Film Review: Hacksaw Ridge

This Saturday past, my uncle and I found ourselves in a common weekend predicament of ours: we were just finishing lunch and didn’t know what to do with ourselves until dinner. We thus decided to resort to our equally common solution for such predicaments: watching a film. Unfortunately at the time, it seemed like slim pickings. Of the options I floated, Hacksaw Ridge took his fancy the most, and so off we went.

As with most pleasant surprises, we both arrived at the cinema with our expectations at about sea level. I thought Hacksaw Ridge was just going to be another WWII film; an outcome I would have had no issue with. I was happy to discover it was a deeply engaging and moving film. It tells the story of Desmond Doss, a United States Army soldier who served as a combat medic in the Pacific Theatre of the Second World War. Doss distinguished himself by saving the lives of dozens of fellow soldiers during the Battle of Okinawa in 1945, earning himself a Medal of Honour; the US military’s highest honour.

Doss about to receive the
 Medal of Honour, 1945

The above alone was enough to pique my interest in the film, but only once it began did I learn that Doss was a Seventh-Day Adventist, a Christian denomination known for its strong pacifist views. As such, not only did Doss receive a Medal of Honour, he was the first conscientious objector ever to do so. Hacksaw Ridge, then, tells a story of Doss’ struggle to navigate his convictions, chiefly his deep desire to serve his country (underpinned by powerful societal pressures to do so) while remaining true to his religious principle of non-violence, all in the face of mistrust from his fellow soldiers and worries of his loved ones.

Andrew Garfield’s portrayal of Doss as a person trying their hardest to move steadily forward in exceptionally trying circumstances while different forces, both psychological as well as physical, threaten to pull him apart not only justifies the Oscar nomination he has received, but makes for a profoundly compelling and gripping film. Hacksaw Ridge beautifully conveys the heights of the power of human belief, as Garfield’s Doss climbs to those heights to endure great tribulations and achieve something truly extraordinary. Yes it’s a theme as old as time, but it is so precisely because of how we are so persistently moved by it through the power of good storytelling.

Hacksaw Ridge pulls no punches in its depiction of the
savagery of war

What made Hacksaw Ridge quite special in my eyes is that it told a very real human story. My uncle mentioned to me after the film that, during the scene where Doss begins to rescue scores of his fellow wounded soldiers, he wondered if Hollywood had overinflated the scale of his achievement for dramatic effect. In reality, Doss indeed pulled 75 injured servicemen to safety at Okinawa. The makers of Hacksaw Ridge may well have embellished his story, particularly events leading up to the achievement, such as the initial resistance he faced from the military to his enlistment, or his troubled relationship with his father. Even if they did so, however, it was the embellishment his good story deserves, which did not rob it of its impact.

As a fan of always being able to see both sides of the story, perhaps the main issue that nagged at me throughout the film was its portrayal of the Japanese soldiers fighting against Doss and his compatriots. They are depicted in a very one-dimensional fashion: blindly ferocious and cruel. On the other side, while the film generally resists the impulse to glorify the ordeal of the American soldiers, a few heroic gestures slip through cracks, accomplishing precious little for the story. Perhaps it is unfair to dwell on these points though, as it could be said Hacksaw Ridge is more about one person navigating a war through their beliefs rather than exposing the complexities of the war itself. Moreover, the film does provide some redeeming glimpses into the lives of the Japanese soldiers as well, briefly returning their humanity to them and, in one moment, hinting that stories as powerful and complex as Doss’ could have just as well played out on the other side of the battlefield.   

Film Review: The Revenant

I'd be lying if I said I wasn't excited to see The Revenant. The film seemed to have all the bases covered: high critical acclaim, an excellent crew and cast, and an engrossing historical setting to boot. Unfortunately, all the above only served to make The Revenant all the more disappointing by the time the credits began to roll.

Without giving too much of the plot away, The Revenant tells the story of a fur trapper's battle to survive and to exact revenge upon the trapper who left him for dead (among other trespasses). It is a simple story, sure enough, but sometimes the simplest stories can be most powerful, a thought which most likely crossed director Alejandro Gonzalez Iñárritu's mind at some point. The Revenant attempts to create and transmit a powerful story by conveying the sheer suffering which the aforesaid fur trapper, Hugh Glass (played by Leonardo DiCaprio), endures in his quest for survival and revenge.

Unfortunately for The Revenant, Glass' suffering is conveyed in such an extreme way that it ceases to be relatable, and even borders on the realm of comedy at times. At one point, for example, after battling through wild animal attacks, broken bones, and the freezing cold, Glass is chased off a cliff by a war party of Arikara Native Americans, and hits a large tree on the way down. I admit I had to stifle a giggle at that moment, and I was certainly not the only member of the audience to do so. During that moment, Glass ceased to be a suffering hero and started to become just a guy who can't catch a break. For the most part though, his suffering isn't touching, it's just exhausting.

Stunning Views: Sadly one of the film's best features.

The Revenant isn't all bad though. Shortly after leaving the cinema, I noticed a bus pass by with an advert for the film plastered on its side, bearing numerous groupings of four and five stars. One of the latter was attributed to Empire Magazine, with the excuse that The Revenant instilled 'an astonishing sensory experience' in viewers. If the capacity to engender such an experience was the only assessment criterion for a film, then Empire's five stars may well be justified. The early 19th century wilderness is painted beautifully by Emmanuel Lubezki's cinematography, from its stunning vistas to its hellish conditions. In fact, 'Best Cinematography' is one of the few Oscar categories which The Revenant ought to stand a chance of winning, rather than the smorgasbord of nominations it has received. The music and soundtrack are also quite impressive.

 

Sadly, the astonishing sensory experience instilled by The Revenant's cinematography does not extend to its direction or acting. You can't fault the actors too much for that though, they simply were not given enough material to tell a compelling story. It would be remiss to say the film does not have its moments. A particularly touching one, where Glass shares a chuckle with a Pawnee Native American he meets along his journey through the wilderness, is so touching because of the brief respite it offers from the odyssey of suffering that is the rest of the film. However, films that are complimented on distinct moments are often so because they fail to sustain a continuous sense of momentousness. It's usually fine for a romantic comedy, but with a film like The Revenant, that seems to want to convey such a sense, it makes its shortcomings all the more apparent.    

Book Review: The Man in the High Castle

Call it a New Year's resolution if you will, but as 2015 drew to a close, I decided that I wanted to become better acquainted with the work of Philip K. Dick, the well known science fiction author. I had always been a fan of science fiction as a genre, in film as well as literature, but my particular interest in Dick's work arose from a greater interest in what you could call 'intellectual' science fiction. To draw a comparison between two films, any incarnation of the Star Wars franchise would be a good example of 'entertaining' science fiction, which primarily serves the purpose that the category implies. Blade Runner (and the novel upon which it is based, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, also written by Dick), on the other hand, is also entertaining, but is certainly more intellectual and artistic, given that it uses science fiction as a means to think about present and, most likely, future issues.

And so began my merry romp through the work of Philip K. Dick, beginning with his Hugo Award-winning novel, The Man in the High Castle. I decided to begin with it partially because it ranks among his best-know and most celebrated works, but mostly because of its setting. When I learned that the novel took place in an alternate history, in which the Axis powers won the Second World War, I was immediately curious as to how Dick imagined and conveyed the resulting world. After all, the deeper into an alternate history one decides to set a story, the more challenging it is to tell a credible story that does not fall apart when its underlying assumptions, historical or otherwise, are called into question.

In the novel, the former United States of America are more
or less divided as shown above between the
Japanese Empire and the Nazi Reich.

I was very pleasantly, and perhaps not all that, surprised. As soon as I began The Man in the High Castle, I was immediately engrossed by the immersive post-war world which the novel's characters inhabited. This reaction did not owe little to my original curiosity, but I believe the writing itself deserves the greatest credit. After all, while many of the story's characters reflect on their history and wonder what might have happened if the Axis powers had not won the war, their reflections arise from a very well-established sense of acceptance of their present global order, in which the Japanese Empire and the Nazi Reich govern the world and that is simply the way of things.

About halfway through the novel, however, I began to realise something. I noticed that The Man in the High Castle had managed to propel me through to its midway point on little more than its setting. The story followed the lives of various characters living in this alternate past, but their lives seemed loosely connected at most, and there was not much of a plot to speak of. In a timely response to my thoughts, however, the plot of The Man in the High Castle slowly began to emerge. Before long, like the novel's characters, I too accepted the setting of the story as the connections between the characters became increasingly apparent and the resulting, fast-paced episodes had me rushing through pages during the wee hours of the morning.

When I closed the back cover of The Man in the High Castle, I had yet another realisation. While the book was certainly thought provoking, it was not intellectual stimulation which I most associated with it. Rather, I wallowed in the conclusion that I had been thoroughly entertained, at first by the novel's setting, and subsequently by its plot. This is not to say The Man in the High Castle was not intellectually stimulating at all. Quite on the contrary. The acceptance of the vast majority of the global population to the story's geopolitical world order, for example, served as a sobering reminder that humans might be able to get used to just about anything. That being said, I was ultimately impressed by the novel's ability to be artistic and entertaining in equal parts, and on that basis, I would recommend it to anyone whose curiosity in the book might just have been sparked.     

Electronic Games and Mental Preservation

In the most recent issue of TIME, Dr. George W. Rebok, a professor at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, is mentioned for saying that after the age of 70 age-related brain degeneration can speed up dramatically. He adds that good ways of countering this degeneration involve "activities that engage and stimulate" the brain. After reading this, I couldn't help but think that an activity which often engages and stimulates the brain, sometimes to the exclusion of all other stimuli and frequently to the dismay of my mother, is playing electronic games.

Given that both scientific research and conventional wisdom advocate engaging mental activity not only for people at risk of mental degeneration, but also for people who will not be at risk of it for years to come, it is interesting to consider what the effect would be of regular (but not excessive) electronic gaming on a person's long term mental health. Concerning short-term mental ability, although there does not yet appear to be a consensus, you need only type "video games mental health" into Google to find a growing amount of research indicating that playing electronic games can improve everything from a person's concentration to their social skills.

Research, let alone agreement, on the long-term mental health benefits of playing electronic games is even sparser. That being said, researchers will soon find themselves in an optimal position to find out about this subject as the younger generation, whose membership includes a growing number of people who regularly play electronic games, grows older. I, for one, would be surprised if not a single study emerges saying that it wouldn't hurt grandma and grandpa if they picked up the Playstation controllers every now and again.

Play Review: 1984

When a friend and I decided to buy tickets to see 1984 at the Playhouse Theatre in London, I was excited, but skeptical. After having been thoroughly impressed by Orwell's novel earlier in the year, and thoroughly unimpressed by the 1956 film adaptation shortly afterwards, naturally I was afraid that the play would not be able to do it justice. I was happily proven wrong.

While I would have a hard time saying the play was on an exact par with the novel, it was certainly able to capture much of what made Orwell's original work so entrancing. The actors, bolstered all around them by the plays's costumes, sets and special effects, were able to convey and instill the powerful sensations from what is a profoundly emotional story. Highlights included the momentous shock which Winston feels when he receives his first note from Julia, or the sensation of absolute terror he experiences during his initial torture and later, in Room 101. It should come as no surprise then that, much like the novel, the play was also able to keep its audience engaged throughout its entire duration; no mean feat considering it lasted over an hour and a half with  no interval. The trailer below will give you a good taste of all the above:

Despite facing the relative time constraints encountered by all theatrical adaptations of novels, the play was nonetheless also able to develop 1984's key themes to provide a truly stimulating intellectual experience. While the classic topics of sanity and surveillance were well developed by the play, it was its treatment of memory as a theme which completely enveloped my mind. The dialogue and scene changes really helped to create a distorted sense of recollection which added layers to the characters' musings over the age-old but perpetually relevant question, "Can we truly know anything?"

My friend and I left the Playhouse Theatre mentally exhausted in the best possible way, barely able to discuss what we had just seen as we attempted to finish processing it all. I'm quite frankly stunned that I even had it in me to write this review so soon after seeing the play. Perhaps Winston's exploration of the fleeting nature and consequent significance of memory compelled me to just sit down and write it before it was too late.

It's quite apt that the topic of memory should be so significant to 1984 and my experience of the story's theatrical adaptation. After a brief tube ride home, during which I collected my thoughts and listened to Big Brother over the PA system, I realised I had enjoyed the play so much precisely because of the way it interacted with my memory of the original novel. This is not to say that if you have not read Orwell's work you won't follow the plot or enjoy the play overall, but I would argue that you won't enjoy it as much as if you had read it beforehand. The play was able to bring the story of 1984 to life for me, but largely because Orwell had already made the story so vivid in my mind to begin with.

Film Review: Transformers: Age of Extinction

Now I'm perfectly happy to admit that I love the action films. Don't get me wrong, I can't express how much I appreciate an intricate plot, fascinating characters or a thought-provoking message in a film. That being said, I can still love a film that possesses none of the above and redeems itself purely though good action. It is for this reason that I am often the only person in a given group of people who is willing to defend the Transformers film series. After the most recent installment, however, I fear the franchise may have lost one of its most casual champions. Before I launch into why that is the case, I should say that the point of this post is to help moviegoers decide if they would like to see Age of Extinction or not, and it will not contain any spoilers.

Don't let the critical tone of the previous paragraph mislead you, Age of Extinction wasn't all bad. Like in previous installments, Michael Bay and the film's writers were able to introduce a host of cool new transformers without severe continuity issues. Among these new characters, two are worthy of mention for being particularly badass.The first of these is Drift, a samurai-themed autobot armed with  more than one obscenely huge sword. The second of these is Crosshairs, an autobot paratrooper whose metal exoskeleton includes a long, flowing coat to keep him looking sharp while he fires away with his pair of transformer-sized handguns.

I'd buy that coat if it came in my size.

And its not just the robots; a couple of the human characters weren't half bad either. Mark Walhberg's performance as Cade Yeager, the struggling single father and inventor, makes his character far more likable as the human hero of the film than the hysterical Sam Witwicky (performed by Shia LaBeouf) had been in the previous three installments. Additionally, Stanley Tucci's performance as Joshua Joyce, the initially arrogant technology manufacturer, ever so slightly improves the clunky and strained character development Joyce briefly undergoes during the film.

It is a little known fact that Bay
was the original choice to direct Titanic

However, if we have to point to character visuals and actor performances as the redeeming features of a film whose previous franchise installments were saved only by their action scenes, things start looking pretty bad for Age of Extinction. Indeed, the film failed to do the one thing it was expected to do: entertain the audience with some mindless action. This failure can be summed up in a sentence I never thought I'd say: Michael Bay finally went overboard with the explosions. This is by no means a new criticism of the director, and it should not be taken to mean that I think the previous Transformers installments were short on gratuitous explosions. However, Age of Extinction lacked some of the cinematography which made the action of its predecessors far more entertaining. The clip below from the third installment, Transformers: Dark of the Moon, shows what I'm getting at:

         
At around 0:40, Optimus Prime goes off on one of the best action rampages I've ever seen in a film, given how he effortlessly switches between a variety of weapons to seamlessly defeat multiple enemies. A variety of camera shots are used to help bring this out, such as the long-distance shot at 0:57 of Prime bringing down two decepticons with his sword in quick succession, shortly followed by a close up of him deploying some sharpened brass knuckles at 1:04 to tear open a final opponent. Finally, the background music for the scene, composed by Steve Jablonsky, adds to the impression of power created by Prime and helps make his rampage a minute of epic screentime.

Bet you never thought you could analyze a Transformers film like that, could you? Well you can, and while you might find that only a handful of scenes from the first three installments match up with the clip above, you certainly won't find anything from Age of Extinction which compares. Any potential for good action is masked by enormous explosions. Plus, as much as I like him, Jablonsky fails to deliver a score with engaging tracks. This is pretty bad news considering that Age of Extinction is the longest installment in the film series, with a running time of 165 minutes. As a director, if you're going all in on action as the means of engaging an audience, you better make sure the action makes up for the simple plot, relatively flat characters and time-worn messages. Sadly, the action in Age of Extinction fails to do this, so it doesn't take long for the film to start dragging as soon as you begin watching it.

Bay is no stranger to criticism, and the box office performance of the Transformers series has usually allowed him and the series' producers to simply shrug it off. The series currently stands as the 4th highest-grossing of all time when averaged to its gross per film of $653m. However, Age of Extinction has experienced a slower box office performance than any of its predecessors. According to Box Office Mojo, on the second weekend following its release, the film had accrued a domestic gross of only $175m. The three previous films, on the other hand, had secured domestic grosses of $224m, $293m and $261m, respectively, after the same length of time. Age of Extinction's slower performance become all the more noteworthy when you consider that its $210m budget is the largest of any film in the franchise.

Age of Extinction's slower box office performance is quite telling. The figures suggest that so far more people have been dissatisfied with the film and, crucially, convinced their friends and family not to go watch it than with any of the previous Transformers films. I would agree with those people: Age of Extinction is not worth the watch. What remains now is to see if this attitude will last long enough to have an impact on the film's lifetime performance at the box office.

Image Sources
1. uk.ign.com
2. collider.com
3. lolshelf.com

Is it really worth joining a political party?

Given the the laughable level of confidence most Southern Europeans have in their respective political systems it might seem surprising that I have been mulling over the prospect of joining a political party in my home country of Portugal.

"But why?" asks the concerned reader in you, and rest assured that it's a question I've asked myself more than once before sitting down to write this. After all, let's consider what someone would actually be able to accomplish by joining a political party. For starters, let's assume I don't see it as a simple route to personal power (which I promise you I don't. Trust me, it's not like I'm a member of a political party or anything...) and that I genuinely want to use it to spur positive change for as many people as possible. Given the very nature of political parties, the odds are stacked against me. Any noble intentions I might have stand a good chance of being whittled down as I make endless compromises to secure the support of my fellow party members. And for what? To complete objectives who probably wouldn't be able to recognize themselves in a mirror after all that wheeling and dealing?

Despite being faced with this rather pessimistic view, I believe Paul Rudd provides an eloquent response.

A criticism is only really worth the breath needed to say it if it comes with a solution. Political parties have become such an integral part of most democracies that any attempt to bring about change through government without them is going to run into some serious walls at best. Sure, staging a revolution could be another possibility, but anyone attempting to do so would sure as hell need a pretty clever alternative to replace the democratic system they'd just chucked out the window (not to mention that, historically, quite a few revolutions haven't had exactly what you'd call a well-considered follow-through). Now, I'm not saying that this is a reality that should or will last forever; resolving the problems that spring from political parties should be high up on the agenda of any society. However, what I will say is that the citizens of a democracy, somewhat ironically, have little choice in this matter. If we want to makes changes to and through our governments, joining a political party is our best bet.

Obviously, this leaves the issue of which political party to join, but I'm sure this post has given you enough fun for today, so I'll leave that issue for another time.