Category: Movie Review

Horror and Humour in Cinema – A Neuroscientific Understanding of Why Dark Humour Tickles

What makes dark humour so funny?

All My Friends Are Still Dead
by Avery Monsen and Jory John.

I’ve been thinking about writing this article since watching the thought-provoking horror, Us (2019).

Featuring doppelgängers, the film shows the horror of a reflection taking the place of our self.  Scary stuff.  But what I enjoyed most about this film was the humour.

The film juxtaposes normal behaviour set in a bizarre world where a copy of self is killing all the other selves.

Seeing a family fighting for their lives to compete to sit in the front seat of the car, the winner based on who has killed the most people/doppelgängers?  Hilarious.

There’s also the additional delight of husband Gabe with a tissue stuck up his bloody nostril stating things like, ‘Almost looks like some kind of fucked-up art instalment.’

Director, writer and producer Jordan Peele states, “Horror and comedy are both great ways of exposing how we feel about things […]  The comedy that emerges from a tense moment or scene in a horror film is necessary for cleaning the emotional palate, to release the tension.  It gives your audience an opportunity to emotionally catch up and get prepared for the next run of terror.”1

Us

Winston Duke really nailed the father character, Gabe; and I appreciated this layer of bizarre humour to lighten the strange – as Jorden states above, to, ‘clean the palate’.

But what does this ‘clean the palate’ actually mean?

And what is it about gallows humour that I find so funny?

An article published in Nature Reviews / Neuroscience, ‘The Neural Basis of Humour Processing’ (Pascal Vrticka, et al (2013)) concludes there are, ‘two core processes of humour appreciation: incongruity detection and resolution (the cognitive component); and a feeling of mirth or reward (the emotional component). Whereas the cognitive component seems to rely principally on activity in the [temporo-occipito-parietal junction] TOPJ, the emotional component appears to involve mesocorticolimbic dopaminergic pathways and the amygdala.’ 2

Neuroanatomy

Yu-Chen Chan, et al summarize and further research the comprehension-elaboration theory of humour in their article, ‘Segregating the comprehension and elaboration processing of verbal jokes: An fMRI study’ (2012)3.  Highlighting that ‘not all situations involving the detection and resolution of incongruities are humorous.’

They go on to quote Wyer and Collin’s comprehension-elaboration theory of humor (1992), where ‘The elaboration follows comprehension, involves the conscious generation of inferences of features not made explicit during comprehension as well as further thoughts stimulated by the newly understood situation, and elicits the unconscious or conscious feeling of amusement.  These elaborations effectively involve appraising the stimulus event for their humourous content.

The amount of humour elicited is a function of the amount of elaboration of the event and its implications that occur subsequent to its reinterpretation.

The affective feeling of humor results from, and may overlap with continued elaboration of the event.’

So, humour in the setting of a horror evokes further elaboration not just because of the incongruent, it’s the nature of the incongruent: normality in a setting of the horrific.

The elaboration, further cognition of the joke makes the humour darkly funny.

Comprehension_Elaboration

In the setting of a horror film, there’s also a layering to dark humour that sparks the cognitive on the foundation of a previously evoked response, like fear.

As stated in the article, ‘The role of the amygdala in human fear: automatic detection of threat’ (Ohman. A (2005))4, ‘Behavioral data suggest that fear stimuli automatically activate fear and capture attention. This effect is likely to be mediated by a subcortical brain network centered on the amygdala […] When the stimulus conditions allow conscious processing, the amygdala response to feared stimuli is enhanced and a cortical network that includes the anterior cingulate cortex and the anterior insula is activated. However, the initial amygdala response to a fear-relevant but non-feared stimulus (e.g. pictures of spiders for a snake phobic) disappears with conscious processing and the cortical network is not recruited. Instead there is activation of the dorsolateral and orbitofrontal cortices that appears to inhibit the amygdala response. The data suggest that activation of the amygdala is mediated by a subcortical pathway, which passes through the superior colliculi and the pulvinar nucleus of the thalamus before accessing the amygdala, and which operates on low spatial frequency information.’

This is interesting with the view that further processing of a scene in a scary film, provoked by an incongruent behaviour, will break the activation of the amygdala and be, ‘mediated by a subcortical pathway, which passes through the superior colliculi and the pulvinar nucleus of the thalamus’ and would give the effect of tension relief (‘cleansing the palate’) and therefore, humour.

The article goes on to describe the activation of the fear response, like increased heart-rate and respiration (as we’ve all experienced in particularly scary movies): ‘The amygdala consists of several separate cell groups (nuclei), which receive input from many different brain areas. Highly processed sensory information from various cortical areas reaches the amygdala through its lateral and basolateral nuclei. In turn, these nuclei project to the central nucleus of the amygdala, which then projects to hypothalamic and brainstem target areas that directly mediate specific signs of fear and anxiety.’

The Role of the Amygdala in the Process of Humour Appreciation

You can imagine sitting in the cinema, immersed in a scary scene that has evoked the fear response: the rapid heart-beat, sitting on the edge-of-your-seat.  That automatic response has kicked in.

So, those jumps you get in a horror are from that ingrained automatic response – like a reflex.

With conscious processing the fear is either enhanced through a clever script that gives layers to the idea of the horror (mediated through the amygdala), or is consciously processed as being, just a film (activation of the dorsolateral and orbitofrontal cortices that appears to inhibit the amygdala response): this isn’t real.

So either the data is further processed, where, ‘a cortical network that includes the anterior cingulate cortex and the anterior insula is activated.’

Or isn’t: ‘the initial amygdala response to a fear-relevant but non-feared stimulus (e.g. pictures of spiders for a snake phobic) disappears with conscious processing and the cortical network is not recruited.’

I think dark humour occurs somewhere in this cognition.  In the further elaboration.

The fear response is already activated, through something that automatically evokes the fear-response, doppelgängers for example; then the data is further analysed when the setting is incongruent to the behaviour of the character, leading to a release of tension on the background of an already evoked fear response.  With further cognition and elaboration the incongruent is resolved by processing through memories, past experiences, so the data is personally related in the context of a horror making the humour: darkly funny.

So, humour instead of a fear response including that extra processing leads to tension release and to a layered emotional response giving a fear response, mirth, therefore creating dark humour that tickles because of its complexity, its, elaboration.

But dark humour isn’t just humour in horror.

Dark humour can be satire.  Dark humour can be about a cop trying to perform a dance in memory of his lost mother… At her funeral.

I recently reviewed the film, Thunder Road (2019), finding the performance and script from writer/director/lead, Jim Cummings genius.  I’m still giggling about this cop falling apart because the character is so sincere and so tragic, it’s funny.

Jim was interviewed on a Podcast by Giles Alderson, and he talks about his intention to straddle both the tragic and humour of this cop having a breakdown, stating the audience will reward you when more than one lobe of the brain is engaged.5

The writing and performance of this film is brilliant because of the empathy evoked by seeing this guy grieving against the incongruity of his abnormal behaviour.

It’s the processing involved while seeing this super-nice guy, doing his absolute best in the worst of circumstances, then just lose his grip that tickles: standing, about to throw a child’s school desk, the teacher subtly pocketing the school safety-scissors included.

His mother is dead, his siblings don’t show at the funeral, his wife has left him, his daughter can’t stand him and is acting out, making statements like, ‘I hope I get mum’s boobs.’  And his job as a cop is emotionally draining and stressful.

His life is eating him alive.

But Jim continues to try to do the right thing only to end up with ripped pants.

Don’t get me wrong, the humour here is subtle and complex – like the way Jim is described, ‘Everyone grieves differently.  Everyone’s unique.’

You can just see it – how the nice people describe someone losing the plot at a funeral.

I’m still giggling because the film shows how difficult life can be and how ridiculous.

So based on the same principle of processing the incongruent on the foundation of a fear response, here the emotional centre is engaged, in empathy for this guy at his mother’s funeral.

The humour is based on the incongruent because this guy is not functioning as a normal human being.

Then the nature of his behaviour is elaborated, because of the sadness and tragedy and empathy for this guy doing his absolute best.

The sadness and tragedy is modified by the incongruent behaviour, leading to further cognition, coming back as humour on a foundation of sadness that leads to elaboration creating that dark humour.

It. Just. TICKLES.

Taking the idea further: if there’s not enough tension for humour to release through incongruity, or if the difference isn’t enough; and if there’s no attachment to the character (leading to further elaboration), the attempt at humour will miss the mark.

The response will be flat: it’s just more data that flows through, marking time.

And if the humour doesn’t require further processing, and really misses that tension relief, it becomes simple.  Like slapstick.  And that’s if there’s a good performance from the actor.

If not, the end result will turn the audience against the storyline because the film will be a boring experience or the laughter will be directed at the film, not with it.

Watching a film that gets dark humour just right, for me, is a genuine pleasure – who can forget the gloriously funny, bad luck of, O. B Jackson (James Parks) in The Hateful Eight (2016)?!ames Parks as O. B Jackson

Tarantino is definitely one of those writers and directors who knows how mix up the violent, the unexpected warmth and intellect with the incongruent.

Think about the relentless violence in John Wick 3 (2019) that saturates to the extent it’s funny.

It’s the unexpected bloody action happening to a well-liked character that absorbs with the incongruent of a deadly killer who loves his dog making John Wick a memorable and likable character adding those touches of joyful dark humour.

I acknowledge that not everyone enjoys this style of (sometimes bloody) humour – and there’s further research about the different theories of humour; think of humour used as aggression (and why people will feel superior and laugh at a movie, perhaps) and humour used in sexual selection (I found that funny too!  Maybe we should go out…).

As a side note, the sexual selection theory is a concept well illustrated in the Coen Brothers’ film, Burn After Reading (2008), with the character Linda Litzke (Frances McDormand) taking online matches to the movies to see if they laugh at the same joke.

A nice illustration and frankly, not a bad filtering method to find the right partner.

Whether you like dark humour or not, I’m sure all would agree that those added complicated interactions of cognition and emotion make watching a film a more rewarding experience, and one that certainly keeps me coming back for more.

Burn After Reading

1.      Universal Pictures (2019) ‘Production Notes’ Us.

2.      Vrticka P, Black J. M. and Reiss A. L. 2013 ‘The Neural Basis of Humour Processing’ Nature Reviews / Neuroscience, Science and Society PERSPECTIVES 14 860 – 868.

3.      Chan Y, Chou T, Chen, H and Liang Kl 2012 ‘Segregating the comprehension and elaboration processing of verbal jokes: An fMRI study’ NeuroImage Dec, 61:  899-906.

4.     Ohman. A, 2005 ‘The role of the amygdala in human fear: automatic detection of threat’ Psychoneuroendocrinology, 10: 953-958.

5.      Giles Alderson (2019) ‘Jim Cummings On Writing, Directing and Starring in Thunder Road’, The Filmakers Podcast May 29, available at: apple.co/2EydVIz

The White Crow

Rated: MThe White Crow

Directed by: Ralph Fiennes

Written by: David Hare

Inspired by the book “Nureyev : The Life” by: Julie Kavanagh

Produced by: Gabrielle Tana p.g.a., Ralph Fiennes p.g.a., Carolyn Marks Blackwood, Andrew Levitas,  François Ivernel

Composer: Ilan Eshkeri

Starring: Oleg Ivenko, Adèle Exarchopoulos, Chulpan Khamatova, Ralph Fiennes, Alexey Morozov, Raphaël Personnaz, Olivier Rabourdin, Ravshana Kurkova, Louis Hofmann, with Sergei Polunin and    Maksimilian Grigoriyev, Andrey Urgant, Nadezhda Markina, Anna Polikarpova, Nebojša Dugalić, Anastasia Meskova.

Based on the true story of the Soviet Union ballet dancer, Rudolf Nureyev (Oleg Ivenko), The White Crow is a film that shifts in time, from his time during the cold war, visiting France as a member of the Kirov Ballet Company in the 1960s, back to his lessons, showing his determination to be the best, the most expressive male dancer, back to the time of his childhood and his birth in 1938 on a crowded train as it travels through the snowy countryside – all his past leading to his ultimate defection from the Soviet Union to France where in a dramatic scene he seeks asylum while under the careful guard of the KGB.

We see the contrast of the oppressive days living in the Soviet Union in the 1930s, the scenes leached of colour, to renewed hope after the war where the people living under the communist regime feel the bad days are over, only to see the vigour and freedom of Paris and the gorgeous be-jewelled costumes and stage-craft of lights and dancing, chandeliers and standing ovations.

The film shows the background of this famous performer, giving insight into his infamous temper and demands.  He explains to his friend and French supporter, Clara Saint (Adèle Exarchopoulos), his nickname, White Crow: the unusual, the extraordinary, not like others: an outsider.

To be able to express and give all of himself in the dance, his drive must remain pure, his soul free.

Ralph Fiennes, has directed with restraint, giving the tone of the film a quiet power.

It was the silence of the soundtrack that absorbed, to hear the scraping of ballet shoes on a hard wooden floor cutting to Rudi’s admiration and observation of paintings and statues in the Rembrandt Room of the Hermitage museum in St Petersburg, showing his aspiration to be as perfect as a statue himself.

The layering of the story makes the film more than the defection of Rudolf Nureyevilm, this is about the determination of a driven and abrasive, spectacularly brilliant dancer, as he explores a world he’s only dreamed about, filled with intellectual conversation, acceptance, art, adoration and freedom.

As his long-time supporter and teacher Alexander Pushkin (Ralph Fiennes – directing and also starring) explains to the KGB about Rudi’s defection – it’s not about politics, it was more an ‘explosion of character’.

Yet it’s the love of his mother and his childhood, the flashes back to his father returning in uniform, his mother searching for firewood in the bitter cold, that gives him the strength to fight through any fear of performance.

It’s a classically, beautiful film filled with the grace of ballet and violins, the tap of piano, the production team determined to show the story with respect with the cast made-up of native Russian actors, the lead, Oleg Ivenko also an award winning ballet dancer.

What I appreciated as a viewer was the cast speaking Russian instead of English with a Russian accent.

And the setting is filmed in France, and Russia, the artwork of Géricault’s painting ‘The Raft Of The Medusa’ used to show the beauty of Rudi’s internal torment and ability to see the beauty in the tragic.

Like Rudi tells Clara Saint, if you have no story to tell, you have no reason to dance.

A White, White Day (Hvítur, Hvítur Dagur)

Rated: MA White, White Day (Hvítur, Hvítur Dagur)

Written and Directed by: Hlynur Pálmason

Produced by: Anton Máni Svansson

Music by: Edmund Finnis

Cinematography by: Maria von Hausswolff

Film Editing by: Julius Krebs Damsbo

Starring: Ingvar E. Sigurdsson, Ída Mekkín Hlynsdóttir, Hilmir Snær Guðnason.

WINNER

Best Actor, Cannes International Film Festival 2019 (Critics’ Week)

WINNER

Best Actor, 2019 Transilvania International Film Festival

Opening the Scandinavian Film Festival, A White, White Day (Hvítur, Hvítur Dagur) is a slow, bold and at times beautiful film, the outstanding performance from Ingvar E. Sigurdsson the centre piece to the background of Icelandic scenery.

I was drawn into the landscape of this film, the interest of change while the centre remains the same; the boldness and cheek of a granddaughter, the roar of a monster – it’s a film about grief but shown in images and movement and stillness, showing the process of grief rather than the narrative.

Time is shown as frame, by frame, an old farm house remains static, as each frame shows wind, snow, wild horses, a full moon at night, to daylight and green grass, and eventually, former police chief and grandfather, Ingimundur (Ingvar E. Sigurdsson) arriving with granddaughter, Salka (Ída Mekkín Hlynsdóttir).

They wander around the old house, turning on taps, finding one of the horses in the kitchen.  Laughing together, the scene shows the relationship between grandfather and granddaughter; the natural companionship and exchange between them, the love.

Slowly, we realise that Ingimundur’s wife has died.  He’s a widow.  He used to be a cop.  We see a counsellor ask him not to be so hard on himself.  Not to self-criticise.

To ask: ‘What would be a perfect day?’

We receive no answer, the film cutting to Ingimundur in a rowboat with his granddaughter after they’ve caught a fish.

The editing (Julius Krebs Damsbo) sets the tone of the film, the story shown through image and object to depict the way a retired police chief’s mind works: Ingmiundur plays soccer in his purple boxes with the sea slowly rippling in the background.

He’s found out his wife was unfaithful.  He didn’t know while she was alive. Now, he has questions.

The sea churns.

The film’s a mysterious family drama that revolves around the quiet strength of this man, Ingimundur, who loses his grip as he investigates the infidelity of his beloved wife.  But instead of revenge, his quiet anger shows the depth of this love.

And the mystery of his love is set in the strangeness of fog and snow, as he tells scary tales to his granddaughter, while he quietly grieves.

I was absorbed into that quiet and open feeling like a strange day can create – that’s why the film’s title is, A White, White Day – where the sky and land are both white so they blend, allowing the dead to speak.

Crime Wave (Ola De Crimenes)

Directed by: Gracia QuerejetaCrime Wave (Ola De Crimenes)

Written by: Luis Marίas

Starring: Maribel Verdú, Juana Acosta, Paula Echevarrίa, Luis Tosar, Asier Rikarte, Miguel Bernardeau and Raúl Arévalo.

Opening in a confessional, with Leyre (Maribel Verdú) attempting to explain to the priest her sins, Leyre asks the priest for reassurance, wanting to make sure of the sanctity of the confession, that her sins would not be passed on to anyone but God.

‘Honey, this isn’t twitter,’ the priest replies, setting the tone of the film.

A thriller and comedy is a strange mix and just asking for the ridiculous.

And the main character, Leyre, ex-wife to murdered husband and mother to sociopathic son, Asier (Asier Rikarte) who murders his father with a pair of scissors, is a ridiculous character: tripping over her high-heels and cleavage on show with every outfit.  I found myself gritting my teeth at the ditzy behaviour.

Leyre attempts to cover-up the murder of her husband while her odd son is unable to absorb the seriousness of the crime, being a sociopath and all.  She runs around like a neurotic that in turn, causes a crime wave across the city of Bilbao.

To try to blend the different styles of story, the comedy with the crime, the soundtrack is used to spark that recognition of detective, who-done-it movies, with brass raunchy outbursts (a little like the character, Leyre).  Then we get classical for the son; the best music in the soundtrack for the entire film.  But mostly, it’s that sleezy music that works as a devise for change of tone but didn’t absorb me into the film because it felt like it was trying too hard.

But there’s some clever here with some genuinely funny moments that I just haven’t seen anywhere else: Vanessa (Paula Echevarrίa) the current wife of the murdered husband, manages to include her hiccups into the manipulation of a conversation by explaining they’re a reminder from the dead husband because he used to always hiccup.

And the tape playing English lessons in the taxi as Leyre convinces the taxi driver (Raúl Arévalo) to help her establish an alibi saying, ‘I’m mad.  I’m mad,’ Yes, the taxi driver is a little mad!

There are many moments of the highly amusing including the infatuation of lover boy (and Asier’s only friend), Julen (Miguel Bernardeau), with Leyre – constantly blowing his load while professing his undying love…

And the pace doesn’t let up.

We get the murder of douche bag husband, the coverup, the current wife in dodgy business with corrupt lawyer, Susana (Juana Acosta), the detectives investigating the crime with their own headaches in life and the taxi-driver / bad actor tricked into a false alibi.  It’s nuts!

Of course it’s nuts.  But also, a little brilliant.

Little

Rated: PGLITTLE

Directed by: Tina Gordon

Screenplay Written by: Tracy Oliver and Tina Gordon

Story by: Tracy Oliver

Produced by: Will Packer, p.g.a, Kenya Barris and James Lopez, p.g.a

Starring: Regina Hall, Issa Rae, Tone Bell, Mikey Day, Marsai Martin, JD McCrary, Thalia Tran, Tucker Meek, Luke James and Rachel Dratch.

When Jordan Sanders (Regina Hall) showed-off her scientific talent in front of an audience of pre-teens only for the bully of the school to ruin her moment, her parents tell her (as they push her with a braced neck and plastered arm in a wheelchair) not to worry because when she gets big, smart kids become the boss.  And no-one bully’s the boss.

Taking this predication as gospel, she becomes a rich tech CEO, running her company, JS Innovations with a be-jewelled iron fist.

She doesn’t care if her staff hate her.  As long as they get the job done.

So when her slippers aren’t precisely 53 cm from the edge of her bed, so her feet fall on the feathered fluffy numbers she calls slippers, it’s hell to pay.  And hell to be paid by her assistant, April (Issa Rae).

No wonder April’s listening to self-help audio books with titles, ‘So You Want To Slap Your Boss.’

When Jordan finally crosses the line, calling out the young daughter of the food truck owner who sells donuts outside her company, the young girl waves her magic plastic wand, wishing the mean boss lady was little.

It’s a classic body-swap of a 38-year-old adult to a 13-year-old, pre-teen.  Only this time, it’s the black girls calling the shots.

Look, I wasn’t really expecting much with this film, maybe a bit of a giggle on a rainy night.  And there were some giggles like the term, BMW: Black Mamma Whooping.

But the story felt disjointed, like it couldn’t quite decide whether to be a girls-night-out comedy or a pre-teen kid, feel-good movie.

The editing didn’t help with the funniest moments spliced in like an after-thought, just to inject some humour in the mix.

There’s a strong performance from new-comer, Marsai Martin as Little Jordan Sanders.  Marsai pitched the idea when she noticed a cultural gap in these body-swap comedies we’ve all seen before: “There weren’t a lot of little black girls with glasses that looked like me on TV or in movies, so I just wanted to create something where you see more of myself and what you look like.”

She wanted one of those funny movies but with black characters.

And the writers make the most of this cultural difference, throwing in jokes like, ‘That only happens to white people.  Black people don’t have the time.’

But the film doesn’t dwell here, with, Jordan’s uber rich and biggest client asking, ‘Did you know there’s three dinner napkins on your back.’

‘It’s fashion,’ she explains.

She has her weaknesses.

There’s also the comment of it’s better to wake up rich and heart broken, then broke AND heart broken.

Yet, there’s not much digging here, more a focus on Jordan’s reaction to the incident in junior high, that motivated her to become a bully and get rich.

There’s a lot of praising the dollar, leading to some pretty cool outfits, nice apartment, super cool car, etc, etc…

Looking good makes you feel good – right?!

The question isn’t asked.  It’s just not that kind of movie.

Little is more about rich people having tantrums and learning life lessons like you can be yourself and succeed.  With an added BTW, money rules.

 

Cold Pursuit

Rated: MA15+Cold Pursuit

Directed by: Hans Petter Moland

Screenplay by: Frank Baldwin

Based on the Movie, ‘Kraftidioten’ Written by: Kim Fupz Aakeson

Produced by: Michael Shamberg p.g.a, Ameet Shukla p.g.a

Starring: Liam Neeson, Tom Bateman, Tom Jackson, Emmy Rossum, Laura Dern, John Doman, Domenick Lombardozzi, Julia Jones, Gus Halper, Micheál Richardson, Michael Eklund, Bradley Stryker, Wesley Macinnes, Nicholas Holmes, Benjamin Hollingsworth, Michael Adamthwaite, William Forsythe, Elizabeth Thai, David O’Hara, Raoul Trujillo, Nathaniel Arcand, Glen Gould, Mitchell Saddleback, Christopher Logan, Arnold Pinnock and Ben Cotton.

An English remake of the Norwegian film, In Order of Disappearance (Kraftidioten) (2014), we certainly see a lot of people get, disappeared.

Set in the snowy mountains of Kehoe, Nels Coxman (Liam Neeson) has just won the Citizen of the Year award.

He’s a simple, family man.  He plows snow so others can get to where they need to be. In his speech he says he was lucky, he picked a good road early and stayed on it.

Until his son is killed by drug dealers.

Cold Pursuit is a bloody revenge film filled with gangsters with names like: The Eskimo, Speedo and Wingman…  Because, well, it’s a gangster thing.

There’s this quirky dark humour where small-town cop Gip (John Doman) thinks drugs should be legalised – to give the people what they want, tax the shit out of it, so the government can double the cops’ pay.

But more than that, the sheer number of people who get killed (see the number of actors cast above) and how they get killed, is… funny.

There are so many funny moments that mostly hit the mark and sometimes don’t.  Pink phones and rubber ducks didn’t quite make it for me.

But added details like the plush hotel with the white fake fur reception desk getting a buff and brush, tickled.

What I realised as the film progressed was the presence of Liam Neeson as the main character, and the clever way director, Hans Petter Moland, uses Neeson’s gravitas for comic effect.

I really like Neeson in this film: still the hero, still the family man – like we’ve seen so many times before – but all that history he owns in that hero-family-man role is used to add another layer to the film.

A revenge, shoot-em-up movie with elements of gangster turned on its head with a super-food conscious villain (AKA Viking), a Thai ball-breaker wife making a tropical paradise in the middle of snowy mountains, a profile-in-pink drug dealer who also sells wedding dresses and drug dealing Native Americans who adore wearing mustard yellow gloves.

Sure the humour is laid on a bit thick and tried too hard at times, but the balance of action, drama, violence and those gallows-humour, ticklish moments made for a (mostly) great entertainer.

Got to say, Liam Neeson’s still got it.

Peppermint

Rated: MA 15+Peppermint

Directed by: Pierre Morel

Written by: Chad St. John

Produced by: Tom Rosenberg, Gary Lucchesi, Richard Wright, Eric Reid

Starring: Jennifer Garner, John Ortiz, John Gallagher, Jr., Juan Pablo Raba, Annie Ilonzeh, Jeff Hephner and Pell James.

Who is Riley North?

She’s a female vigilante who wants justice.

A classic revenge film, Riley North (Jennifer Garner) loses her husband Chris (Jeff Hephner) and her daughter Carly (Cailey Fleming) when Chris even contemplates robbing a drug cartel.

After Riley wakes in hospital from a coma, something has changed. When the guys who killed her family are let off, something breaks.

It’s a rampage of revenge with Riley North becoming an assassin; social media arguing whether she’s a criminal or a hero.

I wasn’t sure what to expect walking into Peppermint, hoping I wasn’t going to see a melodrama of family crisis.  And thankfully, the film is more action than drama with Garner holding her own in the believable character of Riley North.

I did however, get struck wondering how this wife and mother, taking her kid out to sell baked goods for the equivalent of the Brownies (for all those Aussies out there who partook in Pow Wows during their Primary School years…) suddenly becomes a killing machine.  But the story gets there, sort of.  I would have liked more backstory, making the most of filling some of the character with interesting mother-becomes-assassin interest.  But in the end, this is an action movie not a drama.

What I found difficult was the timing that felt off at moments, like tough cop talk lines delivered flat: ‘Pro tip’, states Detective Moises Beltran (John Ortiz) to fellow detective Carmichael (John Gallagher Jr.) who likes a shot of booze added to his morning coffee, ‘Wait until you’re dead before you embalm yourself.’

So there were jolts in the narrative.

And it felt like a film I’d seen before with nothing really new; techniques like flash backs as exciting as it gets.

But hey, it works!

And the story evolves with some good action.

What can I say, I like a good crime thriller.

So although not the best I’ve seen, Peppermint served with ‘a double scoop’ is worth a watch.

The School

Rated: MThe School

Directed by:  Storm Ashwood

Produced by: Clement Dunn, Cathy Flannery

Written by:  Storm Ashwood, Tessa Alana

Starring:  Megan Drury, Will McDonald, Jak Ruwald.

After a visually stunning trailer, I was more then ready to watch The School: an Australian supernatural horror thriller by award-winning director Storm Ashwood.  But I have to admit I was slightly disappointed.

Amy is a doctor, wife and grieving mother. After spending two years by her comatose son, David’s side, Amy falls into her own twisted world of obsession and denial. Blocking out everything and everyone around her while the walls of the hospital she neglects begin to fall apart. She begins to awaken in what seems to be an abandoned old school, where Amy finds herself a prisoner to a hoard of displaced cultish and feral kids trapped in a hostile supernatural purgatory for children.

As the stakes get higher, Amy becomes an unwilling surrogate mother and must try and escape an impending evil. But terror ensues and Amy must find her way out, fighting against the demonic, supernatural creatures and ultimately her very own demons.

Despite the catchy plot and stunning visuals, The School fails to offer a sense of place, making the hospital where her son remains, and her workplace, the same site where a school used to be.

Filmed at the Gladesville Mental Asylum, founded in the late 1830s, the film’s location is also the oldest facility of the kind in Australia. Regrettably, the unusual punishment of its patients was a normality, including the use of electric shock therapy making both patient and employee deaths common.

There are 1,228 unmarked patient graves on-site providing an unsettling place to capture the supernatural horror elements in the film.

Storm Ashwood has led a successful directing career thus far. His short film The Wish was not only nominated for Best Director and Best Script in the SASAs, but was also screened in festivals around the world including The Australian Film Festival, The LA Film Festival, and the most prestigious, The Clermont-Ferrand Film Festival in Paris. Storm was nominated for an AACTA (Australian Academy of Cinema and Television Awards) for best short screenplay as well as having overwhelming success in the festival circuit, with an array of awards and nominations including Best Director, Best Screenplay, Best Cinematography, Best Foreign film and several Merit awards.

His feature film script A Search For Hope was a runner up for the 21st Century ScreenWriting awards in 2007.

Early in 2012 Storm’s feature film script and teaser for THE SCHOOL was included as one of the Top 10 Finalists for the MTV Optus180 project.

The Meg

Rated: MThe Meg

Directed by: John Turteaitub

Produced by: Lorenzo di Bonaventura, Belle Avery and Colin Wilson

Written by: Dean Georgaris and Jon Hoeber & Erich Hoeber

Based on: MEG, the bestselling novel by by Steve Alten

Starring: Jason Statham, Li Bingbing.

The depths of the ocean. Unexplored. Unknown. Unconquered. Sound familiar?

I must confess that the scifi premise, used many times before in better and/or smaller productions such as Jaws (1975) or Piranha (1978), intrigue me. While the cast of Jason Statham made me lower my expectations to rock bottom.

>A deep-sea submersible—part of Mana One, an international undersea observation program off the coast of China—has been attacked by a massive creature and now lies disabled at the bottom of the deepest part of the Pacific Ocean… with its crew trapped inside.

In the film, Statham plays Jonas Taylor, an undersea rescue diver who was the best of the best before a terrifying brush with a massive creature powerful enough to crush the hull of a nuclear submarine. The traumatic attack took the lives of two friends and put Jonas into voluntary drydock. When Megalodon emerges once again and threatens the lives of Mana One’s crew, Jonas becomes their last and only hope.

I love a big monster movie just like anybody else but I hate when a trailer plays with my feelings as a viewer, teasing a bigger version of the classic Jaws and delivering what’s nothing more than a louder film.

The irresistible combination of over-the-top special effects and a great soundtrack is not enough to scratch the surface of the story. Half way through the film I became more concerned about the fate of the gorgeous little Yorkshire Terrier paddling around the Megalodon than of the weak romance orchestrated between Jason Statham and award winning Chinese actress Li Bingbing.

If there is anything to be afraid of, is that The Meg has become one of the year’s few Hollywood surprise stories, making $45 million in one of the highest debuts of the year. Meaning that more such a films may well be on their way to feast from the box office once again.

Submergence

Rated: MSubmergence

Directed by: Wim Wenders

Based on the novel, “Submergence” by: J.M. Ledgard

Screenplay Written by: Erin Dignam

Cinematographer: Benoît Debie

Produced by: Cameron Lamb along with Wim Wenders and Uwe Kiefer

Starring: Alicia Vikander, James McAvoy, Cerlyn Jones, Reda Kateb, Alexander Siddig and Hakeemshady Mohamed.

Based on the novel written by journalist J.M. Ledgard, Submergence opens the door to soaring cliffs and underwater twilight, to the senseless violence of women buried and bashed and foreigners imprisoned while Jihadists make suicide vests.

This is a movie of contrasts, where bio-mathematician Danielle Flinders (Alicia Vikander) and British Secret Service agent James More (James McAvoy) meet at a hotel on the Normandy coast in France.

Danielle’s a professor and believer in nature with a drive to understand the depths of the ocean down to where there’s no light, just darkness, searching for the origin of life to show the world there’s life in darkness.

Scottish agent James believes the world’s about power, that education is secondary – he wants to save the world by stopping terrorists from setting off bombs. His mission is to travel to Somalia to find the men responsible, to put his own life at risk to save others.

They meet; they fall in love. They each have a mission where they may never come back.

Submersion is a romance. The eyes meeting, searching to reveal the other. Yet, there’s this thread of water and life.

We’re introduced to the happy professor as she works on the discovery of the origins of life on earth; her research to compare samples with those from Mars, ground breaking.

Dani’s whole being is about work and what it means to the world.

She’s then drawn into a smaller world, a bubble – where love is like death; where apart she realises she’s never been lonely before.

To which her colleague Thumbs (Cerlyn Jones) replies, ‘Welcome to the planet’.

The film floats around with one storyline flowing into the other, from the underwater world viewed from a submersible hundreds of kilometres below the surface, to the stark desert sun where James is chained, waiting interrogation – waiting to get back to Danielle.

I drifted in and out of the film with the meeting of the British operatives to the lovers discussing life, to the science of photosynthetic life that creates through light to the organisms of darkness who live on chemicals – director Wim Wenders gives poetry to the perspective.

I liked McAvoy as the Scottish operative who falls in love – he’s a witty and likable character and quite a different role with more warmth and less crazy than his recent previous roles in such films as, ‘Split (2016)’, ‘Atomic Blonde (2017)’ or even ‘Trance (2013)’. I admit I’m a big fan.

Alicia Vikander as the mathematician was slow to warm as she falls for the Scotsman.

They’re a couple I found more believable apart than together.

I didn’t believe their love for each other as much as their passion for life because there was so much reasoning involved.

The contrast of the scientist, the solider, the extremists who believe Jihad is life after death – this is what I found interesting.

As Wenders states:
“What I really hope is on a rainy Thursday night in Bristol or Detroit or wherever you are, when you come out of the cinema, your perspective of the planet, on your own habits, is just altered slightly. You will realize how large the world is, how varied it is, but also how fragile it is.”

Overall, I found Submergence a quietly absorbing and interesting escape.

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