THEGAYUK

Category: Film

  • FILM REVIEW | A Most Wanted Man

    ★★★★★ |  A Most Wanted Man

    In Dutch filmmaker Anton Corbijn’s take on John le Carré’s spy thriller we are very much aware of who ‘the most wanted man’ is, but like Gunther Bachmann, a German Intelligence Officer in Hamburg, we never know why he has earned this title.

    Gunther is very much the ‘good man’ in this intricate web of international spy/terrorist catching. Gruff, scruffy, chain-smoking and a fiercely independent operator in charge of a Specialised Terrorist Unit, he is trying to get information from Issa Karpov a half Russian & half-Chechen Muslim illegal immigrant before the police or other authorities can capture and imprison him.

    Karpov has escaped from a Russian prison where he was brutally tortured and he is portrayed as being the innocent victim of the fact that his father was a notorious terrorist/criminal. Via a sympathetic lawyer, Karpov leads Gunther to Tommy Brue a wealthy Merchant Banker who is trying to extract himself from his late father’s dubious clients who he has inherited. This includes Karpov Snr. who still has a major nest egg stashed away in the Bank. Gunther wants to use Brue and these illegal millions to trap a respected Professor who he suspects is the head of a cell of terrorists. Although both the German Authorities and the CIA. reluctantly agree to give Gunther time to do things his way, they obviously do not mean it at all.

    It’s a well told thrilling intricate story, although a tad confusing at times, and it keeps you completely engaged until the very end. It’s very much Gunther’s story, which is appropriate as the great Philip Seymour Hoffman plays him magnificently in this, his final movie role. I’m unsure if Corbijn actually re-edited the movie as a result of Hoffman’s untimely death which occurred after its Sundance Premiere, but anyway Gunther is rarely off the screen. It’s a powerful swan song from this talented actor and even more poignant because he plays yet another dishevelled character that seems to be such a perfect fit for him in his very distinguished career.

    The cast is made up of Rachel McAdams as the liberal lawyer/social worker, Robin Wright as the cold-hearted double-dealing CIA. Agent, Willem Dafoe as the Banker plagued by the sins of his father, Nina Hoss as the very matter-of-fact loyal assistant to Gunther, and handsome Grigoriy Dobrygin as the hunted man who is forced to decide between his life and his religion when he is made to shave his shaggy beard off.

    We came away believing the real possibility that if the Gunthers of this world were actually allowed to use Intelligence as opposed to the usual knee-jerk response of sheer brutality to try and deal with the whole scenario of terrorists, then things may even start to get resolved. And the other totally different thought ingrained in our minds as the final credits rolled, was that the world will never quite be the same after the loss of such a very fine actor.

    A Most Wanted Man opens in the UK on the 12th September 2014

  • FILM REVIEW | I’m A Porn Star

    Filmmaker Charlie David‘s light-hearted rambling review of the burgeoning gay pornography industry could never be mistaken as a serious piece of investigative journalism. After speedily racing through the whole history of the business from its birth in the 1930s up to present day, the documentary focuses on four of the most successful performers today. They have probably earned the accolade of ‘star’ but then again this grossly overused title has now been claimed by everyone who has ever had a bit part in a movie or video. And there are a lot of them. In our internet based culture there now an estimated 370 million porn websites online contributing the bulk of a $13 billion business worldwide!

    All of David’s subjects are very affable men and happy enough to candidly share their views on controversial topics such as barebacking, HIV, social stigma, fetishes and escorting. The whole question of gay-for-pay was also discussed by them and not always in a positive manner. Whilst Colby Jansen’s attitude regarding his evolving sexuality was refreshingly honest, Johnny Rapid’s constant reminders of not only how straight he was (‘When I am being f..ked by a guy, I keep thinking of my girlfriend just so that I can remain erect’) became very tiresome.

    And with interviews with Ryan R a leading director (and a heterosexual) who claimed as others did that he did gay instead of straight porn because it was financially more lucrative, David never pushed him or anyone else further on this issue. The fact that there are seemingly so many straight men either side of the camera seems to indicate that as a community we still haven’t dispensed with all our internalised homophobia.

    The most likeable, and by far the most level-headed of the pornstars featured, was the young-looking 29 years old Canadian Brent Everett. He’s not only an out proud gay man, but a happily married one who also has the full support of his parents for his chosen line of work. Everett, quite a charmer, is very effusive about his very successful career and doesn’t proffer any hint of regret or become an apologist for his roles like so many of his peers. He revels in the fact that it his work is fun and that he is clearly committed to making it as entertaining and sexy as possible for his legions of fans.

    And that was probably David’s motives in making this titillating movie with its explicit scenes of sex and a seemingly endless parade of erect penises that often distract you from some of his narration. He also succeeds in making the industry look like a well-run corporate type business far removed from its old sleazy and seedy back-street image. It’s an enjoyable and diverting lively romp that will fascinate and amuse anybody with the slightest interest in the subject i.e. all gay men!

     

     

  • FILM REVIEW | Ballet Boys

    Ballet Boys is a feature length documentary that follows in the footsteps of three adolescent male dancers as they are about to graduate from the Norwegian Ballet Academy and move on to the next stage of their training. ★★★

    CREDIT: Ballet Boys

    (more…)

  • FILM REVIEW | Magic In The Moonlight

    ★★ | Magic In The Moonlight

    Within a few minutes after the opening of this movie… Woody Allen’s 46th, and probably one of his most tedious … it is very obvious that the magic in the title refers strictly to the staged tricks created by the two leading characters and not to the film itself.

    Allen’s very thin story, set in Europe some time between the two World Wars, is about a famous English professional illusionist who’s stage persona is a very crass Chinaman complete with Fu Manchu moustache (which I’m guessing that Allen must have considered was not racially offensive). Wei Ling Soo aka Stanley is recruited by his best friend Howard to unmask an American psychic who he believes is faking her way into the bosom of a wealthy American Family vacationing in their chateau on the French Riviera. Sophie is aided and abetted by her scheming mother in order to get their hands on some of their fortune and marry the gormless heir of the family.

    It turns out she really is a fraud but for totally different reasons than the ones that we expect, but by the time that the pompous sarcastic Stanley has uncovered this, we have lost all interest anyway. Forget the sleight of hand tricks he plays, as its the plot that is so slight to the point of being so transparently obvious.

    Cold-hearted cynical Stanley with his very unemotional fiance back in London naturally falls in love with Sophie but as she is practically 30 years younger, we are as uncomfortable about this age-inappropriate romance as Stanley awkwardly appears to be as well.

    Colin Firth makes heavy going of his portrayal of Stanley, and a radiant looking Emma Stone fares little better in this very stilted script that gives neither of them much of a chance to shine. The only cast member that relieved the fast encroaching boredom was the wonderful Eileen Aitkens as Stanley’s Aunt, even though her part was very small.

    Kudos though for the stunning period costumes and very glorious sets and locations which at least gave us something pretty to look at, but not enough to stop me nodding off from time to time.

    P.S. Look closely in the scene set in a Jazz Club for the fleeting glance of the singer who is none other than the fabulous Ute Lemper.

  • FILM REVIEW | Obvious Child

    ★★★★★ | Obvious Child

    The movie opens with a very confident Donna in the middle of her stand-up comedy routine in a small nondescript bar in New York. She is extremely funny and disarmingly honest as she talks candidly about the absurdities of her own life.

    The small audience loves it and applaud her enthusiastically when she finishes her Set. All that is except her boyfriend who had been standing at the back of the room listening to a stream of highly personal jokes made at his expense. Then minutes later the two of them are together in a rather busy unisex bathroom and he dumps her. Not for the jokes but because he has been sleeping with her best friend for some time now.

    Suddenly life doesn’t seem quite so funny for this part-time comedian so she takes to her bed with a large bottle of wine and her phone. The more she drinks, the more she leaves a series of ugly voicemails on her (now ex) boyfriends machine.

    Days later she’s back on stage and recounts this new development that resulted in her being a reluctant single again but she is so bitter and angry that she totally alienates the dwindling audience. This calls for more drinking in the bar afterwards and when she is well-plastered allows herself to be picked up by Max a clean-cut preppy business studies graduate who seems a fish-out-water both in this Dive and also in Donna’s bed where he ends up later.

    Fast forward a few weeks and Donna discovers she is pregnant. She knows that the baby is Max’s but, as she tells Nellie her roommate, she doesn’t know how it happened. She was sure they had condoms and that she had even helped Max open the packet, but she was unsure if in their drunken stupor they had actually used them.

    What Donna has no doubts about is that she will have an abortion, but when in a series of coincidences, she keeps running into Max again, she feels an obligation to at least share the news with him. The trouble is she never knows how too. She tries to confide in her puppet-making very supportive father and even in her rather cold micro-managing Professor mother but she fears losing their support. Naturally, when she does break down and break the news they are in her corner anyway and back her choice completely.

    But still left with having to deal with Max, she invites the unsuspecting (and very sweet) man to watch her perform at the Bar the night before the ‘procedure’ is scheduled, the date is February 13th. She is brutally upfront with all the details regarding the unwanted pregnancy and her chosen route and has her slightly shocked audience laughing along with her. Except, Max who runs out into the cold.

    This wonderful, refreshing, heart-breaking comedy that bravely dares to tackle the oft-taboo subject of abortion head on is the work of director and co-writer Gillian Robespierre and is based on the successful short film she had made a few years earlier. Both Donna and Max are very believable characters, thanks to a combination of some excellent writing and great performances, and even though they are so totally opposite on many levels they are a good fit. This is, despite the plot I have outlined so far, a romantic comedy after all. There are still some moments of great pain and struggle as Donna wrestles with the finality of her choice and I think it is also very important to note that even with its very honest and open approach to abortion, no-one in this story treats the subject glibly.

    There is also a rather wonderful unexpected ending that so refreshingly steered cleared of all of the usual cliches but as it includes spoilers I have omitted covering it here.

    This is indie movie making at its best and I loved it now just as much and when I first saw this at Sundance.

  • FILM REVIEW | Man At Bath

    ★ | Man At Bath
    Emmanuel is a man of very few words, a hustler and the live-in lover of Omar.

    They live in an apartment in a tower block in Gennevilliers, a working-class suburb of Paris. When Omar announces that he is going to New York for a week to work on a film project, an angry Emmanuel punishes him by brutally sexually assaulting him. After that, as Omar goes to leave, he tells Emmanuel to move out of the apartment by the time he returns from his trip.

    Emmanuel wiles his way seemingly having sex with half of the men in his neighbourhood, some for money, and others just for the hell of it. It’s hard to tell as he is one very emotionless cold fish. He does have the idea of trying to contact Omar in New York but as he is so detached from real life, he somehow thinks that the only way to do this is by the defunct Telegram system.

    Omar, on the other hand, is traipsing around New York videoing his friend Chiara Mastrioniani (playing herself) promoting her latest movie. Along the way, he manages to pick up a skinny Canadian film student who becomes an obsession for both his sexual appetite and his camera too.

    Despite trying to desperately read between the lines trying to discover any deep or disguised existentialist meaning, that sadly is the total sum of it. The movie is the latest from French filmmaker Christophe Honoré whose somewhat indulgent output in recent years has gone from quite bizarre (Beloved) to downright bad (Let My People Go) and this one fits neatly in both camps.

    I’m not sure if the whole affair was meant to be a vehicle to ‘legitimise’ the gay porn star Francois Sagat’s move into mainstream films because if it was, it was a complete and utter failure. I kept thinking back to Manhola Dargis of The New York Times when she once wrote about Janet Jackson: ‘how can I put it gently? She is a woman of very limited facial expressions!’ Ms Dargis has evidently not seen Mr Sagat on the screen, as he has none!

    When the very short muscular Sagat strips his clothes off every other scene despite his erect penis he fails to imbue the act with any sexuality at all, which doesn’t make this even a half-decent piece of soft porn.

    Evidently, the whole project had been commissioned by the writer/director Olivier Assayas on behalf of the Theatre de Gennevilliers, and Honore took his own inspiration from a local Impressionist painting entitled Man at Bath. The end result is hardly something that would make me want to visit Gennevilliers, or even sit through another Honore movie in the near distant future.

  • FILM REVIEW | Happy Christmas

    Jeff and Kelly are trying are trying to do a balancing act juggling their freelance careers whilst bringing up their 2year old son Jude.

    It’s slightly off kilter right now as Jeff is managing to work on pre-production of his next movie, but Kelly has got writer’s block since she completed her first book so has settled for full-time homemaking for the time being. The couple is however quite happy and things are going along relatively smoothly until they get a holiday visit that shatters their peace and throws the household into disarray.

    The visitor is Jeff’s rather volatile sister Jenny who’s just had a bad breakup with her latest boyfriend and she flies into town for some much needed TLC, in return for helping them out with some childcare. It is soon apparent that self-absorbed Jenny is incapable of looking after herself let alone a small helpless baby. On her first night, she goes to a party with an old friend and gets so totally wasted and passes out that Jeff is forced to go collect her in the middle of the night.

    The next time Jenny gets totally drunk is when she is babysitting young Jude at home and this time she almost manages to burn the whole house down. It then takes a lot of persuading on Jeff’s part to convince his very sceptical wife to give her sister-in-law another chance. Kelly does eventually reluctantly agree and the two women very slowly start to bond. Jenny actually encourages her to her back to writing by telling her to set aside her planned second novel and instead write a sexually explicit trashy novel to make some fast ready money.

    Suddenly Jenny has a purpose too and she looks less likely to self-destruct and even grabs herself a new beau and starts to date the family babysitter (and pot dealer) Kevin and surprisingly looks that she might live happily ever after all. Possibly.

    This is the latest movie from prolific filmmaker Joe Swanberg who as usual directs, writes and stars in it too. I will confess that I am a fan as even when the plots are slight (as this one is) there is a cast of well-rounded characters whose interplay with each other as they cope (and enjoy) their daily existence makes for fascinating viewing. Swanberg injects it all with his own tempered sense of humour, and in this instance is aided by the presence of Lena Dunham playing Carson, Jenny’s best friend. But then he always shrewdly casts his movies with what appear to be his mates Melanie Lynskey as Kelly, Anna Kendrick as Jenny and Mark Webber as Kevin.

    I’m generally on the same page as Charles Laughton when it comes to children in movies, but even I could not help but be seduced by scene-stealing baby Jude played by Swanberg’s own son.

    After last year’s Drinking Buddies this is probably Swanberg’s second most accessible work to date and part of his continued evolving from a filmmaker once known as the king of mumblecore. Long may it continue.

  • FILM REVIEW | The Notorious Mr Bout

    ★★★★★ | The Notorious Mr Bout

    According to this new documentary from filmmakers Tony Gerber and Maxim Pozdorovkin, it would seem that everybody has wildly exaggerated polarising ideas about who Viktor Anatolyevich Bout really is. None more so than Mr Bout himself who considers himself simply as a devoted family man and a highly successful international entrepreneur, and the D.E.A. who claim that his illegal arms trading and gun-running activities have rightly earned him the title of Merchant of Death. It seems that the truth may lie somewhere in the middle.

    After the fall of communism in his native Russia, Bout was determined to embrace the newly permitted capitalist society and so bravely entered the world of import/export. At first he traded in anything he could lay his hands upon, but then hit on the fact he could make even more money by buying up old Russian planes and starting a cargo service in the Third World. As well as shipping produce and home electronics he and his rather dubious partners included Bulgarian made arms in the consignments that they flew around some of the more troubled countries in Africa.

    Bout is undoubtedly a larger-than-life colourful character. One of his many excesses was his love of his video camera and whilst it made for some very intimate and extraordinary footage for this film, he also shot footage when he was cavorting with several warlords and some very shady despots, and that provided damning evidence when the authorities decided to go after him. The D.E.A. set up a covert sting operation in Bangkok where it was alleged that the shipment of arms he was selling were intended to be used to kill Americans, so he was arrested and extradited to the US where he was made an example of, by being given an excessively long jail sentence.

    According to investigative journalists who had met Bout out in the field, he was really very small fry in the world of arms trading and he did not in anyway justify either the reasoning or the ferocity of the way that he was pursued. The D.E.A. could have felt that they had been taunted by the brazen way he carried out his activities, which frankly were fueled by both his love of the limelight and his sheer naivete.

    Bout’s loyal wife Alla is a constant presence throughout the film (the very dated archival footage of their wedding is particularly wonderful) and she dutifully plays along as his supportive partner. As she deals with her husband’s trial she also proclaims her innocence too, but whilst she may not have been explicitly involved, it is hard to believe that she didn’t know what her husband was up too.

    At the end of this excellent and compelling documentary it’s clear that the ‘notoriety’ in the title really split between Bout’s activities but also with the questionable motives of the D.E.A. At Bout’s trial, the Judge made a point of mentioning that prior to the entrapment operation that the D.E.A. had set up, there was no evidence at all that Bout had broken any American laws.

    It seems that they wanted to make a scapegoat/example of someone and so they chose Viktor Anatolyevich Bout. This is a distraction from the main picture as just before the credits role, someone makes the point that most arms trafficking in the world is done by Governments trying to help their friends, and this is rarely considered illegal.

    Highly recommended

  • FILM: A Man, His Lover and His Mother

    Lorenz Meran is a successful middle-aged gay writer who is struggling with writer’s block when he gets called back home after his elderly mother has a stroke.

    Rosie is a feisty old bird and unlike Lorenz and his perpetually unhappy sibling Sophie, she seems to be the one member of this family who likes to have some fun. A little too much now given the fragile state of her health but whatever happens, she is determined not to give up chain smoking or even admit to the fact that she is an alcoholic.

    The parental home is a small town in eastern Switzerland, a far cry from Lorenz’s hedonistic life in Berlin of one-night stands that he chronicles in his novels, but as his mother’s health declines he very reluctantly finds himself back in the house he never thought he would ever have to live in again. He does, however, have a diversion one night when he has an ‘encounter’ with Mario a grandson of his mother’s friend, but as he dresses and prepares to leave the next morning he discovers that the boy had actually been a big fan of his work for some time. So without discussing it at all, Lorenz panics and hastily dashes off telling a startled Mario that he would never have had sex with him if he had known he was just a groupie.

    The plot unravels slowly as the family are hesitantly drawn together by their mother’s decline, and Sophie has to finally deal with her own failing marriage, and both siblings make the startling discovery that it wasn’t in fact their mother who had been having ‘affairs’ when they were young as they had always suspected, but it had been their overbearing and distant father, now long dead. And all his lovers were in fact men.

    Jaded Lorenz’s humor never seems to lighten as he tries to deal with his impatient Literary Agent from afar, and with sullen Chantal a young neighbor of his mother’s who he suspects is supplying Rosie with alcohol. If that is not enough, at his mother’s insistence, Mario turns up to help doing oddjobs about the house.

    And then just when you are about to despair about this family, Rosie reluctantly but with her usual style, decides to make a go of living in the Seniors home that they forced her into, Sophie gets back with her estranged husband for another reconciliation, and Lorenz stops being angry and suspicious of the world just in time to realise that the long term love of his life that he has always wanted is actually there on his doorstep in the shape of Mario. And to top it all, his writer’s block disappears as he sets about writing his latest novel based on Rosie, and the ‘triangle’ he discovered when he explored his father’s past.

    The movie is the latest work of Swiss gay filmmaker Marcel Gisler (who like Lorenz was born in Altstätten and works in Berlin, however I could not establish if this is an autobiographical piece). Gisler’s movie output is infrequent at best… the last one was 14 years ago… his usual fare are more explicitly gay and complicated, and this one is definitely his most refined and subtlest. Lorenz’s long struggle for happiness is finally determined by resolving the questions that arise from the troubling nightmares he still has about his father, and from being able to accept and enjoy the love of his family simply for what it is.

    It all works… albeit a little drawn out… not just because of the script with its scattered passages of dark humour, but also because of the two excellent central performances. The veteran Swiss Actress Sibylle Brunner, in her first ever leading role, is rightly picking up awards for her devastatingly wonderful turn as Rosie, and Swiss actor Fabian Krüger is pitch perfect as the dour faced Lorenz who waits until the last reel to smile.

    This movie is being hailed in some quarters as New Swiss Cinema and worthy of a world audience. I’m not sure if I really knew much about ‘Old Swiss Cinema ‘to make any comment, other than to say it definitely is well-worth seeing.

    A Man, His Lover And His Mother is Available to buy on DVD from Amazon

  • FILM REVIEW | Bruno & Earlene Go To Vegas

    ★★ | Bruno & Earlene Go To Vegas

    When the movie opens Earlene is sitting on a wall in Venice Beach swigging from a bottle secreted in a brown paper bag and she very dramatically utters to a total stranger, ‘Experience is the name we give our mistakes. Which one are you?’ and I cannot help but cringe.

    It sadly will not be the last time I feel like that, whilst watching this well-meaning micro-budget indie movie, that is all heart but ends up being an undisciplined convoluted mishmash of a film.

    Earlene like every other character in this story has her ‘issues’ although in her case the reason for her mood swings is not clear until near the end. Her new androgynous Australian friend Bruno, that she immediately latches on to at their first encounter is sexually confused, and so she adopts his well-being and happiness as her own crusade. Bruno has a dream of visiting Paris to see the Eiffel Tower, which is obviously out of the question as neither of them have any money, so his new friend Earlene promises to take him on a road trip to see the next best thing i.e. a full-size replica in Las Vegas.

    En route and a chance meeting with Billy, a good-looking cocky gay drifter takes them off course and they stumble upon a very small forgotten town in the middle of the Nevada desert. It’s inhabited by an odd bunch of misfits straight out of Central Casting that includes a Cher look-alike Sheriff, a tap-dancing drag queen, and a couple of Scottish male strippers. They are all kindred spirits who have found this remote bolt-hole where they can escape the outside world that none of them remotely fit in.

    This debut feature from British writer/director/producer Simon Savory bravely tackles issues of gender and sexual identity and friendship, and at times is close to succeeding. It’s valiant effort, however, is hampered by a heavy-handed script with a smattering of pompous sounding epithets which made the dialogue somewhat stilted. Ashleigh Simpson the lead actress could have taken her performance down a notch or too as she overplayed the part of Earlene to the point of being annoying.

    On the other hand, Savory’s choice to shoot this British production on location was very wise and really paid off with some excellent cinematography of the beautiful desert setting.

    P.S. It’s tough being a filmmaker with such a minute budget and the biggest disadvantage of assuming all the major functions yourself, as in this case is that you lack the benefit of another independent set of ears and eyes which may have spotted some of the issues, which stopped it being the movie it was obviously meant to be.

    Due for release on the 15th September.

  • Leonardo DiCaprio And Tom Cruise Top Sexiest Flight Crew Survey

    Pilot or stewardess? Man or woman? If you’re an aviation fan and you have a thing for airborne film characters, it will come as no surprise to you that one in two felt a certain weakness for Tom Cruise as a fighter pilot in Top Gun.

    The statistics are drawn from the Travel and Compensation Habits of English Passengers survey carried out by refund.me, the international provider that helps airline passengers claim their right to financial compensation for delays, cancellations, missed connections and diversions.

    Cruise isn’t alone on the wish-list of British passengers. Second place went to Leonardo DiCaprio, who received 32% of the votes thanks to his role in the Hollywood hit Catch Me If You Can, and third place to Denzel Washington for his performance as a pilot in Flight with 18% of the votes.

    When it comes to female cabin crew, the most desired actress after Catherine Zeta Jones was Kirsten Dunst, who received 39% of the votes, for her role in the romantic comedy Elisabethtown. She was followed in third place by Ellen Pompeo, who received 20% of the vote for her performance as Marci in Catch Me If You Can.

    refund.me has consolidated its position in the UK market as a leading representative of passengers seeking compensation from airlines for delays, cancellations, missed connections and diversions. Charging a sector-low commission of 15%, the provider helps users to receive compensation of up to €600.