipulation and personal redemption, as a boxer trying to retire ends up fighting against the orders of his manager to lose. There’s a strong sense of verisimilitude and intensity coming from the work of director Robert Wise here—not only the cranked-up tension of a real time 70 minutes, but the atmosphere of a boxing ring, the struggles of the boxer and the way the camera moves through the environment. It’s quite admirable even for those who don’t really have an interest for boxing. The simple plot is not a disadvantage, as it allows the filmmakers to focus on the way to tell the story. The Setup is quite admirable, but it also anticipates a slew of other later boxing films (notably Raging Bull) that would move away from realistic aesthetics in telling ringside stories.

  • Maniac Cop 2 (1990)

    Maniac Cop 2 (1990)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On Cable TV, August 2020) Considering my low opinion of slashers, it’s a bit surprising that I ended up moderately enjoying Maniac Cop 2. Interestingly enough, it’s a sequel that assumes the best parts of its predecessor, and strategically maximizes a few elements in order to get even larger audiences. For one thing, it takes as granted the supernatural nature of its titular Maniac Cop brought back from the dead. For another, it frequently trades gore for action with more stunts than the previous film. The iconography of the killer cop is also maximized, which is nearly always a good thing in creating great visuals. (There is one great fire-stunt shot that’s so good I’m wondering why it hasn’t been stolen by later generations of filmmakers.) Best of all, though, is how writer Larry Cohen and director William Lustig stick to their B-movie guns: Maniac Cop 2 is wall-to-wall entertainment, clearly dedicated to being a pure thrill machine. Claudia Christian has a starring role, and Bruce Campbell is back for a brief encore. This being said, this does remain a B-movie bordering on slasher exploitation—keep your expectations in check.

  • Happy Birthday to Me (1980)

    Happy Birthday to Me (1980)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (In French, On Cable TV, August 2020) You’ve seen simple Tuesday slashers, Friday the 13th slashers, Halloween slashers, Christmas slashers, April’s fool slashers, probably Easter slashers and Independence Day slashers—but what about a birthday slasher? That’s the gimmick adopted by Happy Birthday to Me, in which the friends of a girl about to celebrate her 18th birthday all start mysteriously dying. You may guess where this is going, but the filmmakers have a wild climactic plot twist in store. Never mind that it makes most of the plot impossible and meaningless—the original ending having been (correctly) judged too predictable, it was (incorrectly) reworked to make it less obvious no matter whether it still made sense. Production values are equal to what low-budget Canadian horror movies were capable of doing at the time: gritty, dark, fuzzy, slightly charming in their lack of polish. But since this is a slasher, the place of honour (and most obvious craft) is left for the kills, many of them cruel and unusual. It’s all fairly rote for a slasher, although the car stunts and whodunit mystery aspects are slightly better than other comparable films. Still, that doesn’t give it much of an excuse for being worth a look. Sure, Happy Birthday to Me is probably better than other films of the subgenre at the time but that doesn’t make ti a must-see. If you’re writing an encyclopedia on slashers, sure, have a look—otherwise, there are much better movies to see without wasting one’s life on an early-1980s slasher.

  • Lo chiamavano Trinità… [They call me Trinity] (1970)

    Lo chiamavano Trinità… [They call me Trinity] (1970)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (YouTube Streaming, August 2020) Ah-ha! If you’re looking for the film that really ignited the career of the Bud Spencer/Terence Hill duo, look further than They Call Me Trinity. The success of God Forgives… I Don’t immediately led to a bigger-budgeted follow-up, more closely tailored to their specific skills than anything else. Accordingly, it made money, got good reviews and left a lasting legacy: Not only a (worse) sequel, but an affirmation that the Spencer/Hill duo was good for box office success—indeed, I can find a few reviews simply calling the duo, “The Trinity Brothers.” It’s easy to see why the film was a success: taking the spaghetti western formula but ensuring that it was accessible to all ages, this is a film that plays to packed houses with a blend of action and comedy. Spencer is easy to like—the teddy-bear act is a lot of fun, while Hill has the Cary Grantesque quality of being uncommonly good-looking while also being willing to plunge into whatever’s needed to get a laugh. Combined with writer-director Enzo Barboni’s intention to tone down the violence of the spaghetti western in order to make it even more broadly accessible, well, this is a film that the whole family will enjoy. Call Me Trinity is also, perhaps, the best of their collaboration—the one to highlight when introducing the duo to new audiences.

  • Rooster Cogburn (1975)

    Rooster Cogburn (1975)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, August 2020) It took a few decades, but in Rooster Cogburn we finally get to see Katharine Hepburn fire a gatling gun. Of course, the price to pay for this treat is having to endure John Wayne’s smarmy arrogance for an entire film. A sequel to True Grit, this film sees Wayne and Hepburn (born the same year; at last, an age-appropriate romance in a Hollywood movie! ) undertake a dangerous journey in the Far West to avenge the death of her friends and family. While both actors are interesting in their own way and the script is tailored to give them plenty of Significant Moments (and riff existing personas; same character for Wayne, same kind of character as The African Queen for Hepburn), Rooster Cogburn at a whole is a disappointment the moment you focus on anything but the stars and the gatling gun. The dialogue is not good, the directing is pedestrian, the narrative is humdrum and while some landscapes are spectacular, that’s really on the location scout more than anyone else. But here’s the thing: When you’ve got WAYNE and HEPBURN together at last (in the only time of their careers), it’s just not possible to pretend to ignore them in the result. Considering this, Rooster Cogburn becomes far more than just its components—it’s nearly a must-watch for classic Hollywood fans, if only for the lone reunion of two screen legends. That’s objective. If you want subjective, consider that Hepburn is at the top of my classic Hollywood list of actors, and Wayne is at the bottom.

  • The Merry Widow (1934)

    The Merry Widow (1934)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, August 2020) According to some contemporary accounts, Maurice Chevalier was one of Hollywood’s highest-paid actors of the 1930s, and his cultural influence essentially defined the French stereotype in American movies. He reportedly spoke English quite fluently in real-life, only to revert to a distinctive French accent in his movies. As much as I dislike the artifice, I must say that it helped create a strong screen persona: That of a bon vivant, gentle womanizer, easygoing hedonist… or, in other words, close to the stereotype that Americans still carry about French people, one that French people don’t do much to try to dispel. You can see that persona and attitude at play in The Merry Widow, a romantic fantasy in which imaginary European kingdoms are used as reasons for a soldier to court a rich widow. From the get-go, the film seeks an amiable, generally harmless tone: one early scene has soldiers chanting as they go to war, but with lyrics clearly stating that their only reason to go there is to impress the girls at home. Against this backdrop, Chevalier takes on the role of a playboy tasked with the serious business of national union through romantic courtship, and the rest of the film goes from there. There are plenty of reasons why this premise wouldn’t fly today, but the result is quite likable as a historical capsule. Ernest Lubitsch directs with his usual touch, and the music is surprisingly catchy. It’s clear that the film celebrates women, romance and courtship in a harmless fashion without any predatory overtones. Chevalier is truly likable, and Jeanette MacDonald is also quite good as the wooed widow. Top-notch production values in terms of sets and costumes mean that there’s always something lavish to look at. Still, the comedy is the draw and The Merry Widow is funny enough to entertain. Chevalier at his peak was not to be underestimated.

  • The Bridges at Toko-Ri (1954)

    The Bridges at Toko-Ri (1954)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On TV, August 2020) You can cleanly fit The Bridges at Toko-Ri in the evolution of the war movie. It borrows equally from the propagandist past of WW2 movies, the reality of the then-recent Korean War and anticipates the nuanced statements of Vietnam-era films. About a third of the film is an exploration of Korean-conflict marine aviation: shot in colour, it focuses on search-and-rescue operations, and on carrier-based bombing missions. Executed with the full cooperation of the US Navy, it harkens to the propaganda films of WW2 in showing us life in the service and what awaited the conscripts who chose that branch of the service. But the formula gets a somewhat more nuanced twist than the WW2 movies—about another third of the film revolves around a protagonist taken from civilian life into the reserves, and asked to fly a dangerous bombing mission. Everyone around him—wife, hierarchical superior, friends— are concerned that he may not come back, and in a larger perspective that the war may not be worth its cost in lives. Such sentiments are a bit unusual to find in military-themed movies of the era (they probably owe much to the James Michener’s novel on which the film was based) and they have contributed to The Bridges at Toko-Ri’s generally well-regarded sophistication. This ambivalence toward combat is carried through the final third of the film, in which our protagonist (William Holden) kisses his wife (Grace Kelly) goodbye and goes bombing. He won’t be back. The dour ending feels like a cold shower if you’re expecting the film to be like the other military adventures of the 1950s—the protagonist is gone, and everyone is mourning a fate that they had clearly anticipated. While I’m ambivalent about my enjoyment of the result (I like my war movies victorious), I can’t deny that the film has plenty of great moments along the way. And The Bridges at Toko-Ri simply feels prescient about the direction that Hollywood war movies would follow a few decades later.

  • The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle (1939)

    The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle (1939)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On DVD, August 2020) While it’s always great to see another new-to-me Fred Astaire film, The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle does lead me once again (but not as strongly as in The Barkleys of Broadway) to state that having Astaire play a historical character is a waste—Astaire is Astaire no matter what his character’s name is. Still, this loosely adapted biography of the title characters does let Astaire do a few things—being in a loving relationship from the get-go with frequent screen partner Ginger Rogers, for one (none of that obsessively pursuing the girl until she says yes), playing in a more realistic film and—gulp—dying at the end of the movie. That last particularity isn’t as much of a downer for two reasons: for one thing, it’s historical fact. For another, Astaire is Astaire—he still had nineteen subsequent musicals to go, and it’s not a last-minute death in a minor film that would depress viewers. The lack of characterization may actually help in softening the blow here. Still, it does highlight that of all of Astaire’s musicals (and more specifically the ten Astaire/Rogers collaboration), The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle is a more grounded film, and a duller one as well: absent the genial comedy of Astaire’s other musicals, it feels longer despite the touches of humour and dance numbers. Said dance numbers owe more to the Castles than to Astaire, meaning that they’re more restrained and not quite with the razzle-dazzle of what Astaire pulled off in previous films. While it must have felt natural to cast a great dancing duo to play the roles of famous ballroom dancers, this film stretches the limits of Astaire’s dancing persona as far as it could go in that direction. Elements of The Story of Vernon and Irene Castle would pop up in later movies (having Astaire as a pilot in The Sky’s the Limit, having Rogers and Astaire as a real-life couple in The Barkleys of Broadway), but it’s a good thing that Astaire never once headed back in that direction. I still liked the movie (it’s really hard to dislike an Astaire film), but I would rank it firmly in the actor’s lower tier.

  • Nikita [La femme Nikita] (1990)

    Nikita [La femme Nikita] (1990)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (Second Viewing, on DVD, August 2020) Coming from the middle of Luc Besson’s classic period (from 1985’s Subway to 1997’s The Fifth Element), Nikita is probably the one film you could showcase in order to show Besson’s strengths as a writer-director without veering into his excesses or self-parody. It features a strong action heroine, distrust of authority, grimy cinematography, Jean Reno, dynamic direction and strong action sequences. At least half a dozen of his later movies would revisit the same elements to various degrees of success but never as successfully. Remade stateside as Point of No Return, the original Nikita has a believable rawness of execution that more than compensate for nonsensical plot justifications. (Seriously: the covert government agency she works for is the worst possible one at what it does… but it heightens the drama.) Even those with fresh memories of the remake will find much to appreciate in the original. I probably saw the original in the mid-nineties, but still had a good time watching it anew. The premise and its execution are ridiculous: yes, let’s send an unpractised operative on an assassination mission and give her thirty seconds to prepare… that’ll go over well. As I said: “worst possible agency.” But Nikita is not so much about solid plotting than Besson’s nervy direction, Anne Parillaud’s performance and the torn stockings accessorizing big guns during the action sequences. Even thirty years and countless hitwomen movies later, this influential action thriller is still worth a watch.

  • A Wrinkle in Time (2018)

    A Wrinkle in Time (2018)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On TV, August 2020) There are many ways in which A Wrinkle in Time irritates me. It starts, clearly, with not being part of its target audience. This is a film clearly designed to appeal to teenage girls, a group of which I’ve never been part of. But it’s also self-consciously a fantasy film dressed in science-fiction garb, and I’m of the film belief that you have to play by the rules of SF if you’re hanging in its playground. But it doesn’t—by going for science-fantasy babble ever chance it gets. When the film features people scoffing at the protagonist’s theories, it wants me to feel sorry for them, but I’m rather there thinking, “No, this is actually stupid.” (One notes that the original classic YA novel by Madeleine L’Engle had pretty much the same issues, if not worse.) The dialogue can be overly precious at times, the rhythm of the film is very uneven and even the villains can be cartoonish. Despite basic technobabble about quantum entanglement and such, the film really is a fantasy in which a girl travels to the dark kingdom to rescue a loved one. The mismatch between my expectation of the form and the way it’s executed would normally be enough to put me off the result with a broken suspension of disbelief. In many ways, A Wrinkle in Time feels a lot like the similarly disappointing Tomorrowland, leading me to think that they may be something stupid in the water at Disney Studios. But here’s the thing: Despite all of this, I still have quite a bit of affection for the result. Everything else about A Wrinkle in Time is quite likable. I like Storm Reid as the protagonist, and I think we should make many more movies for young girls. I absolutely enjoyed the casting—if going on a death-defying adventure means having Oprah Whitney, Mandy Kaling and Reese Witherspoon as guardian angels, then sign me up. (Witherspoon gets the chance to be very funny along the way.) Even the supporting actors include likable choices such as Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Michael Peña, Zach Galifianakis and Chris Pine. This is definitely the father in myself speaking, but I really liked the overall message of girl empowerment and positive depiction of father/daughter relationships. The ending wraps things up satisfyingly, and director Ava Duvernay clearly shows a mastery of her craft every step of the way. The now de-rigueur wall-to-wall use of colourful CGI leads to spectacular visuals and, as much as we can use this qualifier on a $100M Disney production, the film does seem to have some earnestness to it. It’s true that I wanted to like the film more than I did. On the other hand, A Wrinkle in Time did manage to keep my sympathy despite flaws that would have destroyed most movies with the very same issues. I strongly suspect that a better film would have moved even farther away from the original L’Engle novel, prompting calls as to why it was even an adaptation.

  • Endings, Beginnings (2019)

    Endings, Beginnings (2019)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, August 2020) The key to executing a low-stake non-genre slice-of-life drama featuring ordinary people is that, well, it works best if you like those people. Or make them interesting. Or have them played by charismatic actors. Alas, Endings, Beginning is pretty much zero out of three. The beginning is particularly trying, as we’re introduced to an average loser who’s pretty much managed to screw everything in her life, and then ask us to care for her as she navigates a love triangle with opposite partners. She then finds new and painfully irritating ways to screw things up even further as the film goes on and on. Naturalistic cinematography further irritates—at some point, as dumb as it sounds, I was even exasperated by the film using the default iPhone notification sounds, as I kept reaching to see if it was my phone. Shailene Woodley makes an effort here to further distinguish herself from her best-known YA roles, but this persona may not be an improvement. Far too long for its own good, Endings, Beginnings does get slightly more interesting toward the end as the stakes get higher—but again, they’re high because the protagonist has systematically gotten in bigger trouble along the way, never taking any action to actually behave responsibly. As I said, an unlikable character makes for an unlikable film.

  • Jojo Rabbit (2019)

    Jojo Rabbit (2019)

    ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

    (On Cable TV, August 2020) The premise of Jojo Rabbit is strikingly unappealing (a young German boy, in WW2 Germany, has Hitler as an imaginary friend and befriends a Jewish girl hidden in his attic, as the Nazis close in a start purging non-patriotic Germans) but if there’s any filmmaker who could make it work, that would be Taika Waititi, whose off-beat sense of humour has led to a string of films far better than their premise would suggest. So it is that from its first moments, Jojo Rabbit plays on a knife’s edge of discomfort, applying an ironic comedy filter on events that, in other hands, would have been yet another tragic-but-dull WW2 drama. This is really and constantly not a film to be watched at a surface level, as it plays for laughs while camouflaging some terrible things. Yet it still manages to earn its dramatic moments later on. There’s an interesting mastery of craft here, as Waititi hits his off-beat beats along the way. I don’t exactly love the results, but I’m impressed enough with them.