The Last Duel

Year of Release:  2021

Director:  Ridley Scott

Screenplay:  Matt Damon, Ben Affleck and Nicole Holofcener, based on the book The Last Duel: A True Story of Trial by Combat in Medieval France by Eric Jager

Starring:  Matt Damon, Adam Driver, Jodie Comer, Harriet Walter, Ben Affleck

Running Time:  153 minutes

Genre:  Historical drama

France, the late 1300s:  Lady Marguerite de Carrouges (Comer) accuses her husband's former best friend Jacques Le Gris (Driver) of raping her.  Her husband, Sir Jean de Carrouges (Damon), challenges le Gris to trial by combat, the last legally sanctioned duel in French history.  However, if Sir Jean loses the duel, not only will he be killed in combat, but Lady Marguerite will also be burned to death.  The film details the events leading up to the duel from the perspectives of Sir Jean, Jacques le Gris and Lady Marguerite.

This is a frustrating film because at it's best it is very good, but it has it's moments of extreme silliness.  The main problem is several of the roles are miscast:  Matt Damon, Adam Driver and Ben Affleck are all good actors but they are just not convincing as medieval French knights.  Affleck, as Count Pierre, Le Gris' patron and friend, in particular plays it like he's in an episode of Blackadder at times.  Jodie Comer however is fantastic as Lady Marguerite, the only character in the film who is in any way sympathetic, and Harriet Walter is good as Sir Jean's mother who hates her daughter in law.  The film looks spectacular, Ridley Scott shows his skill at handling historical epics, and the brutal action scenes are filmed with real dynamism.  The duel itself is savagely intense, and graphically violent.  The film utilises a structure where we are given three different perspectives on the events, and the film does point out who is telling the truth.  We see the friendship of Jean de Carrouges and Jacques Le Gris and it's subsequent disintegration, and the troubled relationship between Jean de Carrouges and Lady Marguerite.  The film shows the same events played out in different ways from different perspectives.  Sir Jean sees himself as a brave and noble knight, fighting for what is rightfully his, however others see him as a cruel, brutal bully and a fool.  Jacque Le Gris sees himself as an intelligent, romantic hero, however others see him as an opportunistic sycophant.  Lady Marguerite is caught in the middle, seen as little more than property.  When she tells her husband about the rape, he sees it as an insult to him, and Lady Marguerite's feelings don't really seem to come into it.  When Jacques le Gris goes to the church to defend himself against the charge, he is told that rape is seen as a crime of property, against the woman's husband or father. The rape sequence is brutal, and it is shown twice, from Le Gris and Marguerite's points of view.  The actual events are the same, even in Le Gris' version it is still an obvious rape, but he believes that she loves him really, so what he did was justified, while for Marguerite it is a brutal violation.  The film does discuss the ghastly treatment of women at the time, but not as much as it might have done.  It was written by Matt Damon and Ben Affleck, who won an Academy Award for their previous screenplay Good Will Hunting (1997), with acclaimed writer/director Nicole Holofcener who wrote the scenes for Lady Marguerite, and based on a 2004 book by Eric Jager.  While the film has problems with an inconsistent tone, moving between macho, blood and thunder epic, medieval court politics and dark feminist drama, and there are issues with the casting, it is still worth seeing.  The three part structure works well and the film is never less than interesting.

   Adam Driver and Matt Damon in The Last Duel

The Man Who Killed Don Quixote

 Year of Release:  2018

Director:  Terry Gilliam

Screenplay:  Terry Gilliam and Tony Girsoni, based on the novel Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes

Starring:  Adam Driver, Jonathan Pryce, Stellan Skarsgård, Olga Kurylenko

Running Time:  132 minutes

Genre:  Action-adventure, comedy

Toby (Driver) is a disillusioned director who is in Spain shooting a commercial based on the story of Don Quixote, he also happens to be near the location of his student film, The Man Who Killed Don Quixote, which he made with non-professional actors ten years previously.  Toby runs into his star, a cobbler, Javier (Pryce), who now believes that he really is Don Quixote, and that Toby is his loyal squire, Sancho Panza.  Javier drags Toby off in search of adventure.

This film has become almost notorious, due to how long it has been in the works.  Gilliam had been attempting to make a film based on Miguel de Cervantes' 17th century novel Don Quixote, since about 1990, and there have been several aborted attempts to film The Man Who Killed Don Quixote, one of which has been immortalised in the 2002 documentary film Lost in La Mancha, so Gilliam deserves some credit just for getting the thing made.  Is the finished film worth waiting nearly 30 years for?  No.  Is it a good film and worth seeing?  Yes.  This features both the good and the bad of Terry Gilliam's work.  It is sprawling, overlong, uneven and indulgent.  It is also ambitious and imaginative.  When it is good, and it is good very often, then it is truly wonderful.  At it's worse, it's just a mess but, despite it's generous running time, it's never dull.  It's also surprisingly dark.  Adam Driver is good as a pretty unlikeable character, and Jonathan Pryce is great as the frail but noble Don Quixote who becomes almost admirable in his romantic delusion.  Stellan Skarsgård is good as ever as Toby's formidable Boss, and Olga Kurylenko is very good, if underused, as the Boss' seductive wife, Jacqui.  The film covers some very familiar Gilliam territory:  The individual versus society, dreams versus reality, and the nature of sanity or insanity.  The film looks fantastic throughout with some striking locations and set pieces.  When looking at Terry Gilliam's career, it is easy to see why Quixote holds such an attraction for him, and he is to be admired for succeeding in his quest to get this film made.

It is not a perfect film, and it may not be the masterpiece that Gilliam fans may have hoped for, but it is a flawed, enjoyable, eccentric work touched by moments of genius, and I will take that over the bland, committee led franchise fare that seems to make up a lot of modern movies any day of the week.  

Adam Driver and Jonathan Pryce ride out in The Man Who Killed Don Quixote

        

The Dead Don't Die

Year:  2019
Director:  Jim Jarmusch
Screenplay:  Jim Jarmusch
Starring:  Bill Murray, Adam Driver, Chloë Sevigny, Tilda Swinton, Steve Buscemi, Danny Glover, Caleb Landry Jones, Selena Gomez, RZA, Iggy Pop, Tom Waits
Running Time:  103 minutes
Genre:  Horror, comedy

The small American town of Centerville is experiencing a series of bizarre events:  It gets dark either far too late or far too early for the time of year, animals are behaving out of character or disappearing, and electronic equipment is behaving very erratically.  Things get much worse when the dead start to come out of the grave and feast on the flesh of the living. 

This marks the second time that acclaimed indie director Jim Jarmusch has entered horror territory, following acclaimed vampire movie Only Lovers Left Alive (2013).  This did not get the same positive reception on it's release.  The humour is very deadpan, police officers Bill Murray and Adam Driver seem to sleepwalk throughout the entire film even before the zombies appear, and is full of bizarre touches, such as Tilda Swinton as an eccentric, samurai sword wielding Scottish mortician (with a frankly extraordinary accent), and Murray and Driver's characters seem to be aware that they are characters in a film, and the film's theme song becomes a recurring in-joke throughout the film.  It's also full of references to other horror films.  This isn't really scary at all, and at times it is too self-consciously cool for it's own good, and the characters are too "hip" and quirky to really feel realistic.  it also hammers home it's political message a little too bluntly at times.  Personally though, I did find it consistently funny.  The zombies themselves are effectively designed, "bleeding" clouds of black ash, and drawn to the things that they loved when they were alive.  It boasts an impressive cast, who all seem to be having fun.

Bill Murray, Chloë Sevigny and Adam Driver face off against zombies in The Dead Don't Die

While We're Young

Year of Release:  2014
Director:  Noah Baumbach
Screenplay:  Noah Baumbach
Starring:  Ben Stiller, Naomi Watts, Adam Driver, Amanda Seyfried, Charles Grodin, Adam Horovitz
Running Time:  97 minutes
Genre:  Comedy, drama

New York City:  Josh Schrebnik (Stiller) is 44 year old documentary filmmaker and teacher.  After making a splash with his debut film, he has spent ten years working on his follow-up, and is married to Cornelia (Watts).  One night Josh meets 25 year old aspiring filmmaker Jamie Massey (Driver) and his wife Darby (Seyfried).  Josh is enamored with the free-spirited hipster couple, Cornelia is more reluctant, but still finds herself drawn to Jamie and Darby.  Before long the older couple are adopting the tastes and lifestyles of their younger friends, at the expense of their older friends.  But things go wrong, when Josh realises that Jamie's values and worldview don't match up with his own.

This is an enjoyable and consistently funny film which does make some pertinent points about ageing.  Josh and Cornelia are approaching their mid-forties and so are a long way from being elderly (full disclosure I am currently 41) but they are facing the specter of old age there are things that they want to do in their lives that they realise they have to do sooner rather than later, or risk never being able to do them at all.  Also they are stuck in a rut, Josh has been working in the same film for ten years, and still doesn't know what it's about.  Both he and Cornelia feel alienated from their best friends, who are new parents.  They are drawn to Jamie and Darby because of their creativity, energy, and their enthusiasm particularly for retro pop culture.  However, Josh soon comes to realise that Jamie is full of pretence and artifice, and is also very manipulative.  However the film makes it clear that Jamie and Darby are part of a changing world, and Josh and Cornelia are not condemned or really mocked for embracing a youthful lifestyle, in fact it proves a mostly positive experience.  Ben Stiller is funny and engaging in the lead, and Adam Driver gets a lot of mileage form his cool hipster persona.  Naomi Watts and Amanda Seyfried are largely sidelined though.  Noah Baumbach has usurped Woody Allen as the king of New York comedy-dramas, mixing heart and humour in nearly equal doses.   This isn't his best work but it is still worth checking out.

Amanda Seyfried, Adam Driver, Ben Stiller and Naomi Watts in While We're Young 

Frances Ha

Year of Release:  2013
Director:  Noah Baumbach
Screenplay:  Noah Baumbach and Greta Gerwig
Starring:  Greta Gerwig, Mickey Sumner, Charlotte d'Amboise, Adam Driver, Michael Zegen
Running Time:  86 minutes
Genre:  Comedy drama

Frances (Gerwig) is a struggling 27 year old dancer living in New York City with her best friend Sophie (Summer).  Her life is upended when Sophie announces that she plans to move to a more upmarket neighbourhood, which Frances can't afford, forcing her to find somewhere else to live, while trying to make ends meet.

Photographed in shimmering monochrome, this virtually plotless film is more a glimpse into the life of Frances, an ambitious young woman, trying to make her own way in the Big Apple, albeit without much success.  Frances herself is frequently frustrating, impulsive and irritating, but is never unsympathetic or unlikeable.  She makes bad decisions and frequently gets herself into trouble.  Early in the film she breaks up with her boyfriend because she doesn't want to move in with him and she really shows very little interest in dating anyone, although one of her roommates does seem to be interested in her.  The big relationship in Frances' life is her friendship with Sophie, and this film portrays friendship in a beguiling and very relatable way.  The two share jokes, and tell each other pretty much everything from their deepest secrets and hopes and fears to something funny that one of them sees on the way to the grocery store.  They fight, they argue, they get on each other's nerves, but the bond is always there.  Even Sophie's fiance, and Frances' jealousy, doesn't destroy their bond.
While the loose, plotless nature of the film may put off some viewers, and some may find Frances deeply annoying, this is a smart and funny film, which has a lot to say about friendship and finding a place for yourself in the world.  Certainly the biggest asset to the film is Greta Gerwig, who co-wrote the film with director Noah Baumbach and stars as Frances.  Charismatic and quirky, with a mix of exuberance, dorkishness and vulnerability, she owns the film, and is in virtually every scene.  Recently Greta Gerwig has spent more time behind the camera than in front of it, as the writer and director of acclaimed films Lady Bird (2017) and Little Women (2019), and this is a reminder of what a great actress she is.

Greta Gerwig in Frances Ha       

BlacKkKlansman

Year of Release:  2018
Director:  Spike Lee
Screenplay:  Charlie Wachtel, David Rabinowitz, Kevin Willmott and Spike Lee, based on the book Black Klansman by Ron Stallworth
Starring:  John David Washington, Adam Driver, Laura Harrier, Topher Grace
Running Time:  135 minutes
Genre:  Crime, thriller, drama

In 1979, Ron Stallworth (Washington) is the first black detective in Colorado Springs, Colorado.  Frustrated with his early assignments, and the racism of his colleagues, Ron is inspired when he is sent undercover to investigate a civil rights rally, and becomes close with activist Patrice (Harrier).  Ron works out a plan to infiltrate the local Ku Klux Klan chapter, calling up the leaders, pretending to be a racist white man, and recruiting white Jewish detective Philip Zimmerman (Driver) to pretend to be him in face-to-face meetings. 

Based on a true story, this is Spike Lee at his angriest and most powerful.  Opening with clips from Gone with the Wind (1948) and the horribly racist The Birth of a Nation (1915), this is a powerful and well-made film with a serious and powerful message about the pervasiveness of racism and how it is bound up in some people's sense of identity.  However, this is not a preachy message film, it's an entertaining thriller, exciting, intriguing and often very funny.  The film has a lot of contemporary relevance, which is occasionally pushed a little bit too bluntly in the dialogue, considering the film's 1970s setting.  Spike Lee is a real visual stylist and, despite, the film's generous run time, it's gripping throughout, and it's well-performed by a talented cast, with John David Washington dominating the screen in the lead role.  However, the film doesn't let it's audience off too lightly concluding with heart-breaking images that show how little has changed. 

Adam Driver and John David Washington in BlacKkKlansman