perlmonger::metalog

Watching

Holy Days: is an Aotearoa road-trip movie, set in 1974, about three elderly nuns; and a boy with a widowed white NZer dad and a deceased Maori mum, and a new white step-mum moving in. The main plot about wicked developers in league with a high-handed Catholic hierarchy is paper thin, contrived, and full of cliches, but that doesn't matter because this is a vehicle for an ensemble of splendid character actors. The two sub-plots are also more satisfying. One sub-plot about the later stages of ageing being appalling and undignified and how acceptance is the constructive way to deal with these uncomfortable realities. And a second sub-plot about the fact our mini-hero's Maori mum died relatively young and his failure to adjust because neither the white NZ culture of his dad nor the Christianity of his three elderly nun friends (gran substitutes) are capable of giving him the cultural perspective he needs to deal with his grief. The movie is also helped along by delightful miniature animations of the nuns on the run in their borrowed (stolen) car, and a rocking gospel soundtrack. Watch this for Judy Davis, Jacki Weaver, and a respectful attitude to indigenous people and women. Bonus Miriam Margolyes and Aotearoa scenery. 3.5/5 but the audience I watched it with enjoyed it.

Hunt for the Wilderpeople: is an Aotearoa off-road trip movie set in about 2015, although it was adapted from a 1986 novel. Too well-known to need a review from me. 4/5

Coyote vs ACME: Wile E. Coyote is, of course, a myth reworked as a folktale reworked as a looney toon - a trickster who does more damage to himself than his targets. In fact, this movie is for the birds and the overt "winners" in this case are the Road Runner ("Meep meep!") and ACME Corporation ceo Foghorn Leghorn (originally based on a satirical fictional Southern senator but here trumped up). The human lawyers who get in the way of this re-enactment of the South-Western North American mythosphere, like true heroes on their journeys, manage to survive and grow a little as people while re-enforcing their understanding that the "American Dream" is a stinking two-tier pile of chickenshit that can only serve as fertiliser for the hopes and dreams of non-psychopath citizens. The repetitive loon-acy is bursting with anvilicious classics. And the tune at the end is a version of the Clash's I Fought the Law (and the Law Won) with a red background. Why, yes, unlike Warner Brothers I do believe movie-goers can cope with ethical complexity and cartoon piano drops in the same film. 4/5

Reading

Poems, by Matilda Young, 1928: when am I ever not reading poems by Matilda Young? 5/5

Watched

- Virginia Woolf's Night and Day (which isn't Woolf's and probably better on screen because of that): a feel-good bildungsroman about a middle-class girl in the 1910s with lots of emoting close-ups from a cast of excellent actors. Not substantial or meaningful beyond encouraging middle-class girls to "follow their star" but that's good enough. 3.5/5

- Minions & Monsters: feel-good film with many movie refs, especially to early Hollywood (inc silents). The world-devouring baddie is an orange blob, lol. 5/5

- The Summer Book: a surprisingly good adaptation of Tove Jansson's lyrical book, which I think is excellent but wouldn't have thought of as filmic (although Jansson was interested in film as an art form). The movie concentrates on exploring a child's discovery of human mortality in tandem with her grandmother's resistance to ageing and growing acceptance of her own inevitable demise, which sounds grim but I found mildly moving and uplifting. Glenn Close is outstanding as the gran but Emily Matthews the child actor playing the granddaughter also shines. 4/5

- My Mother's Wedding: three middle-class sisters, a Royal Navy officer, a movie actor, and a nurse, return to their childhood home to attend their twice-widowed mother's third wedding. Slice of life family drama, which is a good example of its type but not especially memorable apart from a lesbian character being central rather than peripheral. 4/5

To Watch

The September arthouse excursion will likely be either The Incomer (trailer link) or Late Fame (trailer). Although I suspect Late Fame will be objectively the better film I obviously favour the batshit Scottish comedy with Michelle Gomez doing comedic evil (why, yes, I have never got over Green Wing) but I reckon I'll be outvoted by the Willem Dafoe fans. Which would you choose?

Also want to see Tell Everyone (trailer).

What's on your cinematic To Watch list?

Having a quiet afternoon listening to Palestrina and watching the Fire Brigade considering whether or not to break into the National Trust property opposite. It was ladder up and helmets on at one point….