The Brave One

Although I like Neil Jordan's films, I probably wouldn't have watched 'The Brave One' had it not been for Jodie Foster's presence. I have always had a platonic fondness for her; we kind of grew up together.

Jodie plays a radio presenter called Erica Bain. One night, she is out walking her dog with her fiancé when three men seize the dog, demanding a reward for its return. When they refuse, they are attacked by two of the men, while a third films the action on a camcorder. Erica is beaten up and is in a coma for three weeks. When she comes round she is told that her fiancé is dead and to her, her life is effectively over, even her dog is missing. The police are not a great help and her way of coping is to buy an unlicensed gun and seek out the men responsible.



When she is witness to a shooting in a shop and is threatened by the killer, she pulls out her gun, kills him, and walks away. Then she comes across some youths terrorizing subway passengers, when they pick on her, she shoots them dead. So it goes on. The police realise a vigilante killer is on the loose but don't know who it is.

One day she is asked to attend a line-out to identify a man the police think is responsible for her fiancé's death. She recognizes him, but doesn't pick him out. Instead she finds him and the others. She manages to kill two of them but she is stopped from killing the third by the detective on the case, Detective Mercer (Terrence Howard). Instead he lets her kill the last one using his gun, leaving her gun at the scene and so framing them as the 'vigilantes'. Hmmm. Dodgy ending but never mind.



It is really just a standard revenge movie, albeit with a female lead. Although it does explore how grief and violence can change a person irrevocably. Erica herself realises that she is a stranger to herself, that she has reinvented herself as someone else.



It's a film that sometimes works and sometimes doesn't. Jodie Foster is good, as ever, but not outstanding.

Caramel

We see a Lebanese film called 'Caramel'. The film takes place in modern-day Beirut, in a beauty salon called Si Belle. The title refers to the caramelized sugar used to wax the salon’s customers. The story follows five women as they cope with various 'life' dilemmas, generally involving romance. Surprisingly for a film based in Beirut, there are no references to war or politics which is some achievement and a positive one.

The owner of the salon is Layal, played by Nadine Labaki, who also wrote and directed the film. Layal is too caught up in an affair with a married man to notice the attention she is getting from a traffic policeman who flirts with her while slapping parking tickets on her car. Who says romance is dead? The 'caramel' also comes in useful for inflicting pain on her lover's wife, when she ends up in the salon.

Meanwhile, her employees at the salon have their own problems. Nisrine is about to get married, but is worried that her husband-to-be will find out that she's been putting it about rather than saving herself for him. She goes to see if a surgeon can fix the problem for her.



There's Rima who has more of interest in women and takes to fondling the hair of a customer she fancies, as she washes it and talks them into getting it cut short.

There's Rose, an elderly seamstress who hopes to find love with a chap called Charles but is thwarted by the slightly demented Lili, who she looks after. Lili's favourite pastime seems to be collecting parking tickets from other people cars.

Finally there's an odd side-story about Jamal, an aging actress, who just seems to be worried about getting old and tries to cling to her youth. Don't we all.

The movie shows that even modern day Beirut still operates under old Islamic laws, it’s just now that western influence means that short skirts and mobile phones are allowed. Layal finds that you cannot book a hotel room unless you are either married or a prostitute, while a couple can easily get harassed by the police just for sitting talking in their car.



Maybe the storyline was simple and clear but I still got lost, probably because I'm not a girl. There were too many stories going on at once for me and as it was Lebanese, we had those subtitles things again. I do find it hard to follow subtitles and pictures at the same time.

It's certainly a girl's film; all the men in the film were a bit of an afterthought and as a man, I felt very sorry for the old chap, Charles, who got stood up at the end.



It's been likened it to a Lebanese 'Sex In The City', which is perhaps why it mystified me, they could have made quite a good soap opera out of it but thankfully they didn't. It was better made than that and well acted. An interesting but not particularly thrilling insight into a different culture. I found it all a bit depressing because in the end I'm not sure that anyone actually got what they really wanted.

Persepolis

'Persepolis' is the film version of Marjane Satrapi's autobiographical graphic novels and recounts her life up to the age of 24. It’s filmed in the same style as the novels and is therefore an animation in 2D, mainly black-and-white. None of your big budget CGI here. Satrapi even co-directed. It is made in French and as usual I found the subtitles a little fast at first but I soon got the hang of them.

Marjane is the daughter of a fairly well off couple in Teheran. Persepolis is what the ancient Greeks call Teheran. The film is, if nothing else, a good history lesson. We learn how the Shah first came to power, with the British government's role in manipulating the situation for the sake of oil depicted as a puppet show. Her family are supportive of the revolutionaries fighting against the Shah's regime but unfortunately rather than the hoped for revolution, once the Shah is deposed he is replaced by the fanatical religious regime that is still in power today.

As she grows up she becomes an avid collector of Western culture, particularly of music and collects bootleg heavy metal and punk. Everything changes though when her uncle is executed by the regime and bombs destroy her neighbourhood as the country gets embroiled in the seven-year long Iran-Iraq war.



She is a precocious child and as she gets older, her parents worry about her outspokenness, as she protests against the regime at school and in other public places. So, for her own good, her parents send her away to complete her education.



She spends her teenage years in Vienna, where she befriends a group of misfit students and enjoys the usual tribulations of being a teenager. She doesn't though feel that she fits in and returns home, where the regime is getting ever more repressive, and where all the women must wear the veil.



The 'star' of the film/cartoon is probably her wise old Grandmother, who has seen it all. She coaches Marjane in life; tells her to always have integrity, not to compromise and to never give in. She is the moral voice of the film.

Things don't work out back home either, she gets married, but it is a mistake. Eventually her parents again persuade her to leave. She goes to France, where she has remained ever since.

The story is always interesting and often darkly humorous, while the approach to telling it is original, if a bit quirky. I think the simplistic animation re-emphasises that the story is told from a child's point of view and works well. Although the situation is simplified you still come away feeling educated. It's never sentimental and doesn't preach. You also come away feeling that you've got to know Marjane Satrapi. Highly recommended.

Joy Division

'Joy Division' is the second of two films focusing on the life and times of the influential Manchester band. Whilst not quite as entertaining as last year's 'Control' mainly because it lacks a big enough dose of Curtis, which was brilliant added by Sam Riley in 'Control'. As much as director Grant Gee would, I'm sure, have liked to interview Curtis, this was clearly not possible. It is still though an interesting and informative film, particularly for a fan like me.

It also lacks a contribution from Deborah Curtis, perhaps contractually bound not to appear, as it was her book that 'Control' was made from. It does though benefit from the insight of Curtis's lover Annik Honoré, who appears to be the only person who noticed, before the event, that Ian Curtis' lyrics were effectively his suicide note.



Grant Gee gets intelligent input from the three surviving members of the band along with other key people from the period such as Tony Wilson and Paul Morley. Regrettably contributions were also not possible from manager Rob Gretton and producer Martin Hannett both, and I did not realise this, are no longer with us. It's a good job they made this film when they were still enough people around to interview. Tony Wilson died not long after it was made.

Hannett, who developed their sound, was often acknowledged as the 5th member. There was a great quote from him, that the band were "a gift to a producer, because they didn't have a clue".

The film includes, as well as interviews, old footage, and new photos of 'Things That are Not There', important Manchester locations also no longer with us.

The film follows the band from their inception through to their eventual success and Curtis' decline with epilepsy and the severe mood swings caused by his medication. By 1980, Curtis had already attempted to commit suicide once but had failed. The band didn't seem surprised he'd tried again just shocked he'd succeeded.

The best parts of the film are of course the precious live footage and the excellent music. We also learn the origins of the famous album covers and the concern in the ranks after Curtis' suicide when they realise that the still unreleased 'Closer' has a tomb on the cover.



Within weeks of his death, their live favourite 'Love Will Tear Us Apart' was released and went top 10, giving the band their first hit. The album with the tomb on the cover soon followed. Popularity arrived at last.

At the end we see a recent performance by New Order, with the three remaining members playing 'Shadowplay'. This is overlaid on a clip of Joy Division playing the same song. Surprisingly it works quite well.