Hail, Caesar!

The latest film from the Coen Brothers 'Hail, Caesar!' depicts life in the Hollywood studios in the 1950s through the role of Eddie Mannix (Josh Brolin) as the head of studio whose job it is to keep everything running smoothly.

The main problem he faces is keeping the Biblical epic ‘Hail, Caesar!’ on track after its star Baird Whitlock (George Clooney) is kidnapped by a group of communist script writers (see ‘Trumbo’) known as ‘The Future’, who demand a $100,000 ransom in exchange for his safe return.

Then there’s DeeAnna Moran (Scarlett Johansson), an actress who becomes pregnant out of wedlock in the middle of her film and there's Hobie Doyle (Alden Ehrenreich), a cowboy actor in Westerns being asked to take over a part in a more serious role, where he really can't cut it.

Meanwhile Mannix is being seduced by a possible new employer, who offers him more money and the chance to be home in time for dinner with his wife every evening. 

Writing about it now the plot sounds like it has promise, so I'm not sure what exactly went wrong because it really didn't seem to work. 'Hail, Caesar!' is a rare thing, a disappointing Coen Brothers film.

For a start there are too many actors and actresses fighting for screen time because there are additional roles for Ralph Fiennes, Tilda Swinton (twice, playing twins), Channing Tatum, Frances McDormand and many others.

The film is part tribute and parody of Hollywood's Golden Age with its many references to the films of that era but it’s an unfocussed one, that will fall flat on most of his audience who do not really go back that far.

In a way it’s the sort of film that Woody Allen would make and that wouldn’t have been for me either. It was probably great fun to make, much less to watch.

The Grand Budapest Hotel

The Grand Budapest Hotel opens with a young girl standing at a monument to a writer and reading a memoir penned by the ‘Author’. Presumably the same chap. This author (Tom Wilkinson) recounts the story of when his younger self (Jude Law) visit the Grand Budapest Hotel, which had fallen on hard times, and met its then owner Zero Moustafa (F. Murray Abraham). Zero then tells his own story of how he came to own it and why he is unwilling to close it down. I hope you’re following? This film has flashbacks with knobs on them.

It’s a film with an unusual approach to its story and it plays out a bit like a Dangermouse cartoon, heading off at tangent after tangent whilst within itself, somewhere, is the actual story.

Back in the 1930's a younger Zero (Tony Revolori), a mere immigrant boy, worked as a lobby boy under the hotel's flamboyant concierge, M. Gustave (Ralph Fiennes). This is in the fictional Republic of Zubrowka, a place that is teetering on the brink of war under the weight of some Nazi lookalike thugs.

Not that Gustave seems to notice. He is too busy as he wines, dines and beds a succession of rich, much older women who all love the hotel because of the exceptional personal service he gives. Sadly his latest conquest Madame D (Tilda Swinton) suddenly drops down dead. Yet in her will she leaves Gustav a priceless painting called ‘Boy with Apple’. Madame D's son Dmitri (Adrien Brody) doesn't take this well and Gustav finds himself framed for her murder.

So he steals the painting and legs it. He makes a deal with Zero, naming him as his heir if he helps him. Then when Gustave is arrested and imprisoned, Zero and his girlie (Saorsie Ronan) combine to free him and things just get steadily more madcap from there onwards. 

We get Gustave and Zero being pursued by a hit man (Willem Defoe) on skis down the full Winter Olympic experience including downhill run, bobsleigh track and ski jump.

Everything moves forward at breakneck speed in this film and if you’re not concentrating you’re going to miss something. Things are not even easy to follow if you do but even if you lose the plot, the film’s still full of weird and wonderful characters to enjoy. All of which are played by famous faces.

It’s all quite ridiculous and you feel at times that writer/director/producer Wes Anderson may just be simply having at laugh at our expense but I enjoyed it thoroughly nonetheless.

Orlando (1992)

The film adaptation is by Sally Potter, a brave lass, because I think she's tried to film the unfilmable.

It's all a bit Shakespearean to me with a touch of Ian McEwan. Although as L points out Ian McEwan's usually have a plot. If Virginia Woolf had one when she started out, she soon lost it. From the moment Jimmy Somerville appears as a falsetto angel, you know this is going to be hard work.

Orlando is a young noble man during Queen Elizabeth I's reign. Tilda Swinton plays Orlando, a woman playing a man. Quentin Crisp plays Queen Elizabeth I, hmmm, but he's more convincing as a woman than Tilda Swinton is as a man. This, as I know that during the film Orlando becomes a woman, rather gives the plot away in the first few seconds.



Orlando is offered a house and land by the Queen, if he can stay forever young. The film follows Orlando as he moves through several centuries of British history, experiencing life along the way, and during this time, impossible as it may seem, he doesn't age a day.

He falls in love with a skater during the winter of the Great Frost, the skater is Sasha, a Russian Princess. A young woman who also dresses as a man and as unconvincingly as Orlando does. She toys with his feelings and one night, when they plan to run away together, she fails to turn up. The cow.

Throughout his amble through the centuries, Orlando bumps into people briefly before moving on. Many historical figures appear but aren't properly introduced. So, if you didn't know the story you'd miss them, such as when Nick Greene and other poets, show up. All the monarchs of the passing years are briefly mentioned.

At some point Orland falls into a coma and when he awakes, he's become a woman. Yes really. Orlando doesn't look unduly bothered or even surprised. Suppose we'd all like to try it but I'd like an assurance that there was a way back. There was a previous scene where Orlando also appeared to have a long sleep and I had thought he'd already gender hopped because with Swinton in the lead, it's hard to tell.



This transformation causes him to lose his grand house. Firstly, because he is legally dead but also because he's now female and this amounts to much the same thing. Women were not allowed to own property.

Orlando continues to be unlucky in love and things get no better when he/she falls off his/her horse and is rescued by Billy Zane. They promptly jump into bed but ultimately, he/she is dumped again.



A quick rush through the twentieth century and then we are in the present day, where Orlando is handing his/her memoirs to a publisher. The film closes with Orlando and his/her child back at the house she acquired centuries ago.

They say it's not the getting there but the journey. Hmmm, I'm not convinced. A truly strange film, to say the least. Rambling and largely plotless. It's allegedly a film about self-discovery but Orlando's character seems to learn little throughout the years. You feel he/she's somewhat wasted his/her time. I suppose Orlando learns that each gender has its faults, no matter what century it is, but despite amassing several centuries of experience, he has little to show for it.

In 1941, Woolf committed suicide by filling her pockets with stones and wading into the River Ouse near where she lived. She probably couldn't find her real self either.