The greatest movies of all time

"The results are in. The greatest movie ever made is... Spice World, Don Corleone."

Updated: June 26, 2023

How do we figure out which film is the greatest of all time?

It's a question we've wanted to answer ever since we started making movies, and it's one we can never solve. Until now.*

In 1998, I stumbled upon the American Film Institute's list of the greatest American films of all time. It sparked a life-long passion for cinema and an obsession with similar film lists. I wanted to see all the great movies, and these lists told me which ones to start with. As time went on, the lists blurred together into one huge list on my computer, which then made me wonder what would happen if I compiled them properly in a spreadsheet. Would it tell me what the greatest film of all time was?

Below is the result of that ridiculous thought. I collected 65 lists, each containing either 50 or 100 (or sometimes 101) films. Some were alphabetised, some were ranked, some were arranged chronologically, so I used a rudimentary weighting system to even them out - basically an appearance on an unranked list got you a five, while an appearance on a ranked list started at 10 points for the top 10, nine for being in the next 10, and so on. I sought out lists of under-represented films - those from certain continents, or of certain genres, or certain eras, or directed by women - in a further attempt to even things out. 

I realise what a flawed endeavour this is, and that my methodology is also flawed, but here are the results nonetheless.

1. The Godfather
2. Citizen Kane
3. Casablanca
4. 2001: A Space Odyssey
5. Vertigo
6. Singin' in the Rain
7. Star Wars
8. Psycho
9. The Godfather Part II
10. Lawrence of Arabia
11. The Wizard of Oz
12. E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial
13. Pulp Fiction
14. Schindler's List
15. Gone With the Wind
16. Some Like It Hot
17. Taxi Driver
18. It's a Wonderful Life
19. Dr Strangelove or: How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love The Bomb
20. Apocalypse Now
21. Chinatown
22. Raiders of the Lost Ark
23. Raging Bull
24. Jaws
25. Annie Hall
26. The Searchers
27. Blade Runner
28. The Silence of the Lambs
29. North by Northwest
30. The Empire Strikes Back
31. Goodfellas
32. Rear Window
33. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest
34. City Lights
35. The Graduate
36. On the Waterfront
37. Alien
38. Bonnie and Clyde
39. King Kong
40. Seven Samurai
41. Double Indemnity
42. The Exorcist
43. Sunset Boulevard
44. The Shawshank Redemption
45. Titanic
46. All About Eve
47. Spirited Away
48. Saving Private Ryan
49. The Third Man
50. Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs
51. The Matrix
52. The Sound of Music
53. A Clockwork Orange
54. Toy Story
55. To Kill a Mockingbird
56. The General
57. Aliens
58. The Maltese Falcon
59. The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
60. The Bridge on the River Kwai
61. High Noon
62. The Grapes of Wrath
63. Breathless
64. Sunrise
65. Fargo
66. Trainspotting
67. The Deer Hunter
68. Tokyo Story
69. The Piano
70. The Wild Bunch
71. Do the Right Thing
72. The Philadelphia Story
73. The African Queen
74. Terminator 2
75. Seven
76. Blue Velvet
77. Battleship Potemkin
78. The 400 Blows
79. 8 1/2
80. The Night of the Hunter
81. Nashville
82. Mr Smith Goes to Washington
83. La Regle du Jeu
84. Modern Times
85. It Happened One Night
86. Rashomon
87. This Is Spinal Tap
88. Mulholland Drive
89. L.A. Confidential
90. Touch of Evil
91. Sullivan's Travels
92. Persona
93. Duck Soup
94. Die Hard
95. Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
96. Metropolis
97. Forrest Gump
98. Cabaret
99. Bicycle Thieves
100. Back To The Future
101. West Side Story
102. The Shining
103. The Seventh Seal
104. Moulin Rouge!
105. Jurassic Park
106. His Girl Friday
107. Bringing Up Baby
108. Bride of Frankenstein
109. The Treasure of the Sierra Madre
110. Sherlock Jr
111. The Best Years of Our Lives
112. Pinocchio
113. In The Mood For Love
114. 12 Angry Men
115. The Princess Bride
116. The Lion King
117. Life Of Brian
118. La Dolce Vita
119. Frankenstein
120. Don't Look Now
121. Ben-Hur
122. There Will Be Blood
123. The Usual Suspects
124. The Gold Rush
125. Nosferatu
126. Midnight Cowboy
127. The Terminator
128. The Passion of Joan of Arc
129. The Manchurian Candidate
130. Pather Panchali
131. Mad Max: Fury Road
132. M
133. Manhattan
134. When Harry Met Sally...
135. Unforgiven
136. The Dark Knight
137. Beau Travail
138. The Lord Of The Rings: The Return Of The King
139. Goldfinger
140. The Lady Eve
141. Stagecoach
142. Rebel Without A Cause
143. Lost In Translation
144. Fantasia
145. Return Of The Jedi
146. Dances With Wolves
147. The Red Shoes
148. Sweet Smell of Success
149. Withnail & I
150. The Lord Of The Rings: The Two Towers
151. Jeanne Dielman, 23, Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles
152. A Streetcar Named Desire

The Godfather appeared on the most lists (38), just ahead of Casablanca and 2001: A Space Odyssey (37), followed by Citizen Kane (35), and Lawrence of Arabia and Vertigo (34). The Godfather Part II appeared on the fewest number of lists of the films in the top 10 (30).

In the top 100, Mulholland Drive appeared on the least number of lists (9).

The highest ranking non-English language film is The Seven Samurai (#40), the highest silent film is City Lights (#34), and the most recent films are 2002's Spirited Away (#47) and 2001's The Lord Of The Rings: The Fellowship Of The Ring (#60). The oldest films are 1927's Sunrise (#64) and Metropolis (#96).

Of the films in the top 100, The Godfather had the highest average score per list (8.4), while Citizen Kane, Star Wars, It's a Wonderful Life, and The Shawshank Redemption were the only other films to also average higher than 8.

For films that appeared on a minimum of five lists, the best average is City Of God (8.6) and There Will Be Blood (8.6), The Godfather (8.4), and Withnail and I, Citizen Kane, and Jeanne Dielman, 23, Quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles (8.3).

The only films in the top 100 directed by women are The Wachowski's The Matrix (#51) and Jane Campion's The Piano (#69). The next highest is Beau Travail (#137) Sofia Coppola's Lost In Translation (#143), and Jeanne Dielman (#151).

* Just kidding. We'll never know the answer.

Moonage Daydream

This is a version of a review airing on ABC Radio across regional Victoria on October 13, 2022.

(M) ★★★★

Director: Brett Morgen.

David Bowie: sucking stars through his nose.

A truly great music doco or biopic captures the essence of an artist. This is why Rocketman was so impressive, but Bohemian Rhapsody less so. It's why Morgen's Cobain: Montage of Heck and Asif Kapadia's Amy are so brilliant. It's tough to match the subject matter to the delivery, to drill down into the core of the musician and excavate the truth in a way that befits them, but it really separates the masterpieces from the mediocre.

Moonage Daydream, an hallucinogenic collage that examines the life and career of David Bowie, is almost a masterpiece, and it works largely because it understands its subject in a deep way. Through a fascinating mixture of style and substance, the film captures the essence of the polymath born David Robert Jones.

Covering Bowie's career from Ziggy Stardust to his electronica-infused work of the late '90s, it explores some his key eras through an interweaving series of interviews and musical interludes. All the while, it blends its chronology with restless visuals - live footage and talk show appearances are interspersed with snippets from silent films and psychedelic animations, while Bowie's own artworks sit alongside candid snaps and never-before-seen clips from his archives.

The key weapon here is Bowie himself and his surprisingly open and self-analytical nature as an interviewee. These chats provide cutting insight into each of his phases and characters, allowing Bowie to tell his own story from beyond the grave. It's fascinating that these interviews exist, given Bowie's reputation for being enigmatic and elusive. It seems that wasn't actually the case, and collected here, they make for a frank self-assessment of a remarkable career and a mind that was always searching and creating. 

The thoughtfulness and creativity of Bowie are the essential ingredients at the heart of Moonage Daydream. Like the artist himself, the film bounces from style to style, from one idea to the next, endlessly inventing and finding new ways to share the art at its core. 

Coupled with the music - an often explosive mix of songs and sounds from his stunningly diverse back catalogue - the film is wonderfully immersive. It's like wandering around the David Bowie Is exhibition on a mild acid trip, with Bowie himself in your headphones, narrating your visit.

The only thing holding Moonage Daydream back is its pacing. It either needs to be half an hour shorter or three hours longer. Moments of repetition become aggravating - there's a surprising amount of footage that appears more than once in the film. This makes some segments drag on, and given its visual eccentricities, the doco could have packed more punch in a more concise runtime. Having said that, it opens up a fascinating insight that leaves you begging for more. Bowie did so much in his lifetime that the film makes you feel like untold riches lie between each costume change and musical reinvention.

For this reason, Moonage Daydream won't be the last word on Bowie that we see on the screen. But it certainly sets the bar high.

The Gray Man

This is a version of a review airing on ABC Radio across regional Victoria on August 18, 2022.

(MA15+) ★★

Director: Anthony & Joe Russo.

Cast: Ryan Gosling, Chris Evans, Ana de Armas, Billy Bob Thornton, Jessica Henwick, Regé-Jean Page, Wagner Moura, Julia Butters, Dhanush, Alfre Woodard.

Unfortunately for Ryan, the whole room was wearing the same colour.

Imagine you're 16 and you're writing a script for an action movie. There will be shootouts, fireworks, fist fights, car chases, explosions, a plane crash, daring rescues, cool locations, and the hero will be utterly unflappable. Sounds cool.

The Gray Man is that movie. Written with all the panache, wit, depth and characterisation you'd expect from a 16-year-old (sorry teens), The Gray Man is the filmic equivalent of an airport novel - perhaps not hugely surprising because it's based on one, the first in a series written by Mark Greaney. So the film is at least true to its source, and that makes it successful in one sense. 

In another more accurate sense, The Gray Man is little more than a loud noise - it will distract you for a bit, then its gone, leaving nothing but a ringing in your ears. Yeah, it's fun while it lasts, but only in a "I've got nothing better to do" kind of way.

The fast-paced plot centres on Sierra Six (Gosling), an ex-con-turned-assassin, who becomes the target of every assassin in the world when he stumbles on the dirty secrets of a crooked government official. 

Netflix has splashed US$200m on this spy flick, hoping to kickstart their own Bond or Bourne franchise. The money is certainly there on the screen - the set pieces are massive, the effects are huge, the cast is top shelf, and the globe-trotting action doesn't let up. But it's an A-grade budget trying to wallpaper over a B-grade script.

Part of me wonders if that's the point. The Russo brothers have given us four of the best films in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, as well as contributing to the all-time-great TV shows Community and Arrested Development, so it seems they know what they're doing. Maybe they set out to make a brains-off, hold-on-tight actioner that harks back to the big shoot-em-ups of the '80s and '90s, but with a modern look and zero depth.

This seems a legit possibility and could give the film a pass, but it's also sporadically clunky and nowhere near as cool as it aims to be. The one-liners don't zing like they should and the tone shifts uneasily between its dark and threatening moments (centring on Evans' too-charming bad guy) and its goofy delights. There's also a weird flashback snuck in early on to set-up a relationship between our hero and a kidnapped girl, after the girl has already been kidnapped, like an afterthought to make us care.

But with so little going on in the character department - despite the best efforts of a very talented cast - it's hard to care. Maybe that's the point though - maybe this is meant to be a very expensive empty vessel that makes a lot of noise and that's it. 

If so, bravo Russo brothers. But it's hard to see how enough people will care enough to come back for the inevitable sequels. 

GIG REVIEW: Sigur Ros - Margaret Court Arena, Melbourne, August 13, 2022

Sigur Ros
Margaret Court Arena, Melbourne
August 13, 2022

I have no idea what Sigur Ros' songs are about. I don't know the words to them - hell, I barely know any of the titles. 

Maybe this makes me a bad fan. Or maybe it's acceptable because I don't speak Icelandic (or their made-up language of Hopelandic for that matter).

But I don't care because Sigur Ros' music moves me in a way that no other band does. To me, it's the most beautiful music I've ever heard a "rock band" make. In fact, seeing Sigur Ros live is a somewhat jarring experience because it reminds you that this beautiful music is actually made by living breathing humans and not in fact created by sticking a microphone on an Icelandic glacier and recording the sound it makes as it slides slowly across the landscape.

Not that the band betrayed their humanity in any real way. The only time frontman Jonsi spoke to the crowd was 19 songs into their 20-song set, when he thanked us for coming. The rest of the time, he looked like a sorcerer, hunched over his guitar, wielding a bow like some kind of magical staff, eliciting phantasmagorical sounds from his instrument.  

But as jarring as it is, and as inhuman as they seemed, seeing Sigur Ros live is thing of beauty. The songs hit as a wave of emotion, without silly things like words and meaning getting in the way. It may as well be instrumental, with Jonsi's voice just another instrument.

Their set was split in two with an intermission, where brave souls dared to line up for fresh drinks, only to mostly miss Glósóli kicking off set two. With no new album from the band in a decade, they leant into their big albums and their "hits", with half the gig dedicated to tracks from () and Takk. Two new tracks - apparently titled Gold 2 and Gold 4 - got an airing, as did a couple of b-sides. It all sounded great.

The darkness of Kveikur was a highlight, as was all-time favourite Svefn-g-englar, but really there were no dud tracks. The grandeur, the beauty, the utterly indecipherable epicness of it all was breathtaking. I'm sure everyone present had their personal moments, where the songs spoke to them in a tongue they didn't understand (seriously, how many Icelandic speakers were there likely to be in a gig in Melbourne? A dozen? 20?). 

But that's the beauty of Sigur Ros. Surely I'm not the only one who feels like their music speaks to them unlike any other band's, despite not understanding a single bloody word of it?

RIP Archie Roach

Archie's family has given permission for his name, image and music to be used.

The last time I saw Archie Roach perform was in March. It was in one of the big tents at the Port Fairy Folk Festival - the same year that a stage was named in his honour.

As we listened in awed silence to the stories he told between his songs, the sound of his oxygen pump hissed through the PA system, amplified by the mic. He spoke in a frail, halting way, his voice trembling under the weight of the health problems that had plagued him for the last decade. 

But when he sang, his voice came from another place. It was rich, powerful and strong, soaring in that beautifully distinctive wide vibrato he's famed for, belying the image of the man before us who had to sit to perform and relied on a contraption to help him breathe. 

This image of Archie sticks in my mind because it's the best analogy I can think of right now for the man he was. He was a man who fought against adversity to share his message. No matter what life threw at him - and it threw a lot - Archie kept going. When he got knocked down, he got back up and sang his song. Even as his health faded, he worked even harder to share his truth, to inspire us all, to leave a lasting legacy of hope through song and story.

Every performance Archie gave was a deep experience, but some have taken on mythic status. The one in 1990, where he played just two songs opening for Paul Kelly at the Melbourne Concert Hall, his perhaps the most legendary. 

The second song was Took The Children Away - a song that never fails to make me cry, and is his best known track. 

"When the song finished, there was dead silence," Paul told Double J in 2019. 

"(Archie) thought that he bombed and just turned and walked off stage.

"As he was he was walking off, the applause started to build and build. 

"The audience had been so stunned that it had taken them a while to respond."

It was the birth of a legend. Later that year, Archie would work with Paul Kelly and Steve Connolly to record Charcoal Lane. The following year he won two ARIA Awards. And so his legend grew.

The other performance that looms large in his legacy came at the Port Fairy Folk Festival in 2010, where he was booked to perform alongside his wife and soul mate Ruby Hunter. 

Less than a month before the gig, Ruby passed away. She was just 54. 

Archie was devastated. He and Ruby had met nearly 40 years prior as homeless teenagers and been inseparable ever since. Archie told me Ruby's passing had felt like he'd lost a part of himself.

Ruby's funeral was held on March 5. Despite the enormous grief that weighed on his heart, Archie turned up at the Folkie the following day and performed, with an empty stool and mic stand set up next to him where Ruby would have been.

"You'll have to bear me up, I can’t do this without you," he told the audience.

"I need you today."

The concert became a tribute to Ruby, with Archie breaking down during River Song, a song he wrote with Ruby during a camping trip. He left the stage to a standing ovation that lasted long after he was gone, and was followed by a minute's silence for Ruby.

Later that year, Archie suffered a stroke, and the following year he was diagnosed with lung cancer.

But nothing could keep him down. He had a message to deliver to the world and wasn't going to rest until he'd delivered it. As soon as he was able, he headed into the studio to make Into The Bloodstream, one of many incredible albums in a back catalogue full of great records.

In July 2012, I got a phone call from my friend Lyn, inviting me to be an extra in Archie's new film clip. It was being filmed at the Crossley Hall, just up the road from the house where Archie would spend the last decade or so of his life.

Lyn neglected to tell me I was supposed to dress in old-style clothes circa the '40s or '50s. I turned up in my t-shirt and Converse. The costume lady rolled her eyes at me, and thrust a jacket into my hands. "Put this on," she said, before whisking herself away to more important things.

In between takes and set-ups, I sat at a table in my borrowed jacket with Archie, Jack Charles and Shane Howard, feeling unworthy and out of my depth as I interviewed them all for the paper where I worked. Archie told me about how his recent turmoil and triggered an expansion of his philosophy.

"A lot of my music just dealt with pain and sorrow - now it’s about joy and getting on with life," he said.

I barely made the cut in the clip, probably because of my Converse. That's me, bottom left-hand corner at the three-minute mark.

But I got to spend a lot of the afternoon watching Archie standing on the little Crossley Hall stage in his dapper suit, lip-synching to Song To Sing. Every time the camera rolled, it felt like I was in church, and Archie was the minister delivering a sermon. 

"When you are down, and you're feeling lonely,

"You've just got to breathe, you've got to believe,

"Just get up off the ground,

"You know you're not the only one down on your knees,

"Asking to be free from all your pain,

"Well come on everybody, you've got a song to sing."

After our scenes were done, Lyn came up to me. "You can sing," she said, "come with me."

Still wearing my borrowed jacket from Wardrobe, Lyn led me into the neighbouring church, St Brigid's, where Archie's producer Craig Pilkington had set up his recording gear. Before I knew it, I was part of a makeshift choir of south-west locals, adding our voices to Archie's soon-to-be-released album. Singing along to those songs, in the resounding reverb of that church, is an experience I'll never forget.

Today, listening back to those songs, and indeed much of Archie's back catalogue, I'm struck by a singular thought - almost every song now sounds like a self-penned eulogy. Archie was so focused on sharing his story, whether it was about life on the mission or on the streets or just life in general, that he imbued the majority of his songs with his truth and his message.

And that message was one of hope, usually amid sadness. His songs are often about finding a way through the darkness and the adversity, or about an acceptance of things we endure, and how those heavy hammer blows can make the sharpest sword. Archie was stolen, then homeless, and then a teenage alcoholic living on the streets. He suffered at the hands of prejudice and racism and a system stacked against him, but he rallied, turned his life around, and became a treasured Australian musician and an icon, not just for indigenous people, but for everyone. Later, he lost the love of his life and half of one of his lungs, but still he battled to tell his truth. 

In the final decade of his life, he released more albums than he did in the previous three. In the last few years, he also wrote a book, put out a live compilation, started a foundation to support young indigenous musicians, toured as much as his health allowed, and even began a YouTube series called Uncle Archie's Kitchen Table Yarns. It was as if he saw the end approaching, and realised he still had too much left to achieve; he had too many songs left to sing, too many stories to tell.

What he seemed to be trying to achieve was to leave behind a legacy of stories and culture to influence generations to come. It's a goal he achieved, and then some. He was working to inspire people with his message; a message present in so much of his music, but perhaps best exemplified by the title track from his 2016 album Let Love Rule.

"Let love rule

"Let it guide us through the night

"That we may stay together

"And keep our spirits calm."

Rest in power, Uncle Archie. I truly hope you're back with Ruby in the Dreamtime now. Your legacy will live on. Thank you.

Thor: Love & Thunder (no spoilers)

(M) ★★★★

Director: Taika Waititi.

Cast: Chris Hemsworth, Natalie Portman, Christian Bale, Tessa Thompson, Taika Waititi, Russell Crowe.

The judges of American Idol had been through some shit.

Apparently this is an unpopular opinion in some quarters of MCU fandom, but I desperately want to see Taika Waititi direct a third Thor film.

His take on Thor, in cahoots with the God of Thunder himself Hemsworth, has been a far funnier, wackier Odinson than what had been seen before. The tone of the films was in line with Waititi's own Kiwi sense of humour, but Thor also became a more comedic character, to the chagrin of some fans.

I like it. In Thor: Ragnarok and Avengers: Endgame, the Thunder God is a profoundly affected by his time among humans and from suffering loss - something he's not had to reconcile with as an Asgardian. He's absorbed humanity like a virus and doesn't fully understand how that sits with his godhood. Humility weighs unevenly on his immortality, and his profound power is ill-at-ease alongside the traits he's picked up from his Midgardian acquaintances. 

Thus Love & Thunder finds him in search of himself and his place in the universe. Having set off with the Guardians of the Galaxy at the end of Endgame, he roams space, bouncing from one distress call to the next, smiting evil with his mighty battleaxe, and winning the day.

But it all feels so hollow and empty. He's missing something in his life - and that something is Jane Foster (Portman), his ex-girlfriend. But when he sees her again, he's in for a massive surprise.

Combining the Mighty Thor comic series with the God Butcher series is a masterstroke from Waititi and co-writer Jennifer Kaytin Robinson. We get great arcs for Jane Foster as she becomes the Mighty Thor and uses that persona to battle her own demons, and we get Gorr (Bale), who is a worthy villain with a worthwhile backstory, cut from the same potentially understandable cloth as Thanos or Ultron or Scarlet Witch. Portman and Bale relish the extra depth in what could easily have been thin characters, and help make the whole thing work.

The humour is a fine balance amid the bleaker elements of the story; as he did with Jojo Rabbit, Waititi manages to work a deft line between the morbid moments and the hilarity. It something he excels at - just watch his breakthrough films Boy and Hunt For The Wilderpeople and note the darker realities lurking below the surface, and how comfortably-yet-uncomfortably they sit with everything else. 

The same thing is on display in Love & Thunder. Cancer and mortality mix with the futility of life itself, while heartbreak and love battle it out. The whole thing is a damning diatribe against religion when looked at from Gorr's angle, a sad story of the inevitably of death when looked at from Jane Foster's side, and an examination of the devastations of lost love from Thor's perspective. The idea that Waititi has made the Thor films throwaway comedic fluff is nonsense.

Waititi's perfect use of Guns N' Roses is also to be commended, while there are visual flourishes (a fight in the Shadow Realm in particular) that are impressive. Some of the battles and action sequences feel a bit samey, as is to be expected 28 films into a saga, but there are moments where you can see Waititi is striving to bring some flair to the long-running party.

Waititi deserves a third film to close out his own Thor trilogy. If anyone is going to end the Thor saga, should Hemsworth want to hang up his cape, it must be Waititi. 

Elvis (2022)

This is a version of a review airing on ABC Radio across regional Victoria on July 7, 2022.

(M) ★★★

Director: Baz Luhrmann.

Cast: Austin Butler, Tom Hanks, Olivia DeJonge, Helen Thomson, Richard Roxburgh, Kelvin Harrison Jr., David Wenham, Kodi Smit-McPhee, Luke Bracey.

"Ladies and gentlemen, here's a little song called Spinal Meningitis Got Me Down."

Baz Luhrmann certainly has a style, and his visual flamboyance and love of a red curtain spectacle would appear to put him in good stead for this attempt at being the definitive Elvis biopic. 

But Baz is his own worst enemy. For every moment of welcome flair in this lengthy drama, there are half a dozen of style-over-substance. The film's first hour is packed with so many unnecessary camera moves, cuts, edits, and crossfades, that it's like being on an out-of-control carnival ride. It's like an explosion at both the bell and neighbouring whistle factories.

It's only in the second half, when Luhrmann calms down, that the film truly engages, and Butler's stunning performance is able to shine through and become more than just a caricature.

Told partially from the point of view of Elvis' manager Colonel Tom Parker (Hanks), the film hits every big checkpoint in the Elvis wikipedia page - his early breakthrough with It's Alright, Mama, his controversial early TV and stage performances, joining the army, marrying Priscilla, his Hollywood stint, the comeback special, and through into the Vegas years and his untimely death, aged 42.

Elvis, its directorial tics aside, is a solid potted history of its subject. Diehard Elvis fans may be disappointed, and if you're looking for a deep dive into what made The King tick, this ain't it, but the film is at least a board overview of his world-changing career.

In a tough role, Butler excels. He captures the stage mannerisms and vocal particulars perfectly, but really flies in the latter half of the film as the troubles settle in. Butler makes Presley human, even as the shopping list of plot points whirls past in a blur of camera tricks and pointless editing stunts.

Equally impressive is Hanks as Parker. Hanks, in one of his few villainous roles, brings layers and complexity to a character that, like Presley, could have ended up being a caricature. In a film where so many characters are mere ciphers, the glue of Presley and Parker - of Butler and Hanks - holds proceedings together.

But for every clever line, such as Parker's manipulations, there is a naff one, usually involving Presley's family or to describe what Presley thinks and feels instead of showing us. For every awesome musical moment (and there are many) there is a saccharine score to beat you over the head, practically yelling at you to feel a particular way. For stunning moment of production design to recapture the era, there's a directorial move with the camera or in the editing suite or in the special FX department that is present for absolutely no reason whatsoever.

Luhrmann's kookiness and over-egging style as a director can have its moments, but his latest film is laden with the same problems that beset his previous one, The Great Gatsby. The movie works best when Luhrmann stops showing off, and gets out of the way of the story and the actors. The constant distractions of direction suck the emotion out of the film, bloat its storytelling, and quickly infuriate.

It's only the work of Butler and Hanks, and a mid-film chill pill for Luhrmann that make Elvis a decent overview of one of modern history's most important figures. Luhrmann's stylistic tics mean the film avoids some tropes of the music biopic genre, and there is an admirable boldness to his approach, but the definitive word on the King of Rock 'n' Roll is yet to be filmed. 

AFI #48: Rear Window (1954)

This is part of a series of articles reviewing the American Film Institute's Top 100 Films, as unveiled in 2007. Why am I doing this? Because when I started, the damned cinemas are closed and I had to review something, and now I can't stop.

(PG) ★★★★★

Director: Alfred Hitchcock.

Cast: James Stewart, Grace Kelly, Thelma Ritter, Raymond Burr, Wendell Corey, Judith Evelyn, Ross Bagdasarian, Georgine Darcy, Sara Berner, Frank Cady, Jesslyn Fax, Irene Winston, Rand Harper, Havis Davenport.

The binoculars confirmed it: the man was not wearing flesh-coloured pants.

"Let's start from the beginning again, Jeff. Tell me everything you saw, and what you think it means."

- Lisa Fremont

When you get down to it, making movies is about two key questions: "what's the story?" and "how will you tell it?".

In the case of Rear Window, the first answer is nothing special - it's a murder mystery. Man kills wife, nosy neighbour pieces together clues to solve it. 

What makes this an exceptional film is how the story is told. And this is where the genius of Alfred Hitchcock comes into play.

"I think I'm more impressed by how Rear Window was made rather than the end product," reviewer The Incredible Suit notes in his ranking of Hitchcock films, "but it's undeniably unique filmmaking (if you don't count the Christopher Reeve remake)".

Indeed, Rear Window's superlative skill is to put you alongside the protagonist unlike any film has done so before or since. Almost every shot is filmed in or from the apartment of LB "Jeff" Jeffries (Stewart) - a photographer laid up with a broken leg, who finds himself with nothing to do but watch his many neighbours go about their lives in their apartments across the courtyard.

By placing the camera next to Jeff, we became complicit in his increasing voyeurism. We join him as he enjoys the music from the pianist's apartment, empathises with Miss "Lonely Hearts" at ground level, grins knowingly at the newlyweds behind the pulled blind, and finds it hard to look away from Miss "Torso" as she does her ballet warm-ups in her underwear. We're also drawn into the slow-burn mystery building in the apartment of Lars and Anna Thorwald at the same pace that Jeff is, as we see what he sees.

As noted in The Wordsworth Book of Movie Classics, the "restrictions" of trapping the film's hero in one room - and the audience with him - allowed "the viewer to feel the claustrophobia of his predicament and share his voyeuristic impulses".

There's that word again: "voyeur". Rear Window's key theme is voyeurism - within 90 seconds of the opening credits finishing, we see a woman drop her bra, then bend over in her pink underwear to pick it up. There's a very real "male gaze" thing going on here, but this titillation also goes to show the unimpeded view Jeff gets of his neighbours and their private lives. It also helps, rightly or wrongly, give us a gradual acceptance of Jeff's voyeurism - if everything is so openly on display, then what harm is there in looking, right? And if someone's life is on the line, then perhaps the right thing to do is look, right? Right?

French director François Truffaut suggested the film was an analogy for films themselves - "the courtyard is the world, the reporter/photographer is the filmmaker, the binoculars stand for the camera and its lenses," he wrote in 1954. The Incredible Suit agreed, calling it "a film about films, full of tiny cinema screens".

The film is also about neighbours and the perceived dying days of community. Jeff watches his neighbours, but never interacts with them. A dark twist involving a dead dog sparks a rant about what makes for good neighbours: "You don't know the meaning of the word 'neighbours'! Neighbours like each other, speak to each other, care if somebody lives or dies! But none of you do!". The rant, which is bellowed to the world at large, is startling, coming out of nowhere. But it aptly sums up the film's voyeurism in a different way, while articulating that classic yet misguided belief of every era - that society was better in the previous one, and that the current era has gone to the dogs (so to speak).

Rear Window is also, oddly, a film about love. Through the windows into other lives we see newlyweds at it like rabbits, the bickering married couple, the young lady fighting off suitors, the lonely lady dreaming of a partner, and the older lady content in her singledom. And then there's Jeff and his perfect girlfriend Lisa (the perfect Grace Kelly). 

Jeff wants to break-up with Lisa because she's "too perfect", which is his way of saying she's out of his league and social bracket, but also because he sees their lives going in different directions, and he views marriage as a kind of curse. This crisis of commitment makes sense in the context of their obvious but unspoken age difference, which makes this May-December relationship far more palatable than Kelly and Gary Cooper in High Noon, or Stewart and Kim Novak in Vertigo.

Stewart's Jeff is a man on the edge of curmudgeonism and driven to distraction by his boredom. In a nice metaphor, his eyes are always on the horizon, chasing the next story, which happens to be taking place outside his window, and not what's happening in his own apartment. He struggles to see how Kelly's Lisa fits in to that, and Stewart nails his frustrations, fears and fervours in one of his best performances.

Kelly is also at the top of her game in a "surprisingly carnal" turn, as Joshua Klein put it in 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die. Her wounded moments hurt, yet she's also convincingly strong and daring, making the varying levels of her character feel like a real person. Jeff laments her "perfection", but by the gods, she does indeed seem perfect. 

Thelma Ritter as the nurse Stella is great comic relief, bringing some sass to her sidekick role, while across the way a brooding Raymond Burr is a great mix of quiet and shady, fuelling the possibility Jeff may be mistaken for long enough. And when Burr finally gets his big moment, he delivers.

Quick fact: that's Ross Bagdasarian AKA David Seville as the frustrated pianist providing much of the film's diegetic score. He's best known for inventing The Chipmunks AKA Alvin, Simon and Theodore.

And while it's the "how" of the story that sells Rear Window, the screenplay is an under-appreciated gem of the genre. The mystery unfolds in a way that rewards repeat viewings, while there is an equally potent and important slowburn happening in our complicity with Jeff's growing voyeurism. The way characters around the courtyard are built without dialogue is also some nifty storytelling.

There are other fascinating factors at play that help sell the drama. There's the remarkable set, the biggest ever built at Paramount Studios at the time, featuring running water and electricity in every fake apartment, and a complex drainage system to handle the fake rain ("Watching it is like watching a living, breathing ecosystem," Klein notes in 1001 Movies). 

There's the perfect pacing which winds the tension tighter and tighter, a sublime sense of mood conjured by the use of music and lighting, an excellent cast, and, as is often the case, Hitchcock making all the right moves at the right times.

As William Bayer put it in his 1973 book The Great Movies, Rear Window "comes very close to being the perfect Hitchcock film, the one that illustrates nearly all his major strengths". Bayer cites Hitchcock's love of voyeurism, his passion for a technical challenge, the multi-layered narrative, the strong visuals, and the common Hitchcockian motif of "an extraordinary thing happening in an everyday situation to an average person".

It's true. Psycho may be more daring and thrilling (and ultimately better), and Vertigo certainly has its fans for its unique stylings and deep themes, but Rear Window is the quintessential Hitchcock film. 

REWIND REVIEW: Hot Fuzz (2007)

I recently joined Jono Pech on his excellent podcast Comedy Rewind, which re-examines funny films from a "bygone era" and looks at how they hold up. Our topic was the classic British action-comedy Hot Fuzz. Listen here as we dissect the film in great depth.

Or you can read this blog. Or both.

(M) ★★★★★

Director: Edgar Wright.

Cast: Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, Jim Broadbent, Timothy Dalton, Paddy Considine, Rafe Spall, Billie Whitelaw, Edward Woodward, Adam Buxton, Olivia Colman, Ron Cook, Kenneth Cranham, Peter Wight, Julia Deakin, Kevin Eldon, Paul Freeman, Karl Johnson, Lucy Punch, Anne Reid, David Threlfall, Stuart Wilson, Bill Bailey, Martin Freeman, Bill Nighy, Steve Coogan.

Detective Swan and his colleagues were in hot pursuit.

Consider the lily.

Or, in the case of Edgar Wright's flawless comedy Hot Fuzz, consider specifically the Japanese peace lily. 

This seemingly innocuous flowering plant is one example of the genius hidden in plain sight in Hot Fuzz's script, written by director Wright and star Simon Pegg. The film is remarkable in many ways, but the script is, to quote the script itself, "off the chain". 

Like so many other things in Hot Fuzz, the lily is not just one thing; nothing in Hot Fuzz is only ever one thing. Almost every moment, object, joke, and line of dialogue does an incredible amount of heavy lifting, and the lily is a prime example. This is sharp writing that's especially rewarding for the audience, but also efficient, allowing more room for even more moments, objects, jokes and narrative elements, which is even more rewarding for the audience. It also enhances the film's rewatchability, which, again, is rewarding for the audience.

So let us consider the lily.

The first mention of the lily comes during a conversation between Nicholas Angel, played with wonderful balance by Pegg, and his ex Janine (a near-faceless cameo from Cate Blanchett). She calls it a rubber plant, he corrects her - a great show-don't-tell moment. The whole conversation is a mini-info-dump about their recent break-up, but we also learn Nicholas is pedantic, by the book, married to his job, and feels being right is important, both in broad terms of justice and the small-scale terms of a conversation. The lily correction is just one example, but a very key one, of Nicholas' character.

Soon after, we get the excellent high-speed montage of Nicholas moving to the country, which is made all the more amusing by Nicholas clinging to this lily. It also adds pathos - we start to care about Nicholas in part because he cares about the lily. It's kinda sad to see a grown man with no family, no friends, no pets, forced to relocate holding close his most treasured possession, which is a plant.

As Nicholas's relationship with his colleague Danny Butterman (Frost) grows, Nicholas tries to buy Danny a Japanese peace lily for his birthday. This coincides with a major plot point - while Nicholas is outside the nursery retrieving his notebook, Leslie the florist (Reid) is murdered, leading to a thrilling foot chase and Nicholas thinking he's closer to uncovering the murderer.

Now let's hone in on the plotting of this scene. It could have taken place anywhere. Nicholas could have bought something else for Danny - he knows of his love of action movies, so he could have bought him some DVDs or a poster or something connected to that passion. He knows Danny loves Cornettos - he could have bought a bulk supply of the ice creams. Both these ideas work, and the scene could have played out the same way, with Leslie running the local video shop or milk bar. Nothing changes to the plot, and the movie still works.

But the gift of the peace lily is far more personal, so it has far more impact, both when we see Nicholas ask if Leslie has any peace lilies, and later when he tells Danny what he was trying to purchase for him. This plant that had previously been a joke and a symbol of Nicholas' pedantry and loneliness becomes a symbol of what Danny is beginning to mean to Nicholas - a symbol of their blossoming friendship, if you will. 

And later, when Nicholas fights for his life against Michael "Lurch" Armstrong in Nicholas' hotel room, the pot of the peace lily proves an effective and ironic weapon. It's almost a literal take on Chekhov's gun, which is the idea that if you show a gun in the first act, it has to go off in the second or third act. 

More accurately, Chekhov's gun is a screenwriting principle which says that every element of the story must be necessary, and all irrelevant elements should be removed. And that's something Hot Fuzz adheres to, although it goes one better by making the necessary elements necessary for multiple reasons.

To wit: the simple act of doing a crossword is a clever comedic sketch, a portent of things to come, and eventually an opportunity for pithy action-movie one-liners. The model village is a stereotypically quaint (and vaguely hilarious) small-town tourist attraction, an ideal setting for a King Kong Vs Godzilla-style finale, and a wonderfully symbolic and foreshadowing narrative device - the darkness at the heart of Sandford comes from its residents' quest to be "a model village".

Wright and Pegg's script is filled with countless examples of this multi-layered thinking. Even "yarp" does heavy-lifting beyond its jokiness. It's initially a gag about inbred country folk, but later becomes used as a moment of tension important to the plot, followed by a great gag to release the tension ("narp?").

Similarly, the over-the-top nature of action movies is used as a joke that demonstrates the naivety of Danny in contrast to the seriousness of Nicholas, but also a bonding moment between the pair, a source of parody and comedy, and an opportunity for massive third-act action sequences. 

This aspect of the film is also impressive - Hot Fuzz is simultaneously a spoof and loving homage of the action genre. It manages to somehow have its cake and eat it too.

As with Shaun Of The Dead's deep love of George Romero and zombie films, Wright and Pegg invest their own passion for the tropes and clichés of action movies, but send it up by being typically British about the whole thing. The pair reportedly watched 138 action films as research for writing Hot Fuzz - everything from Chuck Norris B-movies to classics like Dirty Harry and LA Confidential - but remained intent on infusing what they had seen with their own Englishness.

"There isn't really any tradition of cop films in the UK," Wright told the New York Post in 2007. 

"We've got a lot of TV cop shows, but we wanted to make a cop film. We felt that every other country in the world had its own tradition of great cop action films and we had none."

The first draft of Hot Fuzz took nine months, and the re-writes stretched out for another nine months. 

It shows - there's not a wasted moment in the film. It takes less than 10 minutes for the story to arrive in Sandford, by which point we understand who Nicholas Angel is, what the tone of the film is, the film's sense of humour, and the filmic language of exaggerated sound FX and sharp edits that it's using. Not to mention cameos from Cate Blanchett, Peter Jackson, Bill Nighy, Martin Freeman and Steve Coogan, amid a who's who cast of British comedy. 

Hot Fuzz is an incredibly rare beast. It's a laugh-out-loud comedy that boasts one of the sharpest and best written scripts of any genre of the era. It's both a piss-take and a love letter. It's built on clichés and tired tropes yet it's something completely new and fresh. In short, Hot Fuzz is an unrepeatable masterpiece of both the buddy-cop action genre and the comedy genre.

Senior Year

This is a version of a review airing on ABC Radio across regional Victoria on May 26, 2022.

(MA15+) ★★

Director: Alex Hardcastle.

Cast: Rebel Wilson, Sam Richardson, Mary Holland, Zoë Chao, Justin Hartley, Chris Parnell, Angourie Rice, Avantika Vandanapu, Michael Cimino, Jeremy Ray Taylor, Brandon Scott Jones, Ana Yi Puig, Zaire Adams, Molly Brown.

"You can't call people 'old AF' - that's not very woke."

High school is, was, and probably always will be difficult. There are good bits, but they're usually peppered in between the heartbreaks, bullying, self-doubts, mistakes and the general awkwardness of being a teenager. Somehow, for most people anyway, high school manages simultaneously to be one of the best and worst times of your life.

Good teen movies understand this. They empathise with their subjects and audience of teens and former teens. The lows are like mortal blows that we all feel, and the highs remind us of our own small victories. Good teen movies get what it is to be a teen.

Senior Year is partly a fish-out-of-water comedy, but it's mainly a teen movie, and it's on this front that it fails. Its characters are caricatures and there is little-to-no empathy for teenage life. And there's nothing Rebel Wilson or anyone else can do to save the film.

Wilson plays Steph, who awakes from a coma after 20 years with one aim in life - to return to high school and pick up where she left off. That means throwing herself back into high school, trying to be prom queen, and regaining her status as the most popular girl in school. 

Naturally Steph is going to learn some life lessons, but her dim-witted desires make it hard to get on board with her quest. When we finally get an insight into why it means so much to her to be prom queen, it actually doesn't really make sense.

Not that the rest of the film does. Steph almost dies when she lapses into a coma, and it's caught on camera, but there are no recriminations for the perpetrator. But more frustrating is the film's narrow view of its main teen characters, none of whom seem like real people, despite the best efforts of the cast.

Wilson is a prime example. Only sporadically amusing, Steph never comes across as an actual person despite Wilson's earnest efforts. It only makes it harder to care about her situation. It also amplifies the idea that Wilson doesn't have what it takes to lead a film. This is probably not true, but this isn't the movie that will change minds. 

All of this would matter little if the film was actually funny, but outside of the efforts of Mary Holland (whose timing and delivery is perfect), very few jokes land. So many gags hit like "teens are too woke LOL" or "teens are too fixated on being insta-famous LOL", both of which feel like simplifications that aren't even that funny to start with.

The occasional pop culture reference works, but the film suffers from failing to either properly parody teen movies or be one. 

Doctor Strange In The Multiverse Of Madness (no spoilers)

This is a version of a review airing on ABC Radio across regional Victoria on May 12, 2022.

(M) ★★★½

Director: Sam Raimi.

Cast: Benedict Cumberbatch, Elizabeth Olsen, Rachel McAdams, Benedict Wong, Xochitl Gomez, Chiwetel Ejiofor.

Ooh, red stuff.

With every addition to the MCU, a growing number of critics ask the question of when the Marvel bubble will burst. 

Everything ends, after all, and the departure of figurehead characters Iron Man and Captain America has made many wonder if the end is nigh. 

The strangely flat The Eternals helped spur this line, though the massive success of Spider-Man: No Way Home gave pause for thought. That could be dismissed as an aberration due to the webslinger’s inbuilt popularity and the film’s audacious “multiverse” plot line, which tied together two decades of character legacy in a beautifully satisfying way. 

But this second solo outing for Marvel's Sorcerer Supreme is likely to spark further discussions about how much fuel the MCU has in the tank. The film is good without being great, and while it's daring in some ways and does a few tonal things not previously seen in the franchise, it will ultimately be remembered for its fan-service cameos rather than its remarkable plotting or character development.

The film finds Dr Strange (Cumberbatch) troubled by nightmares in which he fails to save a young girl (Gomez). When that girl appears in real life fleeing from a many-tentacled demon, Strange is sucked into an interdimensional battle that sees him flung across the multiverse and battling alternate versions of himself.

The much-heralded return of Sam Raimi to the Marvel fold has its upsides - namely a sporadic horror bent that keeps Multiverse Of Madness feeling fresh. Whether it be a rotting corpse rising from the dead or a baddie limping down a dimly lit corridor like a zombie, the movie stands out from the other previous 27 MCU instalments when Raimi lets his inner Evil Dead out to play.

Outside the horror and the occasional sense of dread, the rest of the film is merely okay. The biggest disappointment lies in Gomez's America Chavez - not through any fault of Gomez's, but due to the script. Chavez is reduced to little more than her multiversal powers. She basically becomes the movie's MacGuffin, her arc is left unresolved, and her biggest impact on the film is to help humanise and test Strange, rather than truly grow as a person, beyond a horribly cliched and predictable final showdown.

While it leaves Chavez frustratingly undeveloped, her presence helps shape Strange's journey and amplifies the film's themes about morality. So much of the story is predicated on the definitions of right and wrong, of the greater good vs the necessary sacrifice, of the choices we make, and the murky spaces in between. This stuff is fascinating, and also helps give us a villain whose motivations are understandable and occasionally truly frightening. 

Ultimately this film's genuinely surprising guest spots and Raimi's dalliances with his dark past are the most memorable bits. The rest serves as solid development for the increasingly heroic Stephen Strange, played with growing ease by the perfectly cast Cumberbatch, in between some so-so moments. 

Multiverse Of Madness gives good villain but disappointing sidekick, throws up some interesting ideas about choices and morals, and tries admirably to introduce some new flavours to the infinite stew that is the MCU. Will it be enough to keep Kevin Fiege's pot bubbling? More than likely for now.

The Unbearable Weight Of Massive Talent

This is a version of a review airing on ABC Radio across regional Victoria on April 28, 2022.

(M) ★★★★

Director: Tom Gormican.

Cast: Nicolas Cage, Pedro Pascal, Sharon Horgan, Lily Sheen, Tiffany Haddish, Ike Barinholtz, Alessandra Mastronardi, Neil Patrick Harris.

Jokes - not for everyone.

The post-modern thing of an actor playing themselves in a film has a couple of stellar examples - Being John Malkovich is a modern classic, while Jean-Claude van Damme's little-seen JCVD attracted the best reviews of his career.  

You can add to that list this wonderfully absurd comedy in which Nicolas Cage plays himself and his insane alter-ego Nicky Cage. It's hard to imagine anyone else being able to deliver such a high-wire act of naturalism and self-parody, or anyone else with the chops, balls and craziness to pull it off.

Perhaps that's why director Tom Gormican pursued Cage (who turned it down three or four times) so hard for the role. No other actor has the actual acting capabilities, action hero cred, and bonkers mythology to make this work.

Cage plays a fictionalised version of himself who is washed up and on the verge of quitting acting. When a billionaire uber-fan (Pascal) hires Cage to be a celebrity guest at his birthday party, an unwitting friendship is born. But the CIA is lurking on the periphery, hoping Cage will help them solve a kidnapping case with geopolitical implications.

Part-buddy comedy, part-goofy actioner, part-Cage-spotting worship-athon, The Unbearable Weight Of Massive Talent is unexpectedly hilarious, fun, and clever. It unfolds in a pleasingly predictable manner, but is elevated by Cage's willingness to go along with everything and his utterly charming partnership with Pascal. The latter makes for a wonderful foil to Cage's dynamism, bringing a wide-eyed charm to mega-fan Javi.

The meta-ness of Cage playing Cage is a highlight, but even more so when he's playing "Nicky Cage" - a Vampire's Kiss era version of himself that is utterly insane. Equally fun and meta is the film script that Javi and Cage start writing together and the way it mirrors what actually plays out in The Unbearable Weight Of Massive Talent. It's this sharpness that elevates this beyond being a one-note joke.

The supporting cast beyond Pascal, particularly Horgan and Haddish, is great, and everything moves at a good pace. The finale is suitably meta, and helps the whole thing lock together. And it's funny - one of the funnier movies to hit the big screen in a while.

No one else could have worked as well in the lead role of this particular movie, so kudos to Gormican for pursuing Cage, and kudos to Cage for having enough self-awareness and courage to go along with it.

Summer Of Soul (Or When The Revolution Could Not Be Televised)

This is a version of a review airing on ABC Radio across regional Victoria on April 14, 2022.

(PG) ★★★★★

Director: Ahmir "Questlove" Thompson.

"Mister, won't you please help my pony!"

Concert films are usually just documents of bands doing what they do - playing live on stage, in front of fervent audiences, running through their hits.

Sometimes they end up being more than that. Sometimes they become a snapshot of a moment in time, or even an historical document. Sometimes they capture a profound turning point in culture, or demonstrate the deeper power of music and how it connects a community.

Summer Of Soul does all that and more. It captures some incredible artists at the peak of their powers, all performing at a remarkable event, the likes of which have never been seen again. But it's also a powerful essay on civil rights, politics, religion, and black identity, as viewed through the prism of a forgotten piece of history.

Questlove (of The Roots fame) does a marvelous job of capturing and celebrating the vibe and power of the 1969 Harlem Cultural Festival, an event that drew a largely black audience of around 50,000 people to Mount Morris Park over several weekends.

The festival took place the same summer a certain other music festival happened, leading some to dub it the Black Woodstock. The event was filmed, but very little of it was ever aired, despite boasting a killer line-up that included Stevie Wonder, Sly & The Family Stone, The Staple Singers, Gladys Knight & The Pips, Nina Simone, BB King, The Fifth Dimension and more.

In between banging musical performances, Questlove slices in interviews from those who were there, providing important context to the festival. In some cases, he drops pieces of dialogue in between lyrics, like a DJ sampling. In other places, he lets the performances or the recollections run on, like a muso feeding off the audience, not wanting to break the spell.

The magic of music is definitely the key attraction, but it's also used in fascinating ways to explore the culture and politics of the time. The film segues seamlessly through its high-profile line-up in between discussing civil rights, black identity, the importance of the church in black culture, the role of the Black Panthers, the politics of the time, and Harlem's multi-cultural make-up. It's an impressive juggling act that seems effortless.

In Summer Of Soul, the festival becomes not only a lens through which to explore black society and the issues facing it, but a metaphor for black history. That this important event and its amazing line-up were largely forgotten about by the wider American society says it all really.

Questlove's film show the capacity for the music doco to be about so much more than music. It's one of the best examples of the genre to date.

REWIND REVIEW: Beastie Boys Story

This is a version of a review airing on ABC Radio across regional Victoria on April 14, 2022.

(M) ★★★★

Director: Spike Jonze.

Cast: Adam Yauch, Michael Diamond, Adam Horovitz. 

Beastie Boys Story is streaming on Apple TV.

"Welcome to Old Men Dancing!"

On May 4, 2022, it will have been 10 years since the death of Adam Yauch, aka MCA, aka the heart and soul of the hip hop legends Beastie Boys. 

That the band ended with his passing is testimony not only to how integral he was to the group, but also the integrity of the remaining members Michael Diamond (Mike D) and Adam Horovitz (Ad Rock). Since Yauch's passing, Diamond and Horovitz have used the Beastie Boys' name selectively, and predominantly to celebrate Yauch and their legacy as a trio.

This integrity and sense of legacy is evident in the two-shot of Beastie Boys Book and Beastie Boys Story. The first is an essential tome detailing the big and small of their career. It allows Diamond and Horovitz to right wrongs, set records straight, and peel back the curtain on a fascinating and hugely influential career.

 

The second is essentially a live stage show version of the book, turned into a semi-documentary in order to allow it to travel the world without Mike D and Ad Rock having to actually travel the world.

The advantage the doco has over the book is the endless stream of footage and music available to help sell the stories, give visual context, and provide opportunities to poke fun. When things go awry in the live show, Jonze leaves them in, because that's part of what Beastie Boys were all about - goofing around, making each other laugh, and generally having a laugh.

However there was always a seriousness hidden in the beats and rhymes of their music, and that's even more in the mix in Beastie Boys Story. Mike D and Ad Rock talk candidly about the mistakes they made and the personas they created around their smash-hit debut Licence To Ill, and how the touring and success of that record turned them into the very things they despised. Their honesty and mea culpas are impressive.

But it's when they talk about Yauch that the doco really hits hard. Watching Ad Rock struggling to talk about his departed friend is heartbreaking. It's part of the honesty that makes the film feel valuable and important, and not a cash-in - paying tribute to Yauch and his work is a key reason for this doco to exist.

Most of the film is excellent, but some parts don't work. While Ad Rock sounds like he's just chatting with the audience, Mike D sounds like he's reading off an autocue (because he is). Some bits drag and some gags bite. There's also nothing on their final two albums, with the doco skipping from Hello Nasty to Yauch's death - a 14-year leap that omits their post-September 11 album To The 5 Boroughs and their brilliant comeback/farewell Hot Sauce Committee Part II.

Perfect for the hardcore fans, it also serves as a great overview for the casual passers-by. A deeper dive would be welcome, but it feels like this is the best insight we'll ever get into the band, and perhaps the last word on a stunning and influential career.

CODA

This is a version of a review appearing on ABC Radio across regional Victoria on March 31, 2022.

(M) ★★★★

Director: Sian Heder.

Cast: Emilia Jones, Eugenio Derbez, Troy Kotsur, Daniel Durant, Marlee Matlin, Ferdia Walsh-Peelo, Amy Forsyth.

CODA is streaming on Apple TV.

"Honey - you don't have red wine with fish."

Is CODA the best film of 2021? 

No, it isn't. I'd give that honour to The Power Of The Dog or Belfast. 

But is it the kind of feelgood movie we all need after a couple of tough years? Absolutely.

CODA's high-concept story of a girl from a deaf family wanting to be a musician sings as sweetly as its star Emilia Jones, and its themes of dreams, outcasts, communication, joy and family help make this the uplifting and sincere movie experience many have been searching for.

Jones is excellent as Ruby Rossi, the only hearing member of her family. Between her schoolwork, her family's fishing business, and serving as her family's interpreter, Ruby's life is full. When she tries to squeeze in her dream of becoming a singer, as well as having a love life, her world overflows, and she's forced to choose between her own needs and the needs of her family.

CODA succeeds thanks to its great cast, its strong idea (adapted from the French film La Famille Belier), and the sincere way it tells its sweet story. Jones is brilliant, carrying the weight of the film and the singing with apparent ease. She is the shining heart in the centre of the movie and it's no exaggeration to say CODA stands or falls on her shoulders.Thankfully, Jones delivers. 

Kotsur is also great, and a worthy winner in a tough best supporting actor field at the Oscars. His award season success has overshadowed Matlin however, whose role is arguably more difficult and multi-faceted than Kotsur's lovable crank. Matlin deserves just as many accolades. Also noteworthy are Durant as Ruby's brother Leo, and Derbez as the passionate music teacher, Mr V.

Heder's adapted screenplay is a neat ball that wraps up most of its story strings nicely. Her direction is unfussy and to the point, which only helps the film's heartfelt sincerity and uplifting nature shine through.

So why isn't it the best film of the year? Compared to the likes of The Power Of The Dog and Belfast, CODA is a safe bet that doesn't push the limits of its artistic endeavours. The cinematography, complexity and thematic depth of the other two mentioned films are leaps and bounds ahead of CODA, as is The Power Of The Dog's score.

But that's ok, that's fine. CODA isn't that kind of film, but it's a beautiful, well-told story is one well worth many accolades and your time.