The Marvels

This is a version of a review airing on ABC Victoria's Statewide Mornings program on November 16, 2023.

(M) ★★★½

Director: Nia DiCosta.

Cast: Brie Larson, Teyonah Parris, Iman Vellani, Samuel L. Jackson, Zawe Ashton, Gary Lewis, Park Seo-joon, Zenobia Shroff, Mohan Kapur, Saagar Shaikh.

Hanging out in kids' bedrooms? Not cool, Captain Marvel.

All the headlines around The Marvels have been about its poor box office performance, which totally ignores how fun and entertaining this film is.

The reasons for the flop out of the gates are many, but the main one is surely a lack of promotion thanks to the actors' strike, which dulled the buzz of this worthy addition to the MCU. Had Larson, Parris and Vellani been able to hit the junket tour and showcase the great chemistry they share on screen, then maybe we'd have a different set of headlines.

Or maybe it's that now-legendary "superhero fatigue", a term that's been thrown around for the past decade, only to get quickly forgotten when the next amazing superhero movie rolls around.

But who cares? Despite its flaws, The Marvels is a hoot, and the kind of good-time superpowered jawn that hopefully stirs up some belated word-of-mouth buzz.

It centres on Carol Danvers AKA Captain Marvel (Larson), Ms Marvel (Vellani) and the steadfastly un-nicknamed Monica Rambeau (Parris - but she's Photon right? Or Spectrum?), who find their powers entangled after a run-in with a wormhole phenomena created by alien warrior Dar-Benn. As they investigate further, they discover they're in a race against time to stop Dar-Benn repairing her damaged homeworld at the expense of numerous other worlds, including Earth.

The Marvels ain't perfect by any stretch of the imagination, but it's fun, riding high on the interactions of its stars. If you haven't caught Disney+'s Ms Marvel series then you've been missing out on the bubbly delight that is Vellani, who brings her fan girl enthusiasm to all the best lines in the film. Combined with Larson and Parris, the trio make for a welcome delight.

Oddly, the film's villain is disappointing despite coming from the wonderful moral grey zone Marvel does so well. Like so many other MCU Big Bad, Dar-Benn believes what she is doing is the right thing (see also Namor, the High Evolutionary, Thanos etc...) and is compelling from that angle, but is sadly unmemorable and lacking in charisma, despite Ashton's best efforts.

The action is great, with the "entanglement" of the three Marvels' powers making for some neat CG trickery. The sillier moments are also excellent; better than the emotional beats. The cat-like flerkens are given a hilarious role while a wacky Bollywood-style dance number in the middle is nice, but the relationship between Danvers and Rambeau feels forced.

The combination of it all is unwieldy at times, but by-and-large The Marvels works. It's disappointing this film will be written off as an MCU flop because its superior to plenty of other entries in the franchise that fared better at the box office.

Killers Of The Flower Moon

This is a version of a review airing on ABC Victoria's Statewide Mornings program on November 2, 2023.

(M) ★★★½

Director: Martin Scorsese.

Cast: Leonardo DiCaprio, Robert De Niro, Lily Gladstone, Jesse Plemons, Tantoo Cardinal, John Lithgow, Brendan Fraser, Cara Jade Myers, JaNae Collins, Jillian Dion, Jason Isbell, William Belleau, Louis Cancelmi, Scott Shepherd, Everett Waller, Talee Redcorn, Yancey Red Corn, Tatanka Means, Tommy Schultz, Sturgill Simpson, Pete Yorn.

"Son, can you direct me to the nearest apothecary?"

Yep, it's long. Like really bloody long. Not quite as long as Scorsese's previous film The Irishman, but that was on Netflix so I could pause it when I needed to go to the toilet. You can't pause a cinema #bringbacktheintermission.

But it's good. Like really bloody good. Scorsese's knack for rich, nuanced storytelling that grows in the darker mud of humanity is unrivalled, and it's in full bloom here. Horrible people doing horrible things for horrible reasons, with the tempo dragging out the tension as we hope for comeuppances - yep, this is what Scorsese does well. 

Based on David Grann's acclaimed non-fiction book of the same name, Killers Of The Flower Moon stars DiCaprio as Ernest Buckhart, a somewhat dim-witted returning WWI veteran who ends up at the ranch of his uncle Bill Hale (De Niro) in Fairfax, Oklahoma. The region is rich with oil, all owned by the Native Americans of Osage County, making for a bizarre situation where the Native Americans have all the wealth, but are still treated like second-class citizens.

Ernest falls in love with Mollie Kyle (Gladstone), playing into the hands of his uncle, who aims to take over her family's oil rights by whatever means necessary. 

With solid performances all round, a fascinating story, and beautiful cinematography, this is a fine film, as you would come to expect from Scorsese, who hasn't made a bad film since the '90s. Ernest Buckhart is a largely unlikeable doofus committing unseemly crimes, but following him around as it all slowly comes apart is oddly enjoyable, even funny at times, despite the killing and depravity. 

But the problem really is the length and the pacing. The first two hours, while fascinating, are slow. It is beautiful and haunting at times, punctuated with increasing outbursts of violence, but it takes a long time to get where it's going, and it's really hard to shake the feeling it could have been shorter without sacrificing the beauty and the elegiac nature. 

Scorsese shows his typical reverence for his material and his subjects, particularly the Native Americans, their rituals, and their plight. He has collected a fine cast, his old friend, the dearly departed Robbie Robertson, delivers a haunting final score, and while the postscript of the film is odd, it demonstrates Scorsese's passion..

A long film is only bad when it feels long, and across its first two acts, Killers Of The Flower Moon feels long. But it's still a worthwhile journey, despite it taking a bloody long time to get where it's going.

Beckham

This is a version of a review airing on ABC Victoria's Statewide Mornings program on October 19, 2023.

(M) ★★★★

Director: Fisher Stevens.

"And then I kicked another goal. And after that, I kicked another goal...."

I know this sounds stupid, but the main thing I learnt from this four-part Netflix doco series was how great of a player David Beckham was. I honestly had no idea. I've only ever had a passing interest in soccer, mainly when the Socceroos or Matildas are in the World Cup. 

Beckham, to me, was a soccer player with a huge profile. He was tabloid fodder. He was married to a Spice Girl. He was good-looking enough to be an occasional model. I figured he must have been a half-decent player, but it never occurred to me he was one of the all-time greats.

So from that angle, this doco is fascinating. His rollercoaster career - the highs are remarkable and the lows even more stunning - makes for incredible and surprisingly emotional viewing. When you throw the off-the-pitch stuff into the mix - his romance with Victoria Beckham, the relentless paparazzi, his topsy-turvy relationship with the public - it makes for a heady combination of glamour and glory.

It would be hard to mess up this treasure trove of content and thankfully Stevens' doesn't. His unrivalled access and all-star cast of talking heads really sell it, capped off by some canny editing by Michael Harte. The deeply personal nature of it all is amplified by moments where interviewees look seemingly right down the barrel to watch replays of football matches, capturing their reactions in intimate detail.

This intimacy is evident in the level of control Posh & Becks have over it all. They're using the doco series as therapy - Victoria Beckham admits as much towards the end - but they brush past some things and lean into other moments. The affair allegations get a mention, but its brief and the "other woman" Rebecca Loos is never named, let alone interviewed. The whole thing is only as intimate as the Beckhams will allow, and while it's remarkably candid, it's still somewhat stage-managed.

But it's ultimately fascinating, not just as a summation of a remarkable football career, but as a study of tabloid media gone wild. Part-therapy and part-brand reclamation on the part of its subjects, it's nonetheless a riveting insight into a pop culture phenomenon and an intriguing study of sporting prowess.