Free State Of Jones, Tanna, and American Honey: Your Week In Film (February 20-26)

Break Free: Matthew McConaughey is Civil War deserter Newt Knight

Movie picks for the next seven days on TV, DVD, Blu-ray, VOD, and in cinemas...

Why did Free State Of Jones (DVD, Blu-ray and VOD) WWW bomb at the box office and get nary a look-in during awards season? Well, for a start, it carries the undeniable whiff of Oscar bait and, at two hours 19 minutes, goes on a bit. But I suspect the main reason for its failure lies elsewhere. Maybe following 2016's #oscarssowhite controversy there was little appetite for a film about the Civil War and slavery with a white lead. Now, while that's certainly a sentiment I understand, it's also a shame because Free State is, more often than not, powerful, worthwhile stuff.

Based on a true story, Gary Ross's film sees disillusioned Confederate army deserter Newt Knight (Matthew McConaughey) flee to Mississippi, where he hides out in a swamp with fellow deserters and runaway slaves. It isn't long before he's organising this raggle-taggle band into an effective fighting unit and inspiring an uprising against the corrupt local Confederate government. Told over several decades, Free State is perhaps at its best during an uplifting but heart-breaking final third in which Ross explores slavery's corrosive legacy; the continued rise of the Ku Klux Klan and how plantation owners could bend the law to keep African-Americans under their control (something also recently put under the microscope in Ava DuVernay's bravura documentary, 13th).

The problem is that despite the film's subject matter, McConaughey is front and centre at all times, while black actors such as Gugu Mbatha-Raw (Belle) and Mahershala Ali (Moonlight) are relegated to the sidelines a little too much. As has surely become apparent since the 'McConaissance' started in earnest, you don't cast the Dallas Buyers Club actor in your movie if you intend to allow anyone else to get a word in edgeways. And so it goes here. Still, Free State's heart is clearly in the right place, even if its execution is imperfect.

The State we're in: More than just another Civil War drama

Surprisingly nominated for a Best Foreign Language Oscar over the likes of Elle and Julieta, Tanna (in cinemas and on Curzon Home Cinema) WWW is set on the eponymous South Pacific island and depicts the true story of a young couple who defied the strict 'arranged marriage' traditions of their tribe and planned to wed for love. It's a Romeo And Juliet affair shot entirely on location, but what makes Aussie duo Martin Butler and Bentley Dean's film interesting is that all the actors are from the tribal village itself. Not only had none of them acted before but, until their contact with Butler and Dean, they'd never seen a film either.

As it turns out, the tribespeople are absolute naturals, especially young Marceline Rofit, who plays Selin, the sister of bride-to-be Wawa (Marie Wawa). A loveable scamp, the camera clearly adores her and, given half a chance, I suspect Hollywood casting agents would be queued up outside her door.

Tanna is smartly told, compelling and possessed of charm in abundance, while the island's sumptuous fauna (including an active volcano) offers Dean the opportunity to really flex his muscles as a cinematographer. In truth, though, it lacked a bit of emotional heft and, at times, felt like the characters were playing second fiddle to the demands of the plot rather too much.

Treasure island: Tanna boasts sumptuous visuals

Despite being a fan of writer/director Andrea Arnold (Fish Tank, Red Road), American Honey (DVD, Blu-ray, and VOD) WW½ left me a little cold on the big screen. A sprawling, interminable road movie, filmed in the old-fashioned square academy format, it sees down-on-her-luck Star (newcomer Sasha Lane) abandoning her old life to set off across the American Midwest in a van with Shia LaBeouf and his gang. Are they an out-of-control rock band on tour? A criminal gang plotting a big score? No, they're off to sell magazine subscriptions door-to-door, silly!

Apart from its punishing length (just 17 minutes shy of three hours), my biggest bugbear is that pretty much everyone in American Honey is profoundly annoying and unsympathetic. The kids with whom Star shares her great subscription-selling adventure are just awful - a gibbering, braying, squealing, drugging, boozing, boring collection of unmitigated gits you'd leave the country to avoid. It does, however, have something interesting to say about America's directionless youth and boasts a very fine soundtrack (Rihanna, Mazzy Star and a bunch of great hip-hop), while Riley Keough is superb as Krystal, the gang's flint-hearted boss. Maybe I'll warm to it on a second viewing...

Taste of Honey: Sasha Lane impresses as Star

Since Sky Movies rebranded as Sky Cinema last year, there has been a definite uptick in the number of interesting, under-the-radar movies showcased on its various channels. This week is very much a case in point. The Goob (from today, 10pm, Sky Cinema/NOW TV) WW½ is a gloomy coming-of-age drama set in the Norfolk Fens. It focuses on the titular Goob (Liam Walpole), a teenage boy struggling to come to terms with not only impending adulthood but also the behaviour of his step-dad, a deeply unpleasant bully played to evil-eyed perfection by Sean Harris. Writer/director Guy Myhill conjures a potent but dispiriting vision of what it is to be young and trapped by poverty and circumstance.

If you're looking for something a little more peculiar, there's Men & Chicken (from Wednesday, 9.50pm, Sky Cinema/NOW TV) WWW, a Danish black comedy which stars Mads Mikkelsen and David Dencik as brothers who, following their father's death, seek out and attempt to connect with the family they never knew they had. Bizarre, hilarious and disturbing in equal measure, it's Monty Python meets The Island Of Doctor Moreau. Just as bonkers is bizarro comic-horror The Greasy Strangler (from Thursday, 10pm, Sky Cinema/NOW TV) WWW. Chock-a-block with catchphrases ("Bullshit artist!") and lines of dialogue you can imagine boozy students bellowing at midnight screenings, Jim Hosking's film - an unholy marriage between Troma and Harmony Korine - clearly fancies itself a future cult classic. This story of a serial killer who is, quite literally, covered head to toe in a thick layer of grease, would all seem a bit contrived and cynical if it wasn't genuinely funny, gratifyingly repulsive (even the soundtrack made me queasy) and riotously entertaining. 

Grease monkeys: No one is safe from the strangler (NSFW)

Finally, don't forget that Sunday night is the Oscars or, if we're being formal, The 89th Annual Academy Awards. Sky have a dedicated channel for the event (Sky Cinema Oscars) with coverage from 11.10pm (the ceremony itself commences at around 01.30am on Monday morning). Will I be staying awake for it? Hell, no, but I'll be dreaming of acting gongs for Isabelle Huppert and Casey Affleck all the same...

What I shall be watching this week: Looking forward to seeing Jeff Nichols' Loving (Blu-ray), and I may well drag myself out for John Wick: Chapter 2 at the cinema.

I keep forgetting to mention that this blog has its own page on Facebook. For extra content of varying quality, be sure to visit us here: https://www.facebook.com/ashumanasrest

Ratings

WWWW - Wonderful

WWW - Worthwhile

WW - Watchable

W - Woeful

Eye In The Sky, Men & Chicken, and David Brent: Life On The Road: Your Week In Film (August 15-21)

Game of drones: Eye In The Sky is a gripping, real-time thriller

UK TV, radio, DVD, Blu-ray, VOD and cinema picks for the next seven days...

Monday 15th: Eye In The Sky (DVD, Blu-ray and VOD) utterly gripped me from first to last (and I say that as the kind of pacifist pinko who is no fan of the military). Helen Mirren is Colonel Katherine Powell, the commander of an operation to combat an extremist threat in Kenya but her mission goes from capture to kill when it becomes clear the terrorists are planning an imminent attack. However, the appearance of a young girl selling bread in the strike zone complicates matters and leads to an escalating international row involving politicians, drone pilots, covert agents, and military brass. Played out in real time, Gavin Hood's film is an incredibly tense examination of modern drone warfare, which is also surprisingly complex and refreshingly even-handed (especially coming in the wake of 2014's clumsily liberal Good Kill, which even Ethan Hawke couldn't save). Eye also boasts terrific performances from Mirren and, in his final screen role, the late Alan Rickman. If you're looking for something a little more peculiar, you could do a lot worse than Men & Chicken (DVD, Blu-ray and VOD), a Danish black comedy which stars Mads Mikkelsen and David Dencik as brothers who, following their father's death, seek out and attempt to connect with the family they never knew they had. Bizarre, hilarious and disturbing in equal measure, it's Monty Python meets The Island Of Doctor Moreau. If I hadn't already sat through Evolution, Anders Thomas Jensen's film would be the strangest thing I've seen all year. The kids are still on their summer break so stick 'em in front of Megamind (Netflix UK), an enjoyable animated superhero romp which cleverly flips the script so the titular bad-guy is forced into doing good for the first time in his life. The voice cast is impressive - Will Ferrell, Jonah Hill, Tina Fey, David Cross, Brad Pitt - and it's a bloody sight better than the similarly-themed Suicide Squad.  

Chicken fun: Mikkelsen stars in a bizarre black comedy 

Tuesday 16th: Like Star Wars: The Force Awakens and Jurassic World, Creed (Netflix UK) goes the 'requel' route. Ryan Coogler's film is part Rocky sequel, part reboot, and at times borrows wholesale from the original 1976 picture and its various follow-ups. That said, it's a definite cut above other recent boxing flicks, such as last year's Jake Gyllenhaal-starring Southpaw, while Michael B Jordan and Sylvester Stallone have genuine chemistry. I wrote a fairly exhaustive review of the film when it hit UK cinemas in January, and you can read it here. In The Naked Gun (22:00, ITV4), the late Leslie Nielsen is Frank Drebin, a detective so hopeless he makes Inspector Clouseau look like Sherlock Holmes. I'm sure I don't have to tell you this big-screen adaptation of Police Squad! is a hoot as Drebin battles to foil a plot to assassinate the Queen. Nice Beaver!

Kiss, kiss, bang, bang: Leslie Nielsen is Frank Drebin

Wednesday 17th: A Man for All Seasons (Netflix UK) charts the breakdown of the relationship between Henry VIII and his chancellor Thomas More, following the king's decision to break with Catholicism so he can divorce and remarry. Devoutly religious, More resigns his post and hopes to live out his days away from Henry's machinations. But the monarch won't hear of it and pushes More to give his public approval to the king's plans - something his former chancellor is not prepared to do. Released in 1966, Fred Zinneman's film won six Oscars (including Best Picture, Best Actor and Best Director) and featured one of cinema's finest dramatic performances - Paul Scofield as More himself. Black Souls (01:10, Film4), Francesco Munzi's atmospheric Italian-French crime noir, is about the Sicilian mob but, with its mostly rural setting and melancholy vibe, eschews the dirty glamour of many Mafia movies. Instead, it focuses on a cast of rich, complex characters, a simple but gripping story in which the stakes and violence grow bigger and scarier as the film proceeds, and a truly heart-stopping denouement. In other words, it's a hidden gem that Film4 has seen fit to bury midweek at a ridiculous time of day. Set your Tivo/Sky+ box - you won't be disappointed.

Mob rule: Black Souls is a hidden gem

Thursday 18th: I always laugh when I recall the name of Tina Turner's character in Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome (Amazon Prime Video): Aunty Entity. Aunty bloody Entity. Fortunately, such silliness doesn't spoil what is a rousing finale to George Miller's original trilogy of MM films. Set around 15 years after Mad Max 2, this time Mel Gibson is battling to liberate a place called Bartertown from Aunty's vice-like grip. Max's punch up with the monstrous Blaster in the Thunderdome arena and a cracking desert chase are the highlights. And, despite the ridiculous moniker, Turner isn't bad either. In The Film Programme (16:00, BBC Radio Four), poet Don Paterson continues his series on great speeches in movie history with Rutger Hauer's philosophical monologue in Blade Runner. "I've seen things you people wouldn't believe..." 

Under the Dome: Mad Max brings the thunder 

Friday 19th I'm not the biggest fan of Ricky Gervais. He peaked early with The Office and it's been a case of diminishing returns ever since, culminating in the abysmal Special Correspondents earlier this year which he wrote and directed. David Brent: Life On The Road (cinemas) sees the funnyman (who was compared, absurdly, to Woody Allen in The Observer recently) return to his most famous creation, now working as a sales rep while touring with his band, Foregone Conclusion. The trailers look promising enough, although it's just more of the same, isn't it? Brent says something outrageous/inappropriate and the people around him look incredulously at the camera. Still, comedy careers have been built on considerably less (I'm looking at you, Jack Whitehall) so let's hope this is a return to form. Ridley Scott's The Martian (Sky Cinema Premiere/NOW TV) stars Matt Damon as an astronaut stranded on Mars when a manned mission to the red planet goes tits up. It's MacGyver in space, it's Cast Away meets Apollo 13, and although the final 20 minutes strain credulity and Damon's smartypants botanist never seems quite bothered enough by his predicament, it's a great deal of fun. 

Road warrior: Brent's back and as insufferable as ever 

Saturday 20th: Julie Walters narrates There's Something About Romcoms (21:00, Channel 4), a celebration of the "rich and varied history" of the titular movie sub-genre featuring contributions from the likes of Meg Ryan, Hugh Grant, Richard Curtis, Rupert Everett and Stephen Merchant. I shall probably tune in to see what they have to say about Nora Ephron/Rob Reiner's sublime When Harry Met Sally but suspect the rest (Bridget Jones, Four Weddings etc) might prove a bit of a slog. Elsewhere today, you'll find a couple of fine biopics: Richard Attenborough's epic, multiple-Oscar-winning Gandhi (13:05, Movie Mix) stars Ben Kingsley as the eponymous freedom fighter who, using non-violent means, led his country to independence from the British, while Salma Hayek is controversial Mexican artist Frida Kahlo, in Frida (17:00, amc).

Prize fighter: Gandhi won eight Oscars

Sunday 21st: Argo (Amazon Prime Video) is one of those Best Picture Oscar winners that should never have got within a million miles of the big prize (see also Crash, The King's Speech, Titanic... I could go on at length). Based on what is actually a fascinating true story, it sees Ben Affleck's CIA man team up with Alan Arkin's movie producer to concoct an outlandish, Hollywood-inspired plan to rescue a group of American hostages who'd fled the US embassy in Iran at the height of the country's 1979 revolution. Affleck's film (he also directs) takes some serious liberties with the truth and its depiction of the Iranian people is lamentable. But, if you can forgive its many shortcomings, there's an entertaining, occasionally thrilling movie in there somewhere. On terrestrial TV, there's Ian Dury biopic Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll (23:00, BBC2) which stars Andy Serkis as the late, great musician, and The Grey (23:00, Channel 4), a wolf-bothering survival thriller starring Liam Neeson.