Last Night (2010)

Why there's a six-month delay in the film being released over here, I don't quite understand, but I'm very excited about the release of Last Night next month. Normally, I'd avoid movies about cheating like the plague (seriously, it's been done!), but with the amazing mix of accents in this trailer, I can't wait.

In recent years, probably since Atonement, I've become quite a fan of Keira Knightley's. Although I think she could do with doing less advertisements, she's picked some amazing films to star in; The Edge of Love being my favourite, and Never Let Me Go as another film on my most-looking-forward-to-in-2011-list.

Reviews so far have been pretty decent for Last Night and even if I can't judge the content yet, the film gets major props from me for allowing the actors to keep their natural accents. It's strange to me how New York is always portrayed in films to be such a melting pot, yet all too often non-American actors are forced to adopt some peculiar overly-unoffensive American accent for their adventures across the pond.



PS: Yay, Guillaume Canet!

Looks of Love: If....

When a film deals with a harrowing subject matter like Lindsay Anderson's If.... does (fagging in British all-boys' public schools), it quite easily gets monotonous. Recently I saw Another Country which is quite like If...., although in Another Country Rupert Everett ends up a Cold War Russian spy, when in If.... Malcolm McDowell deals with his frustrations with some good old ultra-violence.

Another Country lacked many of the things that made If.... so great; it might have been the fact that it was a play brought to screen (I'm beginning to think that's just never a good idea), but it felt so uninspired. Films with younger actors always excite me because anything seems possible, but where If.... still feels fresh and original after 42 years, Another Country was dull and traditional.

There's many moments that stick out when I think of If....: the ending of course, the scene where Mick Travis shoots a gun at pictures on his walls (perfectly aiming for Audrey Hepburn, which infuriated her husband Mel Ferrer when the film came out), the infamous "dance" with The Girl.. but my absolute favourite is the scene where Bobby Phillips falls in love with Wallace.








It's such a simple scene and the contrast between this scene and the rest of the film couldn't be bigger. Just the amount of shouting and noise early on, and the quiet and concentration two minutes in.. amazing.

Favourite Characters: An Education

The funny thing about An Education was that I loved the film, but rather disliked the two main characters. Jenny was too up herself and David.. well, he was just a total creeper, wasn't he? What made me love the film were the supporting characters. The overbearing but well-meaning Dad, giddy schoolgirls living vicariously through their best friend and mainly, the characters played by Olivia Williams and Rosamund Pike.


I've always really looked up to my teachers and appreciated them. There's two teachers especially that inspired me in that sappy Dead Poets Society-kind of way, and I recognised a lot of them in Miss Stubbs' character, even though one was a dude.

Miss Stubbs was such a well-rounded character, her character showed through in a lot of seemingly throw-away lines and actions. The way she refused Jenny's gift from Paris was heart-breaking because Olivia Williams makes it seem like Miss Stubbs would love a bottle of Chanel perfume but she can't accept it because she wants Jenny to know she doesn't approve of her throwing away all of her potential for a man. Then, later on when Jenny needs her help, she's there with a "I don't need to tell you 'I told you so', do I?"-type attitude that is just perfect for her character and that particular situation. It's kind of refreshing -- in other films these characters are so quick to forget everything and come a-running, it's like they instantly lose all the dimension they had. I like that Miss Stubbs has some principals.

Also, the best line in the movie is delivered by Miss Stubbs when Jenny comes to visit her at home.

"This is lovely. All your books and pictures."
"Paperbacks and postcards, Jenny."

Another character I loved, was Rosamund Pike's Helen. Pike is a highlight in every film I've seen of hers, but Helen is one of the first characters with real depth I've seen her play. As the girlfriend of David's partner in crime (quite literally), Helen is in charge of Jenny's transformation, looks-wise, into a young woman. She takes Jenny under her wing and is genuinely nice to her from the moment they're first lumped together as the men go off to do business. She's a bit ditzy and probably not too well-informed in terms of culture, and her ignorance is a bit of a joke to the others.

At no point does Helen become a person to pity. You feel for her, but she still has so much going for her. I think that's why I disliked Jenny as a character because, as I saw it, she feels superior to Helen because Helen isn't as smart as Jenny (and the men make jokes about that), but still, besides being utterly beautiful, Helen has a kind of elegance, kindness and charm that people can't learn: you either have it or you don't. While beauty might fade, that elegance and grace that Helen has.. I don't know, in Helen's life that might just be as important as Jenny's intelligence is in Jenny's life.