Ride Like A Girl

(PG) ★★★

Director: Rachel Griffiths.

Cast: Teresa Palmer, Sam Neill, Sullivan Stapleton, Genevieve Morris, Brooke Satchwell, Stevie Payne, Magda Szubanski, Mick Molloy.

The horse was surprisingly adept at surfing.

Read my review for ABC News here.

Female sports biopics are, sadly, few and far between - last year's I, Tonya (which wasn't exactly celebratory of its heroine) and the year before's Battle Of The Sexes are the only ones that immediately come to mind (tell me all the ones I'm forgetting in the comments, please).

So Ride Like A Girl, the story of history-making jockey Michelle Payne, is a breath of fresh air. Not only is it a positive sportswoman biopic, but it's also Australian. And given how much we Aussies love sport, we should really be seeing a lot more of this kind of film.

I don't want to bang on too much more about the film here - you can click here for my full review on my employer's national news website. This is only being written on the off chance people regularly come to this site, or in case someone ended up here by accident due to the vagaries of the internet. And to say things I've thought of since writing my review for the ABC two days ago.

For those of you who don't want to click through to the ABC News website. Ride Like A Girl is the very definition of "good, not great". If it was a horse, it would be the kind that wins a few group two races, but never flourishes in group one.

The true story at the heart of it is exceptional, but little about the craft of the film itself is. The direction from first-time director Rachel Griffiths (best known as an actor in the likes of Muriel's Wedding and Six Feet Under) is solid and competent, and the script tells its story in a straight-forward, no-frills manner. The cast does a good job, with Stapleton the stand-out as now-disgraced trainer Darren Weir, Palmer showing real grit in the lead role, and Neill proving yet again to be incapable of delivering a bad performance, but no one is in career-best form.

These are good things though - if you want to see another exceptional true story with a horse-racing theme told poorly, check out The Cup. It takes its amazing real life yarn and pisses it away with a shitty script, terrible pacing, and dire performances. If nothing else, Ride Like A Girl is better than The Cup.

Perhaps more important than the three-star quality of the film though is what it says, both explicitly and implicitly. Much of the run-time is dedicated to Payne bashing against the glass ceiling of the male-dominated racing industry, and busting her gut to prove her worth to a bunch of ignorant men. At the same time, purely by existing, this female-led sports film highlights how few female-led sports films there are, and how worthy their stories are.

While the film is "good, not great", it is still heartwarming and tells a cracking underdog yarn. It has broad appeal, and hopefully a lot of people go and see it, if only to show that there is an audience for these kinds of films.

Abominable

(G) ★★★★

Director: Jill Culton.

Cast: (voices of) Chloe Bennet, Albert Tsai, Tenzing Norgay Trainor, Eddie Izzard, Sarah Paulson, Tsai Chin, Michelle Wong.

Yeti's love eating the heads of human children.

If you took Steven Spielberg's E.T. - The Extra Terrestrial, mixed it with some healthy dollops of Hayao Miyazaki, ran it through some impressive CG animation, and set it in China, you might end up with something close to Abominable.

The second collab between Dreamworks and Pearl Studios (formerly Oriental Dreamworks) is a "help the creature get home" family adventure that is filled with so much fun and wonder that you just want to give the whole damned movie a big hug. It's utterly charming and downright beautiful, flourishing on themes which celebrate family, nature and the importance of doing the right thing.

Abominable's heroine is Yi (Bennet), a driven teen trying to save money for the cross-China trip she and her family dreamt of taking. But when she discovers an injured Yeti hiding on the roof of her apartment building, she drops everything to help the creature (which she nicknames Everest) to get back to its home (which is also Everest), with two of her neighbours along for the ride.

(And yep, this film was going to be called Everest, but they changed it to Abominable, probably to avoid confusion with the film that came out four years ago called Everest that no one was ever going to mistake for this film.)

There's a lot to like about Abominable. It doesn't have the depth of CG insta-classics like, say, almost every Pixar film, but it says the right things and makes all the right moves. There is genuine warmth and heart in its story of Yi and her friends helping a lost creature get home. It has its bad guys and its moments of darkness, but the overwhelming sense is one of beautiful joy.

A lot of this comes through in its Miyazaki-esque love of nature and application of magic. The Japanese director's work has always blossomed with mystical forces and revelled in the way people interact with the environment - check out Ponyo, Princess Mononoke, Spirited Away and more for a long list of examples. The magic at the centre of Abominable is similar, and sparks some memorable moments, including a floral tidal wave, a blossoming statue, and an aerial bombing involving blueberries.

The voice cast is great, led by Bennet's Yi, who is an excellent and interesting heroine. Yi is big-hearted and talented but misguided when it comes to her family. Equally intriguing is Dr Burnish (Izzard), who is painted in increasingly dynamic strokes as the story progresses.

More family friendly than that other CG Yeti outing, the under-rated Smallfeet, Abominable is adorable.

Ad Astra

(M) ★★

Director: James Gray.

Cast: Brad Pitt, Tommy Lee Jones, Ruth Negga, Liv Tyler, Donald Sutherland.

"Wait... am I being overtaken by a Volkswagen?"

Unnecessary narration is a real bugbear of mine. Nine times out of 10 in modern film, it's redundant, telling us things we already know or could easily figure out. Rare recent exceptions include It: Chapter Two and Once Upon A Time In Hollywood, where narration was used to good effect to fill in gaps with short, sharp exposition. It's also great in things like Deadpool, where it's a meta-tool to poke fun at what's going on and get laughs (see also the meme-worthy narration of Arrested Development).

But in most modern movies, it adds nothing, merely telling us what we're already seeing and treating the audience like idiots too stupid to decipher a wistful look or a pregnant pause. They took it out of Blade Runner for good reason, and the same should apply in Ad Astra, a profound yet ponderous existential journey into the far reaches of both outer space and an astronaut's "soul".

The narration is not the only thing that grates about Ad Astra, but it is emblematic of the troubles at the heart of this Heart Of Darkness-like journey. While it's an admirable attempt at an all-too-rare beast - the big-budget sci-fi art film - the film is about as subtle as its redundant narration.

Ad Astra (which is Latin for "to the stars") follows astronaut Roy McBride on a secret mission to the moon, Mars and beyond as he seeks to contact his astronaut father (Jones), who was long thought dead following a one-way mission to the outer edges of the galaxy.

There is so much to praise about this movie. Pitt's performances for one, as well as the sound design, Max Richter's score, the way the film portrays space travel, Hoyte van Hoytema's cinematography, and some of the set pieces.

But all this excellence is dragged down by some painfully obvious pop-psychology, dully and unnecessarily narrated by Pitt. Without giving too much away, his character's journey is both an inner and outer one, and what he finds by the film's end is underwhelming, and as subtle as a sledgehammer. Ad Astra's plot-as-metaphor is tiring and silly, and ultimately unrewarding.

The film is also front-loaded with its best set pieces. The two finest sequences - a high altitude plummet from a space elevator and a high-speed shoot-out on the moon - come in the first half and nothing in the latter half can match their energy or excitement. The pace slows down dramatically, partly because the plot necessitates a long solo space journey which plays out as a monotonous bout of space madness. And then it just begins to wear on you, despite the beauty of it all.

And it is beautiful. The obvious comparison with that other recent big-budget sci-fi think piece Interstellar (which has a far worse ending than Ad Astra, to be fair) is difficult to avoid when you consider both films share a cinematographer. Hoytema's visuals are again amazing. And they're aided by an immersive and impressive sound design that also compliments Richter's score, which in turn compliments the whole production.

As for Pitt, he does a stellar job (pardon the pun), with a turn that fits into his already crowded list of great roles. It is a mostly quiet and internal performance, which makes the dull-and-dumb narration all the more frustrating. It's as if the filmmakers are saying "Pitt's performance is too subtle and people are too stupid, so we better get him to say what his character is thinking". It does Pitt a disservice, undermining a top 10 turn from him, and also undoing so much of the film's good work.

Ad Astra reaches for the stars in its storytelling, but isn't brave enough to really fly.

It: Chapter Two

(MA15+) ★★★★

Director:  Andy Muschietti.

Cast: Jessica Chastain, James McAvoy, Bill Hader, Bill Skarsgård,  Isaiah Mustafa, Jay Ryan, James Ransone, Jaeden Martell, Jeremy Ray Taylor, Sophia Lillis, Finn Wolfhard, Wyatt Oleff, Chosen Jacobs, Jack Dylan Grazer, Teach Grant.

The new X-Men team wasn't up to scratch.

Read my full review of It (2017) here.

I loved It - it made my top 10 films of 2017 because not only was it pants-browningly scary, but it was also a beautifully shot coming-of-age story that deserves to be a rite-of-passage horror movie for teens now and in the future.

But that film was only half the story, literally. Stephen King's 1986 source novel divided its action into two sections, set 27 years apart. So It: Chapter Two finds the protagonists of the previous film all grown up, all unhappy, and trying to repress their 27-year-old memories of a child-eating clown named Pennywise (Skarsgård).

But Mike (Mustafa) stayed behind in their hometown of Derry, obsessing over Pennywise, while all the rest of his "gang" The Losers moved on and away. When it seems like "It" has returned to fulfil his 27-year murder cycle, Mike summons The Losers back to Derry to fulfil the promise they made to deal with the murderous clown once and for all.

The success of the first film (which works as a standalone movie) saw this sequel greenlit with double the budget and a top-shelf cast. It's this quality cast - notably Chastain, McAvoy and Hader - that helps elevate Chapter Two above its potentially schlocky material. A handy FX budget also helps sell some of the more ludicrous effects sequences, particularly in the inevitably CG-heavy showdown.

But the way the material is handled is top-shelf too. Whereas the first film dealt with adolescents on the brink of adulthood and the typical fears that come with coming of age, here we find the protagonists on the brink of mid-life crises, riddled with uncertainty and haunted by their pasts. Unrequited loves, closeted sexuality, childhood trauma, unfulfilled lives, self doubts - these are as much a part of the nightmares of The Losers' lives as the monstrous Pennywise.

As much as the likes of Chastain, McAvoy and Hader (and Ryan and Ransone too) bring the goods in the acting stakes, it's Pennywise's show. Aided by some freaky make-up and FX work, Skarsgård is again utterly terrifying, his performance a masterclass in scary. He again makes It's secret weapon, of course, "It". While the film leans heavily on its jump scares, delayed jump scares, and rising soundtrack, it also finds other ways to unnerve. A kid alone in the dark with Pennywise lit by a single firefly, a broad daylight encounter between Hader's Richie and Pennywise, an old lady acting strangely in a loungeroom, Pennywise headbutting a glass wall trying to break through - all of these moments will have you checking under your bed when you get home.

Pennywise may be the star, but special mentions goes to Hader, who gives the performance of his career. He's hilarious, providing some much needed levity amid the po-faced seriousness, but he also helps make Richie the most well-rounded and interesting character of The Losers. It's an under-rated turn from an under-rated actor in a film you might not necessarily seek out for its top-notch thespianism.

The only real creaks come in the story itself. Each character wanders off for their own trip down memory lane, which keeps the scares coming, but drags the story out. There is also the matter of how one kills a millennia-old fear beast, which tips the film's ending into absurdity somewhat. But the film is self-aware enough to poke fun at itself, via the age-old Stephen King critique that his endings suck, with McAvoy's Bill standing in for King (who also cameos in the film). This at least helps keep expectations in check.

It's likely we haven't seen the last of It (they're already touting the possibility of prequels) but if they can leave It well enough alone, then we have a finely crafted horror duology on our hands that will stand the test of time as one of the better Stephen King adaptations.

The Kitchen

(MA15+) ★★

Director: Andrea Berloff.

Cast: Melissa McCarthy, Tiffany Haddish, Elisabeth Moss, Domhnall Gleeson, Brian d'Arcy James, James Badge Dale, Wayne Duvall, Jeremy Bobb, Bill Camp, Margo Martindale, Common, E.J. Bonilla.

They thought the kitchen was bad until they saw ... the conservatory!

I've often said that instead of remaking great films, Hollywood should be remaking disappointing films. Why do-over something that's already a classic - why not realise the unfulfilled potential of a missed opportunity?

The League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen, The Dark Knight Rises and Assassin's Creed are a couple of prime examples. And I'm going to add The Kitchen to that list. Its great characters, excellent premise and strong themes go begging courtesy to a haphazard delivery that never gives its characters, premise or themes time to shine.

Based on a Vertigo graphic novel series, The Kitchen is the story of three wives in New York's Hell's Kitchen who are left behind when their Irish mobster husbands go to jail for a robbery. Unsatisfied with the way the Irish mob looks after them while their fellas are locked up, Kathy (McCarthy), Ruby (Haddish) and Claire (Moss) decide to take a slice of the pie for themselves.

Soon they're running the Irish mob's protection racket and going head-to-head with the Mafia. But are they in over their heads?

This film has so much going for it. A killer cast with meaty roles, some awesome themes of female empowerment, power and corruption, plus a strong plot that gives its characters solid arcs. So where does it all go so wrong?

According to this post from John August's excellent screenwriting blog, the average scene length is about three minutes long at most, or between one to three for a Harry Potter film, as the reader's question notes. For The Kitchen, the average scene length appears to be less than one minute.

Obviously it's not every scene, but it's damned-near most of them and it gives the story a rushed quality, as if the filmmakers were racing to the end, like a four-year-old recounting their day - "this happened, and then this happened, and then this happened, and then this....". Scenes are never given time to breathe - instead characters get a few lines each, then bam, onto the next set.

While this is fine at first and allows for a quick set-up of the story, the film's "quickly, quickly" approach eventually grinds. For a story that often feels like it's begging to be a TV series, this is particularly bewildering and frustrating. The richness of the characters and their individual arcs are compressed into an endless barrage of short sequences, giving the entire film the feeling of a montage.

This not only messes with the pacing of the film, it also means we are unable to absorb some of the finer details of the story, rendering a "twist" ending ineffective. It also sucks much of the pathos out of the characters, voiding so much good work done by McCarthy, Haddish and Moss, who are all excellent. When key characters end up at the wrong end of a pistol, it's hard to feel anything because the relentless pacing has pulled the necessary emotion from the story.

It also ruins The Kitchen's potential for dark comedy. There are a couple of nice moments that start to summon up some black humour, but the film doesn't have the patience to linger or commit to the darkness, or indeed any particular tone.

It's a big disappointment from a story and characters with so much potential. The cast's good work and the great production design just makes it all the more frustrating.

Maybe we can get the TV series this deserves in 10 years time. But for now, a visit to The Kitchen is only going to get you a rushed, unsatisfying meal.