LONDON CITY NIGHTS: Bradley Cooper

Sunday, January 4, 2015

'American Sniper' (2014) directed by Clint Eastwood

Sunday, January 4, 2015 - by londoncitynights · - 0 Comments

The most positive thing I can say about American Sniper is that it's at least up front about being military propaganda. There's none of the crypto-intellectual ideological obfuscation of Zero Dark Thirty and its ilk. Nope, American Sniper outlines its childlike perspective on the world very early on. There's three types of people in the world; the sheep, innocent, cosseted and blind to the true nature of the world; wolves, represented here by the population of the Middle East; and sheepdogs, the glittering knights of the US Military.

You and I are the submissive sheep in that equation: utterly dependent on muscle men with beards running through distant sandy cities shooting men, women and children with impunity.

The film, half biopic and half war film, doles up the life story of Chris Kyle (Bradley Cooper), the deadliest sniper in American history. Over the course of four tours of Iraq he blew away 160 people, earning him the nicknames 'The Legend' (from his fellow soldiers) and 'The Devil of Ramadi' (from the people he was shooting). Eastwood pulls no punches, opening with Kyle shooting an Iraqi child in the heart with a high-powered rifle. Our hero grimaces and grits his teeth, pained at his actions but thinking "It had to be done". As the boy's blood leaks into the dusty road both character and audience reflect that war is not without casualties and though this is a personal tragedy it must be for the greater good. I mean, he's the hero, he kinda sorta had to shoot that kid. Right?

The film then loops around to Kyle's childhood in Texas. He's vigorously pumped full of good ol' boy American ideals by his square-jawed Dad and growing up to become a rodeo rider. He's dissolute but somehow still noble; as if waiting for his true calling in life. When he witnesses the bombing of a US Embassy on TV he gets a determined look in his eyes and with the US flag gently waving behind him, the faint echo of a bald eagle's screech in his ears and a vision of George W. Bush giving him a silent thumbs up he signs up for war.

Sienna Miller looking vaguely concerned, her default expression here.

Before we know it 9/11 happens and I guess Saddam Hussein must have done it or something (note: check this) because Kyle is quickly parcelled off to Iraq where he shoots a load of people, gets a bounty put on his head, tries to hunt down some terrorist leaders and enters into a kind of sniper hunt with the brutal rival sniper "Butcher". Bubbling away in the background are the woes of Taya (Sienna Miller), Kyle's worried wife who frets that his absence is tearing apart their family.

Let's set aside the jingoistic bullshit that powers American Sniper for a moment and examine its qualities as a narrative. Very quickly Chris Kyle reveals himself as a deeply two dimensional character; mild efforts are made by both Eastwood and Cooper to show him as tortured by what he 'has' to do. This is undercut by his later blasé attitude towards his kill count, which I guess must come from Kyle himself. His only regret is apparently that he couldn't kill more people to save more American soldiers; an outlook that makes him look deeply psychopathic. His callousness makes him boring - for all the drama there's little development.

Now, onto the jingoistic bullshit. I'm going approach this with cool commercial logic. This is not a film hand-wringing peaceniks like myself are going to flock to. Nope, this is a film targeted squarely at those who are happy to deify soldiers and think Operation Iraqi Freedom (lol) was totally justified and a just dandy way to spend billions of dollars and piss countless lives away for jack shit. Consequently there is zero time given to the wider implications of the war; and what these soldiers are fighting for is never defined. The whole messy affair is reduced to a simply goodies versus baddies scenario, perfect for a target audience for whom critical thought is anathema.

A sinister Musselman (probably up to no good).

This is accomplished by dehumanising the Iraqis; either concealing their faces under sinister-looking scarves and balaclavas or rendering them spittle-flecked bearded nightmare men. Our heroes repeatedly refer to them as "fuckin' savages" or "fuckin' animals" - something cemented by repeatedly visually linking the Iraqis with barking dogs. This dehumanisation of the enemy is pretty typical in nationalistic propaganda; rendering them an angry formless untermensch with whom its impossible to sympathise or identify with.

The only antagonist with a the slightest hint of a personality is the villainous "Butcher" who acts as a sort of nemesis for Kyle. Given that the two never meet and that the Butcher never speaks he's a rather ill-defined antagonist; his total moral corruption visible in his tactic of hiding in buildings and picking off enemy combatants with a high-powered sniper rifle, as opposed to our brave hero who... uhmm.. uh.. Hmm.

Moving swiftly on....

That American Sniper so fiercely caters for right wing nationalists with a boner for milporn leaves it no space for any profundity or understanding why any of this is happening. This is unfortunate, because Chris Kyle's biography contains one genuinely fascinating development: his ironic death. After returning from Iraq he spent his time helping Marines with PTSD; eventually taking one disturbed former soldier to a shooting range. This proved to not be such a smart therapeutic decision given that the soldier went bananas and shot Kyle to death. What a tragic (totally unrelated and utterly random) event *bows head in quiet reverence*.

American Sniper approaches this patently meaningful wrinkle with timidity, glossing over it as fast as humanly possible in a brief title card. This is tactically understandable given that Eastwood's apparent aim here is to bolster the ranks of the 'noble' military. It's hypocritical as fuck though; the glaringly obvious conclusion that military life chews up and spits out those who're suckered into it, rendering them screwed up psycho-losers liable to fatally lash out at the slightest provocation.

But hypocrisy isn't surprising here, American Sniper is precision-targeted at complete fucking morons. This is a hagiography of a literal mass-murderer: straight-up pornography for those who get off on seeing poor people being bloodily dispatched by high-powered weaponry. Its Manichean philosophy affirms flag-waving nationalism aka the vile ideology of those who will happily carry out whatever atrocity they're ordered to by their superiors.

And it's got the gall to say we're the sheep.

Hey Clint. Go fuck yourself!

★

American Sniper is released January 16th.

Wednesday, July 30, 2014

'Guardians of the Galaxy' (2014) directed by James Gunn

Wednesday, July 30, 2014 - by londoncitynights · - 0 Comments

In James Gunn's excellent Guardians of the Galaxy the human race gets to be the coolest kid in the playground. Set in a universe populated by the moronic, the pompous and the self important (all with surreal haircuts) we come out looking like intergalactic Fonzies. Even better, is that our most effective weapons aren't guns and bombs, they're Marvin Gaye, Michael Jackson and David motherfucking Bowie.

This is an old school space opera that's much more a 21st century evolution of Flash Gordon than any po-faced hard science fictioning, the kind of setting where a few blobs of latex and a bit of facepaint on an extra and they're a whole new species. This blob of weirdness set within the same filmic universe as Iron Man, Thor and Captain America, but this is a clean slate in every sense of the word. Gone is the desaturated dullness of The Winter Soldier and the atrocious flattened cinematography of The Avengers. In its place is a riot of colour and imagination, shot with an eye for the epic and a desire to embrace comicbook ridiculousness.

That Marvel are willing to release a tentpole summer blockbuster starring a talking raccoon, a tree man that only says three words and an obscure-to-everyone-but-ultra-geeks supporting cast of comic book space dudes says an awful lot about their current level of confidence. I consider myself relatively up on comics - I know my Stilt Man from my Hypno-Hustler - but even I drew a blank on what the hell the Guardians of the Galaxy's deal was.

Drink in that lovely colour. Mmmm.

The centre of the story is Peter Quill aka Starlord (Chris Pratt). Abducted by aliens as a young child he's grown up to become space Indiana Jones. His life consists to be zooming around the universe in a cool spaceship, stealing alien archaeological relics and living the Kirkian dream of banging multicoloured spacebabes. After tracking down one particularly important item he becomes involved in an intergalactic war, one side wreathed in darkness and flying around in a sinister ship that looks like a floating Castle Dracula and the other a miniskirted, greenery covered utopia run by a magnificently coiffed Glenn Close (you decide who the baddies are).

Space MacGuffin in tow, Quill is suddenly the focus of a lot of attention. Courtsey of some impressively organic screenwriting he's soon the leader of a fractious group of losers bound together by either psychoses or greed. They are; green skinned assassin Gamora (Zoe Saldana), gun-wielding smartass raccoon Rocket (Bradley Cooper), the childlike tree man Groot (Vin Diesel) and hulking moron Drax (Dave Bautista).

They've got to band together to keep the space whatsit from falling into the hands of the evil Kree Empire led by the sinister Ronan, his cybernetic half-sister Nebula and their muscle Korath who all serve the Darkseid ripoff Thanos who wants nothing more than to master the Infinity Gems and blah blah blah.... you know what? None of that rubbish matters in the slightest.

Here's 'yer baddie. He's a bit pantomime.

Refreshingly the entire intergalactic conflict takes a backseat to well constructed set pieces, cracklingly good dialogue and excellent music. This whole science fiction universe is one ginormous straight man to our everyman hero as he bounces from one ridiculous situation to another with only his sense of comic timing saving him from disaster. By the end you've realised the less seriously Quill treats the plot the more success he has.

Highlights are passing off the Kevin Bacon classic Footloose as one of Earth's epic tales, an inpromptu dance-off in the face of certain death, a perfectly timed jizz-joke, Drax's inability to comprehend metaphor, a Simpsonsesque foreground vs background gag involving Groot and the confident, logical assertion that no person can truly be "a 100% dick". Gunn essentially treats the Marvel space comics like his personal playground, fitting in more idiosyncrasies and bizarre elements than anyone could ever have expected Marvel would allow.

Underscoring all that is a firm vision of epic adventure. Cinematographer Ben Davis frames his glittering space vistas with a care and attention to detail that'd make Jack Kirby blush. Everything is vibrant and alive, frames are packed with miniature details that bring the world to life and crucial imagery is composed with an artist's eye for drawing the eye through a frame. Great blooms of colour fill the screen during the action sequences, purples, red and yellow flames blossoming around the characters to stunning effect. For the first time in a Marvel film even the 3D is worthwhile, the fruit of Gunn taking an active interest in the post-conversion process.

^ this is good shit ^

On top of all that is the genius idea to soundtrack the film with hits from the 70s. The conceit is that when Quill was abducted in 1988 one of his few possessions was a cassette Walkman loaded with a mix of his mother's favourite tunes. The music makes the film accessible, the familiarity of the songs giving audiences a foothold in an this alien universe. Not to mention that the careful chosen songs all kick ass - as characters plan out their next move to the snarling howls of Joan Jett it's difficult not to get keyed up.

Guardians of the Galaxy ends up feeling like a sharply delivered riposte to critics (and I include myself in this) who've written off Marvel Studios movies as unimaginatively formulaic and stylistically bland. This is light years beyond garbage like Thor: The Dark World, Iron Man 2 and The Avengers; if Marvel really are trying to figure out a formula to stick to they could do a hell of a lot worse than making their subsequent films more like this. This is brimming over with things I enjoy - imagination, good nature and the most ridiculous hairdos this side of The Fifth Element.

★★★★

Guardians of the Galaxy is released on the 31st of July.

Friday, May 24, 2013

‘The Hangover Part III’ (2013) directed by Todd Phillips

Friday, May 24, 2013 - by londoncitynights · - 0 Comments

INT. BRADLEY COOPER’S HOUSE - EARLY MORNING

Chaos reigns. The detritus of BRADLEY COOPER's life is scattered everywhere. Broken glass fills the hall, the broken light fittings spark. Embedded in the wall is a gigantic, gently smoking golden cross. ED HELMS is lying on his back on the parquet flooring. His body is spattered in a neon blue liquid and we see two enormous barbed insectile mandibles have been grafted to his jaw. Rapper CHRIS BROWN is splayed naked on the sofa, his fists covered in blood and glittering sequins. ZACH GALIFIANAKIS is spasmodically jerking on the floor. We see that he’s clutching a wheezing, suffocating, yet still gently chittering bottlenose dolphin tightly in his arms. THE BORING ONE, DOUG OR SOMETHING I DUNNO is nowhere to be seen. Finally we see BRADLEY COOPER face down on an enormous four poster bed covered in sticky black viscera of indeterminate origin. An Oscar statuette reading “Best Actor 2013 Academy Awards: Daniel Day Lewis” protrudes from his anus, the head and shoulders enveloped within him. Slowly, red-eyed and blinking, he comes to.

‘Silver Linings Playbook’ (2012) directed by David O. Russell, 18th November 2012

Tuesday, November 20, 2012 - by londoncitynights · - 0 Comments

‘Silver Linings Playbook’ is a film about mental illness. We follow the story of Pat (Bradley Cooper), sufferer of a bipolar disorder. As the film opens he's being released from a state mental institution after serving a sentence for violently beating someone half to death. He suffers from intense mood swings, turning on a knife edge from happy and upbeat to depressive and violent.

David O. Russell has created a film that pulls itself in two directions at once. It’s obviously striving to present an accurate and sympathetic view of various types of mental disorder but is shackled to the conventions of the romantic comedy. These two ‘genres’ (if ‘mental illness film’ is really a genre) sit uneasily together.

Tiffany (Jennifer Lawrence) and Pat (Bradley Cooper)

The narrative shows us Pat’s attempts to conquer his condition and reintegrate himself into a society that’s suspicious and scared of him. They’re scared of him with good reason though, he lacks a filter on his words and actions, frequently acting inappropriately and with no empathy for how he might come across to others. While he’s constantly feeling some kind of extreme emotion, he entirely lacks the apparatus to identify how he’s affecting those around him. He’ll burst into his parent’s bedroom late at night to rant about Ernest Hemingway and throw a book through the window, or run up and hug a visibly frightened ex-colleague.

Pat is not the most likeable filmic hero. Throughout the film he operates under the illusion that he’s going to get his marriage back together, which everyone around him can immediately tell is not going to happen. People try to let him down gently and get him to see that his wife probably isn’t coming back. He labours under the illusion that their love is unbreakable, even after she’s had an affair and he’s nearly beaten a man to death in front of her.

Pat's parents, Dolores (Jacki Weaver) and Pat Sr. (Robert De Niro)

Into this tangled world comes the equally complicated Tiffany (Jennifer Lawrence). She’s a recent widow and ever since her husband died has been undergoing an alienating nymphomania. To the obvious disgust and embarrassment of her family she’s been having sex with nearly everybody she comes across. It’s gotten to the point where she’s been fired from her job for sleeping with everyone in the office. So can these two damaged people come together and help each other with their problems?

But it’s not just our two leads that are suffering psychic pains. One of the points the film makes is that the dividing line between those that are diagnosed mentally atypical and those that appear to lead normal lives is blurred. Nearly every character in the film appears to be dealing with some kind of problem, be it an obsessive compulsive disorder, violent fits of rage or a hidden depression. Russell is much more sympathetic to those like Pat and Tiffany who are honest enough to recognise their own problems and has a deep respect for the methods they use to try and fix themselves.

also Chris Tucker is in this film.

Both Bradley Cooper and Jennifer Lawrence have raging internal storms constantly bubbling behind their performances. They’re portraying people that are not only volatile, but to some degree also have the knowledge that they can ‘get away with it’. The two have both been damaged in some way, so both have an 'excuse' for their actions. One of Cooper’s best tactics is to use his wide, bright blue eyes to show Pat's terrifying clearness and confidence in his actions. The disconnect between how sure he is that his course is the right one and what we in the audience know to be true makes him both tragic and fairly frightening. Cooper is confident in a difficult role, and in less skilled hands runs a risk of losing audience sympathy altogether.

Lawrence is a good match for him, her and Cooper bounce off each other realistically and reflexively. She doesn’t have quite as many emotional gears to shift into as he does, but this is more of a function of her character rather than a limitation in her performance. What she does fantastically is the transformation from reserved, cool and collected to towering, violent, frustrated rage. There’s a physical change that comes over her in one scene that’s a marvel to behold, it’s like suddenly there’s a completely different person that’s sprung out of the character.

The world that these two inhabit is as carefully constructed as the two central characters. Due to their mental states, both Pat and Tiffany live and are dependant on their parents. Russell takes the same kind of downbeat look at working class American life as he did in ‘The Fighter’, although with a slightly softer touch. The film takes place in an overcast suburbia, row after row of identical houses, identical streets and nosy neighbours. This endless downtrodden domestic conformity gets to you after a while, but does the job of making our leads stand out like sore thumbs.

It’s clear that everyone involved here is sincere in making a film that aims to educate us about what it is like suffering from or living with a person with a mental disorder. The characters are treated with nothing but dignity, even in their most unsympathetic moments we at least understand why they are doing what they’re doing. Despite this, the film does use the pretty lame cliche of saying ‘maybe the ones who’ve been diagnosed with mental illness are actually the sane ones?’

This film has genuine flashes of complexity, and when it resorts to cliché like this it falls flat. Russell goes some way to justify this by making nearly every other character in the film a bubbling pit of vague symptoms, but this ends up feeling like a clever way to dodge the point. ‘Silver Linings Playbook’ doesn’t exactly glamorise mental illness, but that fact that it propels the central love story means some of the rough edges are necessarily sanded down.

For the vast majority of the running time ‘Silver Linings Playbook’ is a downbeat, bittersweet indie drama. The last quarter of the film feels like it’s been parachuted in from a glossy, conventional romantic comedy. Suddenly these damaged characters that we’ve gotten to know are acting relatively normally, and the focus shifts not onto whether they’re healing mentally, but bizarrely, onto their dancing skills. The argument the film puts forward is that their dancing skills are directly linked to their mental health, but after treading so carefully on this territory for the first 90 minutes it becomes very clumsy, very fast.

It’s a let down. We have it impressed upon us that this is an impossibly complex situation with no easy solutions, but the film takes a tonal swerve, shows us that actually there are easy solutions and ties everything up in a neat little bow. A happy ending and roll credits.

Other criticisms include the fact that this film assumes you have a knowledge of American Football, and specifically know a vague history of the Philadelphia Eagles. Characters repeatedly reference events in the history of this team, which may be common knowledge in the US, but I’ve got no idea what the hell they’re talking about and there’s not enough context to figure it out.

The climax of the film involves a ridiculously complex bet on which all the emotional and financial woes of our characters rest. The set up for this bet is one of the most interminable and confusing scenes I’ve seen in a film lately, and assumes you’ve got a knowledge of both American Football and US betting lingo. There’s a protracted negotiation of ‘points’ on a bet and just when this is decided, the characters begin discussing transforming the already complex bet into a parlay (I didn’t know what this was). To be fair they include a clumsy bit of exposition after the scene is over that translates it all into plain English, but it’s too little too late. If the audience is watching the set up to the big climax and they don’t know what the hell anyone is talking about, it saps urgency from the film and replaces it with alienation and confusion.

‘Silver Linings Playbook’ for the most part is an achingly sincere film that clearly cares a great deal about its subject matter. It’s got a solid core of talent and some deftly and sensitively sketched characterisation. But it can’t work out what it wants to be. Does it want to be an serious indie drama about mental illness or a conventional rom-com with two sweet, attractive leads? By trying to do both it doesn’t succeed at either.

‘Silver Linings Playbook’ is on general release from 21^st November 2012

LONDON CITY NIGHTS