November 2019 film review

LE MANS 66 (AKA FORD VS FERRARI) 2019 D- James Mangold

In 1964, someone persuades Henry Ford II that it would be good for sales if he could build a car to win the famous Le Mans 24 hour endurance race and thereby end the hegemony of Ferrari, who have dominated the race for years. Ford calls upon Carroll Shelby (Matt Damon), a man who has established himself as a winner (though not in Europe) and he in turn asks a friend, Jeff Miles (Christian Bale) to help him build it and, even more important, drive it. 

          But Miles is a ‘difficult’ man, whose face doesn’t fit, and the Ford hierarchy would squeeze him out of the plan. But Shelby is a man used to getting his way...

          This film has a lot going for it. Directed by James Mangold, whose last film was Logan, easily the best of the X men series, and featuring strong performances from the lead players, it is both thrilling and insightful. My only criticism is the lack of strong female roles, with the exception of  Caitriona Balfe as Miles’s wife, but even there her contribution is peripheral. Definitely a man’s film then, though women have praised it too, among them my own wife.

THE IRISHMAN 2019 D- Martin Scorsese
“Do you paint houses?” An Irishman (Robert deNiro) is asked. “Yes”, he responds, “And I do my own carpentry too.” It would seem this is Mafia code for “Do you murder people for money?” And “And I clean up afterwards” respectively. And there you have it. For this is the story, and for Scorsese a very well worn path I think you’ll agree, of a hitman and his hits. Some way into the film we meet Jimmy Hoffa (Al Pacino, who for my money steals the show), leader of the immensely powerful Teamster’s Union and “the second most powerful man in America”, who befriends deNiro and uses him as minder-in-chief. Of course everyone knows that Hoffa disappeared in 1975 and his body has never been found...
          When it comes to portraying the shady, violent world of the Italian Mafia, nobody has done it better than Scorsese. His Goodfellas was perhaps the definitive gangster movie. And in this film, produced by Netflix, he has the advantage of some remarkable technology with which has been able to ‘de-age’ the main characters, including a Jo Pesci, who when left ungraphiced clearly is in more need of this technology than any of the others. But in this reviewer’s opinion, this is only a gimmick, a piece of wizardry which doesn’t really add much to the movie. And like Le Mans 66, there is a distressing paucity of women’s roles. In Goodfellas we had the estimable Lorraine Bracco. In this, women stay well in the background.

LITTLE MONSTERS (2019) D- Abe Forsythe
In a rural township in Australia, a primary school teacher (Lupita Nyong’o) takes her class on an outing to a local theme park, well it’s more a farm that’s been done up as a petting zoo. Whatever. On the way there we meet no-hoper Josh Gad who manages to persuade teach to let him act as chaperone in place of a parent who has dropped out. She’s not entirely sure about him, and she may be right to be so, but in the event he proves an invaluable ally when the farm is attacked by a huge gang of marauding, wait for it, zombies.
            For yes, this is a zombie flick, Ozzie style. This is in fact a very tight little movie, well acted and directed, with not too much gore but plenty of laughs as well as nastier moments. I understand Mark Kermode, world’s biggest fan of horror movies, didn’t rate it, but maybe all that blood and guts have jaded his palate. The fact is, I did.
           

November 2019 book review

LITTLE SIBERIA, by Antti Tuomainen.
A meteorite falls in a remote Finnish village, Turns out it’s a very rare kind, and maybe worth as much as a million euros. Greed breaks out in the village as its inhabitants argue over ownership. The heavenly body attracts interest from outside too: the Russian mob reckons they can just take it for themselves.
          It is placed in the local museum while its fate is decided, and on the rota of people assigned to guard it is our hero, a pastor who has served in the armed forces in Afghanistan, so he can take care of himself. Which he will need to do, as one attempt after another is made to purloin the hot rock.
          A very different tale from Palm Beach, Finland; nonetheless Mr. Tuomainen has created another quirky, violent little tale of nastiness in the Arctic. And although I like to read important, significant books even, I also like a cracking good read. Which this very much is.

FEED THE RAT, by Al Alvarez
The ‘rat’ of the title being the itch to take risks and push the envelope that is within some people, which must be ‘fed’ if boredom is to kept from the door. Some ‘feed their rat’ by mountain climbing, and this skilfully crafted book is about these men, and one man in particular: Mo Antoine, a Brit despite his exotic name, who constantly seeks greater challenges on peaks throughout the world.
          Alvarez, an experienced climber himself, accompanies Mo on some of these ventures, though must bow out when the technical challenges become too great for him, and he is forced to sit and watch his illustrious friend negotiate vertical pitches that seem to lack any discernible hand or footholds.
          Alvarez has established a glowing reputation for his writing, especially in America where he regularly contributes to The New Yorker. And this is as good an introduction into his oeuvre as you might wish for.

MEMOIRS OF AN INFANTRY OFFICER, by Siegfried Sasoon
This achingly beautiful yet at times horrific account of life in the trenches of the Great War follows on from his book Memoirs of a Fox hunting Man and covers the period 1916-1917, as the British and French throw themselves continually against the German defenses, usually to little avail and at terrible loss of life.
           Sasoon himself, who calls himself Sherston in this book, has already distinguished himself in battle more than once and has won the Military Cross as a result. But soon he begins to realize the awful futility of war in general and this conflict in particular. Knowing that as a ‘war hero’ his voice will carry considerable weight, he hatches a plan to denounce the generals and political leaders who have chosen to continue the war for no readily discernible reason. But will anybody listen, even to him? Or will he simply be labelled a man driven mad by shell-shock and dispatched to a psychiatric institution? Read on, if you like crisp, exquisite prose telling a story of death and inglory.

AN APOLOGY

    Followers of this blog may have noticed a paucity of posts lately. This is because I have discovered Facebook and now use it as my ‘internet mouthpiece’, if you will. It’s a useful discipline to distill one’s thoughts into 100 words or less, though giving up the opportunity to write at further length has been a bit of a wrench.

I will still post on this blog from time to time, especially around the end/beginning of each month to post reviews of films and books I have encountered for the first time. For the rest you can find me on FB under the name ‘Steve Glascoe’ if you wish to keep up with my stream of consciousness, such as it is.

But once again, apologies if you have felt abandoned.