Spider-Man - Across The Spider-Verse

Webs Are Flowing
Out Like Endless
Rain Into A Paper Cup

Spider-Man -
Across The Spider-Verse
Directed by Joaquim Dos Santos,
Kemp Powers & Justin K. Thompson
USA  2023 Sony/Marvel
UK cinema release print

Warning: Yep, there will be plenty of spoilers here.

Spider-Man - Across The Spider-Verse is the direct sequel to Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse (reviewed here) and has been made back to back with its sequel, Spider-Man - Beyond The Spider-Verse, which comes out in cinemas this coming March 2024. So, yeah, if you’re expecting this one to end with an unresolved story plus a cliffhanger, you’d be absolutely right. In fact, don’t even bother sitting through the end credits on this one because, surprisingly, this one has no mid or post-credits scenes on it.

Now, I quite liked the first Spider-Verse movie, even though I had no idea who this Miles Morales was and, yeah, it took me by surprise. This second one also managed to take me by surprise because, after the densely packed previous installment, I really didn’t expect this one to be much more than a disappointing repeat of the first one at best. Well, I was completely wrong because... and I don’t often say this or take this kind of statement about new movies all that kindly or credibly but... this one is at least as good as the first movie, if not better.

The story on this one follows on from the post credits sequence of the last one, where Spider-Man 2099 (played here by Oscar Isaac) seems to be monitoring the state of the multiverse. However, Miles Morales (played by Shameik Moore), it turns out, is not even supposed to be the Spider-Man for his version of reality because, as it turns out, the spider that bit him in the first movie was actually from another dimension and this, plus a couple of other things happening, including a hilarious new villain called The Spot, have set up the interconnecting universes on a crash collision and, long story short, Miles father has to die to avoid a catastrophic incident. Cue many, many different multidimensional incarnations of Spider-Man trying to stop Miles from returning to his own dimension to save his dad from imminent destruction.

The film looks great, employing different animation styles and colour palettes throughout. It also has a superb voice cast including Hailee Steinfeld returning as Gwen Stacey, aka Spider-Gwen and various other actors, sometimes returning from other related Marvel movies. Such as J K Simmons once again returning briefly as J Jonah Jameson and, in a wonderful live action moment, Peggy Lu reprising her Mrs. Chen role from the two Venom movies. Biggest shout out, though, goes to the superb performance put in by Daniel Kaluuya as the British Spider-Punk. And, of course, all these wonderful performances wouldn’t be possible without the brilliant writers who make both the dialogue and story superb. Note to Hollywood... pay the damn writers who are, at time of writing, on strike. Get your priorities right here!

Now, I heard a review of the film which pointed out that there was a lot of stuff being thrown at the audience all at once but, underneath all that visual chaos, the film has a warm, beating heart which enables you to care about the main protagonists. I’d say yes to the second point but, honestly, this one didn’t hit me as much of an information overload of a spectacle as the first. There are a lot of visual and audio jokes for sure but I think I caught most of them and this one seemed, if anything, to make a lot more sense than I thought it would. To the extent that the big twist reveal near the end of the movie, such as it was, came as no surprise to me by that point in the story.

However, it was a logical story beat so it didn’t disappoint me as such and, that particular villain reveal aside, I also loved that another villainish character in this movie is as much one of the heroes as he is a villain. But his complex psychological needs to ‘parent’ what’s going on in the Spider-Verse kinda turns him into a villain too.

The film would be nothing, of course, without Daniel Pemberton’s follow up score to his wonderful job in the first movie and I am keeping my fingers crossed that some company will release this one on a proper CD at some point and, not just stick with a useless electronic download of the score.

And I think that’s me pretty much done with Spider-Man - Across The Spider-Verse. I absolutely expected it to be, well, not that great but, I absolutely loved it and will be first in line when the third movie comes out early next year. Would recommend this to anyone who loves the various Marvel characters and a script that doesn’t take itself too seriously. Good stuff.

Nope

Nope Way Out

Nope
USA/Japan/Canada 2022
Directed by Jordan Peel
Universal Pictures

Warning: Ever so slight spoilers.

Regular readers of my blog may remember that I’ve not been that impressed with the cinematic CV of Jordan Peel so far, at least in terms of his big hit Get Out (reviewed here) and his admittedly better follow up movie Us (reviewed here). It has to be said that both movies I mentioned here are very well put together and have some great performances in them... they just didn’t happen to do much for me, for the most part (although I thought the music in Us was pretty good). With Nope, well, since UFOs and aliens are something of a trigger for me, I was kinda hoping to say that I’ve finally seen a Jordan Peel movie that I really liked but... nope.

That being said, it’s quite entertaining, telling the story of a family of Hollywood ranchers, brother and sister, who fall on hard times after their father is killed by falling debris, his head penetrated by a falling coin near the start of the movie. The surviving family are brother and sister OJ (who tends to wear orange clothing throughout the film... like Orange Juice I guess), played by the always watchable Daniel Kaluuya and his sister Emerald (more often than not dressed in green), played by Keke Palmer. The family are said to be descended from the jockey who rode a horse photographed by Muybridge, doing his thing to study movement (and to win a bet), way back when.

Also thrown into the mix are the successful proprietor of a nearby ranch called Jupe (played by Steven Yeun), a local electronics store employee called Angel (played by Brandon Perea) and an old school Hollywood director of photography called Antlers Holst (played by Michael Wincott) who, armed with his hand cranked camera, fulfils an important plot point at a certain part of the film. The story involves a UFO or, something like it, which has been ‘stealing’ horses on the ranch. One of the things I did like about the main characters is, instead of them trying to work out how to make contact or react in awe and wonder etc, they just want to be the first to properly photograph it so that they can gain money and fame from getting a clean shot of the thing. The stakes are upped once they know just what they are dealing with, following a certain event which takes place just under an hour from the end of the movie.

And, yeah, like Peel’s other movies, it’s well shot, flows together nicely, has some great performances but, for me, it just didn’t feel that engaging (although I loved the old Hollywood stuff and the parody old style cowboy music used for some sections). One of the problems for me, though, was with certain story points. The film makes a point about building up Jupe’s character for instance, with a real humdinger of a back story from when he was the child star of a hit TV show as a kid. But, although there may have been some metaphor involved in its inclusion, I couldn’t really make out why we were delving into his back story, especially when it’s made clear (again, just under an hour before the end of the story) that his character isn’t as significant as we once thought. I just couldn’t see the point of it. Now, I’m no fan of the Chekhov’s Gun principle of writing, where everything has to mean something or connect the dots but, I did feel that since we were asked to observe the background of an incident involving this character multiple times and fairly in depth, that it might have had more of an impact on the story, maybe?

Also, the threat which the main protagonists are facing and the way in which they try to deal with it... didn’t make a heck of a lot of sense to me. I’m guessing you need to know more about how to tame a horse or break it in (trying not to give too much away here) but, yeah, I didn’t really know what was going on after a certain point, it has to be said.

But, I did have a certain amount of fun with it and I certainly found the film somewhat interesting and entertaining so, yeah, it kept me quiet for a couple of hours, I guess. Nope was a minor movie for me and certainly not Peel’s best of the few I’ve seen but it is quite watchable and I’m sure some people will love it. Not my cup of tea but I’m still looking forward to the day when Jordan Peel manages to totally blow me away. He’s bound to do this at some point, surely... I live in hope, not nope.

Black Panther

Wakanda Man Is He?

Black Panther
2018 USA Directed by Ryan Coogler
UK cinema release print.

Black Panther is the latest in the chain-linked Marvel Cinematic Universe movies which have set modern cinematic trends on fire since the debut of the first Iron Man film. It carries on directly from story and character elements set up in both Avengers - Age Of Ultron (reviewed here) and Captain America - Civil War (reviewed here).

Now, I’m not a big Black Panther comic book fan, truth be told. I remember I used to draw him occasionally as a kid (like most of the Marvel and DC superheroes) but I never really had any of his stand alone appearances... just the odd appearance in a hardback UK british Marvel annual or Marvel Treasury edition guesting in other heroes' stories. So, in terms of the comic book roots for this film, I can’t really talk with any authority.

I do, however, remember Klaw (aka Ulysses Klau) and was really stoked when he turned up in Age Of Ultron, portrayed by Andy Serkis, because I wanted to see him in the colourful costume and with the ‘sonic claw’ he used to wear on his arm. Alas, my biggest disappointment with this movie is that, although Serkis once again shows up to do the honours, I felt he was a really under utilised character and, alas, doesn’t have either the costume or that big metal stump  with the sonic antenna sticking out of it... which is a shame. I had further disappointment with this character’s arc here too... used as a bit of a plot point rather than a character in his own right... but I can’t say too much here because I want this review to be spoiler free.

As it happens though, in spite of this, Black Panther is actually pretty good and certainly holds its own with a fair amount of the MCU movies over the years. And in terms of art direction... well in that respect it’s probably the best of the current Marvel movies... at least in a visual sense.

The film has good performances all around and that helps a lot for a movie with not many ties to the other films being present in the flesh, so to speak. Chadwick Boseman really seems to have grown into the role fairly quickly and he has some of the humour which the character was missing in Captain America - Civil War. Which is not surprising since his involvement in that movie came from his reaction to the death of his father. Martin Freeman returns here too, as the CIA agent he played in Civil War and he is also a heck of a lot more palatable this time around with him taking a more heroic role... though having an American accent coming out of his mouth is still just plain wrong and sounds quite terrible. Lupita Lupita Nyong'o, Letitia Wright, Angela Bassett, Daniel Kaluuya and Forest Whitaker are all, as expected, strong in their varies supporting roles and, I have to say, Michael B. Jordan as the villanous Killmonger is quite striking, both in presence and appearance here.

Okay. So there’s a lot of good stuff here with an almost ‘international espionage’ tone to some of the scenes (my favourite part of the movie was the ‘incident’ set in a casino in Busan) and the action is as competently handled as well as it is in all the other Marvel movies of recent years. That being said, in a movie which is pretty entertaining a lot of the time, I did have a few little grumbles with it.

Okay, so my main problem was that it was quite repetitive all the way through. You have three (technically) combat challenge scenes, three spirit journey scenes and the whole thing kept feeling like... "Didn’t I see this stuff enough earlier in the movie?" I take the point that most Marvel movies like this are somewhat formulaic in that they are ‘battle - pause - battle - pause - battle - pause’ movies but I just felt the types of situations which presented these conflicts could have been a little more varied in the execution. This is maybe, partially, due to the fact that the film doesn’t ‘globe hop’ as much as some of the others (most of it is set in the fictional country of Wakanda) and... I dunno... it just got a bit ‘samey’ after a while.

The only other problem I have with it is in the continuity of the Black Panther character in relation to his other appearance. We saw in Captain America - Civil War how he failed to stop the murder of his father and then took over the mantle of Black Panther. However, it turns out he doesn’t get his ‘panther powers’ bestowed on him - by the ingestion of a specific herb - until this part of the story, set after those events from the former film. So are we saying the version of the character in that one was not operating at optimum strength? Especially when, to be honest, I couldn’t see much (if any) difference between that version of the character and this one? I either didn’t understand something or there was some sloppy writing in here. Not sure which, to be honest.

These are all fairly minor grumbles though and there’s a lot of good stuff to make up for it.

I said the film has the best art direction of any of the MCU films to date and the colours utilised throughout are fantastic. I loved the clashes of the red costumes of the king’s personal guard against the various sets/locations and there are some amazing, probably artifically enhanced, skies in this film. It’s really nice to look at and marks this director out as someone to watch, I think.

It also has a really nice score by Ludwig Göransson but I’m really unhappy that, just like another MCU film Guardians Of The Galaxy 2 (reviewed here), the powers that be have not seen fit to issue a CD release of this one... instead going down the incredibly stupid ‘download’ route. Way to exclude the soundtrack listeners who wanted to purchase this thing people! This practice should be outlawed.

So there you have it. A pretty cool film. I don’t think it deserves all the unbelievable hype it seems to be getting and, frankly, it’s no Wonder Woman (reviewed here) but it is a pretty good entry in the series and it certainly doesn’t let the other movies down... although I didn’t like it as much as some of the others from the last couple of years of the ongoing saga, truth be told. It does have a certain power though and brings, again, a slightly different feel to the Marvel Cinematic Universe which will be useful in future crossovers... the next one being the big Avengers - Infinity War film in two months time. With regards to that, this film has two post credits scenes... one in the middle and one right at the end so, you know, you might want to stick around for those two. A certain character makes an appearance in the second of these who I was expecting to turn up in the main body of the movie properly and lend a hand, given the set up in a previous film but... oh well, at least he’s in here.

If you are a lover of the Marvel superhero movies then Black Panther is a little different and definitely one to have a look at... especially if you want to know what’s going on for the next one. Definitely give this one a go if this is your thing. A solid entry in the ongoing Marvel juggernaut.

Get Out

Sunken Do Nots

Get Out
USA 2017
Directed by Jordan Peele
UK cinema release print.

Warning: Right from the outset, there will be spoilers here.
If you want to see this movie then don’t be reading this review.

I will kinda half apologise right now because I know a lot of people really like this movie but... I wish I could’ve had a heads up and 'gotten out' of seeing Get Out when I had the chance.

The warning signs were clearly on the trailer. It looked like a truly obvious plot set up hiding no real surprises and I didn’t totally buy into the ‘happy couple’ of the trailer either... something definitely wasn’t as simplistic about that relationship as one of the characters obviously thought it was. In short, it looked like a truly forgettable attempt at a thriller with a possible racist bent and not something I would ever really need to see.

But then, much to my amazement, it started getting some truly great word of mouth on twitter and the like, the week before its UK debut. People and, even some organisations I trusted, were touting this as a modern day classic. Not only that... they were touting it as a classic ‘horror movie’. Really, did I miss something in the trailer which tagged it as a horror movie? Couldn’t see any non-human monsters or supernatural elements in there but if people were saying this was so and being as enthusiastic as they were then... maybe this one was worth checking out after all.

So I did and then, rather than write the review up as soon as I got home from the cinema, I put a good night’s sleep between the computer keyboard and me as that was my review equivalent of counting to ten to calm down because, frankly, I came out of that movie so angry at having such a non-film inflicted on me that I didn’t want to say things I’d regret in the heat of anger. So hopefully my enraged rant is somewhat tempered as I write this the next morning.

Lets get the good stuff out of the way first.

Get Out is nice to look at and is edited in such a way that it all manages to hold together... except in the case of one ‘what the heck, that’s not possible’ moment and I’ll detail that in a while. The main male lead Chris, played by Daniel Kaluuya, is really good in this and one of the few good things about the script is that he’s painted as a really smart and confident character who, frankly, you would want to go to the pub and hang out with. It’s a great performance and it feels a little wasted in this movie, to be honest. We also have Catherine Keener playing the mother of Chris’ current girlfriend Rose, played by Allison Williams. Keener is always a great performer to watch and, along with Kaluuya, is one of the few people in this movie who aren’t playing it way over the top. Which is more than I can say for the guy playing the father, who came off as channelling Bill Murray's character in Wes Anderson’s The Royal Tenenbaums, it seemed to me. The last guy who is really terrific in this movie is Caleb Landry Jones, an actor I’ve come to admire over the years. I first saw him playing a villainous brother in The Last Exorcism (reviewed here). After a while I noticed him cropping up as a more pleasant and even heroic figure in films such as X-Men First Class, where he plays Banshee (reviewed here) and the incredible Byzantium (which I reviewed here). Alas, he’s back to playing a villainous brother again here and I really hope he doesn’t get typecast in this kind of role because, if he’s not careful, he’s going to end up as the Brad Dourif of his generation and that would be a shame.

That’s pretty much it for the good stuff, I’m afraid. The score is kinda nice but I don’t understand why it’s being singled out by people and, well, it’s not out on CD as far as I can tell, only download, so it’s not like I’ll get the opportunity to hear it away from the movie myself. It was nice to hear Flanagan and Allen performing Run Rabbit Run again on the soundtrack though.

Okay, the bad stuff.

Did I mention it’s really obvious? I’d picked up on all the main, so called ‘twists’ during the first watch of the trailer, including the stuff about Chris’ girlfriend which supposedly ‘comes to light’ two thirds of the way through the movie but which, in fact, is pretty much telegraphed right from the get go. I hate figuring out films ahead of time and maybe it’s because I’ve seen a fair few of them that it’s hard to surprise me but this one is truly not a plot you would need to understand rocket science for, people.

Another thing... this is in no way, shape or form a ‘horror movie’. It’s not even an American slasher. It’s squarely attempting to be a thriller and, if you want to get really technical, I’ll acknowledge that there’s a very soft science fiction tinge to the story, if you want to see it that way. I don’t know why people would buy into the idea this is a horror movie but I can only assume the kinds of people seeing this have no idea what a horror film even looks like. Also, the people loving this movie (and it’s good that they do, actually, because that means cinema is not dead and some of them will go on to perpetuate the industry/art form when they go to work, one would hope) must all be really young and naive cinema goers who don’t have that many films under their belts because, seriously? They didn’t see any of this stuff coming after the first ten minutes of the movie?

There was one thing I even saw coming even though it made ‘absolutely no sense’ for it to be happening. In order to stop himself being triggered by a certain sound which puts him back into a hypnotic trance (the sunken place), Chris, who is strapped down tightly in a chair, realises that the upholstery he has been picking at with his fingers contains cotton padding inside and it’s something that he can stuff his ears with. Which he promptly does? Um... what? So he manages, somehow, to unpick the big straps that have his hands trapped, which he’s already demonstrated is impossible, stuff his ears up and then, even more of a stretch, somehow replace these straps and make them look untampered with? I can only assume that a crucial sequence explaining just how this would have been possible was excised from the movie at some point because, frankly, this completely throws any semblance of credibility the movie was going for at this point. Absolutely no way that happens people!

That’s not all, either. After our hero successfully uses the cotton wool to block his ears at a key point and is looking to make his escape from hostile territory with similar dangers... he throws the cotton wool away! Really? You would throw your one chance at protection from this problem away before you’ve made it to freedom? I think not. This is a serious weakness in the movie and I really can’t think of a way of justifying this kind of plotting, to be honest. This isn’t just ‘not turning a light on in a scary movie’ levels of wrongheadedness... this is completely crazy. 

And I’m racking my brains to say anything else of any interest about Get Out here but I think I’m done. It’s a shame that such fine actors and a quite competent director have collaborated on a story which feels like it comes straight out of 1950s short stories and would make one of the less interesting episodes of The Twilight Zone but I equally can’t blame them because, well, sometimes things look a little rosier on the page than they turn out on the screen. I’m really glad, in some ways, that the film is doing well for them because then, at least, they’re getting something back from it. I just hope it doesn’t usher in a new golden age of truly dumbed down stories that insult the collective intelligence of the audiences like this one does, though, because that’s always a possibility when something like this is a hit. I just hope that next time I trust my gut instincts on the trailer and work out which films to let pass me by. We shall see. I’m not a fast learner.