Iro's Film Diary

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Iro's Top 100 Movies v3.0

I wish I could say something here, but I've haven't seen it in a while so my memory's not very credible.

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Movie Reviews | Anime Reviews
Top 100 Action Movie Countdown (2015): List | Thread
"Well, at least your intentions behind the UTTERLY DEVASTATING FAULTS IN YOUR LOGIC are good." - Captain Steel

#146 - X-Men: First Class
Matthew Vaughn, 2011



In 1962, a collection of individuals who have superpowers because of genetic mutations must join the fight against a supervillain looking to incite a nuclear war.

There are times when X-Men: First Class is able to back up its potentially interesting premise about the chain of events that would lead to the formation of the actual X-Men. Having Michael Fassbender's Magneto serve as a de facto protagonist definitely provides the film with its most interesting plot thread and individual scenes as he single-mindedly pursues vengeance against the mad scientist (a magnificent Kevin Bacon) who killed his mother. There's also something to be said for the concept where the film effectively functions as a retro spy thriller that just so happens to have superheroes in it, offering an intriguing variation on not just the franchise but the sub-genre in general. Otherwise, the film either goes over a lot of the same ground as previous X-Men films in its examination of the usual mutant-based prejudices and the various ways in which they do (or don't) influence various characters. Surrounding this is an aesthetic that is very inconsistent in terms of quality. The thing that definitely stands out the most is the art direction that complements the film's 1960s setting and flirtations with the spy genre, especially when it comes to the supervillainous set designs making for some distinctive visuals; however, this has the drawback of making the effects work look considerably rough in comparison. As a result, I think First Class has just enough charm to keep it from being the worst X-Men film, but there are quite a few elements working against it from a cast of mostly annoying characters (especially Mystique, though that could just be because of Jennifer Lawrence) to some especially absurd developments (like what happens to Darwin).

#147 - The VVitch: A New England Folktale
Robert Eggers, 2015



In 17th-century New England, a family living on an isolated farm have their existence threatened by a malevolent force in the nearby woods.

The VVitch touches upon a number of potentially unsettling concepts in telling its tale of a puritan family being torn apart in one way or another by not just the presence of a witch but also by their own increasingly strained relationships with one another on a failing farm. It is for these reasons and many others that it generally does a decent job of building dread that persists as everything from tense arguments to horrific injuries build up across the film, though never consistently enough to maintain much momentum. Many factors do feel like they have a similar make-or-break vibe as they spend too much time straddling the line between effective and ineffective. The visuals can be appropriately stark and unsettling, but they can also be drab and numbing. The music and ambience noise can be creepy, but it can also be obtrusive to the point of being somewhat comical. The performers themselves can be seen to struggle with Eggers' attempts to replicate the archaic diction of 17th-century puritans, often lapsing into histrionics in order to compensate for the clunkier parts. While The VVitch doesn't exactly botch its execution and proves darkly compelling for the most part, it's still got plenty of issues that result in me struggling to think of it as a modern horror classic. It may be capable of building up multiple layers of fear thanks to a balance of both evil occultism and paranoid devotion both taking their respective tolls on the bodies, minds, and souls of the family but that only goes far in getting under an audience's skin.

#148 - X-Men: Days of Future Past
Bryan Singer, 2014



In a world where genetic mutations grant people superpowers, one such mutant is sent back in time to 1973 in order to prevent a future genocide.

X-Men: Days of Future Past uses a rather fluffy time-travel plot to tie together the original timeline established by the franchise's first few films with the prequel timeline that kicked off with First Class, with it being a testament to the slickness of the overall production that it barely manages to avoid collapsing into an outwardly-incomprehensible mess. Watching this so soon after First Class was interesting, if only to see the differences between the directorial skills of both Bryan Singer and Matthew Vaughn - Singer at least gets to play with a bigger budget and the resulting product has a fair bit of sheen to its many scenes of super-powered action, but the resulting film does seem to lack personality even as it throws temporally-themed quandaries at its characters (who generally get to deliver decent performances regardless of how much development or screen-time they get). The action scenes may look pretty decent, but they have the side-effect of drawing attention to the plot's stringy nature (most notably through the film's famed Quicksilver sequence). As a result, Days of Future Past may be a colourful slice of light entertainment but it still feels fundamentally hollow underneath its many attempts to add superficial variations to the familiar X-Men formula.

#149 - Paper Moon
Peter Bogdanovich, 1973



During the Great Depression, a small-time con artist forms an unlikely partnership with a young orphan as they make their way across Kansas.

There's definitely some fun to be had with Paper Moon, a clever little period piece that centres on a comically mismatched pair - Ryan O'Neal as a sharp-tongued grifter and his real-life daughter Tatum as a recently-orphaned urchin who can more than keep up with her companion's trickery - as they hit the road and get into a variety of misadventures. As with any story that's dependent on an audience following along with scams and subterfuge, there's quite the demand for tight writing and Paper Moon does a reasonably good job of peppering its loose road-movie narrative with vignettes that are admittedly a little loose in terms of structuring but are more than borne out by performers and technicians alike. The stark monochromatic cinematography that worked wonders in Bogdanovich's earlier The Last Picture Show is on display once again and adds even more character to a film that could have been a mawkish fiasco but instead proves capable of delivering more than its fair share of amusement and drama.

#150 - Victoria
Sebastian Schipper, 2015



While out clubbing in Berlin, a young Spanish woman meets a group of Germans and ends up having to help them carry out a bank heist.

Victoria may not be the first film that's been shot in a single uninterrupted take, but the audacity of its premise serves to make it a curiosity all its own. It starts in the wee hours of the morning as the eponymous Victoria is about to go home after a night of partying only to encounter a group of affable young German men as she is leaving the club. Though she is initially charmed by these mischievious fellows, she eventually learns that they are petty criminals and are being forced to carry out a robbery so that one of them can pay off his debt to a local gangster. As if that wasn't bad enough, she is also brought in to assist when one of them isn't up for doing the job. Though the prospect of watching an entire heist take place in one feature-length shot is definitely an interesting one, one can easily grow skeptical of whether or not Victoria can deliver the goods without exposing itself as an exercise in gimmickry. In that regard, I'm not sure that it succeeds. I can certainly respect the effort that's taken to pull off such a production as Victoria and co. pinball between a number of different locations for well over two hours straight, especially when you consider how steady the camerawork manages to be even as the film moves away from casual conversations into tense set-pieces. You can even forgive it for not featuring Lubezki-like intensity when it comes to colours or lighting, especially since any gratuitously artistic gestures would undermine the raw grit that the film seems to demand.

However, for all the skill that's on display when it comes to organising and executing such an ambitious concept, there's still not a whole lot going on underneath the surface to make it seem like Victoria is more than just a gimmick. It definitely doesn't seem strong enough to justify its sizeable running time; though the first hour of the film is still dedicated to developing its core cast of characters and the ways in which they interact, by the time the story kicks into gear they still don't feel developed enough for you to be wholly invested in their success or survival. Even scenes that are clearly designed to be character moments don't feel especially strong, with the performers needing to compensate for writing that is most definitely in service to the single-take conceit. As a result, while I definitely commend Victoria for managing to pull off such a difficult filmmaking feat without fail, I do note that such a feat is a double-edged sword. One can only marvel at the unbroken camerawork for so long when the film isn't especially great at hitting any of its actual narrative beats, struggling to flesh out characters or make one truly feel the tension when things get out of hand. If anything, one can even wonder how much the film might actually get hamstrung by having to play along with the single-shot gimmick. As a result, Victoria may be a fairly impressive little experiment in cinematic virtuosity, but it's debatable as to whether or not its unique nature is quite enough to make it a great film in its own right - in that case, I don't consider it to be victorious.

#151 - Garage Days
Alex Proyas, 2002



The members of a struggling Sydney rock band get into all sorts of misadventures as they try to get a shot at the big time.

How do you follow up creating not one but two darkly fantastic '90s cult classics? If you're Alex Proyas, you shift gears completely and put out an irreverent comedy about a bunch of ocker punks trying to make a name for themselves in the Sydney music scene. Garage Days does nothing to distinguish itself favourably from other youth sub-culture movies of the same era as it peppers its tale of scrappy rockstar wannabes with anything that stands even the slightest chance of sticking, whether it's dry relationship drama involving an unexpected pregnancy or various characters' experimenting with sex and drugs. Even the film's A-plot is riddled with clichés when it comes to both narrative and comedy, especially as it touts the same old rock-movie rhetoric where the heroic underdogs are fighting the good fight for "real music" against sleazy executives and vapid corporate rockers. The film definitely doesn't play to Proyas' strengths - even his tendency towards bizarre visuals is given the weakest of outlets (such as the depicting of several characters taking accidental acid trips). As a result, Garage Days manages to avoid being anywhere near as fun as it may seem on the outside, playing into a lot of the worst aspects of a) movies about rock music, b) movies about youth sub-cultures and c) Australian comedies. I'd tell you to avoid it, but I don't think that'll be a problem.

#152 - X-Men
Bryan Singer, 2000



In a world where rare genetic mutations grant people superpowers, conflict brews between two ideologically opposed factions of mutants and a prejudiced human politician.

The thing that struck me the most as I revisited X-Men was that it was short. For a film that has to establish a slightly more complex mythology than your average superhero movie in introducing the "good" mutants led by Professor X (Patrick Stewart) and the "bad" mutants led by Magneto (Ian McKellen) in addition to the classic three-way X-Men conflict, the fact that it manages to get all that out in less than a hundred minutes and tell a decent story is actually rather remarkable. Of course, the story is compromised somewhat by it being the most bare-bones depiction of the aforementioned conflict yet, but it's the kind of straightforward narrative that is easy to take in stride. As an action film, it holds up okay - the effects haven't aged all that badly and the pacing of action scenes with character development is handled just fine. However, there's only so much that I can get out of this film after almost twenty years and I don't know how many viewings - I'm not entirely convinced that it's been sufficiently bettered by other films in the franchise, but I don't think that makes it great.

#153 - X2
Bryan Singer, 2003



In a world where rare genetic mutations grant people superpowers, a motley collection of mutants must fight against a genocidal military scientist.

Unlike its predecessor, I haven't seen X2 at all since it first hit theatres well over a decade ago. I can understand why it gets touted as a superior installment in the franchise as it takes advantage of the relative freedom offered by a sequel and makes a decent go of things. A lot of that is down to having the very dependable Brian Cox play the human villain whose ruthless yet complex crusade against mutants makes for a great enough character to buoy not just the returning characters but also some new additions. Watching it immediately after the relatively streamlined original does make it easy to spot the bloat in some areas, such as sequences that seem especially contrived to add in new action beats here and there (plus over-extending on the whole mutant-as-metaphor subtext to almost comical levels even for this franchise). At least there's a decent degree of polish that is capable of compensating for some questionable developments here and there, but even the good parts of X2 do very little to sufficiently make it seem like something that I'll revisit again in the next thirteen years.

#154 - The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus
Terry Gilliam, 2009



The immortal proprietor of a magical travelling sideshow must battle with the Devil for his daughter's soul.

Terry Gilliam is one of those filmmakers where I'm always interested in seeing what kind of crazed cinematic concoctions he can come up with and for the most part his work has not really steered me wrong (I think The Brothers Grimm is his only serious misstep, and even then it has enough of his idiosyncratic touch to not be a complete disaster). The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus is definitely one of his weakest films, but I still find a lot to like about the bizarre tale of the eponymous doctor and the misadventures surrounding his travelling imaginarium. Gilliam assembles another stellar cast to bring to life a story that balances the real, the weird, and the downright fantastic. His usual brand of visual creativity is most definitely on display in everything from off-kilter camera moves to the elaborately-designed worlds both inside and outside the imaginarium. It's enough to compensate for the fact that this is arguably an example of diminishing returns as Gilliam does indulge quite a few of his favourite themes and trademarks, but he indulges them well enough to make the ride feel more worth it than not.

#155 - Casualties of War
Brian De Palma, 1989



During the Vietnam War, an American soldier is forced into a difficult situation when his squadmates abduct a Vietnamese woman from her village.

I have to wonder if Brian De Palma is really the right director for a film like Casualties of War. Given his propensity for making films where the use of sex and violence frequently borders on exploitational, one can't help but wonder how he'd actually treat a film based on an actual wartime atrocity. While he's able to show some restraint in that regard, it doesn't seem to make a whole lot of difference to this extremely straightforward morality play that sees Michael J. Fox's clean-cut private butt heads with Sean Penn's aggressive sergeant, especially when the latter's angry paranoia about the Viet Cong leads him to kidnap and abuse a young Vietnamese woman. De Palma's competent enough on a technical level and there's a decent Ennio Morricone score in the mix, but it's in service to a film that somehow manages to be rather dull even as it deals with some incredibly harsh and uncomfortable subject matter.

#156 - Macbeth
Geoffrey Wright, 2006



In the ganglands of Melbourne, a lieutenant in a prominent crime organisation conspires with his wife to murder the outfit's boss.

I can see the appeal in adapting Shakespeare plays to modern settings while anachronistically retaining the original dialogue, but that appeal is nowhere to be found in Geoffrey Wright's adaptation of the Scottish play. Transplanting the play's action from medieval Scotland to present-day Australia sounds doable in theory, but that theory is shot to hell within a matter of minutes as the film turns out to be a mess of barely-coherent shots and cuts where any attempts at adding grittiness to an already gritty Shakespeare play actively detract from the story rather than enhance it (especially the absurd decision to reimagine the witches as pretty young Goths). Thick Australian accents mangle the words and suck any and all life out of them even as the actors occasionally try something more ambitious than generic tough-guy growling - and that's without mentioning misguided casting decisions such as having Sam Worthington of all people play the eponymous traitor or even local comedian Mick Molloy popping up in one distractingly bad bit part as a murderous henchman. Scenes of garbled Elizabethan wordplay are occasionally interrupted by some especially bland and poorly-crafted action scenes; action scenes always tend to feel a little redundant even in the best Shakespeare films, but this film seems virtually dependent on them to an especially pronounced fault. Combine all that with a garishly over-saturated aesthetic (plus some painfully histrionic background music) and you have what might just be my least favourite Shakespeare film yet. The play itself is defined as a tragedy, but Wright's film definitely comes across as a whole other kind of tragedy.

#157 - Ran
Akira Kurosawa, 1985



In feudal Japan, an ageing warlord's decision to abdicate his position results in a power struggle between his three sons.

Ran has quite rightfully earned a reputation for being an epic film as it translates Shakespearean tragedy into a larger-than-life tale of family disputes leading to all-out war and destruction. The theatrical approach to the material in every scene - ranging from lonely soliloquy to crowded skirmish - can come across as something of a double-edged sword that constantly threatens to tip over into potentially alienating melodrama, but it never does. The plot and characters may be painted in broad strokes, but that's to be expected and accepted in a film of this magnitude - even though the film is not shy about its more artificial aspects, that is not an obstacle to the actors emoting with gusto. While you have the legendary Tatsuya Nakadai delivering another magnificent turn as the old warrior at the heart of the story, the performer that truly stands out above all others is Mieko Harada as the Lady Macbeth-like noblewoman who commands every scene in which she appears and makes for a remarkably strong presence. As for the surrounding film, well, it's amazing to see Kurosawa work wonders in full-blooded colour that extends from immaculately-designed costumes to elaborately-staged battles. Though I'm not so sure that large-scale clashes between warring soldiers play all the way to Kurosawa's strengths, they hold up just fine. I suspect that Ran won't overtake Seven Samurai as my favourite Kurosawa, but it certainly comes closer than any of his other films as it goes for a whole other kind of epic and succeeds admirably.

#158 - Dolemite
D'Urville Martin, 1975


Note the shadows of the film crew in the bottom left - this is just one of the film's many pronounced goofs.

After being wrongfully imprisoned by corrupt cops and a business rival, a pimp is released from jail on the condition that he brings the true criminals to justice.

With its staggering of technical ineptitude and shamelessly amateur approach to storytelling, Dolemite seems like an obvious candidate for the "so bad it's good" canon...if not for the fact that it actually does try to be funny and (if I'm going to be completely honest) mostly succeeds. A lot of that is down to stand-up comedian Rudy Ray Moore's bizarre turn as the eponymous pimp, who is quite possibly one of the least convincing badasses in cinematic history but who can chew the scenery like nobody's business, elevating even the slightest of one-liners with his passionate delivery (though his rhyming stand-up routines are probably the most boring parts of the movie). He headlines one very messy film that features just about every blaxploitation stereotype in the book - revenge plot, prison, evil whiteys, rampant drug use, kung-fu fighting, gratuitous nudity, wah-wah pedal on the soundtrack, pimps and hoes, etc. - and blasts through the screen with very little regard for clean editing, solid narrative, or (most notoriously) keeping the boom mic out of the shot. There's no denying that the film starts running out of steam during its last third or so (plus the odd problematic element, such as Dolemite himself slapping around one of his many sexual partners mid-coitus), but I still reckon that Dolemite deserves some degree of recognition when it comes to talking about the best worst movies ever made. Its status as an actual comedy does little to undermine the laughably awful nature of its non-comedic elements - if anything, this film manages an ideal blend of deliberate and accidental humour that grants it a unique staying power beyond that of its peers.

Since I really liked Black Dynamite, I've been meaning to see Dolemite.

I managed to see Dolemite before Black Dynamite - certainly lent an extra layer of enjoyment to the proceedings as it does seem like the most obvious source of inspiration. Thinking about Black Dynamite is what made me bump up my rating because no way in hell does Dolemite deserve a lower rating.

I have had Ran on my watchlist for a long time. Your review and rating has me even more excited to see it, especially with Seven Samurai being your favorite Kurosawa, as it is mine as well.

Glad you liked Paper Moon . It's just a very charming and fun movie. Tatum fully deserves the praise she gets.

Haven't watched X Men or X2 since i was a kid, loved them at the time. They are the sort of films i'd rather preserve my memory of because i doubt i would like them as much now.

As i said i liked your write up of Dolemite in the guilty pleasures thread so i'm planning on watching it at some point.

It's disappointing to hear Macbeth pulled apart. I've not seen it, but I have a copy and I remember reading quite positive reviews of Worthington's performance. I didn't believe it, but I thought it was worth a look as I like Macbeth and it didn't cost me anything.

As I've said a few times on this site, Ran is one of the few, if not only, films about which the first thing you can hear is how good the battle scenes are and yet the film is great. Usually that description is my cue to leave.

I've not seen Dolemite in forever. I should rectify that. I've been thinking about a Blaxploitation marathon/binge.

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