Call It, Friendo

This week we discuss two films from American screenwriter and director Michael Mann. The first is Blackhat (2015), starring Thor himself, Chris Hemsworth, as a blackhat hacker named Hathaway. The film, Mann’s most recent, was a giant financial flop. The second is Collateral (2004), starring Jamie Foxx and Tom Cruise. An LA cabbie unwillingly drives an assassin around the city as he bumps off witne...

This week we discuss two critically acclaimed mafia films from one of cinema’s greats, Martin Scorsese. The first is The Irishman (2019), starring Robert De Niro, as mob hitman Frank Sheeran, and Al Pacino, as teamster president Jimmy Hoffa. The film, the budget of which allegedly spiralled to around the $250 million mark, was eventually acquired by Netflix and earned 10 Oscar nominations. The sec...

This week we discuss three films which are linked thematically to Crime and Punishment. The first and second are both versions of Insomnia. The (1997) original, directed by Erik Skjoldbjærg and starring Stellan Skarsgård, depicts a detective who is wracked with guilt after crossing a series of moral lines, leading to an extreme bout of insomnia. Christopher Nolan’s (2002) remake, starring Al Pacin...

This week we discuss two films which were screened at the Cannes Film Festival in 1973. The first is Touki Bouki (1973), a Senegalese drama directed by Djibril Diop Mambéty. The film was restored in 2008 thanks to Martin Scorsese and the World Cinema Foundation. The second is Scarecrow (1973), starring Al Pacino and Gene Hackman. The film, although a box office bomb, shared the Grand Prix at Canne...

This week we discuss the films of acclaimed Australian filmmaker Cate Shortland. The first is Somersault (2004), a coming-of-age drama starring Abbie Cornish and Sam Worthington. The film, set in the Australian ski resort of Jindabyne, is a beautifully shot, powerful insight into the life of an emotionally troubled young runaway and the men who she interacts with. The second is Lore (2012), a dram...

This week we discuss two classic Australian films. The first is The Year My Voice Broke (1987), a coming-of-age tale written and directed by John Duigan. The film features early performances from Noah Taylor and Ben Mendelsohn and was followed by a sequel, Flirting (1991). The second is Wake in Fright (1971), starring Gary Bond and Donald Pleasence. This film tells the story of a young teacher tra...

This week we discuss two films which feature male actors dressing as women. The first is Juwanna Mann (2002), a romantic comedy starring Miguel A. Núñez Jr and Vivica A. Fox. The film tells the story of Jamal Jeffries, a basketball player who, upon getting banned from the league, chooses to disguise himself as a woman, Juwanna Mann, to play on a fictional WNBA team. The second is Dressed to Kill (...

This week we discuss two films which feature explorers on journeys on the Amazon. The first is Embrace of the Serpent (2015), a story from the perspective of Karamakate, a native who interacts with two white explorers on their respective treks to find the elusive yakruna plant 30 years apart. The film was Colombia’s first ever Oscar nominee. The second is The Lost City of Z (2016), starring Charli...

This week we discuss two films from acclaimed French filmmaker Claire Denis. The first is Beau Travail (1999), a loose adaptation of Herman Melville’s 1891 novella Billy Budd. The film centres on a group of French legionnaires serving in Djibouti. The second is High Life (2018), starring Robert Pattinson and Juliette Binoche. The film tells the story of a group of convicted death row inmates sent...

This week we discuss two Historical epics written by legendary English screenwriter Robert Bolt. The first is The Bounty (1984), the 5th retelling of the famous mutiny on The Bounty committed to film. However, this version, starring Mel Gibson and Anthony Hopkins, purports to be the most faithful to real-life events. The second is The Mission (1986), starring Jeremy Irons and Robert De Niro. The f...

This week we discuss two Neo-Westerns directed by Chinese American filmmaker Chloé Zhao. The first is The Rider (2017), a semi-fictionalised account of former bronc rider Brady Jandreau. With a cast of real people playing themselves, Zhao captures an honest depiction of life in rural South Dakota, and of a man dealing with the effects of a life-altering accident. The second is Nomadland (2020), st...

This week we discuss two films released on VOD in 2021. The first is Locked Down (2021), a film written, filmed and released during the COVID-19 pandemic. It stars Chiwetel Ejiofor and Anne Hathaway as a couple who plan a heist at Harrods during lockdown. The second is Synchronic (2019), Aaron Moorhead and Justin Benson’s low budget time travel film about one man’s quest to find and rescue his fri...

This week we discuss two films starring Nicole Kidman in two extremely different roles. The first is Birth (2004), Jonathan Glazer’s second feature and follow-up to Sexy Beast. In the film, a widow meets a ten-year-old boy who claims to be the reincarnation of her dead husband, leading to more than a few uncomfortable moments. The second is Destroyer (2018), directed by Karyn Kusama and starring N...

This week we discuss two films, both excellent character studies, from award-winning French director Jacques Audiard. The first is Dheepan (2015), the story of a makeshift family of 3 Tamil refugees relocated to a tough housing estate in France. The film, inspired by Sam Peckinpah’s Straw Dogs, won the Palme d’Or at Cannes. The second is Rust and Bone (2012), based on the short story collection of...

This week we discuss two films from acclaimed Australian director Peter Weir released in the 1980s. The first is The Year of Living Dangerously (1982), which gives a semi-fictionalised insight into some of the events leading up to the attempted communist coup in Indonesia in 1965. The second is The Mosquito Coast (1986), based on the novel by travel writer Paul Theroux, which follows Harrison Ford...

This week we discuss the filmography of genre director S. Craig Zahler and delve into all 3 of his films in chronological order. The first is Bone Tomahawk (2015), a gritty, ultraviolent western where a group of cowboys and lawmen face off against a bloody-thirsty tribe of cave-dwelling mutants. The second is Brawl in Cell Block 99 (2017), an even grittier and more ultraviolent tale of a man who f...

This week we discuss two Mike Leigh period films which examine vastly different areas of British culture. The first is Topsy Turvy (1999), which depicts Gilbert and Sullivan’s tumultuous creative process in bringing their acclaimed operetta, The Mikado, to the stage. The second is Vera Drake (2004), a hard-hitting look into the life of a working-class housewife in 1950s London who performs backstr...

This week we discuss two works of imagination from the 70s and 80s. The first is Zardoz, John Boorman’s 1974 follow up to the very successful Deliverance. In contrast to the film which preceded it, Zardoz was not well received by viewers or critics of the time. The second is Time Bandits, a 1981 fantasy adventure from Terry Gilliam and fellow python Michael Palin. An early entry in Gilliam’s direc...

This week we go back to the 1970s for 2 films from American filmmaker Michael Ritchie. The first is The Bad News Bears, a 1976 baseball comedy that set the blueprint for a lot of films to follow. An alcoholic coach, played by Walter Matthau, has to corral a group of young misfits and mould them into a winning team. The second is The Candidate, a 1972 political comedy drama that leans far more to t...

This week sees a return to Scandinavia as we take on 2 highly acclaimed Swedish films. The first is Fanny and Alexander, the 1982 film which marked the end of Ingmar Bergman’s illustrious career as a director. This period drama gives an insight both into how Swedish high society lived at the start of the 20th century, and into some of the issues Bergman faced in his relationship with his father. T...

This week, we watched two horror films produced by Netflix. In both cases, the streaming giant gave their talented, up-and-coming directors carte blanche and complete creative control. The results were mixed. The first is Apostle, Gareth Evans’s 2018 period horror, a big departure from the Indonesian martial arts films with which he built his reputation. The second is Gerald’s Game, Mike Flanagan’...

This week we watched two frankly outstanding, critically acclaimed dramas showing two completely different sides of the Middle East. The first is Incendies, Denis Villeneuve’s 2010 harrowing tale of twins who journey to an unnamed Middle Eastern country to learn more about their late mother’s life. The second is A Separation, Asghar Farhadi’s 2011 Oscar-winning courtroom drama, which gives the vie...

Thankfully back to narrative features this week, and very good ones no less, as we dip into the 1970s for a couple of Oscar-nominated thrillers. The first is The Conversation, Francis Ford Coppola’s 1974 slow-burn surveillance tale, starring Gene Hackman. The second is Klute, Alan J Pakula’s 1971 starting point to his paranoia trilogy, starring Donald Sutherland and Jane Fonda.   Timestamps The Co...

It’s a weird one this week, with 2 unconventional documentaries from the 2000s. The first is 2003’s Windy City Heat, an elaborate practical joke played on an unwitting LA open micer, directed by comedy legend Bobcat Goldthwait. The second is 2007’s My Winnipeg, Guy Maddin’s surrealist reflection on his hometown.   Timestamps Windy City Heat (00:00:45) My Winnipeg (00:49:30)   Links Windy City Heat...

The dystopian future is nigh this time on Call It, Friendo as we tackle two “end of the world” movies of vastly differing quality. First, the good one, Bong Joon-Ho’s 2013 train-based action sci-fi film “Snowpiercer”. Apart from celebrating the excellent set design, we also discuss some of the logistical issues of living on a train for 15 years. Second, the bad one, Michael Anderson’s 1976 effort...