12 Years A Slave

(MA15+) ★★★★★

Director: Steve McQueen.

Cast: Chiwetel Ejiofor, Michael Fassbender, Benedict Cumberbatch, Lupita Nyong'o, Paul Dano, Paul Giamatti, Sarah Poulson.

"Come now, child; we're black people in a historical drama. What could possibly go wrong?"

Great films don't have to be enjoyable to watch, and 12 Years A Slave is a fine example.

This is an outstanding film - it's a collection of remarkable performances driving a strong script, deftly handled by director McQueen (Hunger, Shame) and dealing with its heavy subject matter impressively.

But it's also a brutal film, packed with the lynchings, whippings, rapes, beatings and other forms of mistreatment that went hand-in-hand with the American South's institutional slavery.

This unflinching look at legally endorsed prejudice and racism is told from the point of view of Solomon Northup (Ejiofor), a free man living with his wife and children in New York until he is kidnapped and sold into slavery.

Beaten for insisting he is not a runaway slave named Platt, Solomon soon learns he must keep his head down and his mouth shut if he is to survive this nightmare.

His ownership passes from the comparatively kindly plantation owner named Ford (Cumberbatch) to the ruthless cotton grower Epps (Fassbender), and all the while Solomon tries to figure out a way to get home.

What's fascinating about the story is the multi-faceted way it looks at slavery, prejudice and the social structures and moral issues within the white and black cultures. The slaves try to stick together, but without sticking their necks out, adding guilt to their already woeful lives. The whites are predominantly racist, just at varying levels, and those that aren't are struggling against an almost overwhelming tide of deeply ingrained bigotry.

As such, 12 Years A Slave is powerful and emotive - devastatingly so - and offers only small reprieves in between. It's a relief when McQueen directs his camera at the beauty of the Georgian everglades or when the soundtrack features the slaves singing a work song.

The fact that slavery existed is horrific enough - the fact that this is based on a true story, written from Northup's own experiences and published in 1853, makes it all the worse.

But what really drives it all home is the performances. Ejiofor, Fassbender and Nyong'o are outstanding. Ejiofor is in every scene and carries the film with a performance that can't have been easy, but is note-perfect and unwavering.

The depth of his portrayal is displayed in a sequence where a group of slaves are gathered around a fresh grave, having buried one of their own who died while picking cotton. As they stand around singing, Ejiofor's Solomon goes from utter dejection to defiant resilience, barely containing his fear, sadness and despair all at the same time as he refuses to "drown in his melancholia". It's a powerhouse moment and just one of many examples that have led to the British actor being listed as a nominee for every acting award on offer.

Fassbender and Nyong'o are equally good. Fassbender is suitably despicable as Epps, while Nyong'o has the distasteful task of playing Patsey, a slave girl who is the object of Epps' affections.

Undoubtedly this is a tough watch, but that's to be expected when dealing with such a subject. 12 Years A Slave pulls no punches and is all the better for it. This is a truly impressive piece of filmmaking.

Lone Survivor

(MA15+) ★★★

Director: Peter Berg.

Cast: Mark Wahlberg, Taylor Kitsch, Ben Foster, Emile Hirsch, Eric Bana, Yousuf Azami, Ali Suliman.

You don't got a beard, you don't get a gun.

A couple of years ago, real-life Navy Seals took part in the making of action film called Act Of Valour, which the Navy hoped would do for its recruitment levels what Top Gun did for the Air Force in the '80s.

Lone Survivor's first act feels like the Hollywood version of Act Of Valour - a propaganda-ish love letter to the brave (and slightly insane) lads who sign up to be Navy Seals.

After an opening act detailing the disturbing levels trainees are pushed to to become elite soldiers, four interchangeable soldiers (played by Wahlberg, Kitsch, Foster and Hirsch) are sent on a mission in Afghanistan to kill Taliban leader Ahmad Shah (Azami).

But things go terribly wrong. It turns out the title is the massive spoiler you suspect it to be and not just two random words stuck together.

When things do go terribly wrong, Lone Survivor abruptly stops seeming like a challenging enticement for wannabe soldiers and becomes a harrowing and intense hour-long shoot-out that is as relentless as it is brutal.

Ever since Saving Private Ryan, war movies have followed the credo of "stick the audience in the thick of it" and Lone Survivor certainly adheres to that ideal. For 60 terrifying minutes, you are part of a firefight that is genuinely nail-biting and scary.

It will also put most rational people off the idea of ever wanting to become a Navy Seal.

It's a credit to the direction of Peter Berg (earning partial redemption for the massive turkey that was Battleship) and the editing team that the shoot-out that dominates so much of Lone Survivor's running time is so impressive and immersive.

But it also means that other important aspects of moviemaking - characterisation, emotions, and dialogue - fall by the wayside. As a result, an overwrought coda at the end showing the pictures and names of the real-life soldiers of Operation Red Wings fails to strike an empathetic chord. We know nothing about these guys except one of them has to buy his girlfriend a horse for their wedding for some reason ... and I can barely remember which soldier that was, such is their interchangeability.

Surprisingly, these downsides don't ruin the film. The last act is surprising and adds an interesting and unexpected angle to proceedings, somewhat redeeming things, and the cast is quality, adding to the believability and verisimilitude of the whole thing.

Ultimately Lone Survivor will be remembered for its bone-breaking, blood-splattering, white-knuckle skirmish - not for its performances, characters, plot or dialogue. On this level, it works. Add in the last act and a strong sense of reality, and there is more good than bad here.

This is not really a war movie - it's a "battle movie". It's focus is not on the broad themes of why nations go to war or what they're really fighting for or the fallout back home or the long-reaching effects these things have. It just wants to tell the story of what happened on this particular Afghan ridge in 2005, even it never properly introduces us to the men involved.

And as such, Lone Survivor loses the war, but definitely wins the battle.

The Railway Man

(M) ★★★★

Director: Jonathan Teplitzky.

Cast: Colin Firth, Jeremy Irvine, Nicole Kidman, Stellan Skarsgard, Hiroyuki Sanada, Tanroh Ishida.

Colin didn't believe in trains, which ultimately meant nothing to the oncoming train.

David Lean's 1957 war story The Bridge On The River Kwai may be rightfully revered as a classic film, but it's never been highly acclaimed for its veracity.

While it never shirked away from the fact that war is "madness", to quote its last line, it barely scratched the surface of the reality of the atrocities inflicted on the POWs and slaves that worked on the Thailand-Burma Railway - an endeavour not called the Death Railway for nothing.

In The Railway Man, based on the book by British POW Eric Lomax, we are presented with those atrocities and the lingering after-effects in far more graphic detail.

And while the details of Lomax's personal story have been changed, most of the important themes remain, as does the impact of what happened between Lomax and one of his Japanese captors many years later.

When not focusing on what happened to Lomax on the Burma Railway (where he's played by Jeremy Irvine), it looks at his life in 1980s, where the older Lomax (Firth) has settled down with his new wife Patti (Kidman).

Unfortunately, his newfound happiness seems to kick his post-traumatic stress disorder into overdrive, leaving Lomax a distant and haunted mess prone to nightmares and strange outbursts.

Concerned for her husband's mental health, Patti contacts one of Lomax's army buddies (Skarsgard) and tries to uncover what happened in the darkest days of working on the railway.

Firth's performance is top-notch. He portrays the damaged ex-soldier as hollowed-out yet still human and hopeful, as both broken and angry, as distant yet somehow sympathetic and ultimately likeable. It's a tough turn and a great one to rival his Oscar-winning role in The King's Speech.

And let's not forget young Irvine (best known previously as the lead in War Horse), who not only makes the torture scenes and other hardships believable but also gives a more than passable impersonation of a young Firth (or should that be a young Lomax?).

Sanada as Takashi Nagase and Skarsgard are also excellent. Kidman gets the short straw with the least developed main character in the film (who also happens to be the plot's catalyst) but still performs admirably, despite being the one who has to deliver many of the script's lesser lines.

The subject matter is obviously confronting but the film is not graphic. It's certainly intense and there's no shying away from what went on between the Japanese forces and their POWs, but the important thing is it helps build towards the emotional outpouring at the end, where all the themes of hate and healing, forgetting and forgiving, and vengeance and vitality meet.

The biggest problem with The Railway Man is its disjointed delivery, which flips back and forth between the war and the '80s, slowing the pace and creating a jarring effect as we switch time periods. Having said that, it's hard to think of a better way of dealing with the alternating eras.

Outside of one major CG sequence which presents the fall of Singapore as a backdrop, the film doesn't go for any big flashy visual moments. The English sequences are typically grey and sombre, while the jungles of Burma and Thailand (filmed partly in Australia) are hot and yellow.

What's interesting about this film, aside from its amazing reality-based climax, is that it's a rare look at what happens after the guns have stopped firing and the soldiers have gone home. So often we see the battles and the intensity, but the lasting impact of the war wounds - both physical and mental - is rarely shown. Such movies do exist - The Best Years Of Our Lives is a good example - but they're far less common than "war movies".

With it's impressive performances, The Railway Man is a great example of a "post-war movie".

Robocop (2014)

(M) ★★

Director: José Padilha.

Cast: Joel Kinnaman, Gary Oldman, Michael Keaton, Abbie Cornish, Jackie Earle Haley, Jennifer Ehle, Jay Baruchel, Samuel L. Jackson.

"You look ... different."

Reboots and remakes aren't necessarily a bad thing.

Without them we wouldn't have Martin Scorsese's The Departed, Steven Soderbergh's Ocean's 11, the Coens' True Grit, or John Carpenter's The Thing, nor would we have seen Christopher Nolan's Batman trilogy or Marc Webb's recent The Amazing Spider-man.

These "re-imaginings" only work when the new film gets exactly what it was that made the original movie or character tick. They may tinker with things but they understand the reason the idea existed in the first place.

This remake of Robocop doesn't get it.

In fact, it's strangely boring, which would seem impossible when you're talking about a movie where a half-man-half-robot police officer runs around shooting things for nearly two hours. How can that be boring?

Whereas the original film asked what this half-man-half-robot police officer represented and what kind of society could allow him to come into being, the new version is more concerned with how he works, leading to a seemingly endless origin story involving countless scenes where Robocop is either operated on, tweaked or tested.

José Padilha's remake attempts to humanise Alex Murphy aka Robocop (Kinnaman) and address the issue of where the man starts and the machine ends, but misses out thanks to a disconnecting performance from Kinnaman and the fact the original was so good because it was a cleverly dark satirical comedy that just happened to star a killer man-bot who blew things up.

The satire is almost entirely gone as we watch Murphy dig too deep in the wrong case, end up fatally wounded, and then become a $2.6 Billion Dollar Man with a badge. The closest we get to the wonderfully dystopian humour of the original is in Samuel L. Jackson's hilariously over-the-top bit part as a biased TV show host and Baruchel's blunt PR man.

It's people like Jackson and Baruchel that add some much-needed credibility to this B-grade-with-a-budget actioner.

Oldman and Keaton are solid and bring more detail and gravitas than is necessary to their roles of "reluctantly immoral scientist" and "morally ambiguous businessman" - in fact, the most exciting moments of the film are when the ex-Batman and the former Commissioner Gordon talk things out.

The story does pick up momentum by the end, but Kinnaman's performance doesn't draw any empathy. The big guy has his moments but his expression rolls from mortified to bored with little in between. When Weller's Alex Murphy was gunned down and turned into Robocop, we cared, even though the movie was an exaggerated satire, but audiences will struggle to feel anything for Kinnaman's Murphy, so bland is his character and so lacking is the chemistry between him and Murphy's wife Clara (Cornish) and his son.

There are some ideas in here that are interesting, such as its themes about man vs machine, the war on crime, and of what it is to be human, while a handful of decent performances save proceedings somewhat.

But there is a lack of engagement and freshness that leads to a creeping sense of boredom - not something you would want if you were trying to reboot the Robocop franchise.

Philomena

(M) ★★★★

Director: Stephen Frears.

Cast: Judy Dench, Steve Coogan, Sophie Kennedy Clark, Anna Maxwell Martin.

"Would you like to hear my Michael Caine impersonation?"

The title character of this beautiful little drama is a great representation of the film itself.

Outwardly, Philomena (played by Dame Judy Dench) seems quiet and reserved, but inside she has pockets of sadness and intensity and courage. And occasionally she can surprise you and even be a little bit cheeky.

That's exactly what this film is like - it's gently paced and never bombastic or over-the-top, yet it features some incredibly moving moments, thought-provoking ideas, and even some hilarity.

Inspired by the true story of Philomena Lee, it's told from the point of view of Martin Sixsmith (Coogan, who also co-wrote and co-produced the film), a recently retrenched government spin doctor who seeks to rebuild his writing career and pull himself out of a depression.

His ticket out of his existential hole is the "human interest story" of Philomena, an Irish woman who had her son taken from her 50 years earlier by the strict nuns that ran the "troubled girls" home where she lived. The cynical Sixsmith and the devoutly Catholic Philomena hit the road in search of the long-lost son, sparking a journey that examines faith, tolerance, forgiveness, redemption and many other themes in between.

There is so much that is impressive about this wonderful film from Frears (The Queen, High Fidelity). The pairing of Coogan and Dench is a stroke of genius - this odd couple provides not only the comedic spark but creates the platform for the story's religious, philosophical and moral explorations.

Coogan is disturbingly good at playing these kind of snide snobs and is very much at home in his role, while Dench, an occasionally wayward accent aside, is brilliant, bestowing Philomena with exactly the right mix of resilience and naivety, sadness and humour, and dressing it all up like your favourite grandma.

It's that delicate balance that make this such a good performance, and it's the performances that are the driving force behind Philomena.

With a story that unfolds so gently in a step-by-step manner, it's the passion in the characters - the sarcastic patronising and then righteous indignation of Sixsmith and the quiet fortitude of Philomena - that help this be such a compelling film. 

Frears wisely lets the dramatic moments unfold quietly. There is no swelling score or camera tricks - just subtle moments full of heart where the score steps aside and lets the actors and the story do the heavy lifting. And like the balance in Dench's performance, Frears gets the juggling of the light and dark right, given the heartbreaking subject matter.

It's a film with depth, tackling big issues while managing to be an immensely personal story at the same time.  How accurate this portrayal of that personal story is ... well, that's up for debate - the ending feels slightly contrived and there's a sense that in the opening announcement of "inspired by a true story", "inspired by" are the key words.

But amid all this, Philomena is laugh out loud funny amid the tearjerking moments.

And, if nothing else, it's worth seeing for the perverse glee of hearing Dame Judy say the word "clitoris".

The Wolf Of Wall Street

(R) ★★★★★

Director: Martin Scorsese.

Cast: Leonardo DiCaprio, Jonah Hill, Margot Robbie, Kyle Chandler, Jon Bernthal, Rob Reiner, Jean Dujardin, Joanna Lumley.

"I can't feel my face. But my hair hurts."

EVEN if Martin Scorsese never made another film, his legacy is assured.

From Mean Streets in 1973 - a regular on "best movies ever" lists - through to his under-appreciated 2011 charmer Hugo, the Scorsese name has been a stamp of quality (with only a few mis-steps along the way) for 40 years.

With that in mind, every time legendary director steps behind the camera there are questions: is it up to his usual standard? Is it typically Scorsese? Is he trying something new again? Is it great?

The answer to all these questions is a resounding "yes".

His fifth collaboration with DiCaprio sits within the Scorsese back-catalogue like it was always meant to be there. It's up to his standard, it has moments that are typical of his films (such as the soundtrack and his roaming camera), it's his first laugh-out-loud comedy, and yes, it's great.

DiCaprio plays real-life Wall Street crook Jordan Belfort, who snorted and screwed his way through the '90s as he made millions upon millions of dollars as a stockbroker with a flagrant disregard for the law.

Based on Belfort's own warts-and-all autobiography, it pulls no punches in portraying Belfort as an amoral brat with an unquenchable thirst for sex, drugs and money.

Criticism that the film glorifies his behaviour and shows nothing of the impact his actions had on thousands of hard-working (and gullible) Americans is not unfounded. But that's not the film Scorsese and co-producer/star DiCaprio appear to be making.

This is about the moral and social vacuum Belfort and his cohorts lived in. The real world (ie. where most of us regular people dwell) doesn't exist and there are plenty of cheap voyeuristic thrills to be had in watching how the filthy rich live (with filthy being the key word). Like Belfort himself, the film could be called morally corrupt but at least its entertaining.

As such, there are no big themes here beyond the "greed is bad" credo we've seen in everything from Erich von Stroheim's 1924 silent film Greed to recent Wall Street swipes such as Boiler Room (also based on Belfort's life) to Margin Call.

Where the value lies is in the humour and the performances. Saying this is Scorsese's funniest film is damning it with faint praise - his only other comedy was the black-as-midnight King Of Comedy, which is an under-rated and uncomfortably satirical and prescient gem. The Wolf Of Wall Street is a flat-out funny film (although still very dark) by any director's standards.

DiCaprio's turn is another highlight in this thoroughly entertaining film. His transition from doe-eyed naif to drug-fuelled loose cannon and through to the inevitable fall is riveting, and with superb support from Hill and Aussie discovery Margot Robbie as Belfort's second wife, as well as Chandler, Lumley, Reiner, Dujardin and a seeming cast of thousands.

Does DiCaprio deserve an Oscar? It's as good as any of his other performances that he could have rightfully won Oscars for, so sure, why not?

The only real gripe is the film's length. Scorsese and his long-time editor Thelma Schoonmaker seem to be having too much fun and forget to cut out some of the fluff. It's not the fact that it clocks in at one minute short of three hours that makes it too long - it's that in places the film drags, which is the only real indication that a film is too long.

But whenever the pace lags, the film bounces back with another riotous set piece, and for most of its running time, The Wolf Of Wall Street is a hilariously debauched and enjoyable ride that would seem totally ridiculous if not for the fact that most of it is probably true.

Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit

(M) ★★★

Director: Kenneth Branagh.

Cast: Chris Pine, Kenneth Branagh, Kevin Costner, Keira Knightley.

"Why, yes, I'd love to see your ship."

IS there still room in the spy landscape for Jack Ryan?

With Bond, Bourne and Ethan Hunt hogging the limelight with adrenalised stunts and a surfeit of style, is anyone really clamouring for a second reboot of Tom Clancy's canny agent?

On the strength of this so-so re-invention, it would seem Ryan doesn't really have the goods to match it with the big boys of the espionage genre. Aside from some sporadic moments, this feels drab and formulaic when compared to the likes of 007 or Tom Cruise's impossible missions.

It's certainly not a bad film - although the cliche-ridden first act makes for a worrying start (at least that's over and dealt with very quickly). It's just that the whole thing is mildly entertaining without being anything special or impressive.

It's not really the fault of director and villain Branagh, nor Pine (who is following in the footsteps of Alec Baldwin, Harrison Ford and Ben Affleck) as Ryan. Nor is it even the fault of scriptwriters Adam Cozad and David Koepp.

It's just that Ryan has always seemed like an every-spy, and this film doesn't change that. He does what any secret agent does, does it well, but never stands out, nor does he have particularly defining personality traits or skill sets (aside from being good at everything). He's just a spy. He could be any spy. In fact, Shadow Recruit could quite easily be not a Jack Ryan film - change a couple of character names and it's an origin story for a brand new franchise focusing on a new nondescript CIA agent.

The only real link to Clancy's novels, character names aside, is Ryan's background (the film is not based on any of Clancy's books - just the character). As per the books, Ryan is injured in a tour of duty as a marine and takes a job on Wall Street while secretly working for the CIA searching for potential terror threats via financial signposts.

From there, we're whisked away to generic spy territory - in this case, Moscow - where Ryan goes head-to-head with Viktor Cherevin (played by a well accented Branagh), who is suspected of having millions secreted in hidden accounts.

This sets up a couple of pro forma but mildly enjoyable set pieces - the office break-in, the white-knuckle car chase - before the film heads for home with a terrorist threat and a ticking bomb countdown.

With a few tweaks, this could have been Die Hard 6, or Bond 26, or Bourne 5 or M:I 5. And any of those tweaks would have given this film a style or a vibe beyond the formulaic because those characters are well defined, whether it be via their charisma, attitude or abilities.

What saves the day here is the fact Shadow Recruit is an origin story. The clumsy clichés of the first act aside, seeing Ryan on his first mission and completely out of his depth - particularly in a desperate bathroom brawl - is intriguing and makes up for the fact he is a stereotype. Pine does his best to balance the Ryan's greenness with his obvious capabilities.

Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit gets a tentative recommendation. It does what it does reasonably well, is smart in places, and aside from a shaky start, it's certainly never terrible. It's just that it feels like dozens of other spy films and as a result is unlikely to linger long in the memory.