between the rock and the cold, cold sea

Tonight I watched two films, and was sufficiently not-exhausted to enjoy them both. The first was HMS Defiant (1962) a film set in 1797 and notable for a decent amount of ship-based claustrophobia, tight plotting, Alec Guinness and Dirk Bogarde. Also, we get some ladies at the very beginning to assure the audience that all this intense homosociality is not, y'know, sodomitical. Filmed in a time when sets were cheap and extras cheaper, it has some nice tallship scenes and quite a bit of flogging.

I like tallships. I also like Alec Guinness. And good dialogue.

The other film was Les femmes de l'ombre, which interested me rather more. The English release is known as Female Agents, which is a much less striking title than The Women of Shadow. Starring Sophie Marceau, Julie Depardieu, Marie Gillain, Déborah François, Moritz Bleibtrau, Maya Sansa, and Julien Boisselier, it is the story of a group of women recruited by the SOE and sent in to France to rescue an English agent and assassinate a German SS colonel.

Salomé allegedly took his inspiration in part from the life of Lise de Baissac. The film itself is afflicted by several dozen things which make no sense for history but make rather a lot of sense in the compressed time/space of a film - although it relies on coincidence a little too much on one particular occasion. It is visually striking, although there are one or two shots that lend themselves to confusion/over-emphasis - the director has reached for the most striking, most iconic image, and reached a bit too far. At times it sways towards hackneyed emotional beats, but on the whole it resists them in favour of something much more raw.

(I'd love to see what someone with more critical chops in cinema made of it.)

It is not a perfect film, and its has a lot to do on a moderate budget. (Including some understated but nasty torture scenes.) But it is a damn good one, and I recommend it wholeheartedly - especially to anyone who read and enjoyed Code Name Verity and/or Rose Under Fire.

How in all the world is it possible for something that should be so ridiculous to be so AMAZINGLY FUN?

Guillermo del Toro must be the answer.

Guillermo del Toro should make all the GIANT FIGHTING THINGS films ever. Science fiction and fantasy film-making? Needs more Guillermo del Toro. He brings beauty and flair and makes the ridiculous sublime. The hideous beauty of the kaiju. The jaegars’ beautiful brutality. Idris Elba, outlined against the sun like the image of some martial saint.

IDRIS ELBA: AVENGING ANGEL.

IDRIS ELBA IS CANCELLING YOUR APOCALYPSE.

I agree with everything Aisha says here at Practically Marzipan. Especially YES YES YES YES YES.

It’s not perfect. But it comes a damn sight closer than most skiffy films I’ve ever seen.

And also: ROBOTS PUNCHING MONSTERS INNA FACE!

When I finally sat down to watch Dredd on Thursday night, as the culmination of a seven-hour skiffy film marathon with whitewaveraven - after The Dark Knight Rises and Resident Evil: Retribution - it blew me away. Especially in contrast to Dark Knight, with its hype and massive budget and (intermittent) acclaim.

(Let us not speak of Resident Evil: Retribution. I had not expected much by way of logic or plot from the franchise's fifth installment, but I expected more than we got - and what we got did not even string its action-scenes together with a minimum of coherence. Also, the black guy dies. Pointlessly.)

My response to The Dark Knight Rises is, essentially: WHY SHOULD I CARE ABOUT BRUCE WAYNE'S MANPAIN? Or Alfred's, or, for that matter, Det. John Blake's. Visually, thematically, in character and artistic terms, it's incoherent: it doesn't know what it wants to be when it grows up. There are some visually striking scenes and excellent point-counterpoint of noise and silence, but at one and the same time it is trying to be too clever and not nearly clever enough. And Christian Bale is not strong enough, in terms of presence, to sell a descent-into-torment-and-triumphant-return - especially not when Dark Knight doesn't know whether or not it's about PEOPLE OF GOOD WILL (read: cops) TAKING BACK THE CITY, or a single masked avenger's crusade against another, worse, masked avenger. It does not develop character, is what I'm saying - in fact, the only character who has a discernible arc is Anne Hathaway's Selina Kyle/Catwoman. Hathaway does brilliantly with the part - her rueful expression, half-defiant, half-apologetic, as she tells Bale's Batman she's deliberately led him into a trap to save herself is entirely marvellous - but the film doesn't actually give much to Kyle/Catwoman. Her arc takes place in the background, the overlooked places: the cat burglar who wants to leave her record behind her and start fresh, unwillingly persuaded first to assist Bane and his gang of psychopaths and then to assist Bruce Wayne/Batman to stop the GIANT NUCLEAR BOMB...

...I'd watch a film of the events of The Dark Knight Rises from the perspective of Hathaway's Kyle. It might be a much more interesting, less ultimately predictable affair.

(So our takeaway: pointless manpain and fascist/ubermensch ideals? DO NOT WANT, sez I.)

But Dredd. Dredd knows it's a film set in a fascist dystopia. Dredd is an SFnal shoot-em-up, but also - as glvalentine said back in September - a study in bleakness. It doesn't present a contrast between law, as personified by the Judges, and chaos in the form of criminals: under the surface slick of words, there is no contrast. Just two competing systems of power-maintenance-through-terror, meeting through the middle ground of violence.

Stylistically gorgeous, pared-down, excellent in its characterisation of its women - it doesn't quite pass the Bechdel test but it's far more feminist that Dark Knight, which does, and gives its women much more room - it has a coherent core. It's dystopic and everyone in the film knows it, but it also has empathy for every single one of its characters: even for Kay, the unrepentant drug-dealing murdering sexually violent henchman of Ma-Ma - to me, it seems the film characterises him as having made himself into the hardest, nastiest bastard he can be, because otherwise he'd be victim, not victimiser. (On the other hand, the fact that he's the only person of colour with any depth of characterisation at all is rather disappointing.)

Lena Headey is brilliant as Ma-Ma, world-weary druglord, and so is Olivia Thirlby as Anderson, the rookie Judge that Karl Urban's Dredd has for her assessment - her last chance to make it as a Judge - when they get trapped in Ma-Ma's locked-down super-slum. Thirlby's character has the shiny idealism scraped off in the course of the ever-mounting body-count... but retains enough to say, bitterly, on letting one criminal - coerced into his crimes - go: "Maybe that's the one difference I will make."

Anyway. A film I really enjoyed. One out of three ain't bad, right?

PS: I've never read the comics for either Batman or Dredd. So there's that.

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Congratulations to the many souls mentioned in the Locus 2012 Recommended Reading List - although with no love for Range of Ghosts or Adaptation or Some Others I Could Mention? I think it to be... incomplete. (And bloody hell, Larry Niven is still writing things? I was... rather under the impression he had been deceased.)

It is delightful.

I work on the assumption that every translation is a fresh recension, which tells you as much about the translator and the era as the original work. Tolkien purists will therefore never be satisfied with any of the films, because no recension can ever capture exactly the ideal.

And it delighted me. It took the tone of the LOTR films - there is consistency of vision here - and mixed it with the lighter flavour of the Hobbit for a much livelier, more humourous experience. This is a film delighted with its landscapes, with its ability to dwell on both the sublime and the ridiculous aspects of turning a - relatively tidy - children's novel in an epic fantasy with the same sprawling vision as The Lord of the Rings, and pull in appendices material. And it is both sublime and ridiculous: it made me cry with delighted satisfaction and laugh with utter glee.

Some of the action sequences are... gleefully, enthusiastically, overblown. And some of the camera swoopiness (I saw it in 2D) made me think of videogames... and Goblin Town is, well. I had Dragon Age and Skyrim flashbacks for the visual style, let's just say - so either DA borrowed more from LOTR that I don't remember, or UNDERGROUND WITH REALLY HIGH WALKWAYS is everyone's favourite epic go-to.

The real joy, though, is the performances. And the scenery, and the depth of world, and the scenery - did I mention the scenery? - but especially the performances. I am FULLY BEHIND the choice to get Cate Blanchett and Christopher Lee and Ian Holmes involved in this, even as cameos. Cate Blanchett and Sir Ian McKellan play off each other wonderfully. Martin Freeman and Ian Stott turn in immensely compelling performances. Gollum is a terror and a delight. Richard Armitage, given a good script, is much less po-faced than usual. Dean O'Gorman and Aidan Turner steal any scene they're in as Fili and Kili.

HOBBIT HOBBIT HOBBIT HOBBIT. I'm going to see it again. Soon. And I have my reason to survive the next two years. WANT MORE HOBBIT.

Ralph Fiennes' Coriolanus (he both directs and plays the title role) is a film adaptation of Shakespeare's play of the same name, The Tragedy of Coriolanus. The language of the play is itself only lightly adapted, but the costumes and setting have been adapted to 20th-century: Fiennes' Caius Martius Coriolanus and Gerard Butler's Aufidius the Volscian are soldiers of a Rome and a Volscia that bear a marked resemblence to modern day small warring states - shot partly in Serbia, it's hard to avoid feeling that the film's physical landscape reinforces the Balkanised sentiments of its theme.

Messengers' speeches are not infrequently delivered by television announcers - and damn, Shakespeare's messengers sound natural on the announcers' tongues - and the Roman Senate is framed almost as a modern parliament. Coriolanus' mother wears military uniform in the more formal scenes, which lends pointedness to her speeches -

"I mock at death
With as big heart as thou. Do as thou list
Thy valiantness was mine, thou suck'dst it from me,
But owe thy pride thyself"

- in particular. It is a film filled with solid performances, and an interesting take on staging Shakespeare. Definitely worth a look.

If I had to use just one word to sum up what irks me most about The Avengers film, it would be this: wasteful.

*

It's a sprawling film. But it's all glitter. No heart. A stellar cast exchanging zinging one-liners and trading snark barbs - although neither Scarlett Johansson nor Jeremy Renner seem to have the presence to hold their own alongside their co-stars - but when you take away Robert Downey Jr. cracking wise with perfect comic timing and Samuel R. Jackson glaring one-eyed at the world, what do you have left?

A lot of explosions.

Not much else.

*

Tom Hiddleston was pitch-perfect as Loki in Thor. He's still mesmerising, coolly amusing, and strangely charming even while going full-on Wicked. But in The Avengers he is a villain for the sake of villainy: his I am a GOD and you will BOW schtick is not a very interesting motivation for any character, even one who canonically has the universe's worst case of sibling envy.

His every scene seethes with energy and chill malevolence, but even Hiddleston's chops can't inflate the hollow shell that's Loki's reason to be bad.

*

Hollowness is a problem all over. Mark Ruffalo and Chris Evans bring both talent and hotness to bear on the roles of Bruce Banner and Captain America, but they have, let's be honest, very little to work with: a film that relies for its impact on its death-or-glory action should put a little more work into getting the audience to care whether its characters live or die.

Success, after all, is a given: one hardly expects The Avengers to destroy the whole earth before it even gets a sequel.

Hotness, while appreciated, on its own just isn't enough.

*

Thor and Tony Stark actually get a smidgeon of solid characterisation. They have pre-existing film franchises of their own, but they also get more face-time with Loki, who wants to best them in ways that are very personal.

*

Let's not mention how white this film is, with the exception of Samuel R. Jackson. Or how American-centric: the end of the world can happen outside the continental states, you know. Or how male: don't tell me Marvel doesn't have another female superhero they could have used in place of Hawkeye.

But that would have made four women with speaking parts, and three women who get fighty with the boys: as it is, I'm not sure Agent Hill (played with understated competence and solid presence by Cobie Smulders) is even in the same room as Johansson's Black Widow at any point, much less allowed to exchange words with her.

*

The Avengers is a film in love with its own conceits and its own hype, wedded to style - big, garish, flashy style - over substance. Take away a few of its toys - like the giant pointless ridiculous flying aircraft-carrier, WTF my suspension of disbelief, you pushed it, over - and given the script more snark and fewer pointless fighty bits, and it could have been so much better.

I am fond of fighty bits. I liked Battleship, for the sweet godless heavens' sakes; I watched Thor and the first Iron Man more than once. But there comes a point when fighty bits stop being entertaining and become ridiculously self-indulgent, and The Avengers hits that point rather early on.

*

The Avengers: it entertained me less than Battleship.

Although it does have better snark, Chris Hemsworth (sadly not shirtless), and Robert Downey Jr (also sadly not shirtless).

Battleship: not a good film, but a ridiculously awesome one.

I realise this is something of a contradiction in terms. Bear with me.

To be honest, one could skip the first ten or twenty minutes of the film and lose very little by it. Introductory material: our protagonist, Alex Hopper, is a screwup with an ego who'll do anything to impress a girl, and whose brother inveigles him into joining the US Navy. Meanwhile, scientists are sending out signals to a newly-discovered planet in the Goldilocks zone. Fastforward a few years, and Hopper's ship is on maneuvers with an international flotilla, and the signals have caused aliens to come investigate/invade (because Hollywood signals travel faster than the speed of light, as always).

Cue explosions, and a ridiculously entertaining amount of BOOM ALIENS EXPLODING SHIPS ALIENS BOOM.

I could live without the framing of the (blond, skinny, civilian) love interest as a collection of bodyparts whose father's permission is required for marriage. (Although she does get a small moment of awesome all her own.) But apart from that there is an un-sexualised female Navy PO (played by Rihanna) who fires the big guns. She appears to be the only lady in the Navy, judging by the film! But, still. It is nice to have a lady making things go BOOM.

This is basically space opera on the Pacific Ocean. There is character development (in small amounts) and a plot arc: solid tension, unprepossessing dialogue that occasionally breaks out into half-decent banter, and several CROWNING MOMENTS OF SPLODEY AWESOME.

Ahem. Sorry. Got carried away there.

The battleship of the title? Comes into play. Best over-the-mantlepiece battleship ever.

The last five minutes of the film are terrible and saccharine and my god we are here for the SPLODEY BITS not the sentiment people! MORE SPLODEY BITS!

It hit a bunch of my narrative kinks: do-or-die (do-and-die) bravery, last stands, nick-of-time reversals, splodey bits, a woman with a big gun.

In conclusion: REALLY GOOD SPLODEY BITS.

Operation See The Hunger Games accomplished. (I negotiated for my ticket in Greek and everything.)

That was a good film, despite the cinema sticking a bloody intermission in the middle of it. I'm impressed with the translation of the novel to the big screen: it feels very faithful. The first part of the film, up until the start of the titular Games proper, hits the emotional beats incredibly well, as does the dénouement. The Games themselves are well-paced and well shot, but I think the director backed off from some of the emotional ugliness there - the beats fell off, but I'm not quite sure I can put my finger on why.

Jennifer Lawrence has turned in a fantastic, nuanced performance. The only other things I've seen her in are Winter's Bone (quietly, understatedly, wrenchingly brilliant) and the hot mess that was X-Men First Class, which despite excellent performances from her and Fassbender and the other guy never quite managed to cohere into anything good.

Also, if anyone, oh, for example, wanted to gift me with the soundtrack for my birthday or something? I liked that soundtrack. I mean, a little overblown at points, but pretty decent.

Go see the film. It's pretty damn good. And has women! Who talk to each other!

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Tomorrow I will have other things to say. About things like books, and Rizzoli & Isles and other suchlike matters. Until soon!

Books 2012: 19


19. Saladin Ahmed, Throne of the Crescent Moon. DAW, 2012. Book One of the Crescent Moon Kingdoms.

I first heard of saladinahmed in the misty past of late 2010, via matociquala. There's a story of his on Beneath Ceaseless Skies that I read shortly thereafter. I've been looking forward to reading Throne of the Crescent Moon, his debut, for over a year.

(Why? Because I've nursed a certain tenderness for medieval Arab culture since my first introduction to the poems of Jalal al-Din Rumi and the travelogue of Ibn Battutah - I even went off to read the Qu'ran all the way through in order to better understand the references, especially in lads like Ibn Khaldun and Osama ibn Munqidh - and the idea of an Arab-inspired fantasy is incredibly attractive to me. Also people kept saying Look forward to this.)

(I haven't had time to read all the Thousand and One Nights. Do you know that the Penguin translation's in three volumes of about a thousand words each?)

Anyway. I'm supposed to be reviewing this properly for Strange Horizons, so I'll be brief. Doctor Adoulla Makhslood, a sixty-year-old ghul hunter, and his young assistant, the dervish Raseed bas Raseed, fight crime evil magic. Adoulla's been doing it his whole life, and he's a little tired of it. Now evil sorcery is attempting to gain dominion over his home city of Dhamsawaat. Adoulla and Raseed, together with Zamia, a young Badawi girl who can turn into a lion, and Adoulla's long-time friends, an alkhemist and her magus husband, must oppose the shadowy wickedness aiming at the Khalif's throne - not because it's the Khalif's throne, but because it's Adoulla's home.

Reading it, I was reminded a lot of Robert E. Howard. This is solid adventure fantasy, sword and sorcery style. But Howard was a racist, sexist sack of shit (however fun Conan is), and Ahmed isn't. Ahmed doesn't overlook consequences, either. Adoulla's Dhamsawaat is a city of the poor and middling, not the wealthy inner circle of court. Ahmed has a deft touch with his setting, and makes it come alive. He's also not half bad at characterisation. (That's an understatement.)

The book does suffer from first-novel problems, however. In the first few chapters especially, it's clear that Ahmed is still finding his voice, still feeling his way into the structure of a novel. The pacing and tension remains uneven, and only gradually do isolated incidents begin to acquire coherence in the larger narrative. Though the tension becomes more controlled and focused towards the end, it does wobble some, and it doesn't always feel as though Ahmed's in control of his novel's structure. But it is enormously fun.

Also? It is refreshing to read a novel with medieval Islam at the heart of its cultural setting, and not medieval Catholicism or neopaganism.

More details, nit-picking, etc, will happen in the Real Review. For now, I would like to ask saladinahmed or the knowledgeable internets if there's a sequel in the works, because that's solid work and I would like more of it, please.

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The Three Musketeers (2011) is a superhero film in period costume. I suspect Dumas would approve. Me, I think it's a perfectly entertaining ridiculous way to spend ~two hours.

Books 2011: 124-127


124. Sherwood Smith, Once A Princess.

Ebook. YA. Tolerably entertaining portal fantasy involving royalty from another world and handsome pirates. First book of two. Cliffhanger ending.


125. Walter Jon Williams, Deep State.

ARG thriller starring Dagmar from This Is Not A Game. Set partly in Turkey, partly on an RAF base in Cyprus: Williams makes the milieu feel right. Brilliant twisty story.


126. Susan R. Matthews, An Exchange of Hostages.

Out of print science fiction with a space operatic feel. Intriguingly grim, fascinatingly brutal, with an extremely well-drawn main character and solid prose chops. Recommended, if you can stomach reading about torture.


127. David Weber, A Beautiful Friendship.

YA set in the Honorverse. Not outstanding. Review forthcoming from Tor.com: I'll linky when it's live.

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Film un-reviews

Way of the Warrior: Utterly forgettable Asian assassin Goes West, My Son, with a baby and a shitload of bad memories. The cinematography isn't brilliant, either.

Fair Game: Naomi West and Sean Penn star as Valerie Plame and Joe Wilson in this dramatisation of the Plame scandal. A well-cast, well-written, well-put-together film.

Attack the Block: Brilliant piece of low-budget science fiction. Aliens invade a block of London council flats, leading to showdowns with the local teenage hard boys, a nurse, and a couple of stoners. Excellent dialogue, tight writing, well shot, and a surprising amount of social criticism. And it passes the Bechdel Test in spirit, if not in fact. (I was distracted by the furry aliens with sharp teeth, okay?) Excellent.

Ironclad: After King John signs the Magna Carta, he hires a Scandinavian army to kill his barons and take back his absolute rights as king. A small band of warriors led by a baron and a Knight Templar seize Rochester castle with the intent of holding out until the archbishop of Canterbury can persuade the French to relieve them. A tense, brutal siege plays out to the final hours. Well written, well cast, well shot, with at least one strong female character - "I am not a sin," she tells the templar - and some fascinating bits of medieval siege warfare. Castle go BOOM! Excellent.