Confess, Fletch – Film Review

Posted on November 18, 2022 by ashleymanningwriter

Director: Greg Mottola

Writers: Zev Borow and Greg Mottola

Starring: Jon Hamm, Marcia Gay Harden, Kyle MacLachlan, Roy Wood Jr., and John Slattery

Rating: ★★★★

Over the last thirty or so years there’s been a few attempts to reboot the Fletch series, based on the series of novels by Gregory McDonald from the 1970s and 80s. Since the original two films in the 80s starring Chevy Chase as the title characters, various names have been attached to the series, including Kevin Smith who spent the better part of a decade trying to get it off the ground. Now a new adaptation has arrived, starring Jon Hamm as Fletch.

The story is set in Boston, where Fletch has travelled at the request of his girlfriend, Angela de Grassi (Lorenza Izzo), to retrieve a painting that was stolen from her in order to trade it with the people who have kidnapped her father. As soon as he arrives, Fletch finds himself at the centre of another mystery, where he finds that his rented apartment has turned into a murder scene.

Jon Hamm is perfectly cast as Fletch. He’s charming, snarky, and just arrogant enough to think he can solve the mystery. He’s really funny in the film, especially in scenes between Fletch and the inspector investigating the murder, Sergeant Inspector Monroe (Roy Wood Jr.), who also believes that Fletch is the murderer. However, the biggest laugh is from Kyle MacLachlan, who plays a cleanliness obsessed art dealer with a passion for EDM. The entire cast is great and make the film funny and engrossing.

The mystery revolves around stolen art and a murdered woman who Fletch finds when he checks into the apartment his girlfriend has rented for him. There’s a lot to the mystery, with a lot of threads that don’t seem connected, until they’re all wrapped up at the end with a satisfying co conclusion. It’s a great mystery that you can really get hooked into, trying to figure it out before the big reveal. This adaptation also modernises Fletch, with refences to things like the pandemic (something I think we will be seeing a lot of in upcoming films/books), as well as smart phones.

Confess, Fletch is smart, witty, and overall very entertaining. Jon Hamm is brilliant in the role and the mystery is excellent. One of the funniest films of the year without a doubt and hopefully the start of a new series. It would be a shame for the other books not to get the same treatment.

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Christmas with You – Film Review

Posted on November 17, 2022 by ashleymanningwriter

Director: Gabriela Tagliavini

Writers: Paco Farias and Jennifer C. Stetson

Starring: Freddie Prince Jr. and Aimee Garcia

Aimee Garcia stars as popstar Angelina Costa in Christmas with You. Her career is teetering on failure as she’s no longer relevant, rehashing old favourites instead of writing new songs. When the pressure of writing a new Christmas song before her yearly gala gets too much, Angelina decides to pay one of her mega-fans, Cristina (Deja Monique Cruz) a visit after seeing a video that she posted online saying it is her Christmas wish to get a selfie with Angelina. While on her visit, she meets Cristina’s father, Miguel (Freddie Prince Jr.), and starts co-writing a song with him, falling in love in the process.

There’s some conflict within the film as Angelina does not like to take risks. Even in her current relationship, which has broken down, she won’t announce the break up publicly. The sparks fly quite quickly between Angelina and Miguel and the plot plays out exactly as you’d expect it to, with everything being resolved nicely in under ninety minutes. It has that Christmas charm, that gives you that warm feeling wanting hot chocolates and blankets. There’s a fair few funny moments, but it’s not going to have you in stitches. Freddie Prince Jr. and Aimee Garcia are both good, and there’s a lot of chemistry between them. For the most part it’s entertaining, if a little forgettable once it’s all over.

Christmas with You is a really decent Christmas rom-com. It does exactly what you expect it to while like its main character not taking any risks, instead sticking to the low-stakes formula that Netflix has perfected in the last few years with their Christmas films.  

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The Wonder – Film Review

Posted on November 16, 2022 by ashleymanningwriter

Director: Sebastián Lelio

Writer: Emma Donoghue, Alice Birch, and Sebastián Lelio

Starring: Florence Pugh, Tom Burke, Kíla Lord Cassidy, Elaine Cassidy, Caolán Byrne, Niamh Algar, Toby Jones

Rating: ★★★★

The Wonder is directed by Sebastián Lelio and is an adaptation of the book of the same name by Emma Donoghue. It stars Florence Pugh as Lib Wright, a nurse who is sent from England to a small village in Ireland to watch a young girl, Anna (Kíla Lord Cassidy), who apparently hasn’t eaten anything since she turned eleven, four months prior. Lib is sceptical, thinking that she must be sneaking food somehow, and takes her position seriously to disprove the girl’s claim.  

The film starts with the fourth wall completely broken, the camera watching a set in a studio as a voice over (Niamh Algar) introducing you to the story and the characters, and the stories they believe in. The camera then pans over and fixes onto the actual set and zooms in on Pugh until the fourth wall is firmly back in place. There are a few other moments where the film breaks its reality, but this is still a full on period drama. You could very easily skip the opening and just watch the rest of the film and not really miss a thing. It’s just a way that the film is say it isn’t trying to lie to you and make you believe the events are real.

This is a story, and not reality. The opening is a good introduction to the theme of stories that is so prevalent throughout the film. It’s also a substitute for the ‘once upon a time’ that so many stories begin with. Stories is what the film is really about, and what they mean to us. There’s an exploration of the blind faith in religion as everyone seems to think that Anna surviving without food is some kind of miracle. It’s a question about whether religion is real or not, but it’s also about stories in general. The coping mechanisms that people use in life. It’s also a question morality question. Lib believes that Anna is starving herself and wants to prove that, to save her life, but at what point is she no longer a ‘watcher’.  

Florence Pugh is absolutely brilliant in this film, giving her all in yet another phenomenal performance. The rest of the cast is also great, especially Kíla Lord Cassidy, but it’s Pugh who steals the film. It’s also got to be said that the visuals are stunning, from the rough nature of Ireland, and muted colours, to the sets and costumes, it’s all well produced and make the film completely gripping and authentic.

The Wonder is a sombre reflection not just on religion, but stories in general. The things we look to help life make sense. It is definitely not going to be for everyone, but with a phenomenal performance from Florence Pugh, it’s definitely worth giving a go.

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Emily – Film Review

Posted on November 15, 2022 by ashleymanningwriter

Director: Frances O’Connor

Writer: Frances O’Connor

Starring: Emma Mackey, Fionn Whitehead, Oliver Jackson-Cohen, Alexandra Dowling, Amelia Gething, Adrian Dunbar, Gemma Jones

Rating: ★★★½

Emily is the directorial debut from Frances O’Connor, who also wrote the screenplay. It’s a largely fictional biopic of Emily Brontë, the writer of Wuthering Heights. The film follows her life during the years leading up the publication of the iconic book, showing what may have inspired her to write it. The film is more of an imagined romance story than a biopic.

Emily is played by Emma Mackey, who’s simply brilliant in the film. She is presented as the black sheep of the family; someone that others thinks of as ‘the strange one’. She doesn’t fit in, much preferring to spend time alone in her room than with others and doesn’t want to let go of the games she played and stories she wrote as a child.

Once she really gets to know the new curate, William Weightman (Oliver Jackson-Cohen), the story comes to life as they start to fall in love with each other. Their romance takes a good amount of the runtime of the biopic, and there’s a lot of chemistry between them. It’s a forbidden love, that can never become public. Other than their relationship, there’s also a lot of time spent showing Emily’s relationship with her siblings, especially Charlotte (Alexandra Dowling) who she has a turbulent relationship with, and more importantly her brother Branwell (Fionn Whitehead). All of the performances are really great.

Like the book Wuthering Heights, there’s a lot of the gothic on show in Emily. There’s a great scene early on when Emily puts on a mask and pretends to become her dead mother, which is both chilling and more unsettling than a lot of horror films. The score, by Abel Korzeniowski, is also a little unnerving at points. Emily’s life is filled with a lot of tragedy and it’s reflected with the beautiful direction from Frances O’Connor which brings to life the Yorkshire setting.

If you’re going into this film thinking you’re going to get an insight into the life of the writer of Wuthering Heights, then you’re going to be sorely disappointed. It’s not really about that book, although it does set forth to answer the question why Emily write it. None of the history around the book, such as how it was released under a man’s name (the pen name Ellis Bell was used as women writers weren’t taken seriously) or how Charlotte edited the book shortly after Emily’s death, are mentioned. Emily doesn’t even start writing the book until very close to the end, and it’s more of a footnote in the film to the romance between Emily and William, which there’s no evidence actually happened.

While Emily plays fast and loose with Emily Brontë’s life, it’s still a very well told story with a great blend of gothic elements. It’s not for historical purists, but it’s an interesting interpretation of her life.

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Pluto: Volume 2 – Manga Review

Posted on November 14, 2022 by ashleymanningwriter

Pluto is Naoki Urasawa’s adaptation of the ‘The Greatest Robot on Earth’ story arc from Osamu Tezuka’s legendary manga series, Astro Boy. Urasawa turns the classic story into a neo-noir detective story with more philosophical questions and a much darker tone. The second volume of Pluto picks up exactly where the first volume ends, with Gesicht investigating the murders of several of the most advanced robots in the world.

I loved the first volume of this manga, and it took me quite a while to get round to reading the second volume. As soon as I started reading I was completely absorbed into the story. Urasawa is my favourite manga writer by far, and Pluto is one of his best.

Like the first volume, this is a great story. The central mystery is really well crafted, and I constantly wanted to read more. One of the best things about the story is how it blends the line between humanity and robots. For the most part, you can’t tell who is a robot and who is human, and even within themselves they are starting to lose that distinction. Atom has spent so long mimicking humans that he starts to believe he can feel emotion. There’s some really great moments that explore when artificial life becomes sentient.

I also really like seeing the robot who previously killed a human years before the story takes place. He’s completely stuck, unmoving but still alive while people study his actions. It’s almost like Hannibal Lector in Silence of the Lambs, as he gives advice to Gesicht, and helps with the investigations, while at the same time seems to have his own reasons for doing so.

The second volume also has an interesting postscript written by Osamu Tezuka’s son Macoto, about how he felt when he was first approached to give approval for Urasawa to adapt the manga. It’s an interesting insight to the behind the scenes of the manga’s creation and also really highlights the significance of both Astro Boy and Osamu Tezuka.

Pluto is a great mystery and volume two marks quarter of the way through the story. It still feels like it’s just getting going, but it’s great so far and hopefully it won’t take me as long to read volume three.

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