list.co.uk/fi lm Reviews | FILM
ACTION BASTILLE DAY (15) 92min ●●●●●
DRAMA DEMOLITION (15) 101min ●●●●● BIOPIC – DRAMA MILES AHEAD (15) 100min ●●●●●
If James Watkins’ frenetic Parisian thriller is to be remembered for anything, it’ll be that it comes across like Idris Elba’s unofi cial audition to play the next James Bond. He’s the highlight of this violent yarn as Sean Briar, a tough-as-nails and taciturn CIA agent who punches before he speaks. Richard ‘Robb Stark’ Madden plays Michael Mason, an American pickpocket who lifts the wrong bag when he steals from Zoe (Charlotte Le Bon), a girl who has fallen in with the team of anarchists behind a bombing campaign. When the bag explodes, Mason is caught on camera as the suspect. But, as revealed by the increasingly far- fetched plot, these terrorists are not who they seem.
Watkins keeps the action fast and furious – a blend of gunshots, squealing tyres and cries of ‘Mon Dieu!’ – as if he’s been watching a lot of Luc Besson i lms. But The French Connection this is not. Nor is it even V for Vendetta, with the sight of anti-fascist rioters feeling ill-conceived. And how French audiences will react, given the terror attacks of November 2015, is another matter. But it’s funny – sometimes unintentionally so – and delivered with the handbrake off. Never mind Elba, this might be Watkins’ 007 calling card. (James Mottram) ■ General release from Fri 22 Apr.
In consecutive years, Jean-Marc Vallée has directed Matthew McConaughey to an Oscar win in Dallas Buyers Club and Reese Witherspoon to a nomination in Wild. Teaming Vallée with Jake Gyllenhaal after his brilliant performance in Nightcrawler must have seemed like a sure-i re bet for awards recognition. Sadly, Demolition is a dreadfully earnest look at bereavement, that’s often reminiscent of Hollywood at its worst. After the death of his wife, investment banker
Davis (Gyllenhaal) begins to act erratically, taking apart objects and paying to join a demolition crew as they dismantle houses. His grief leads him to write an angry letter to a vending machine company when he unsuccessfully tries to get a bag of sweets from one of their products, but the missive falls into the sympathetic hands of Karen (Naomi Watts), who forms a healing friendship with him. Writer Bryan Sipe is also responsible for this year’s laughable Nicholas Sparks adaptation The Choice, and his script for Demolition is similarly shallow. The cutesy ending suggests that the i lm’s heart is in the right place, but the tiresome histrionics take a wrecking ball to the considerable reputations of all concerned. (Eddie Harrison) ■ General release from Fri 29 Apr.
‘If you’re gonna tell a story, come with some attitude, man.’ So says Don Cheadle in the guise of Miles Davis, with the actor taking his own advice in this free-form biopic of the jazz icon. It’s an evident passion project for Cheadle, who makes his directorial debut, alongside co-writing, producing and taking the lead role. The bulk of the i lm unfolds in mid-1970s New York, where Davis is battling a degenerative hip condition, drug dependency and creative block. He’s jolted out of seclusion by the arrival of journalist Dave Brill (Ewan McGregor) and soon the pair are engaged in a (i ctional) caper, as they try to retrieve a master tape from a slimy music executive (an underused Michael Stuhlbarg). As director, Cheadle employs dynamic editing, with images and sounds triggering l ashbacks to earlier parts of Davis’ life, yet the i lm still ends up resorting to many of the biopic clichés it seems so eager to avoid. Fortunately, the leads are l awless, with Cheadle capturing Davis’ raspy voice and swagger and forming an enjoyable double act with McGregor. What Miles Ahead lacks in consistency and detail it makes up for in attitude, as it captures the spirit of Davis’ life and career. (Matthew Turner) ■ General release from Fri 22 Apr.
CRIME THRILLER VICTORIA (15) 138min ●●●●●
Sebastian Schipper’s sensational thriller is the real deal, 138-minutes of drama captured in just one take. The action unspools on the streets of Berlin as an innocent woman falls for a dubious man and ends up embroiled in a daring heist with tragic consequences.
Single, continuous shots are nothing new, from Hitchcock’s Rope in 1948 to 2014’s Birdman, but there’s usually some subterfuge involved. For his fourth feature, actor-turned-director Schipper has come up with an original, kinetic reason to deliver the story in this way, with the technique perfectly in tune with the breathless nature of events.
Spaniard Victoria (Laia Costa) is heading home after a night of
clubbing when she falls in with a gang led by Sonne (Frederick Lau). In the café where she works, Sonne and Victoria open up to each other as she plays the piano, but an accident with one of Sonne’s men offers Victoria a fateful opportunity to get involved with his criminal world. Schipper’s shooting strategy is more than a gimmick; it gives
his i lm a virtually unique selling point. The one-shot ethic might seem to offer limited options, but the succession of visceral action wouldn’t disgrace a big-budget Michael Mann thriller, while the love story is tenderly relayed. The young cast provides uniformly adrenalised performances,
with Lau demonstrating Brando-like moodiness, and the immense complexities involved in shooting on location chime nicely with the heist theme. The plot may betray more than a few holes when viewed in retrospect, but they’re more than papered over by a raw sense of ‘you are there’ immediacy. Victoria is an electrifying slice of cinema that is likely to be frequently imitated, but rarely improved upon. (Eddie Harrison) ■ Out now.
7 Apr–2 Jun 2016 THE LIST 69