Three Films

We rarely go to the cinema these day, mainly because our taste is films is so disparate there are very few films about that we both want to see, and although I am quite happy to go to the cinema on my own the OH isn't. And of course many of the more interesting films jus never make it out of major cities. So on long flights we do tend to binge watch because there is lots of choice and we can both find what we like.

So this time out I watched Suffragette, The Dressmaker and Everest.

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Suffragette was obviously really memorable, since I had completely forgotten what the third film was and had to refer back to a Facebook post I had written earlier to remind myself. What a wasted opportunity! What  a clunky script! What a lot of mis-cast actresses! Honestly this film was so bad I didn't even tear up when they sang March of the Women, and that I can tell you is unheard of. The only bit that was at all affecting was right at the very end when the fictional film of women at the funeral of Emily Davidson morphed into contemporary footage of the event. That was moving. But equally it summed up the whole off-balance tenor of the film. Emily Davidson wasn't the major character in the film, so it seemed very odd  that it should end with her funeral. It wasn't the death of Emily Davidson that got women the vote; in fact there are some who might argue that in fact it delayed the granting of women's suffrage rather than hastened it. So again, an odd place to end. And although Emily's name is one that every girl in the country should know, they don't. And even after watching this film I doubt many who don't know would be any the wiser. Like I said, a missed opportunity. So, overall, not a fan of this one.

 

 

 

 

One of the things I cherish about flights to Oz is the chance to watch quirky Australian made movies that often don't get universal release. This doesn't quite fall into that category, not small, not totally Australian and not as quirky as all that,  but it had some great moments. I picked it from those on offer because of the presence of Hugo Weaving, who acted up a storm as a local policeman with a serious fabric fetish. It was billed as a comedy, and it was very funny in places, but it should have been labelled as a black comedy, not because that would have stopped me watching but because it would have made the end more foreseeable and more bearable. In fact, dressed up with jokes and a lot of laconic Aussie humour though it was,  this is at bottom a bleak little story, with very little good to say about human nature.

 

 

 

Everest I watched because I had recently read an interview with Emily Watson about her role in this film, which is based on true events, as the base camp manager who had had to arrange communication between the dying leader of the ill-fated Adventure Consultants Everest Expedition  in 1996 and his pregnant wife back in New Zealand. In the event I couldn't really see why playing this role  should have been such a harrowing experience for Watson as the interview made out, but then it's Watson who is the award winning actress, not me. (Don't get me wrong, I think she is an excellent actress, and she was as good in this as in anything I have ever seen her in, bar Oranges and Sunshine, in which she is stupendous, I just think maybe the interview over-egged the pudding a bit).Anyway the interview made me curious to see the film, so when I saw it on the  playlist I leaped at it. I might not have shown such alacrity had I known beforehand that Keira Knightley was in it, but by the time I saw her I was sick of messing about with the touchscreen controls and luckily, as the pregnant, left behind wife, it was a small role. To be fair, although I am no fan of KK who I think has some very annoying actress tics, she was very good in this. It's not the sort of film of which you can really use the word enjoy, since so many of the people in it die, but it was watchable, compelling, interesting, I watched it again on the way back and have since read up some more about the expedition. None of this has brought me any nearer to understanding why people want to climb mountains at grave risk to life and limb, which has always seemed to me to be stupidity personified, but possibly to understand it you have to have the right sort of personality which obviously I don't have.

 

As far as I now the OH watched the latest Star Wars movie again. Crash, bang, wallop. It's what he likes.