Movie Review: Yesterday

Yesterday ** ½ / *****

Directed by: Danny Boyle.

Written by: Richard Curtis and Jack Barth.

Starring: Himesh Patel (Jack Malik), Lily James (Ellie), Kate McKinnon (Mandi), Ed Sheeran (Ed Sheeran), Joel Fry (Rocky), Sophia Di Martino (Carol), Ellise Chappell (Lucy), Meera Syal (Sheila Malik), Harry Michell (Nick), Sanjeev Bhaskar (Jed Malik), Alexander Arnold (Gavin), Justin Edwards (Leo), Sarah Lancashire (Liz).

 

Yesterday has a premise that you could take in any number of interesting ways – and instead decides to take the path of least resistance. It’s a film about a failed singer/songwriter Jack Malick, who following a worldwide blackout one night, gets hit by a bus, and when he wakes up in the hospital, he is apparently the only one in the world who remembers The Beatles. So he does the logical thing – and passes off The Beatles music as his own, and becomes a worldwide sensation. But fame is hollow and empty – he feels guilty taking credit for others genius. And it’s all meaningless without the love of his best friend – a cute schoolteacher who has been in love with him for years, but now he’s lost his chance. What will he do?

 

Because the film was written by Richard Curtis (Love Actually, Notting Hill, Four Weddings and a Funeral) you can probably guess what he’s going to do. That’s because Yesterday is a film that is on rails – it progresses exactly how you would expect it to from each and every scene, right up to its inevitable conclusion, which is never in doubt.

 

It’s not that Yesterday is a bad movie – it really isn’t. The lead character, Jack Malick is played by Himesh Patel in a charming performance, even if as the film movies along, and he becomes more miserable in his success, it sucks much of the joy and charm out his performance, and he just becomes mopey. Lily James is also charming as Ellie – his love interest, although all of her talk about columns wears thing – especially since she apparently puts the fact they haven’t been together all this time entirely on him, as if she couldn’t have said something once in a decade – and then puts him in an impossible situation right that. The music is, of course, good – it’s The Beatles after all, and they must have paid millions to get the rights to the songs. Jack’s version of the songs though is, of course, not as good as The Beatles versions – but it’s still fun to hear them. Ed Sheeran shows up as himself in the film – and although I’m not in any way a fan, he clearly has a good sense of humor about himself, and isn’t afraid to poke fun of his image. He’s charming – and thankfully not overused.

 

Watching the film is a pleasant enough experience. Curtis is a fine screenwriter of these types of clichés, and knows what he’s doing – as does the cast. The film was directed by Danny Boyle – which is an odd choice for him, especially since he pretty much mutes his style for the film (other than a surprise cameo near the end, you probably wouldn’t guess this was a Danny Boyle at all, unless you already knew). But he’s efficient in his direction, and keeps things moving along. Yes, the film should probably be about 20 minutes shorter – cut out a lot of moping – and it could have been better.

 

And yet, something about the film bugged me – and I’m not sure I can quite put my finger on it. Part of it is me imaging what a more daring, darker film with this premise could have been – if say Jack remained a failure even with The Beatles songs, and was driven crazy by insisting on their genius that no one else could hear. Or how the film takes some easy ways out – and misses some opportunities for fun. When Jack agrees to an impromptu songwriting contest for example – where they are each supposed to write a song in 10 minutes – and come back, he could have least given poor Ed a chance – but he responds with The Long and Winding Road. He could have played Octopus’ Garden – or better yet, Revolution #9 just to screw with people.

 

But basically, it just annoyed me because there should have been a better movie here – something more daring, or at least something more. Richard Curtis took a very good premise and wrote a very mediocre Richard Curtis out of it. That cannot help but be disappointing.

Movie Review: T2: Trainspotting

T2: Trainspotting *** ½ / *****

Directed by: Danny Boyle.   

Written by: John Hodge based on the novels by Irvine Welsh.

Starring: Ewan McGregor (Renton), Jonny Lee Miller (Simon), Robert Carlyle (Begbie / Begbie's Father), Ewen Bremner (Spud), Anjela Nedyalkova (Veronika), Shirley Henderson (Gail), Kelly Macdonald (Diane).

 

Let’s get this out of the way off the top – no, we really didn’t need a 20 years later sequel to Danny Boyle’s Trainspotting – the film that really made his career as a director, and made Ewan McGregor into a star. When I re-watched the film recently – for probably the 6^th or 7^th time – but the first time since about 17 years – I was once again sucked into the propulsive energy of the film, while at the same time I saw the film differently than I did as a teenager – I liked these people less, and their journey wasn’t as romantic as it once seemed. I have a feeling that the filmmakers felt the same way, because the awkwardly titled T2: Trainspotting (why not just Trainspotting 2?) really is a more melancholy experience than the first film – a film about how it may be romantic to be young and lost, but it’s really kind of pathetic to be that way in your mid-40s. Boyle doesn’t try to shoot the film with the same, constant drumbeat of energy as before, and his characters seem more tired than anything else. There is once again a plot with a scam at the center of it – but everyone’s going through the motions even more than they did in the first film. I surprised myself by how much I liked the film.

 

The setup is simple – 20 years after Renton (McGregor) double crossed his friends Simon (Johnny Lee Miller), Spud (Ewen Bremmer) and Begbie (Robert Carlyle), take the 16,000 quid from their big score for himself, and fleeing Scotland, he returns. Spud has bounced on-and-off heroin for all those years, and immediately forgives Renton (he, after all, could have joined Renton all those years ago). Simon seemingly forgives him as well – at first he’s pissed, but he figures he can use Renton for his own purposes – opening up a “spa” aka brothel, with his new, younger “girlfriend” Veronika (Anjela Nedyalkova). Begbie has spent all these years in jail, and is pissed, and escapes and is more pissed, and then finds out Renton is back, and is event more pissed than that.

 

I think the way T2: Trainspotting works is because it doesn’t delude itself into thinking these guys were ever going to grow up and turn themselves into anything all that useful. Spud may be lovable – but he’s also the weakest of the group – a guy who is a horrible father, and partner to Gail (Shirley Henderson). Simon was always a conman, and he was never really going to change. Begbie was a psycho 20 years ago, and all that time in prison won’t help. Renton at least had the right idea – get out, get away from everyone and everything you know, give yourself a chance. Even that didn’t really work. When he comes back, he falls into his old habits – and the movie knows that this a regression more than anything else. McGregor is excellent here, as a man reeling from a life that is falling apart – and wasn’t that good to begin with – trying to recapture some of that youth.

 

What this does mean about T2: Trainspotting is that the film is nowhere near as fun or entertaining as the original film – and it doesn’t try to be. By Boyle standards, the direction is subdued (so by most people standards, it’s still pretty amped, but definitely tamer than normal). T2: Trainspotting clearly won’t have the same cultural impact its predecessor did – this isn’t a film made for the college age crowd the first one was, complete with poster that adorned every dorm room imaginable. This is a film for those people, who 20 years later, are still confused, and don’t know where to go with their lives. That can be fun in your 20s – by your 40s, that just sad. And T2: Trainspotting knows that.

Classic Movie Review: Trainspotting

Trainspotting (1996)

Directed by: Danny Boyle.

Written by: John Hodge based on the novel by Irvine Welsh.

Starring: Ewan McGregor (Renton), Ewen Bremner (Spud), Jonny Lee Miller (Sick Boy), Kevin McKidd (Tommy), Robert Carlyle (Begbie), Kelly Macdonald (Diane), Peter Mullan (Swanney), James Cosmo (Mr. Renton), Eileen Nicholas (Mrs. Renton),  Susan Vidler (Allison), Pauline Lynch (Lizzy), Shirley Henderson (Gail), Stuart McQuarrie (Gavin / US Tourist), Irvine Welsh (Mikey Forrester).

 

It can be a strange experience going back and revisiting a movie you loved as a teenager for the first time in years as an adult. Such is the case I had recently watching Danny Boyle’s Trainspotting – in preparation for the sequel out this month – a film that came out when I was 15 years old, and that I probably watched at least 5 times before I graduated from high school in 2000 – and then, I don’t think I’ve seen the film since. It’s interesting to see the film now for all these years later for several reasons. One is that while the cast was largely unknown at the time, almost all of the major roles were filled by actors, who if they didn’t become huge stars, at least became well known working actors. Another is to see, in a rawer form, the same sort of direction that Danny Boyle would refine through the years- culminating 12 years later with Slumdog Millionaire (2008) – a film that uses the same kind of tricks that Trainspotting does to try and energize the audience. The difference is that in 1996, that felt new and exciting (at least to the novice cinephile I was at the time), and by 2008, it felt like a safe choice. Finally, watching a film like Trainspotting as an adult really does let you know, rather quickly, how much you’ve aged. I remembered the film as a drug film about how fun it was to do drugs – right up until the time it isn’t fun anymore, and you need to stop or die. What surprised me on this viewing is how quickly things really do turn dark in Trainspotting – we’re barely a half hour in when Baby Dawn dies – and Renton (Ewan McGregor) removes all doubt about what an absolute shit he is – going immediately to fix himself another dose of heroin – and while he’s “thoughtful” enough to prepare one for Baby Dawn’s mother as well – he notes that, of course, she got hers after he got his. Viewing the film as an adult, I don’t see it so much as about freedom – as I did when I was a teenager – but about a group of selfish assholes. Oddly though, that doesn’t make me like the film any less.

 

There is a rawness and energy about Trainspotting from its opening sequence – when Renton, Sick Boy (Johnny Lee Miller) and Spud (Ewen Bremmer) are all running from the cops (set to Iggy Pop’s Lust for Life – one of the many great songs that made the soundtrack one of the best of the 1990s). Renton gets bumped by a car – and immediately pops back up again – but instead of running, just looks at the driver and laughs – right before he’s tackled. The movie then flashes backward, not to the beginning of Renton’s story, but just the part he chooses to begin with (whatever made him – or anyone – start heroin is never mentioned – except for poor, dumb Tommy). Renton informs us – in voiceover – that this time, he’s going to quit the junk for sure – and informs us how exactly he’s going to go ahead and do that. It works – but only for a bit. He’ll be back on it again soon, perhaps because whether he’s stoned or not, he ends up doing the same thing – hanging out with his idiot friends, drinking, going to bars, and not working. IF he’s on heroin, he’s got no sex drive – but when he’s off, and he does meet a girl (Kelly McDonald) – and goes home with her, it turns out she’s s high school student.

 

Renton drifts on and off drugs throughout the film, and as our narrator, he certainly does maintain a certain degree of our sympathy. But he isn’t wholly honest with the audience either – or perhaps, he thinks he is, and isn’t being honest with himself. Aside than Baby Dawn, the other death in the film is that of Tommy (Kevin McKidd) – and while Renton never even hints at any guilty feelings towards Tommy’s death – he clearly set it in motion not once, but twice – first by stealing the sex tape Tommy and his girlfriend made together – and whose absence causes his girlfriend to leave Tommy, and sink into depression, and second by hooking him up with heroin for the first time because of that depression. But if Renton is an asshole, we continue to like him in part because Sick Boy and especially Begbie (Robert Carlyle) – a psychopath who picks fights with any and every one – are even worse. The last third of the movie is the only part with anything resembling a real plot – as Renton, Begbie, Sick Boy and Spud – all go in on a big drug deal, although watching the film again, I was surprised by just how little this “big score” really was.

 

Trainspotting ended up becoming one of the quintessential examples of ‘90s movies – a film that became a huge cult hit on VHS, and whose posters adorned quite a few dorm rooms over the years. Like many films of that time, its debt to Scorsese is obvious – particularly GoodFellas, which had just come out 6 years earlier. But Boyle – making just his second film (following 1994’s Shallow Grave) amped up the energy even more. He is aided a great deal by his cast – especially McGregor, who seemed to be DeNiro to Boyle’s Scorsese for a while, until a falling out over The Beach (2000) led them not to work together until the upcoming T2: Trainspotting sequel. That’s a shame, because as good of an actor as McGregor is, he’s rarely been as good as he was here – he’s slimmer than normal here, angrier, with more than a little danger to him. He has the swagger necessary to pull this film off.

 

Of course, as with many things in Hollywood, what once seemed dangerous and edgy has now fully become part of the system – especially perhaps Boyle and McGregor, neither of whom you would describe that way now. But it felt that way in 1996 – and looking back at the film now, knowing where everyone would end up, I can still see that raw energy that made it so exciting to me then – even if I see the emptiness in the characters more now than I did then. There are some films that are timeless classics – beloved by all, that are universal in nature, and will remain classics long after everyone involved them – even as their initial audience – has come and gone. And then there are films that are tied to a specific time and place, and whose impact is harder to see for younger generations. I think Trainspotting is the later – and I don’t really mean that as an insult.

Movie Review: Steve Jobs

Steve Jobs
Directed by: Danny Boyle.
Written by: Aaron Sorkin based on the book by Walter Isaacson.
Starring: Michael Fassbender (Steve Jobs), Kate Winslet (Joanna Hoffman), Seth Rogen (Steve Wozniak), Jeff Daniels (John Sculley), Michael Stuhlbarg (Andy Hertzfeld), Katherine Waterston (Chrisann Brennan), Perla Haney-Jardine (Lisa Brennan - 19), Ripley Sobo (Lisa Brennan - 9), Makenzie Moss (Lisa Brennan - 5), Sarah Snook (Andrea Cunningham), John Ortiz (Joel Pforzheimer).

There is perhaps no staler genre than the biopic of the visionary genius – movies that take complex figures and reduce them down to an easily digestible 2 hour movie, complete with plenty of “Eureka!” moments, when the movie knowingly winks at the audience when the brilliant man (and it’s almost always a man – Hollywood hasn’t done so well by visionary women) come up with their life changing, earth shattering revelation. Jake Kasdan’s Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story brilliantly satirized the musical genius biopic, but even if the genius at the core of the movie wasn’t a musician, for the most part, they follow the same pattern – we usually get a key moment or two from the main figure’s childhood, which will inevitably shape their entire lives, and then a collection of “greatest hits” – where the movie makes us in the audience privy to moments of great visionary genius. Lather, rinse, collect your Oscar, repeat as it usually goes with these biopics.

In the last 5 years, Aaron Sorkin has written three biopics which largely askew these conventions. His Oscar winning screenplay for The Social Network focuses on one chapter of Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg’s life, which the film acknowledges is a work in progress, since Zuckerberg is still in his early 20s when the film ends. Moneyball (co-written with Steven Zallian) is a little more traditional look at Oakland A’s GM Billy Beane, but that may well be the work of Zallian, with Sorkin brought in to punch up the dialogue. With his latest, Steve Jobs, Sorkin completely abandons the traditional biopic structure – inside deciding to write about Jobs’ life in a bold, three act structure, each set in the minutes leading up to a product launch – for the Mac in 1984, for Next in 1988 and for the iMac in 1998. In the lead up to all of these launches, where Jobs stalks around backstage yelling at everyone, seems to be every key figure in Jobs life, who need to have it out with him right then and there. It’s a boldly artificial structure – and doesn’t try to hide that (late in the film Jobs makes a joke about how before each one of these launches, everyone acts like a drunk in the bar who has to tell him what they really think of him). It betrays Sorkin’s roots as a playwright – but it also allows Sorkin to do what he does best – write really long dialogue sequences, often while two people are walking and talking, delivered in a brisk pace, in a rhythm that is immediately identifiable as Sorkin’s, and no one else’s.

With Sorkin, as with other writers immediately identifiable by their dialogue (Tarantino and Mamet come to mind), casting is pivotal, because if one person screws up the dialogue, the whole thing comes crashing down. Luckily, no one screws it up in Steve Jobs – starting with Michael Fassbender, who is brilliant as Steve Jobs. Like Jessie Eisenberg’s portrayal of Mark Zuckerberg, the movie not only makes no effort to try and get you to like Jobs, it almost seems to go out of its way to make him look like a complete and total asshole. Jobs has no problem dressing down his underlings – and he sees everyone as his underling, and doesn’t care about anyone’s feelings – not even his 5 year daughter, who for years he denied was even his, and who breaks her little heart at the first launch telling her that the computer named Lisa isn’t named after her, but is just a coincidence. He’ll soften – a little in each of the three launches – in his relationship with his daughter, perhaps redeeming himself (a little) by the end. The message of the movie is vocalized by Steve Wozniak (Seth Rogen) at one point “It’s not binary – you can be decent and a genius at the same time” – and it’s something that this version of Jobs learns, somewhat by the end.

For the most part though, Fassbender relishes playing Jobs as an asshole, and does it wonderfully. Kate Winslet is also great as Jobs’ His Girl Friday, Joanna Hoffman, who is supposedly in charge of Marketing for the company, but whose real job appears to follow Jobs around and be his voice of morality – a role that Sorkin most often assigns to women. That may sound like a trite dismissal of Winslet’s character – but she really does make it her own, even with a Polish accent that strangely seems to get a little stronger as the movie progresses. Seth Rogen, trying his hand at drama, makes for a fine Steve Wozniak – even if the movie doesn’t give him quite as much to do as you would expect, Rogen still slips into the role well. The best supporting performance – aside from Winslet – is probably by Michael Stuhlbarg playing Andy Hertzfeld, the underling that Jobs is probably hardest on, but who gradually emerges as the most sympathetic character in the film, aside from Lisa, who has to deal with this asshole of a father, and a flake (Katherine Waterston – not given anywhere near the complexity of her role in Inherent Vice last year) of a mother, who still turns out pretty good.

The film was directed by Danny Boyle, who although I would never say is as great a director as David Fincher, who was originally attached to the movie, was probably the right choice. This is a movie that moves a mile a minute, both in terms of the dialogue, and the camera movement, which is constantly on the movie following Jobs wherever he goes. This is the type of high energy thing that Boyle excels at – and even if this film is undeniably more Sorkin than Boyle, the two styles merge nicely.

Steve Jobs is a big, fun, fast moving entertaining film that nevertheless doesn’t quite match Sorkin’s best work. It isn’t as deep or fascinating as The Social Network, and I’m not sure it has the endless re-watch value of The American President, A Few Good Men (two movies I’ve easily seen 15 times each, in bits and pieces when they’re on TV, which is always) or single episodes of The West Wing or Sports Night (and no, I didn’t forget to include Studio 60 or The Newsroom). Steve Jobs is a really good movie that never quite clicks into being a truly great one. Perhaps it’s because it’s all just a little too simplistic – asshole learns not to be an asshole – to truly get at the depths of something like The Social Network. Nevertheless, the film is hugely entertaining, smart and stylish, and boasts some excellent performances. If it doesn’t quite reach the heights of Sorkin’s best work, perhaps that’s just because that is a high bar to clear – and we can all be thankful it’s far superior to Sorkin at his worst, and most preachy.

Movie Review: Trance

Trance
Directed by:  Danny Boyle.
Written by: Joe Ahearne and John Hodge.
Starring: James McAvoy (Simon), Vincent Cassel (Franck), Rosario Dawson (Elizabeth), Danny Sapani (Nate), Matt Cross (Dominic), Wahab Sheikh (Riz).

Director Danny Boyle has pretty much admitted that he made Trance just to keep the creative juices flowing during the very long process he went through to direct the opening ceremonies of the 2012 London Olympics. And Trance feels that way – a simple genre exercise by a talented director in between bigger projects. Sometimes, it’s these “simple genre films” directors make in between their more ambitious projects that turn out to be far more interesting than their more serious work. But that isn’t the case with Trance – a film that starts at ridiculous and simply goes downhill from there. You can tell in every frame of Trance that a talented director is behind the film. And you can tell in every scene, that you have three talented actors giving the movie their all. But Trance never really adds up to anything – and as the film hits the audience with one twist after another, I simply grew tired and bored with all the hyper-stylized action on the screen. A great twist ending is one you do not see coming – but should have. Think of a film like The Sixth Sense – I certainly never suspected the secret behind that movie as I watched it the first time, but when it hit, it made complete, logical sense. A film with a twist ending like Trance feels like a cheat – there is no possible way you can see the ending coming, because the film withholds too much information to ensure you don’t see the ending coming. Rather than that satisfying moment where you want to scream “Of course”, when you realize you’ve been fooled, the ending of Trance feels like you’ve had the rug pulled out from under you.

The movie stars James McAvoy as Simon – who works in an art gallery/auction house and opens the movie by explaining just how hard it is to steal priceless masterpieces these days, by walking you through the process of what they do to ensure thieves cannot steal them. And then, of course, a group of thieves led by Franck (Vincent Cassel) do just that – steal a masterpiece by Goya that had just been sold at auction for over $25 million. But wait, there’s more – in the film’s first twist, Simon isn’t just the innocent guy he seems to be, who tried to save the painting, and gets hit on the head for his troubles – but he’s the groups inside man. And then there’s even more – when Franck opens the case that is supposed to contain the painting – all he finds is an empty frame. He’s obviously unhappy about this, and his gang is there to meet Simon when he returns from hospital – but Simon has conveniently forgotten what he did with the painting, and blames that bump on the head. So Franck decides the only way to figure out what happened, is to get Simon a hypnotist to unlock the memory from Simon’s brain – and Simon chooses Elizabeth (Rosario Dawson) for just that purposes.

The movie is essentially a three character piece – yes, Franck has three henchmen in his employ, but they don’t really do anything. The film concentrates on the triangle that Simon, Franck and Elizabeth form – these three circle each other, in more ways than one, and almost on a scene to scene level, your opinion on who is trustworthy and who isn’t, who is playing who, and whether they are good, bad or somewhere in between, changes. If these types of role reversals are handled properly, they can be great fun to watch. But in Trance, I just felt like the movie was jerking me around, for the sake of jerking me around – and hence I grew restless and bored. McAvoy, Cassel and especially Dawson are all very good in the movie – in the case of Dawson it is even more impressive when you consider how much pseudo-intellectual and psychological claptrap she has to speak throughout the movie. But by the end of the movie, I just no longer cared what was happening – who was good and who wasn’t, and what precisely happened. Boyle does his best to disguise the shallowness of the movie with his mile and minute direction, and rapid fire editing, but it all ends up being sound and fury, signifying nothing.

Boyle had been on a bit of a role leading up to Trance. Following his big budget failure – The Beach (2000) – he had made several very good to great films in a row – 28 Days Later (2002), Millions (2004), Sunshine (2007 – probably my favorite of his films), the Oscar winning Slumdog Millionaire (2008) and 127 Hours (2010). So, I guess he was overdue for a dud. Hopefully, with the Olympics behind, and his battery recharged with the trifle that is Trance, he’ll return to form next time out. Because Trance is one of the worst films Danny Boyle has ever directed.

Movie Review: 127 Hours

127 Hours *** ½
Directed by: Danny Boyle.
Written By: Danny Boyle & Simon Beaufoy based on the book by Aron Ralston.
Starring: James Franco (Aron Ralston), Kate Mara (Girl 1), Amber Tamblyn (Girl 2), Clémence Poésy (Girlfriend), Lizzy Caplan (Sonja), Treat Williams (Aron's Dad), Kate Burton (Mrs. Ralston).

127 Hours is a harrowing true story about a man trapped in a cavern for days on end with no one to talk to, and no real way of getting out of the situation alive. Directed by Danny Boyle, and starring James Franco, in an excellent performance, the movie takes this seemingly uncinematic story and makes it into an intense, visually alive experience – one that you will not soon forget.

Aron Ralston (Franco) is a young engineer whose passion is hiking in the desert region in Utah close to his house. He decides to head out solo one weekend, and neglects to tell anyone where he is going. He gets out to the desert and starts his hike, and quickly meets two beautiful young women who are lost. He guides them to wear they need to go, and the three laugh and flirt, before splitting up and heading on their separate ways. It isn’t long after this that Ralston slips, falls down a shaft in a cavern and ends up with his arm literally caught between a rock and a hard place – in this case the cavern’s wall. He cannot move his arm, and the few tools he has are pretty useless in chipping the rock away – in fact it appears like his arm is really supporting the rock, so the more he chips away, the more his arm is actually trapped there. He has a little water, a little food and his video camera – which he uses to document what happens over those 127 Hours he is trapped down there. Other than his encounter with the two girls early in the film, and a few disjointed flashbacks showing us Aron’s loving relationship with his family, and his troubled relationship with his ex-girlfriend, the film is essentially just Franco, down that shaft by himself – talking to his camera, and trying to find his way out.

But that doesn’t mean the film is boring in the least. Franco is a talented actor, and here he gives what is probably his performance to date. Aron maintains his dark sense of humor down there – which Franco gets perfectly – funny without being morbid, yet still recognizing the gravity of the situation. and it is also an intense, physical performance from Franco, who really does seem to start unraveling before our eyes. Franco is the heart of every scene in the movie, and he delivers a great performance.

Director Danny Boyle may go a little too far over the top with the visual fireworks at times in the movie. This is Boyle’s style, and while it worked amazingly well in Slumdog Millionaire, there were times in this film where I wished he would have played it a little more straight – lets flashy camera moves and rapid fire editing. To me, it freed the movie up just a little bit too much. I appreciated what Rodrigo Cortes did in Buried more – where he literally trapped us with Ryan Reynolds for an hour and a half. The pulsating, loud score by A.R. Rahman (who collaborated with Boyle on Slumdog Millionaire) adds to the intensity no doubt – although sometimes it becomes a little too overbearing. These are minor complaints – overall I did like the visuals of the film, and the score would be wonderful to listen to on its own. However, I think the film could have been even better if Boyle had realized that sometimes, less is more.

I don’t think it’s really giving anything away to reveal that Ralston makes it out of that cavern – after all, he has been doing the press rounds with Boyle and Franco, and the opening titles reveal that the film is based on a book written by Ralston. I won’t reveal how it is that he gets out, but needless to say it is painful and intense when it finally comes – and represents Franco at his best. The scene – which is probably no more than 3 minutes – is one of the hardest to watch of any film this year – but it is handled brilliantly by all involved.

There have been many survival stories put on film over the years – and a few like Sean Penn’s excellent Into the Wild which could be described as a non-survival story – but few can match 127 Hours for its sheer intensity. This is an inspiring story, but also one filled with pain and dark humor. That Boyle and Franco pulled it off at all is reason to celebrate.