In Cinemas Now

The Help (2011)

Director: Tate Taylor
Writers: Tate Taylor, Kathryn Stockett (novel)
Stars: Emma Stone, Viola Davis and Bryce Dallas Howard 

A combination of white guilt and black uprising is the driving force behind the drama in “The Help” which looks back at an ugly time and place in US history through a distinctly feminine eye (the male cast members are mere token gestures). Jackson Mississippi is the place, early 1960’s the time where the lives of a disparate group of southern ladies unfold and intermingle, coping with the agenda heavy plight of their surroundings which covers everything from racial tension and domestic violence to less substantial yet equally rewarding avenues of coming of age triumphs of womanhood and friendship. 

With award season on the horizon this is an almost a sure bet for nominations and Viloa Davis as negro Maid Aibileen and the ever-plucky Emma Stone as budding journo and black sympathiser “Skeeter” will rightly lead the charge with likably rangy performances, neither would be possible if not for Bryce Dallas Howard career highlight portrayal of Hilly, whose spiteful and obnoxious nature incumbent of the era allows everyone else to mount the moral high ground. 

Everything here works, it’s a smooth feel good movie which is sugary but not too sweet, resentful but not too bitter and in the process captures an endearing light in an otherwise dark time. 



8/10

We Need To Talk About Kevin (2011)

Director: Lynne Ramsay
Writers: Lynne Ramsay , Rory Kinnear (screenplay)
Stars: Tilda Swinton, John C. Reilly and Ezra Miller

Certain parlances use the phrase “You’re either teaching it or allowing it to happen” and  it's debatable whether or not this sort of hard line stance on teaching and parenting works when dealing with such an incredibly tough subject meshed with remarkably complex emotions that are encountered in  “We Need To Talk About Kevin”.

Adapted from the novel of the same name this is a hauntingly transcendent experience which in its purest form is a film about an ordinary American family coping with an extraordinary evil before, during and after the aforementioned malevolence manifests itself through mass murder. 

Teenager Kevin (Ezra Miller) is to quote Heath Ledgers Joker “an agent of chaos” revelling in an introverted destructive nature which acts as force field to deny access to his true thoughts and feelings. There are shades of the Ricky Fitts character from Sam Mendes’ American Beauty (1999) in his mysterious and dark aura which inevitably originates from the darker recesses of family life, which in this case is the story of a broken maternal relationship. Tilda Swinton is the mother Eva, inwardly torn by the rejection of her affection by her first born,  and systematically broken by Kevin’s psychological prowess and abuse whilst father John C. Reily laps up his sons ostensible love. The cast strike up a dynamic chemistry which is fed by the divisive oedipal themes that in part drive the narrative, it’s slightly reminiscent of Ordinary People (1980) but with dread and terror replacing angst. 

Director Lynn Ramsey is in masterful form weaving together a tri-linear composite of hazy memories,  comprising of barely conceivable early warning signs of the unimaginable. They are vignettes offering such subtle indicators as overly involved video-gamesmanship, odd breakfast time behaviours and other nihilistic virtues- Rounding it off with a bleak realisation of a life in tatters and the daunting task of picking up the pieces. There is a noticeable attention to detail through incredible visceral sounds of thumping heart beats and reoccurring themes of varying stains of red matter, Ramsey’s artistry is simply stunning – Making this easily one of the years best films

9/10