Rango (US, 2011)

Post-modern frippery can only take you so far… and that’s not ‘very’.  Rango‘s mix of the spaghetti western and Chinatown (US, 1974) is brilliantly done ranging from Johnny Depp’s  charming eponymous hero, a lizard, to Ned  Beatty’s perfect impersonation of John Huston’s villain, a tortoise here, in the classic noir, directed by Roman Polanksi. Add [...]

The Illusionist (UK-France, 2010)

Sylvain Chomet’s beautifully animated Jacques Tati tale has ‘retro’ impregnated as firmly as the word ‘Blackpool’ in its eponymous rock. It’s beguiling, elegaic and deeply conservative so my guess is its appeal, which is almost universal amongst UK critics, will be limited to the middle aged. Like Tati’s films, Chomet’s adapted an unfilmed Tati script, [...]

Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs (US, 2009)

A Freudian approach to narrative emphasises the Oedipal trajectory of the story. Freud used the myth of Oedipus to explain the psychic processes necessary for a boy to become a man. This requires the boy to move his sexual fixation from his mother toward a mother substitute so he can become like his father. Raymond [...]

Coraline (US, 2009)

The film reminded me of Paul Berry’s brilliant short The Sandman (UK, 1991), particularly in the focus on eyes, and Coraline‘s Grimm inheritance makes sure that this fairy tale is properly scary. The stop motion animation is fantastic, it has the flexibility of CGI, particularly with the elaborate camera movements, without the technique’s ugly ‘plasticness’. [...]

Monsters vs Aliens (US, 2009)

This postmodern (all the monsters are from ’50s SF movies) concoction has some interesting visuals and shedloads of limp gags (one or two are OK) and a terrible ‘girl finds career-minded fiance is not worth it’ sub plot. I saw the film at the National Media Museum’s IMAX (Bradford, UK) in 3D; the first 3D [...]

Waltz with Bashir (Vals im Bashir, Israel, Germany, France, US)

There’s been some discussion about how Persepolis and Waltz the Bashir have brought animation to ‘maturity’ with their serious take on the world. No doubt this remark has been made many times and is a symptom of people suddenly having their preconceptions about animation challenged. Why animate a film/drama documentary about the massacres in Sabra [...]

Persepolis (France, 2007)

Animation’s starting to get the ‘adult’ appreciation it deserves; as are graphic novels. Marjane Satrapi’s graphic autobiography forms the basis of this excellent film. If ever the political was embedded in the personal then it’s in lives that live through revolutions; the Iranian one in ’79 in this case. By focusing upon the travails of [...]

Robots (US, 2005)

Fabulous visuals; witty. But… same-old Oedipal narrative and monstrous mother. (OAR) http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0358082/