BRAD ASTRA

MOVIE
Ad Astra
Brad Pitt, Tommy Lee Jones
Director James Gray
Review Ray Chan

THIS is not merely a movie in which Brad Pitt is the lead - it's virtually the Brad Pitt show from start to end. He’s featured in just about every scene and gets most of the dialogue, delivered in a curious whispery monotone that apparently reflects what a cool, composed guy he is.
    The actor – whose star (pun intended) seems to be ascending again after his role in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood - plays Major Roy McBride, an astronaut extraordinaire who is so good at everything he can probably pilot a space craft blindfolded while juggling balls in anti-gravity. Which is pretty close to what he ends up doing in the film.
    Sombre, pensive and thoughtful, Roy has a pulse rate that never goes above 70 beats per minute, not even in the opening sequence when he’s knocked off a vertiginous sky-high antenna by a mysterious power surge and plummets to Earth.
    Later, after Roy survives the plunge in best James Bond fashion, it’s revealed to him that the waves of energy – which have caused the loss of more than 40,000 lives across Earth – were likely caused by cosmic rays emanating from Neptune, specifically an exploratory station run by Roy’s long-lost father and decorated pioneer H. Clifford McBride (Tommy Lee Jones), whose original mission was to seek out new life and civilisations and literally go where no man has gone before.
    Officials believe that he is alive, gone rogue, and causing the power bursts, and so assign his son to locate him by traveling ad astra: “to the stars”.
    Roy is at first reticent because of abandonment issues, but he learns to overcome his fears as he traverses the solar system to find his father, opening up ever so slightly into his persona with each new person he encounters.
    The story is set in the “near future”, when travel to the moon and Mars from Earth is commonplace, and evidently the journey to the far reaches of the Milky Way only takes a few weeks.
    To get to the Mars launch pad from where his vessel will take him to Neptune, Roy takes a commercial trip to the moon, flight stewardesses and all, where he will transit to a ship bound for the red planet.
    But the route there is across hostile territory, and Roy’s ATV is attacked by resource pirates who have built a base on the colonised satellite.
    The ensuing chase and action scenes are well-staged, particularly when his dune buggy careens into an open crater and takes an eternity to spiral down to the bottom, thanks to the lower gravity.
    This sequence, together with a later incident in which Roy helps to rescue a stranded craft, only to confront a hostile cargo of experimental subjects gone wild, get the first half of the movie off to a rollicking start, but from there, the tone shifts to a less frenetic pace as we follow our hero across the dark emptiness of space.
    Suffice it to say he ends up travelling to Neptune all by himself, eventually confronting his father, who sheds not an ounce of emotion at the reunion.
    Metaphorically, the message seems to be that the farther Roy moves away from life, the more desolate he becomes, with the people he loves, such as his long-suffering wife, quickly moving out of his orbit, just like he escapes Neptune’s.
    There’s hardly any sign of any sort of bonding between the two McBrides, which seems to be somewhat of an anticlimax given that most of the movie’s running time has been used up getting to this point.
    Roy convinces his old man to return to Earth, but as they begin the spacewalk to the ship, McBride Snr begs for the safety tether connecting the two men to be severed, no doubt symbolising the cutting of the umbilical cord which kept any semblance of a relationship between them alive.
    Watching the movie on a big screen is wonderful though, as the cinematography and effects are brilliant, taking viewers on a stunning visual tour of the planets, stars, rings, comets and assorted celestial bodies in between.
    Unfortunately, the spectacle doesn't translate as well to the storyline. If you’re looking for a big emotional payoff, well, you might find a bit of a black hole instead.

#adastra #kinnandco

SAD CLOWN FACE

MOVIE
IT: Chapter Two
Jessica Chastain, James McAvoy
Director Andrew Muschietti
Review Ray Chan

Writer Stephen King makes a cameo here, as he so often does in movie adaptations of his stories.

    Playing an antique shop owner, he turns down an offer by now grown-up and well-known author Bill Denbrough (James McAvoy) to autograph one of his own books, pointing out that he didn’t like the ending.
    It’s also part of a running gag employed throughout in which Bill can’t seem to come up with satisfactory conclusions to his novels, a common criticism of King’s own efforts.
    The comment seems an intentional reference from King as to how he expects audiences to react, but there’s certainly a degree of accuracy about it, summarising as it does the feelings of many viewers who have to endure almost three hours of a film that doesn’t really solve the riddle of who or what the titular clownish monster is.
    Do you need to have watched the first instalment to understand Chapter Two? You probably do, for despite the many recaps that are shown, it’s still hard going for a newcomer to catch up with what has gone before.
    In short, the movie occurs 27 years after seven kids who call themselves the Losers Club banded together in the small Maine town of Derry in 1989, to defeat an evil supernatural force named Pennywise (Bill Skarsgård), which primarily takes the form of a pernicious Punchinello and gobbles up small children.
    The story opens with an uncomfortably prolonged sequence focusing on a brutal hate crime that goes unpunished, setting off a chain of events leading to the reappearance of Pennywise, ready to again feed his blood lust after almost three decades' absence.
    Of the original club, only Mike Hanlon (Isaiah Mustafa) has remained in the town, precisely because he anticipated the creepy clown’s return, and who – with Pennywise now having announced his return – calls on his former childhood friends to return home to battle this evil anew.
    As well as leader Bill, each of the Losers is apparently a winner in life: Beverly Marsh (Jessica Chastain) is a fashion designer; Ben Hanscom (played by Kiwi Jay Ryan) an architect, who has shed his baby fat for washboard abs; Richie Tozier (Bill Hader) a stand-up comedian; Eddie Kaspbrak (James Ransone) a risk analyst; and Stanley Uris (Andy Bean) is fabulously wealthy.
    All but one of them make it back to Derry, with their reunion triggering a return of the memories they had long suppressed.
    Mike, who has done some research involving Indian shamans, reveals to his peers that he knows how exactly Pennywise can be killed, but not before they must all confront their own past experiences with the horrific harlequin.
    The movie is replete with digital effects that show off scores of monstrous beings of various shapes and sizes, but audiences these days are so indifferent to such overkill that the only truly frightening effects are realised through well-placed jump scares.
    In fact, in the attempt to bedazzle the viewer, this sequel misses out on the nuances and finer details, in particular the symbolism and character development that made the first chapter ultimately a more well-rounded product.
    Despite seeming to run on interminably, none of those extraneous minutes are employed in the service of themes such as the power of friendship, reconciling with the past, and, at the heart of the narrative, standing up to one’s fears and phobias.
    The movie is not a full-on disappointment, but the talents of such a stellar cast seems wasted in a production that's more a case of the flesh being willing whilst the spirit is weak. Send in the frowns.

#ittheend #itchaptertwo #buzzmarketing#