films

Wonder Woman (Film)

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Genre: Superhero / Film
Main Creative Team: Patty Jenkins (director); Allan Heinberg (screenplay); Zack Snyder (story, producer); Jason Fuchs (story); Charles Roven (producer); Deborah Snyder (producer); Richard Suckle (producer)
Main Cast: Gal Gadot; Chris Pine; Ewen Bremner; Saïd Taghmaoui; Eugene Brave Rock; Lucy Davis; Robin Wright; Connie Nielsen; Danny Huston; David Thewlis; Elena Anaya
First Shown: 15th May, 2017
Available: Cinemas

When a man arrives on the island with tales of a great war, Diana (Gal Gadot) believes it is caused by Ares and heads out to find him.

This film presents a much more innocent Diana. She’s grown up among the Amazons and only knows about the world outside from stories. She thinks stopping World War I will be as simple as killing Ares. Steve (Chris Pine), the man who landed on the island, knows the situation is a lot more complicated. He has information to get back to London about a new chemical weapon, which could threaten ongoing peace negotiations.

A lot of superhero films focus on heroes learning to harness their powers as the primary thing. Diana starts out ready trained. The focus is on her learning how to direct that training and work with others. This was a side of the plot I liked, as it gets away from having to believe someone goes from nothing to being able to save the world in a few days. There’s some subversion of the idea that defeating the big bad makes all the problems go away, but it doesn’t really commit to that completely. I thought it might be about to go there, and then it doesn’t, which is a shame. It’s possible to have dramatic finales and make it clear that life is a little more complicated.

Diana and Steve end up with a small team, with the purpose of infiltrating enemy lines. I generally enjoyed the team dynamics and how the representation was tackled. Starting with Diana herself, she’s played by a Jewish Israeli actress, which is a departure from previous Wonder Woman castings. This also meant other Amazons have similar accents to match, rather than having American accents.

Charlie (Ewen Bremner) is a Scottish sniper. It becomes clear that he has PTSD, which is treated sensitively by those around him. This is particularly poignant because mental health wasn’t an area where the military did well. It was poorly understood, and things like freezing in battle were likely to be attributed to cowardice, rather than trauma. So it’s important that Charlie’s trauma was accepted and understood by those around him.

Sameer (Saïd Taghmaoui) is French Moroccan. There’s a nod here to racism, as Sameer says he wanted to be an actor, but was the wrong colour. He does stray into some stereotypes, such as being lecherous. Though at times it’s also clear he’s playing up stereotypes knowingly. His name was shortened to Sammy, which was a slur against Indian people at the time, so that stood out a bit in a way I don’t think the creators realised.

Chief (Eugene Brave Rock) is Blackfoot and initially speaks to Diana in Blackfoot. He is dressed sensibly and speaks fluent English (which is a low bar, but one a lot of media doesn’t get over). He tells Diana about colonialism, making it clear it was Steve’s people who did that. The thing I didn’t like was a brief moment, but it still stood out. At one point, Chief needs to signal them, so he sets a fire for stereotypical smoke signals. They’re separated into little rings like it’s a cartoon, because a regular smoky fire just wouldn’t do, I suppose.

Last but not least, the team have a coordinator back in London: Etta Candy (Lucy Davis). She’s a great character, but I felt she was underused. When Diana first arrives in London, Etta is there to help out, and has some funny moments and some resourceful ones when she realises something isn’t quite right. She does her coordinator thing, passing on valuable information. But I really would have liked more in the later part of the story. Etta and Diana are shown together in the aftermath, but they don’t have a conversation, which was a missed opportunity to show their relationship developing. Also notable is that Etta is fat, as she is in the comics.

Though I liked most things about the main team, I had criticisms when it came to some of the other casting and presentation, including the crowd scenes. Modern warfare meant a lot of injuries like amputation and disfigurement. People were getting body parts blown off and mangled in ways that hadn’t really happened on that scale before. This meant there were suddenly a lot of newly disabled people. The film shows them when it’s convenient for the plot. Diana sees returning veterans with their injuries, which is part of her realising the full horror of this war. But it doesn’t show them where it would be realistic, which is every crowd scene in London. The people who returned disabled didn’t just vanish, so there would have been a much higher ratio of disabled people than there is in London today.

This also relates to the issue with Doctor Poison (Elena Anaya). She has facial disfigurement, which is covered with a prosthetic. There’s a history of using facial scars and disfigurement to mark someone as a villain. Covering injuries with masks or prosthetics is linked to hiding things, rather than showing them as improving the quality of life for the person wearing them. Nothing about Doctor Poison’s portrayal challenges those stereotypes, and there aren’t people with similar injuries in other roles. It’s especially noticeable to do this in a WWI setting, because there were so many people who had that sort of injury.

Outside of that issue, Doctor Poison really could have used more development. She had the potential to be an interesting villain, but she was overshadowed by General Ludendorff (Danny Huston). This was a bit of a reoccurring thing with women who weren’t Wonder Woman, as they didn’t get as much time and development as the men.

There are some non-white women with speaking roles among the Amazons, but they don’t have major parts, and weren’t a big component of the Amazon crowd scenes. The Amazons also tended towards slim athletic builds. I’d have liked more variety here. They recruited athletes and the like for these roles, but it’s clear there was a bias in which sort of athletes were approached. I did like that there was an age range, with Hippolyta (Connie Nielsen) and Antiope (Robin Wright) being played by women in their 50s.

My criticisms don’t mean it was a bad film. It was a good superhero story and a vast improvement on DC’s previous attempts. There are good aspects of representation, starting with this being one of the minority of superhero films with a woman as the lead. But it doesn’t mean there aren’t areas that could use improvement. I’d hope some of these are considered for future films in this universe.

Power Rangers (Film)

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Alternate Titles: Saban’s Power Rangers
Genre: Young Adult Superhero / Film
Main Creative Team: Dean Israelite (director); John Gatins (screenplay); Matt Sazama (story); Burk Sharpless (story); Michele Mulroney (story); Kieran Mulroney (story)
Main Cast: Dacre Montgomery; Naomi Scott; RJ Cyler; Becky G; Ludi Lin; Bill Hader; Bryan Cranston; Elizabeth Banks
First Shown: 22nd March, 2017
Available: Cinemas

Five teenagers find coloured coins, which lead them to an alien spaceship. It turns out they’re Power Rangers and only they can save the Earth from Rita Repulsa (Elizabeth Banks).

This reboot of the franchise shows the formation of the first team of human Power Rangers. Jason (Dacre Montgomery) is the Red Ranger and the leader of the group. Kimberly (Naomi Scott) is the Pink Ranger and a former cheerleader. Billy (RJ Cyler) is the Blue Ranger and is a nerdy tech genius. Zach (Ludi Lin) is the Black Ranger and is a carer for his sick mother. Trini (Becky G) is the Yellow Ranger and a loner. They come together by being in the same place at the same time, where they find the coins that give them their powers.

Consequences are important in this story. Jason is introduced with a prank gone wrong, which leads to animal abuse and reckless driving. It’s lucky that no one dies. Kimberly has also behaved badly towards others. Initially, it looks like her former friends are being randomly mean to her, but it becomes apparent that she did something to cause that reaction. There’s no magic to put things back how they were, but it is possible to rebuild. It also shows a more grey approach to characters, where generally decent people can do awful things.

The rangers all start out as strangers to each other. There’s a lot of friendship building going on. Jason and Billy get the most development time. I also liked that Kimberly and Trini are shown hanging out, and offering each other support, after Trini’s initial distance from the group. It’s interesting to see how different friendships develop within the group.

There’s some suggestion of romance between Kimberly and Jason, but it felt natural that they’d identify with each other, given their situations. It also doesn’t go beyond a few looks and comments. There may be a kiss in the trailer, but this isn’t in the film, which is a good choice. I’m all for a bit more slow building in relationships.

I had mixed feelings about the camera angles used. There’s a lot of switching around views on things like car chases. It does create the feel of confusion, and the difficulty in staying aware of surroundings, when in such a situation. I did generally like the sets and shooting choices, but this one was a little difficult for me as someone who gets motion sickness.

There are a number of differences in the casting compared to the original series. Jason is the only remaining white character in the new team, though I’d note that he’s also the leader and the one set up as the initial character the audience meets. I realise this can come from a place of trying to get through the system, where a film with an apparent white lead is more likely to get funding, but it’d still be nice if this wasn’t needed to play the system.

In general though, the group is more diverse than the original series. The positive is that the new casting means Billy is African American, Trini is Mexican, Kimberly is South Asian and Zack is Chinese. This does broaden it out from the source material, and avoids having the Black Ranger as the black character, and the Yellow Ranger as Asian. The negative is that Trini used to be played by a Vietnamese actress, and there are no new East Asian girls in any role, so that’s an area where representation was lost. This is always a difficult issue, as the change will mean some people will see themselves who wouldn’t have before, and some won’t see themselves the way they did before. It’s a problem with media in general lacking diversity, that any such changes can have a big impact. This film is what it is in terms of who is shown, but I’d hope they’ll consider continuing to reimagine characters. I would love to see them consider an East Asian girl for the new ranger hinted for the sequel.

Billy is autistic and states directly that he’s on the spectrum. He describes himself as having a different way of thinking, rather than describing himself in negative ways. There’s a lot that I related to with Billy, from the tendency to monologue during difficult tasks, using scripts to introduce himself, and not liking to be touched. It’s also notable that he’s black, as portrayals of autistic people are often white people. This relates to wider problems, such as the underdiagnosis of black autistic people and issues faced dealing with groups like the police. It’s important for people to realise that autistic people can be anyone.

Trini is queer of some description. Zack guesses she might have girlfriend problems, based on her reaction to him assuming she has boyfriend problems. It’s uncertain exactly how she identifies, and the feeling I got was she was questioning. She’s figuring out labels, which aren’t the ones her family want for her. There are arguments both ways for having a clearer statement. On the one hand, films often avoid using the words, so it’s nice when it is made clear. On the other, this is the first section of a longer story, so it’s possible they’ll pull off questioning turning into figuring things out.

There were bits I didn’t like. The opening scenario with the prank was my least favourite part, because it felt like I was supposed to find it funny. It’s pretty hard to find something funny when it involves an unhappy animal.

Another part I wasn’t fond of was Kimberly stripping down to a bikini as Jason watches without her knowing. This is so she can swim, and if she’d later shown her awesome swimming/diving skill, it might have fit. But this isn’t shown again. I’d compare that to Trini, who is a hiker, being the first to figure how to use her powers to move quickly across terrain. There isn’t a similar swimming/diving moment with Kimberly. There could have been, given the locations used. So she appeared to be in her bikini in order to be seen by Jason.

There’s some throwing around of terms like crazy and lame, though the crazy part is more a description of the rangers rather than their opposition. Rita is mainly described as evil, rather than crazy.

The armour designs do have the thing where the girls get rounded breast plates and the boys get angular ones, though at least their armour covers them equally. The exception is Rita’s armour, as apparently the more evil a person gets, the sexier their armour and the less skin it covers.

There’s a little bit of swearing, some sexual references, and violence. It does take care to have monsters raised by Rita as the main opponents. In other words, opponents that aren’t sentient. The scariest parts are down to Rita, who threatens and murders people. That could be a little heavy for younger viewers, though most in the suggested range of tweens and up should be fine. I’m noting this because the original series was aimed a little younger, which some may not realise when deciding on this film.

I was pleased they did actually say, “It’s morphin time!” It may be a small thing, but I will never forgive Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer for not including, “To me, my board!” Some catchphrases really need to be there.

It was a fun film. It had the colourful action expected from the franchise. The serious aspects covered a range of issues that teenagers can face, without getting too heavy. Combined with the diverse cast, it means a lot of children and teens will be able to see themselves, as well as enjoy the action. There were some scenes I didn’t like very much. There are also a few things I hope they develop in the sequels, such as Trini’s identity story, and how they cast future rangers. I will be on board to see where it goes next.

Hidden Figures (Film)

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Genre: Biography / Film
Main Creative Team: Theodore Melfi (director, writer); Allison Schroeder (writer)
Main Cast: Taraji P. Henson; Octavia Spencer; Janelle Monáe; Kevin Costner; Kirsten Dunst; Jim Parsons; Glen Powell; Mahershala Ali; Aldis Hodge; Olek Krupa
First Shown: 10th December, 2016
Available: Cinemas

NASA needs to figure out how to put someone in orbit and stop being racist.

This film is based on the real stories of black women in the early days of NACA/NASA, as written about in a book by Margot Lee Shetterly. It’s a fictional version of those events, though the general core of the story is there. My focus is on the story as presented in the film, rather than a comparison to the real events.

There are three main storylines, following the paths of the three leading characters. Katherine Johnson (Taraji P. Henson) is a mathematical genius. When they need a computer for the main team, Katherine is the one who gets the job. Mary Jackson (Janelle Monáe) decides to apply for a job as an engineer. Dorothy Vaughan (Octavia Spencer) has been working as a supervisor for the colored computers department, though hasn’t been given the job officially. She also realises their days are numbered, as NASA prepares for its first mainframe.

Discrimination is shown in a variety of ways in the film, from general society things such as separate water fountains, to the working environment in NASA. Katherine faces issues as the only black woman in a department of mostly white men. Someone sets out a coffee pot marked “colored” after she uses the general shared coffee pot. There are no toilets for black people in the building, so she has to travel back to her old work place. It’s a hostile working environment, designed to make it harder for Katherine to do her job.

Dorothy and Mary don’t face issues from their direct co-workers, but hit problems when it comes to the system. Everything is designed to make it harder for them to advance, which is explained away as only being fair. Their stories highlight how systematic discrimination means that everyone doesn’t start from the same place.

I liked that it touched on the ways that marginalised people can both help and hinder each other. Karl Zielinski (Olek Krupa) uses his own experiences as a Polish Jewish man to empathise with Mary. He encourages her to apply for the engineering position. On the other side, Vivian Mitchell (Kirsten Dunst), a white woman, does not use a shared identity as a woman to empathise with the additional issues the black women face. Jim Johnson (Mahershala Ali), a black man, is initially dismissive of Katherine working at NASA on the basis of her being a woman. Sharing one marginalisation does not automatically mean understanding another. Intersectionality can be complicated.

I did raise an eyebrow at Al Harrison (Kevin Costner), Katherine’s new boss. His presentation seemed very much for the comfort of white audience members. He doesn’t hold racist or sexist attitudes: he just wants the best person for the job. He’s the one who eventually takes a sledgehammer to the signs on the colored bathrooms. He’s the person that white people can feel they would be, because they wouldn’t support segregation and they’d do something about it. However, it is notable that he doesn’t notice what’s going on until Katherine tells him. If any message should be taken from that, it’s that being anti-prejudice in personal beliefs is not enough to stop discrimination. Seeing what the system is doing to people requires paying attention and talking to those it impacts.

It’s a polished story, with decent pacing, and good performances by the actors. I liked all the casting choices, and noted that Karl was actually played by a Polish actor (this is an area where casting often falls down, as Western Europeans get cast for all European roles). I’d had concerns that it might be difficult to watch with the discrimination themes, but there are moments of triumph to break up the tough sections, and it ends on a positive note for the main characters. There is always a bittersweet element to this sort of story though. For every person who succeeds, there will be numerous people who never made it over those extra obstacles. For every person who gets the spotlight showing what they did, there are others who’ll remain obscure. I find stories like this a reminder that we still have a long way to go.

The Book of Life

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Book of Life CoverGenre: Children’s Fantasy / Film
Main Creative Team: Jorge R. Gutiérrez (director, writer); Doug Langdale (writer); Guillermo del Toro (producer)
Main Cast: Diego Luna; Zoe Saldana; Channing Tatum; Ice Cube; Ron Perlman; Kate del Castillo; Christina Applegate
First Shown: October, 2014
Available: Amazon.com | Amazon UK

A group of school children are taken to see a special exhibit on Mexico, where they hear a story that took place many years ago.

The opening had promise. Once the frame story of the children settles in, the main action in the past gets going. It’s the Day of the Dead, and the rulers of the two lands of the dead are watching. La Muerte (Kate del Castillo) is made of sugar and rules the Land of the Remembered, and Xibalba (Ron Perlman) is made of tar and rules the Land of the Forgotten. They see three children playing and make a wager. This is the point where I got that sinking feeling, and it just kept sinking lower as the story continued. The problem comes down to the wager: which of the two boys will marry the girl when they grow up.

There are things I liked about the film. The visuals were great. The school children are being told the story with wooden models, so the characters in the main story also resemble those models. The Land of the Remembered is particularly beautiful, with vibrant colours and detail. It creates a distinctive animation style.

The two immortals were the highlight for me. Both had great character designs, again with a lot of nice detail. Though they’re introduced as though one is good and one bad, it becomes clear that they’re both rather more ambiguous. I enjoyed the interplay between the two of them.

I also liked the plotline of Manolo (Diego Luna), one of the potential suitors, trying to find his place. He comes from a line of bullfighters, but wants to pursue music. This addresses gender role issues and machoism. Manolo is sensitive and doesn’t want to kill the bulls, which is seen as weak and unmanly.

Joaquín (Channing Tatum), the other suitor, is the son of a famous hero. Joaquín is arrogant and self-centred, but it becomes apparent that it comes from insecurity. He gets to grow into a more caring person as he comes to terms with his own issues.

Then there’s the problem of María (Zoe Saldana). Though María says she’s not a prize to be won, this is wishful thinking on her part. The entire story is about her having to choose one of the men. She gets a choice of which one, but she doesn’t have a choice to do something else with her life or marry someone else. There’s potential for stories to look at how women have very restricted choices at times, but this one failed to go there, because it never acknowledged that she was restricted.

One of the glaring things is that María does not have a personal story outside of the main plot. Manolo is figuring out his place in the world. Joaquín is trying to live up to the legacy of his dead father. But María is just there for the main plot. She was sent away by her father as a child, yet she doesn’t get space to address her family relationships as the others do. She’s highly educated, yet doesn’t have plans on what she might do next. She has combat training, yet when the action scenes roll around, they’re mainly there so the men can reconcile their differences by fighting together. She doesn’t really develop in any way from the María introduced as a child. All the speaking up, knowing how to fight, and being educated, serves to make her a more valuable prize. It doesn’t mean she gets treated as an equal part of the story.

Even for viewers who don’t have the same issue I did, and think love triangles are amazing, there’s no tension to this one. It’s obvious who she’ll marry from the start. There are no surprises here.

The setting could have told any story. The wager could have been anything. It could have gone in a direction no one expected and still have a happy ending. Instead, the main plotline was this, which really didn’t do justice to the characters and setting.

Paddington (Film)

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Paddington CoverGenre: Children’s Fantasy / Film
Main Creative Team: Paul King (director, writer, story); Hamish McColl (story); David Heyman (producer)
Main Cast: Ben Whishaw; Sally Hawkins; Hugh Bonneville; Madeleine Harris; Samuel Joslin; Julie Walters; Jim Broadbent; Nicole Kidman; Peter Capaldi; Tim Downie; Michael Gambon; Imelda Staunton
First Shown: 28th November, 2014
Available: Amazon.com | Amazon UK

The original Paddington Bear books, by Michael Bond (who has a cameo in the film), began publication in the late 1950s. The film isn’t a retelling of any specific book, but follows the same basic idea. Paddington’s (Ben Whishaw) home in Peru is destroyed, so he stows away on a ship heading for London. Once there, he ends up at Paddington Station, where he meets the Brown family. But things take a sinister turn when a taxidermist (Nicole Kidman) finds out he’s arrived.

I wasn’t sure how funny I’d find the film, as some of the humour stems from Paddington not understanding what’s going on and making mistakes. However, the funny side tended to be that things turned out unexpectedly, rather than Paddington feeling embarrassed or upset. I find the former funny, but the latter makes me uncomfortable. So I was glad it focused on unexpected resolutions.

The interactions between the Browns were great. At the start, there are obviously tensions in the family. Mr Brown (Hugh Bonneville) is very serious and obsessed with trying to shield everyone from risks. Judy (Madeleine Harris) sides with him over Paddington, because she wants the family to appear normal and not be embarrassing. On the other side, there’s Mrs Brown (Sally Hawkins), who is an artist, and Jonathan (Samuel Joslin), who dreams of being an astronaut. The dreamer side of the family want to help Paddington. I liked seeing how the family came together and sorted out their differences.

However, my favourite member of the family was Mrs Bird (Julie Walters), an elderly relative. Her asides, and her practical approach to dealing with Paddington, were very funny. She knows what’s really going on, even if it takes the Browns a little longer to figure it out.

There’s a magical realism feel to the film. Paddington causes some comment, but most people either ignore that he’s a bear or accept it after an initial comment. Things shift around the characters, such as the mural changing in the Brown’s house, the band playing the background music appearing in the scene, and the dolls house in the attic becoming a tiny version of the Brown’s house. This works particularly well due to the film being live action, as it grounds the surreal elements in the real.

One possible issue is whether people will make the connection between a bear in a children’s story and real refugees. I felt this was handled reasonably well, as there are references that reinforce this connection. Paddington has a label around his neck, reminiscent of child evacuees in World War II. This is stated directly in the film by his Aunt Lucy (Imelda Staunton), who hopes it will remind people of their past kindness. Putting this into the story was a nice touch, as it’s something the author of the books said was a direct inspiration for Paddington’s label.

Some of the hostility Paddington faces is based on fears about immigrants. The Brown’s neighbour, Mr Curry (Peter Capaldi), is worried that bears will end up taking over the neighbourhood and keep him awake with their jungle music. The narrative makes it very clear that Mr Curry isn’t a nice person. In contrast, Paddington also meets Mr Gruber (Jim Broadbent), who was a Jewish child refugee. Mr Gruber is warm, kind, and everything Mr Curry isn’t.

Colonialism is tackled in the tradition of snark and sarcasm. The film opens with an old colonial explorer (Tim Downie) on an expedition to Peru. He’s taken only the essentials, which means a trail of baggage including a large clock and a piano. Later, as the bears are learning English from a recording, it announces to them that British people have numerous words for rain, in a parody of the statements made about Inuit people and snow. Peru is referred to as Darkest Peru, as it is in the book, though the repetition of this is taken to an extreme that highlights its ridiculousness. Many of these moments are subtle, but clear in their critique of colonial attitudes.

The choice of villain also reinforces an anti-colonial narrative: she’s a taxidermist working at the Natural History Museum, who wants to return to a time when the best way to deal with a new species was to kill it and mount it as a trophy. She represents the old values, with all the problems that come with them. Her scenes are particularly chilling, because she is so callous about the value of life.

Though I generally liked the film, there were moments I didn’t like. There’s a scene where Mr Brown dresses as a woman as a disguise and a security guard flirts with him. These kinds of scenes rely on the idea that a man dressing as a woman is inherently funny, and that a man flirting with another man is funny. I did like some aspects of how it was handled though. Mr Brown later comments on the clothing being liberating. The disguise represents the first risk he takes to help Paddington, stepping outside of the constrictive life he’s constructed. It’s more unusual to follow up such scenes with a positive framing (it tends to be “never again, because I’m a manly man” rather than “actually, that was fine”).

I recognise that Paddington being called Paddington is unavoidable given the source, but it does still make me wince that he gets named because his name is deemed unpronounceable. That’s always been the part of the story that doesn’t sit well with me.

Paddington is a light-hearted family film with genuinely funny moments. I enjoyed seeing the Brown family come together and loved the visual style. The topic of refugees and immigration is as relevant now as ever, and the film presents this in a positive way. I would note some of the taxidermy scenes could be frightening for younger viewers. No animals are harmed, but the intentions are clear, and there are previously stuffed animals on show.