London Film Festival Review - Rare Exports: A Christmas Tale

I’m half Finnish, and I’m always telling people that Father Christmas lives in Mount Korvatunturi in Finnish Lapland. No-one ever believes me! They think he lives at the North Pole. Like that’s even possible.

It was therefore exciting to see that a film confirming the real origins of Father Christmas was showing at the London Film Festival. Little did I know that I had a lot to learn about Santa Claus myself. You see, the cuddly figure we’ve been brought up with was just the creation of Coca Cola. In reality, he is deadly.

Rare Exports follows Pieteri, a little boy living in the shade of Korvatunturi with his father. An American mining company has been digging deep into the mountain looking for the real Father Christmas. When children start going missing, Pieteri begins to suspect that something evil has been unleashed.

On the surface this should be a children’s film – the main character is a classic lonely child who is not taken seriously by adults, and it’s about Santa Claus. However, it is much too scary for children. The monsters evoke a strong sense of menace and are just real enough to be believable. Though perhaps not an out-and-out horror, most adults should be at least creeped out by it. British and American parents may also feel that the more relaxed attitude to nakedness shown, though typical of the Nordic countries, is not suitable for their offspring.

Rare Exports is based on two short films made in 2003 and 2005 by director Jalmeri Helander. Like District 9 before it, one interesting idea has been successfully developed and expanded into a feature. Funny, shocking and sweet, this film is very different from your usual Hollywood holiday fare, and all the better for it. I don’t think I’m ever going to look at Father Christmas the same way again.

London Film Festival Review - The Parking Lot Movie

I love slackers and slacker culture. I would like to be a slacker myself (I certainly watch enough television), but my work ethic and drive have always been just strong enough to get in the way. Spiritually, though, I am at one with these people. The Parking Lot Movie is a portrait of a slacker paradise that has been lovingly cultivated in Charlottesville, Virginia, for over 20 years. Like a documentary version of Clerks, it shows the titanic struggles and absurdities of the service industry through the eyes of these outsiders.

The Corner Parking Lot is a little car park situated opposite the University of Virginia owned by Chris Farina – a very relaxed guy who likes to wear shorts, and who also happens to be a documentary film maker himself. Chris only lets friends work in the car park, or friends of friends. This policy has meant that all his employees have been intelligent slackers – philosophy graduate students, musicians, dreamers. Director Meghan Eckman spent three years filming the goings on at the car park, and interviewing current and past attendants. The results are hilarious, moving and fascinating.

Working at the parking lot involves mostly just sitting alone in the ramshackle booth and taking money from customers. Eckman allows her subjects to go through the minutiae of all the tasks, the little rituals that have developed in this strange island of space-time. The job gives plenty of scope for these underachievers to analyse their lives, themselves, and the nature of the car park, producing many of the best lines. For example, one describes the role of the parking lot attendant as that of a “creator-destroyer god”.

Unfortunately the attendants’ philophising and mucking around has to be interrupted by those who want to use the car park. In the words of Randal Graves: “This job would be great if it wasn’t for the customers.” The interviewees do not prescribe to the maxim that “the customer is always right”. It’s more a case of “the customer is always a douche”. When you realise they deal with a lot of SUV-driving frat boys, it’s not surprising that they are cynical.

There is a sense of desolation running between the laughs, of course – no one dreams of being a car park attendant. However, for many it seems the job gave them time to find out what they wanted to do, and to grow as a human being while they did it.

Slacker culture held the Zeitgeist during the 90s, and so the The Parking Lot Movie seems to come from that decade – it’s so lo-fi that it should be soundtracked by Pavement. The low budget feel is charming, however, and doesn’t detract from the subject at all.

Eckman has found a wonderful bit of weirdness to focus her camera on, filled with droll and witty people. This documentary has everything from the sublime to the ridiculous, the mundane to the profound, the pitiful to the inspirational. And it has all been found in one little patch of concrete.

Film review - The Town

When Gone Baby Gone was released, it became easy to say that Ben Affleck is a better director than actor – his directorial debut had an assured quality to it, and at that time the roles really weren’t coming his way. His follow up, The Town, is another serious look at working-class Boston, but this time he is directing and starring. It turns out he’s good at both.

The story follows Doug Macray (Affleck), a man from the Charlestown district of Boston who has followed his father into the profession of bank robbing. Apparently, this is not an uncommon line of work in Charlestown. After a successful job, Doug and his gang discover that the woman they took hostage (Rebecca Hall) lives in the area. Worried that she may be able to identify them, he decides to find out how much she knows.

Then things start to turn romantic, and his life spirals out of control.

Affleck has produced a very tense thriller from Chuck Hogan’s source novel, full of twists, suspense and drama. There’s a lot of action, with brutal robbery scenes and a good old-fashioned car chase. The love story is particularly well handled thanks to Hall’s performance. Her character feels very real – an understated young woman who’s been through trauma and finds comfort in Doug.

The rest of the performances are also excellent, and a special mention must go to Jeremy Renner (last seen in The Hurt Locker) as Doug’s partner in crime. It’s also lovely to see Jon Hamm as an FBI agent, but fans of Mad Men will find it strange to see him in the modern world (at one particularly disturbing point he mentions Skype).

The lead performance from Affleck is by no means stunning, but shows the natural charm that got him noticed by Hollywood in the first place (before it got him noticed by the paparazzi). His character is much like Will from Good Will Hunting: a guy who should be doing great things but sticks around his neighbourhood out of misplaced loyalty. This film shows that when given interesting parts, he isn’t so bad after all.

There are a few negatives to the film – the final shootout goes on a bit, and the criminal fraternity of Charlestown is not paricularly well defined (making the role of Pete Postlethwaite’s boss in the whole affair as hard to understand as the thick Bostonian accents everyone has).

It is likely that The Town will be compared to The Departed. While it seems run of the mill next to Scorsese’s stab at a Boston-set crime film, it is certainly an enjoyable ride and another quality film from Mr Affleck.

Film review - Toy Story 3

Toy Story was the first computer-animated feature, and its second sequel may just be the best. This film about a group of toys is a heartbreaking study of change and loss, but also an accomplished prison escape movie. It’s a comedy, but will make you cry.

Woody, Buzz and the gang have resigned themselves to a quiet life in the attic when they see their owner Andy start packing for college. But when they accidently get donated to a daycare centre, they enter a toy’s paradise full of children to play with and new toys to befriend. However, all is not what it seems at Sunnyside daycare, and they realise they have to get back to Andy.

Every frame of Toy Story 3 is full of invention, and every character a delight (except Jessie, who is as annoying as ever). It is this attention to detail that lifts Pixar films above all others aimed at children. The tight plot is expertly crafted, using genre clichés from horror and thrillers that keep the adults’ attention too. A hilarious script is performed by a wonderful cast, but Ned Beatty needs a special mention for the voice of strawberry-scented Lotso, one of the great film villains of all time.

As well as all the excitement in the story, there is also a lot of sadness. Ultimately this is a tale about growing up and leaving your childhood behind, which means it will probably have more effect on adults than children – they won’t know what they’ve got until it's gone. Only Professor Coldheart wouldn’t be blubbing by the end.

Review - Four Lions

Christopher Morris isn’t exactly a stranger to controversy. His red hot satire seems to have upset as many people as it has made laugh. The Daily Mail set were flabbergasted at Brass Eye as they were told it was making light of paedophiles. Actually, it was making fun of Daily Mail readers. His comedy has always veered between disturbing (like Jam) and supremely silly (The Day Today). Four Lions, his first feature film, deals with serious subjects but is actually one of his silliest pieces of work.

The film follows the most useless group of terrorists since the People’s Front of Judea. Omar (the excellent Riz Ahmed) is a young man who wants to make his mark on the world by blowing himself up. After a disasterous stint at a training camp in Pakistan with friend Waj (Kayvan Novak), Omar and his cell decide to go it alone and organise their own attack on London. Unfortunately for Omar, the idiocy of Waj, Barry (Nigel Lindsay), Hassan (Arsher Ali) and Fessal (Adeel Akhtar) complicate matters at every turn.

The earlier Monty Python reference is very apt, as there is something very Pythonesque about the humour here. The characters are extremely stupid, almost to a surreal level. Even Omar, the brains of the outfit, is stupid by definition – he has a nice life in the Britain with a beautiful wife and son, yet he wants to destroy it. This was Morris’s intention, to show how muddled your thinking must be believe being a suicide bomber is a good idea.

I suppose Daily Mail readers will say that the film is making light of terrorism, of showing suicide bombers being nice people. It is true that by using the template of a heist movie, Morris does make the audience (the real target of the bombs) root for the bombers at some points in the film. This is because the characters are engaging and, yes, not wholly evil. However, they aren’t brain washed – they are aware that what they are doing will lead to mass slaughter. The fact that these “normal” people could be capable of this is perhaps more terrifying than portraying them as classic baddies, and certainly more realistic.

This is a truly hilarious film, but the jokes do not detract from how upsetting much of it is or how tragic for all concerned. Morris has pitched the whole thing about as well as you could have hoped for, walking an extremely thin tightrope the whole way. Like his old mucker Armando Iannucci (co-writer of the In the Loop) he is making comedy that gets to the heart of matters.

Review - Sex and the City 2

The first Sex and the City film was a big disappointment. Most of it was just fashion porn, with some truly hideous mawkish moments (more often than not starring poor Jennifer Hudson). A few genuinely touching bits were cancelled out by the extended wedding fashion shoot cringing.

Now that I have accepted that SATC on the big screen will always be a horrible version of the TV series, I could enjoy the second outing as a mildly amusing romp. The faux-seriousness of their supposed problems aside (you do have it tough, girls – having the children you so desperately craved, the love of your life that eluded you so long, or a demanding job), the film is an enjoyable trip with your four favourite girlfriends, even if they are bastardised versions of people you once loved.

The plot, as it goes, concerns Carrie, Miranda, Samantha and Charlotte worrying about their lives and going on an all expenses paid trip to Abu Dhabi. Compared with the first film, fewer moments stuck in my proverbial craw. Those that did were:

1. The wedding. Given the history of the two characters it felt deeply wrong, even if the ceremony was fabulous.
2. Why did Penelope Cruz have a cameo? What did that bring to the film?
3. What was going on with the accent of Samantha’s “Danish” guy? He sounded like he was from Rotherham.
4. Many outfits were just ludicrous - taffeta and souks do not mix.

Kim Cattrall and Cynthia Nixon are great comedic actresses, outshining their co-stars in a way that wasn’t noticeable in the TV show. Working with a so-so script, they deliver some great lines. Sarah Jessica Parker and Kristin Davis’s characters are often just annoying.

Generally this is funnier and ten times stupider than the first film. Which means it is a hundred times stupider than the original series. Let it wash over you and, whatever you do, don’t analyse it.

Review - Hot Tub Time Machine

This film follows three 40-somethings and a 20-something as they travel to the 80s in a magic hot tub at a skiing resort. Gritty realism isn’t really what the director Steve Pink is going for. Instead it is very, very stupid and very funny.

The three old friends (John Cusack, Craig Robinson and Rob Corddry) leap into their own teenage bodies and must relive an eventful weekend from their past. The results are very rude and crude, with lots of retro references and general making fun of the past. Everyone apparently had day-glo clothes and very bad hair back then.

This is obviously riding the coat tails of The Hangover, and it just isn’t up to that standard – because it isn’t as funny, but also because it doesn’t have a nugget of sweetness at its centre. It is also a bit smuttier than many “gross-out” comedies of late. As long as you aren’t a prude, it should give you an evening of laughs if nothing else.