Movie of the week – Redoubtable
We’ve got two very different gems from France opening this week. The latest from The Artist’s Oscar winning director Michel Hazanvicius, Redoubtable is a homage to / biopic of French New Wave supremo Jean Luc Godard. Focussed on the relationship between Godard and his young wife Anne Wiazemsky, it’s a hilarious tribute to the Swiss filmmaker that isn’t afraid to have fun at the expense of his ego.
Revenge
The rape-revenge genre gets a female makeover from first time writer/director Coralie Fargeat. Revenge has a simple exploitation movie setup – a woman returns from near death to avenge the men who exploited her – but Fargeat structures it in a way that comments on the sub-genre, making it both a thrilling and uncomfortable watch.
Entebbe
In Entebbe, the story of the 1976 terrorist hijacking of an Air France jet and subsequent rescue mission by Israeli troops is told through the eyes of one of the German terrorists, played by Daniel Bruhl. While the Jews and Muslims involved are portrayed as broad stereotypes, the film asks us to invest in the moral dilemma experienced by Bruhl’s character, but it’s a bridge too far and the film is ultimately a misjudged and offensive take on the incident.
How to Talk to Girls at Parties
One of the worst films of 2018 is How to Talk to Girls at Parties, an insufferable and laugh free sci-fi comedy in which a teenage oik falls for an alien in the body of Elle Fanning. This sort of fish out of water comedy format was popular in the ’80s, and it wasn’t very funny back then either.
By Eric Hillis of themoviewaffler.com
