The Electrical Life of Louis Wain (11.26.21)

 

Every family has at least one crazy cat person, and if you think otherwise I have some bad news for you: That crazy cat person is probably you. Thanks to the internet, the goofy beasts are everywhere, but in Louis Wain's day, appreciating cats as anything other than rat and mice catchers was a bit of an oddity, if the bizarre film I just watched is to believed. The Electrical Life of Louis Wain, a shiny new Amazon original movie, chronicles the life and trials of the world’s first feline meme creator and does so in a way that is occasionally sweet, occasionally tragic, and almost always weird, if not always in a good way. 

The Electrical Life, like its main character, exudes some really weird energy right off the bat and does not stop doing so throughout thanks to some truly schizophrenic filmmaking (which is not always a bad thing). There are some funny bits that underscore the eccentricity of the Louis Wain character (portrayed by Benedict Cumberbatch), but heartbreaking circumstances in his life often bring the film crashing back to reality. The former sequences are usually done with some real creative flair, with interesting camera angles, color palettes, and music (which uses the otherworldly sounding theremin and musical saw to great effect), the latter with much more traditional shots and score. This chaotic combination of weird and melancholy often works in the movie’s favor, but also keeps it from having a concrete identity of its own. The same can be said of its main character, who is still a bit of a mystery to me even after spending two hours with him. But I suppose it’s also annoying to me when biopics reduce a real historical figure down to three or four easily identifiable character traits, so I don’t know what I would have had them do that was different than what they actually did. 

Ultimately I feel like The Electrical Life should have gone all-out with the weird instead of only utilizing it half of the time. Weird and sad are not exclusive , after all, but you would not know it from watching this with the shifts in tone and visuals. As it stands, I ended up asking myself questions like “what exactly is this movie?” and “what are the themes they’re trying to explore?” and “wait, did the subtitles just translate that cat?” a couple of times, pulling me out of the story as a result (and this confusion only gets progressively worse as the character slowly loses touch with reality). But there is no arguing with the fact that The Electrical Life is a competently made film, from the directing to the scriptwriting to the acting (especially Felix Wilde, Windsor Wilde, and Norbury Ackland, who all play Peter the cat at various stages in his life and should be given a good amount of treats for their good work if they haven’t already). I just wish it had more of a concrete idea of what it was. 

The Electrical Life of Louis Wain is a harmless watch that won’t change your life but does a pretty good job of celebrating the lives of those that not only put up with cats but also, against all reason, enjoy doing so. Check it out.  

The Electrical Life of Louis Wain is now available on Amazon Prime. 

 

This review was first published in The Keizertimes on November 26^th, 2021. Visit at http://keizertimes.com/

Squid Game (11.05.21)

 

It is sometimes easy for me to forget in the never-ending deluge of Hollywood content that the United States is no longer the only superpower when it comes to making movies and television. Every once in a while, however, the comfy yet blinding isolationist bubble that American studios have inflated around me in the field of entertainment is burst when an unexpected gem comes rocketing to our shores, reminding me yet again that we are not the center of the world. South Korea’s Parasite, for example, was not content to be the best “foreign film” of the year, but the best film period (if you treat the Academy Awards as anything more than an exercise in self-congratulatory nonsense, anyway). In this same spirit, it was a shock to many people (creator Hwang Dong-hyuk included) when Korea’s Squid Game shot into the American zeitgeist and beat Bridgerton in becoming Netflix’s most viewed original show ever this last week. And after spending some time with it I can confidently say that Squid Game is one of those rare phenomena that is all it’s cracked up to be.  

               The premise is pretty straightforward: a mysterious organization captures hundreds of impoverished/in debt Korean citizens and offers them the chance to win billions of won (Korea’s currency) if they compete in an elaborate series of children’s games on a giant scale. The only catch? They lose, they die. They break the rules, they die. Other TV shows and movies have had similar ideas, but none are as effectively conveyed and as disturbingly timely as in the case of Squid Game, which firmly demands you consider subjects such as class inequality and the dehumanizing nature of greed even as it shows you the worst possible outcomes of such things as a dire warning to alter course. It is a dark, brutal tale with some incredible acting, a fantastic soundtrack, and edge-of-your-seat storytelling that preaches as well as entertains. It does have a lot of blood and stuff though, so don’t watch it with your elderly grandma or anything.  

               Ironically, the only things I can fault Squid Game for are American (or, rather, English) related. The translation from Korean to English is not perfect at times; although, I find that this is to be expected-- translations are very rarely 1:1. The American dubs are also quite terrible, ranging from silly sounding to oddly offensive. If you watch Squid Game, you should definitely watch it in it’s original Korean with English subtitles (this was Netflix’s default when I watched it). These are pretty small complaints, however; an odd word choice here or there should not be enough to keep you from this one.  

               As I type this, it is unclear whether or not Netflix will greenlight the show for a second season. It certainly has the numbers and the story potential, so only time will tell. I, for one, will be watching if they do.  

               All nine episodes of Squid Game (season 1?) are now available on Netflix.  

 

This review was first published in The Keizertimes on November 5^th, 2021. Visit at http://keizertimes.com/

Dune (10.29.21)

The Fremen people have a distinctive way of walking while traversing the sandy wastes of Arrakis in Frank Herbert's Dune: all over the place and without rhythm. This is done as to not attract the giant sandworms that are native to the hellish planet, and if stars Timothée Chalamet and Rebecca Ferguson are to be believed, this walk is much harder than it initially seems. Something else that is much harder than it initially seems? Making a good movie adaptation of the seminal sci-fi novel that is Dune. For the most part, Denis Villeneuve’s Dune succeeds, but much like a Fremen sand walk, it goes back and forth on a few things and is ultimately a bit uneven.

One aspect of the novel that leads to a difficult transition to film is its sheer complexity (and scope; Dune makes it clear from the beginning that it is only the first of a planned two-parter). It is therefore a bit hard to follow along in the movie when the actors mumble and don’t enunciate the silly sci-fi lines they’re delivering. This, more than the plot itself lead me to confusion more than once. But the acting is also quite solid despite this, which is to be expected with a cast that includes the aforementioned two as well as names such as Oscar Isaac, Stellan Skarsgard, and Josh Brolin.

The soundtrack, written by Hans Zimmer, is all over the place both in style and execution. From bagpipes to tracks with a distinctly Middle Eastern flavor, Dune does not really have a unified sound. For the most part it is nice to listen to, however, even if it veers into bombastically obnoxious territory from time to time.

And did I even enjoy watching Dune? I somehow still don’t know. Sometimes I was bored with the slow-burn plot and the political themes, and sometimes I was enthralled by the world building and the presentation of it all. When asking this question of a movie this length I guess it really comes down to which moments where the most prevalent. If this is the case, then yes, I enjoyed Dune.

At this point it’s probably not surprising that I’m going back and forth between whether or not Dune should be enjoyed at the theater or watched at home via HBO Max. On the one hand, the visuals and scope are astounding and were clearly filmed with a theater screen in mind. On the other, it was pretty nice to be able to pause the almost three hour-long film any time I wanted to go to the bathroom or ask my family what exactly was going on. Plus, you know, subtitles. Those are pretty nice too, especially when the exposition gets mumbly.

Despite some unevenness, Dune is ultimately worth the watch if you have the time and the patience. Dune Dudes in particular (I assume this is what fans call themselves… if not, what a waste) can rest assured that Frank Herbert's magnum opus has gotten the adaptation it deserves at last.

Dune is now available in theaters and on HBO Max. 

 

This review was first published in The Keizertimes on October 29th, 2021. Visit at http://keizertimes.com/