The opening few minutes of Kung Fu Panda's point towards a different kind of DreamWorks animation, and for a while, the movie delivers on that promise. The company's logo is given a clever Asian-style spin right at the start, and the film utilises that same animation style for the initial sequence, in which a fearless warrior named Po defeats hordes of marauding villains with his kung-fu skills, blinding bystanders with his handsomeness and "awesomeness" in the process. Such antics cannot last, however, and this adventure is quickly revealed as a dream from which Po – a chubby panda with the voice of Jack Black – awakes, plunging him back into the humdrum monotony of his real life. Po lives above his father's noodle shop, in which he reluctantly works and is expected to inherit one day, but all of his dreams revolve around the Furious Five, a group of legendary kung fu masters who train under the tutelage of the wise master Shifu (Dustin Hoffman).
For reasons too silly and complicated to get into here, Po finds himself clumsily blundering into a ceremony at which the Dragon Warrior is set to be named. This is a great honour to bestow upon any kung fu fighting animal, and there is much speculation as to which of the five great figures will receive it; would it be Tigress (Angelina Jolie), Monkey (Jackie Chan), Mantis (Seth Rogen), Viper (Lucy Liu) or Crane (David Cross)? Perhaps Oogway (Randall Duk Kim) was put off by the unoriginality of their names, and instead he points his withered finger at Po, choosing the hapless panda as the Dragon Warrior and enraging Shifu, who instantly resolves to break Po in an unforgiving training programme.
What follows is standard-issue. Plenty of pratfalls and hi-jinks as Po is pushed to the limit by Shifu's methods, and a gradual sense of self-discovery in which Po finds the wherewithal to challenge the villain of the piece: Ian McShane's Tai Lung. That the film feels as fresh as it does is a pleasant surprise, and it's a credit to the filmmakers Mark Osborne and John Stevenson, who maintain a swift pace and pepper the picture with clever gags, steering clear of the toilet humour and pop-culture references that plague so many films of this type. Instead, the film's jokes are sold on the back of excellent comic timing and a very enjoyable performance from Jack Black in the central role, who finds the perfect tone for Po. Dustin Hoffman is great as well, and Ian McShane is an effective baddie (although I spent most of the film convinced he was Jeremy Irons), but it's a shame the script couldn't find more for the film's big-name cast to do. The Furious Five are a letdown; Jolie seems bored reading her drab dialogue, and I can barely remember any contribution from her colleagues.
They're all superbly designed, though, and throughout Kung Fu Panda the visual scheme is a constant delight. Stunning animation might be the norm rather than the exception among these big-budget CGI movies, but the levels of detail and beauty on display in the sweeping scenery, facial expressions and inventive set-pieces is still something to behold. In particular, Tai Lung's thrilling escape from jail and his battle with The Furious Five on a rickety rope bridge are smashing pieces of filmmaking in which the dynamic camera and inventive staging work wonders; while Po and Shifu's tussle over a dumpling is a standalone sequence that manages to be exciting and terrifically funny at once.
Kung Fu Panda, then, is a lot of fun, but once it was over, I couldn't escape the nagging feeling that this appealing picture had played it too safe. The film's story sticks rigidly to a tried-and-tested "follow your dream" template, to the point where the plot points and twists feel like they're simply arriving on cue, and every narrative cliché is embraced before the film's close. That, I feel, is the film's fatal flaw, and the one aspect of Kung Fu Panda that prevents it from making a lasting impression. No amount of technical wizardry can make the film's basic skeleton feel like anything more than a retread of a hackneyed theme; and while one can enjoy the film's jokes and inventive touches, it's hard not to feel disappointed that the filmmakers haven't dared to spread their wings a little more. While Pixar continue to break new ground in both animation and storytelling, producing unexpected magic from the most unlikely concepts, and taking risks wherever possible, DreamWorks seems to be stuck in a mindset that links cute talking animals to straightforward stories and simplistic morality. As I said, I had a pretty good time watching Kung Fu Panda, but it is rapidly falling away in my memory, and by the time Pixar's WALL•E arrives on these shores, I fear it will have been long forgotten.
In July 2005, a man was rushed to a Washington hospital with severe stomach pains, and within hours, he was dead. The cause of the man's death was a perforated colon that led to heavy internal bleeding, and it later transpired that this injury was inflicted earlier that day, when the man engaged in anal sex with a fully-grown stallion. Ouch. His named was Kenneth Pinyan, a divorced 45 year-old who lived a double life. Unbeknownst to his friends and family Mr Pinyan also went by the pseudonym "Mr Hands", and he used this name when he sought out those who shared his fetish for horses over the internet. These zoophiles would often meet for parties in which they drank, swapped stories, and took occasional trips down to the barn, where their animal encounters would usually be videotaped. When the investigation into Kenneth Pinyan's death revealed this whole subculture of bestiality, the reaction was understandably one of revulsion and disbelief – how could anyone even think about such a thing? – but Robinson Devor's Zoo is a film that bravely tries to tell this story from the viewpoint of those who were part of it, and to let the men who love horses too much explain themselves.
What a shame the film is such a bore. Devor's intention – to explore the zoophile world and to cast these outsiders as something other than freaks – is admirable, but his film is exasperatingly passive, and the director's desire to avoid any hint of sensationalism in his handling of this story prevents him from really getting to the heart of the matter. Instead, he tip-toes daintily around the edges of his subject for 80 minutes, seemingly afraid of getting his hands dirty by delving deep into the issues this topic raises (although we can be thankful that a brief glimpse of fuzzy footage is the most we see of a sex act in progress). Part of the problem lies in Devor's style of filmmaking. With the subject of his story already dead, Devor has elected to recreate the events of Pinyan's life, hiring an actor named John Paulsen to (wordlessly) portray Mr Hands in a series of moodily lit and artfully staged sequences.
Such a tactic isn't rare among documentaries, of course. The great Errol Morris has often made superb use of skilfully re-enacted sequences that help to draw us into the story and shed fresh light on the events being described, but Morris' films usually benefit from much more focused filmmaking and tighter editing that Zoo possesses. The film unfolds at a languid pace, in time with Paul Matthew Moore's Phillip Glass-style score, and while it's often beautiful to look at, the effect is ultimately soporific. As this is all going on, the film is narrated by the zoophiles themselves, with "H", "Coyote" and "The Happy Horseman" among those willing to offer their side of the story. But these men seem to be incapable of articulating emotions which perhaps they don't even understand, and as they laboriously attempt to justify their "love", the film starts going around in circles. The zoophiles frequently reiterate that the horses were well cared for and that their sex acts were consensual, but as no horses can offer a rebuttal or confirmation of such a statement, the arguments take us nowhere.
The most interesting character to emerge in Zoo is Jenny Edwards, the animal rescuer who removed the horse involved in Pinyan's death after the story broke (the unfortunate animal was gelded for his trouble). Mrs Edwards is a woman who cares deeply for these animals, and in one revealing segment, she recalls a time when she was suffering from a serious illness, and she would often spend nights alone in the fields with her horses. She would draw great strength just from being close to them, just by holding them, and she seems to be suggesting that there's a fine line between that kind of love, and the kind practised by those who don't honour the same boundaries; but Zoo won't make the connection. It can't show us how, or why, people would start having sex with horses, and as a result it feels increasingly pointless. "I don't know how I feel about it" Jenny Edwards says towards the end of the film, "but I'm right at the edge of being able to understand it". Good for her, but few viewers will gain any similar sense of understanding from this fuzzy, empty documentary.
Who could have guessed that this mild, amiable and rather forgettable comedy would smash box-office records in its native France? When it was released in February of this year, Bienvenue chez les Ch'tis became an instant smash among French cinemagoers, and has subsequently roared towards the decade-long box-office crown that James Cameron's Titanic has held in that country. Such a success can only be attributed to the way Dany Boon's film touches upon national stereotypes and prejudices. Bienvenue chez les Ch'tis is based around the perception that life in the south of France is nothing much gorgeous sunshine and happiness, while the north of the country is a cold and miserable place to be; but Boon, a native of Nord-Pas de Calais, wants to show us that things aren't as grim up north as many might think.
Such a scenario inevitably doesn't hold as much resonance for viewers outside of France, but Bienvenue chez les Ch'tis possesses a warm, Ealing-esque sense of humour that should translate for most audiences. Kad Merad plays disgruntled post office manager Philippe who, at the constant urging of his wife, has long been lobbying for a transfer to one of the much-coveted positions in the Côte d'Azur. Hoping to gain an edge on his competition, Philippe pretends to be wheelchair-bound in his interview, but when his ruse is uncovered he is punished severely: transferred to the reputedly inhospitable northern town of Bergues. Judging by the grim look on his wife's face, one would suspect that Philippe was being sent to the frontlines, never to return, when he says goodbye to her and his young son. On the motorway Philippe is stopped by a policeman for travelling too slowly, but when he hears about the driver's final destination he can only offer his commiserations and wave him on his lonely way.
Here's the thing, though – Bergues isn't that bad after all. After a rocky start in which Philippe finds himself knee-deep in misunderstandings and struggling to grasp the area's unique dialect, he soon finds his bearings and is given a warm welcome by his fellow post office employees. These include Antoine (Boon himself), who struggles to escape his overbearing mother's grip and is deeply infatuated with Annabelle (Anne Marivin), often drowning his sorrows on the job when she rebuffs his advances. In helping to straighten out various characters' little problems, Philippe becomes a contented member of the Bergues community, but for some reason he feels compelled to maintain an unhappy façade in front of his friends and family back home, regaling them with horror stories on his weekend visits. Inevitably, these tall tales come back to haunt him when his wife (Zoé Félix) decides it is her duty to stand by her man in this hellhole.
There are two or three hilarious sequences in Bienvenue chez les Ch'tis. One occurs early on when Philippe's attempt to play his non-existent disabled card descend into slapstick; another sees Philippe and Antoine cycling haphazardly around Bergues while growing increasingly inebriated; and the big set-piece in which the whole town try to convince Philippe's wife that life here is every bit as horrific as she's heard is very funny indeed. Aside from those instances, however, the comedy in this picture is of a determinedly gentle variety, and while it's far from unappealing it isn't quite amusing enough to distract from the film's laziness in other areas. The opening scenes seem to set us up for a classic farce, and I greatly enjoyed Philippe's first encounter with Antoine, in which both sexual and linguistic confusion come into play. The linguistic element of the film is particularly important. The Ch'ti of the title refers both to the natives of Bergues and their distinctive patois, where the letter "s" is pronounced "ch", and numerous words find their meaning completely warped. The film's subtitlers have obviously endeavoured to retain this core component of Bienvenue chez les Ch'tis' humour (office is confused with fish, for example), and the potentially parochial gags Boon likes to trade in come across remarkably well.
Boon's screenplay is extremely simplistic, however, and the stretches in between his occasional flashes of inspiration can irritate, with the writer allowing his plot to slacken badly before he resolves things in a too-neat fashion (the ending is dreadful). As a director he uses broad and unimaginative strokes, and he can't find any ways to make this standard fish-out-of-water tale feel fresh. Thankfully, the acting is very strong across the board, with Boon being a dab hand at playing the likable dolt (as he showed in Patrice Leconte's My Best Friend), and he is assisted by particularly strong work from both Merad and the heart-stoppingly beautiful Marivin. The ensemble's efforts ensure Bienvenue chez les Ch'tis is always a charming work, but this is nothing more than a passable comedy for which the French reaction has been nothing short of baffling. Great comedy can be universal, but something here has obviously been lost in translation.
California Dreamin' is not quite the film it might have been. Before the picture starts, a title card tells us that director Cristian Nemescu died in a car crash on August 24th 2006, and that the movie we're about to watch is presented as it was when he passed away. One wonders what changes Nemescu would have made to his engaging debut had he been allowed more time to work on it; perhaps he would have tightened the structure, cleaned up some of the narrative strands, and eliminated the flashbacks that feel like an unnecessary burden for the picture to carry. Such speculation gets us nowhere, though, and instead let's simply take California Dreamin' on its own terms; as an enjoyable, skilfully acted drama that just about avoids outstaying its welcome.
Loosely based on an incident that occurred in 1999, Nemescu's film follows a trainload of American NATO troops who have been assigned communications equipment that must be urgently delivered to Kosovo, where the war continues to be fought. The squadron is led by Captain Jones (Armand Assante) who runs a tight ship and is determined to meet the deadline that he has been set, but he unexpectedly runs into trouble in the tiny Romanian village of Capalnita. The local stationmaster in this town is a corrupt character named Doiaru (Razvan Vasilescu), and he refuses to allow the train passage when he discovers they don't have all of the required customs papers. The furious Jones tries to find a diplomatic solution, and he makes phone call after phone call in an attempt to untangle the red tape he has become embroiled in, but the officious Doiaru will not budge.
From this premise, Nemescu spins a variety of individual stories, perhaps too many for his film to handle. As Jones and Doiaru find themselves at an impasse, romance blooms between Doiaru's teenage daughter Monica (Maria Dinulescu) and Jones' second-in-command David (Jamie Elman), and the town's mayor organises a welcoming party for the visiting troops, hoping to use their presence to boost Capalnita's profile and economy. California Dreamin' is an unwieldy picture that sometimes seems to be pulling in too many directions at once, but even at 155 minutes I was never bored. The central theme of communication is explored by Nemescu in a number through a number of funny, clever sequences; best of all during the party that forms the film's centrepiece. As a Romanian Elvis impersonator tries to make the Americans feel at home, the town's female population swarm around the soldiers like flies, not letting the language barrier stand in the way of their desires, and Nemescu stages this sequence brilliantly, allowing his camera to roam between the various encounters that are taking place in the square. Most of California Dreamin' is shot in a realist fashion comprising of long takes filmed on a handheld camera – mirroring other recent Romanian films such as The Death of Mr Lazarescu and 4 Months, 3 Weeks and 2 Days – but Nemescu allows some fantastical elements to creep into the picture as well. During a sex scene between Monica and David, the city outside the window seems to pulsate in time with their racing heartbeats, and as the loved-up pair run through the streets later, a jet of water explodes out of every manhole cover the oblivious couple pass.
Such switches in tone leave the film feeling uneven, but the strong performances Nemescu has drawn from his cast keep it anchored, with Armand Assante's increasingly frustrated Captain being the picture's main driving force. As California Dreamin' progresses, Nemescu adds layers of complexity to the characters and generates tension in a steady fashion, but the ending is a let-down; it seems rushed and I didn't feel the sense of tragedy that was clearly intended. Again, we have to wonder whether a sharper edit would have found a more effective movie under the one we have, but in its current state California Dreamin' remains an intelligent, funny and textured satire, and to describe it as the weakest example of the recent Romanian new wave probably says more about the high quality of the other films than it does about this one. This picture might not have reached its full potential, but there's certainly enough here to suggest that Cristian Nemescu was a filmmaker with a lot more to say.
One of my most memorable cinematic experiences as a youngster came in 1993, when I sat down to watch Steven Spielberg's Jurassic Park, and for two hours I was completely convinced that impossible things were taking place right in front of me. It was the wizardry of Spielberg, of course, that made me believe in the long-extinct creatures rampaging across the screen, but he couldn't have done it without the work of another great film magician, whose fingerprints can be found on some of the most innovative and ingenious pictures of the past twenty years. Stan Winston, who died today at the age of 62 from multiple myeloma, was a brilliant visual effects and makeup artist who created monsters, robots and aliens that have proved remarkably durable against the passage of time.
He worked on many great films, but my favourite examples of his craft came in his collaborations with James Cameron. He created The Terminator and helped Cameron produce the stunning effects that made the sequel such a groundbreaking feature, while some of his best work came in Cameron's 1986 masterpiece Aliens. Remember those hordes of beasts closing in on Ripley and her crew? And that climactic showdown between the lead character and the alien queen herself? If a film like Aliens were made today it would be easy to imagine these elements being completely CGI-d, but that would risk losing the expressiveness, depth and tactility that Winston's creations possessed. Aliens won Winston one of his four Oscars, with the others coming for Jurassic Park and Terminator 2 (which earned him two statuettes). He was also nominated for his unforgettable makeup work on Edward Scissorhands and Batman Returns, while just this year he was lending his expertise to Jon Favreau's Iron Man. Stan Winston once said "I don't do special effects. I do characters. I do creatures", and that was the beauty of his art.
