Directed by Valerie Faris and Jonathan Dayton (Little Miss Sunshine, Ruby Sparks), from a script by Simon Beaufoy (The Full Monty, Slumdog Millionaire), Battle Of The Sexes tells the real-life story of the 1973 tennis match between women's champion Billie Jean King and former men's champion Bobby Riggs.
Emma Stone is superb as Billie Jean King. King was a pioneer in womens' tennis, a fierce campaigner for equal pay and equal rights in a time when female tennis players would make around an eighth of what the male players would make. Stone captures King's passion and fire, but also explores her more vulnerable side as the film also focuses on King's personal life. Whilst married, King started a relationship with hairdresser Marilyn Barnett (King came out in the 1980s when her relationship with Barnett ended somewhat acrimoniously, and she now lives with her partner of 30 years, her former doubles partner Ilana Kloss.) Stone manages to convey King's tension of wanting to indulge her true feelings balanced against the demands of the sport (and the expectations of her family) nicely. Her relationship with Marilyn isn't sensationalised at all, and is presented very matter-of-factly. Stone truly dsappears into the role and it's a truly impressive performance.
I will be honest, I've never really taken to Steve Carell as an actor but- after brilliant performances in Foxcatcher and The Big Short- I'm coming round to him. He is pitch-perfect as Riggs, a larger-than-life hustler and showman, a compulsive gambler whose addiction strains his marriage. In the run-up to the match, he plays on the 'male chauvinist pig' persona and doesn't train- assuming that he'll steamroller King. There's something undeniably likeable about Carell's Riggs even though the position he takes on womens' tennis is unlikeable. But, as with Stone, Carell also shows the pathos as his relationship with wife Priscilla strains. A fine performance.
The supporting performances are similarly strong: Sarah Silverman (another actress that I'm not massively fussed on) is great as the snarky Gladys Heldman, the founder of World Tennis Magazine who helped King start her own tour when she boycotted the LTA tournaments. Andrea Riseborough gives a spirited performance as Marilyn Barnett, whilst there's a great supporting turn by Austin Stowell as Larry King (Billie Jean's husband). Elisabeth Shue puts in a dignified and stoic turn as Riggs' wife Priscilla, in love with her husband but unable to cope with his gambling. Alan Cumming is great as the waspish fashion designer Ted Tinling (although some of his advice to Billie Jean re: her sexuality seems a little contrived and he has a very affected accent which is a little distracting). Bill Pullman puts in a strong turn as boorish tennis promoter Jack Kramer, butting heads with Billie Jean throughout.
As a secondary antagonist in the story, Jessica McNamee provides a certain amount of venom as Australian tennis player Margaret Court. When Court beat King early in 1973 and became the top female player in the world, Riggs challenged her to a match- and promptly annihilated her in less than an hour. There's the suggestion also that, aside from professional rivalry, Court knew about and disapproved of King's sexuality- there's a pointed comment made about 'licentiousness and sin' in all-womens' tours (in real life, Margaret Court has been a longtime opponent to LGBT rights and made several negative statements during the recent Australian vote on same-sex marriage, so it's not entirely certain whether Beaufoy has just retrofitted Court's current position to the original time or whether she was always such a raging homophobe).
Battle Of The Sexes is a well-balanced film and it's damn well entertaining. If you're not a tennis fan, you don't need to stay away; what I know about tennis could go on the back of a stamp but I found the humour and the drama engaging and the performances exciting.
Rating: 4 out of 5
Tez
You'd never really peg Communism as a source of comedy, would you? When trailers for The Death Of Stalin came out, I really didn't know what to make of it. Is it a piss-take in the vein of Churchill: The Hollywood Years (complete with inaccurate accents)? A revisionist piece of history? A broad farce? But then I saw who it was directed by: Armando Iannucci. The driving force behind The Thick Of It and big screen version In The Loop, and the US sitcom Veep. A man to whom scabrous political satire is practically second nature. As a massive Thick Of It fan, I decided to give it a go. I wasn't disappointed.
Based on a French comic book by Fabien Nury and Thierry Robin, The Death Of Stalin follows the last days of the Soviet leader's life and the mayhem that ensued after his death, as various factions within the ruling Politburo jockey for position in the brave new world to come by scheming, plotting and conspiring against one another. These include chief of security Lavrentiy Beria (Simon Russell Beale), acting premier Georgy Malenkov (Jeffrey Tambor) and secretary Nikita Khrushchev (Steve Buscemi).
The film doesn't shy away from the fact that Stalin's regime was a brutal dictatorship where everyone was at the whim of a raging madman; an early scene, where Stalin demands a recording of a radio broadcast which wasn't made, sees the stage manager (Paddy Considine) frantically trying to get people back in their seats for the concerto to be played again. It's a moment of pure farce, but underlies the message. Similarly, when the decision to allow the trains to run again so people can come and see Stalin lying in state ends in tragedy, the film doesn't gloss over it. You may think that such disparate elements wouldn't work to form a cohesive hole but, for me, it did. The comedy was much needed to lift these darker moments.
Cast-wise, it's incredibly strong with Simon Russell Beale impressing as the ambitious and sadistic Beria. Buscemi brings his trademark fast-talking wise-guy schtik to Khrushchev to great effect, whilst Tambor is great as the sad-sack and easily swayed Malenkov. Andrea Riseborough gives a wonderful performance as Stalin's daughter Svetlana whilst Rupert Friend is a hoot as Stalin's drunkard son Vasily. There's good support too by Paul Whitehouse as Politburo member Anastas Mikoyan and Michael Palin as Vyacheslav Molotov. Perhaps the funniest performance comes from Jason Isaacs as Red Army chief Georgy Zhukov, complete with broad Yorkshire accent and a take-no-prisoners attitude. Zhukov's support for Khrushchev proves vital in securing Khrushchev's ascendancy- and seals Beria's fate.
Everyone keeps their own accents, so there are no excruciating faux-Russian accents flying round. This might take a while to get used to, but it doesn't take long. You don't particularly need to know anything specific about Russian history to enjoy the film; everything you need to know is explained. The humour is dark, caustic, and bloody funny. Fans of Iannucci will know what to expect: toe-curling political incompetence, the occasional f-bomb, inordinate amounts of arse-covering, and some exquisitely baroque insults.
I was pleasantly surprised by how funny and how well made The Death Of Stalin is. Definitely one to give a go.
Rating: 4 out of 5
Tez
Riggan Thomson used to be in pictures. He used to be big. He used to be Birdman. Wanting to reinvent himself, Riggan writes, directs and stars in a Broadway show based on the Raymond Carver story 'What We Talk About When We Talk About Love'. However, he has to deal with volatile actors, ex- and current lovers and his fractious relationship with his daughter as the clock counts down to opening night.
I've been divided over Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu's previous films. Despite the rather heavy philosophical air of the piece, 21 Grams had some brilliant performances, but I found Babel an indulgent and utterly pretentious mess. I wasn't sure what to expect from Birdman, but luckily Inarritu has mostly reined in the indulgence (a few bizarre moments of whimsy notwithstanding) and has crafted a hyper-real character piece which is absorbing to watch.
Michael Keaton gives a career-best performance as Riggan. Struggling with his various crises, whilst being pursued by the inner voice of Birdman deriding his current choices, Keaton is excellent. Riggan could have been an overindulged child, a pretentious auteur whose neuroses run puddle-deep, but Keaton gives the character gravitas and a certain amount of dignity (even when running through Times Square in just his underwear at one point).
Edward Norton is great as temperamental method actor Mike Shiner, who comes into Riggan's play as a last-minute replacement and shakes things up. He's an insufferable asshole on occasions, but Norton riffs on it (along with his own reputation of being 'difficult') to great effect. Emma Stone is similarly great as Riggan's daughter Sam, a recovering addict who acts as her father's assistant. She gets some lovely scenes with Norton as a nascent relationship between Mike and Sam forms, and gets a brilliant moment when, in a rage, she tells Riggan he doesn't matter. Stone really sells the anger and the pent-up fury of that moment and it doesn't feel fake.
Amy Ryan adds a dose of calm reality to proceedings as Riggan's ex-wife Sylvia, appearing in a couple of key scenes (most notably when she reminds him he's 'not Farrah Fawcett'). Naomi Watts' performance is great as an actress ready to make her Broadway debut yet nervous of it at the same time. She has a particularly great scene with Andrea Riseborough (who plays Riggan's current girlfriend) in which one of the funnies lines of the film is given. Lindsay Duncan gives a nice supporting turn as influential theatre critic Tabitha Dickinson, who threatens to bury Riggan's play with a bad review. There's a surprisingly dramatic turn by Zach Galifianakis, proving he can do so much more than his Hangover persona, as Riggan's lawyer Jake, desperately trying to keep everything from falling to pieces.
The way the film is shot is particularly good and credit must go to Inarritu and his cinematographer, the brilliant Emmanuel Lubezki, for that. The play is mostly set within the labyrinthine corridors of the St James Theatre (with occasional excursions outside the theatre and onto the street) and there's some very clever camera trickery at work to make it look as if the film was shot in one continuous take. The camera follows characters into dressing rooms then follows another one out of it. It looks good and really maintains the flow of the piece.
The script takes potshots at the current vogue for superhero movies which is a bit of an easy target, but there's something quite satisfying about having an actor who did comicbook movies before they were de rigeur criticising it. The casting of Keaton, Norton and Stone (aka Bruce Wayne/Batman, Bruce Banner/The Incredible Hulk and Gwen Stacy) adds an extra level. It does make it all a bit meta, but it's enjoyable enough.
It's got a strong script, great performances to a man and cleverly shot. So why am I not shouting from the rafters? My main problem with the film is the ending. It's difficult to discuss without spoiling things, so all I'll say is this. The ending is ambiguous but it just seems done for the sake of it. No doubt there will be people ready to queue up and say I've either missed the entire point of the film or that I've wilfully misunderstood the director's intentions... if that's the case, so be it, but I judge what I see on the screen and how it makes me feel and the ending of Birdman left me cold and disconnected.
If the film had stopped just a few minutes earlier, it would have got a 5-star review. But the very end of the film just feels ambiguous for ambiguity's sake and undermined the sterling work of the previous two hours. Still very much worth seeing, though, but a disappointment.
Rating: 4 out of 5
Tez
