Movie review - "The Shrouds" (2025) ***1/2 (warning: spoilers)

 I went with this. Modern day version of an Edgar Allan Poe story - man going mad after wife dies, doing stuff with the crypt, catnip to the ladies. The nudity suits the story because it has body horror elements. Ending unsatisfying - felt life a cliff hanger. Needed another beat at least. Still watchable.  

Movie review - "Fast Company" (1979) **

 David Cronenberg does a car film - which is fine but this is dull. Made conscientiously. Nicely shot. Bland rock soundtrack from some guy who is like Springsteen lite. William Smith seems like a genuine racer.

Claudia Jennings in her last role is wasted as Smith's girlfriend. I just didn't care. Maybe if Jennings had played the lead.

There's a scene where some guy is in bed with two topless women that feels like an eleventh hour addition to jazz it up. It's too polite.

Movie review - "Maps to the Stars" (2014) ***1/2 (warning: spoilers)

Acerbic, gripping look at life in Hollywood with more melodramatic plot than a Greek tragedy (which feels like it's main influence, actually) - there is incest, suicide, self-immolation, murder, threesomes, schizophrenia, visions of dead people, cancer, drowning, greed, lust, botox, massage and lots of therapy.

I can't say that I super enjoyed it - some of it was just plain unpleasant, and depressing with so much pain. There's plenty of story and I could never pick what was going to happen next. It's also superbly acted: Julianne Moore as an aging starlet (loved her lip work), newcomer Evan Bird as a brattish child star, chameleon Mia Wasikowska, and ever reliable Olivia Williams; John Cusack and Robert Pattison are also solid in smaller, if crucial parts. Actually everyone was good, down to the smallest parts.

The one thing I didn't quite believe story wise was Cusack being a famous self-help guru and Bird's father - that didn't feel super real to me (also would someone with Cusack's secret really chase fame? It wasn't necessary that he was famous).

Maybe I'm being too smarty pants here but the movie seemed to betray a Canadian bias - a distaste for lack of politeness (Bird and Moore suffer terribly for being rude) and guns (Bird again is shown to be a brat).

Movie review - "A Dangerous Method" (2011) ***

Literate, smart and thoughtful entertainment almost entirely derailed by an appalling performance form Keira Knightley, full of ticks and gestures and erratic accent, like some bad acting grad fresh out of QUT who mainly got the role because she was really hot and willing to show a little nipple. David Cronenberg really should have pulled her under control - she's not remotely believable as someone capable of being a doctor herself. She's a film star trying to be an actor, and good for her, but she needed a month's more rehearsal and probably a director who is better with women.

There's excellent work from Michael Fassbender, Viggo Mortensen (once you get used to his false nose) and Vincent Cassell (as a rock and roll lifestyle shrink - give into temptation, take drugs, sleep with your patients). Sarah Gadon is a completely blank canvass as Fassbender's wife. The most interesting character is Freud - smart, arrogant, not wanting to be questioned, more political than he seems.

Lots of ideas fly around, the main one being the difference in approach between Jung and Freud. It's treatment is a little stolid - at times I wished Peter Weir or someone more cinematic directed this, Cronenberg's approach feels stiff, as if he was intimidated by the pre-World War I-ness of it all and the literary quality of Christopher Hampton's script. It's very bright and clean and HD, something which didn't work for me (although I know others liked it). For all it's spanking scenes it is curiously unerotoic.

Movie review – “A History of Violence” (2007) ***

Not really an examination of violence since every violent act committed by Viggo Mortensen and family is clearly justified – he has to act at the diner because the psychos are going to kill diners, ditto when the crooks threaten his family, and when he visits William Hurt. So not a lot of complexity. As a thriller with violent moments it works – it’s a modern day western really, with Viggo as a retired gunslinger who can’t escape his past. He’s got all the super hero powers of Clint Eastwood in his films. Strong cast – Viggo and Maria Bello actually make married sex exciting, William Hurt and Ed Harris are chilling monsters. Why was this praised to the skies, though?