TL;DR This Week In Cinema: How The West Was Weird

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THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN

RT: 63%

Man, Southpaw was just the worst. Fortunately, Antoine Fuqua‘s decided to lift his head from the bottom of the screenwriters’ bargain bin and picked up a gig with Nic Pizzolatto (of True Detective fame).

Don’t get too excited – he’s just finding the balancing point between his last dogshit effort and his Oscar-winner Training Day, starting by reuniting with Denzel Washington. This remake-of-a-remake (the original being the near-perfect Seven Samurai) is competent! And that’s about it.

One thing does stand out: while Washington and co-star Chris Pratt phone in charming rogue archetypes, their fellow teammates are properly diverse – finally, a film in which Johnny Depp doesn’t play the damn Native American!

tl;dr One cat short of The Hateful Eight.

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EQUITY

RT: 81%

Skyler White gets her own shot at kingpin (queenpin?) status, in this thriller that gives primacy to women in a genre dominated by men.

Naomi (Anna Gunn) is finally reaching the upper rungs of the Wall St ladder when her ambitions are undermined by the attention of goverment lawyer Samantha (Alysia Reiner). As the two women cautiously orbit each other, they struggle against the standards of their industry – one generally hostile to their sex.

Gunn was one of Breaking Bad‘s finest performers, wholly undeserving of the fan response. Seeing her lead a film and command the critics’ respect feels like justice, even if she is playing a ruthless money magnate.

tl;dr Gunn cashes in on the empire business.

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LIFE, ANIMATED

RT: 93%

Eliciting chills mere seconds into the trailer, this doco is a bonafide tearjerker – one that follows a family whose closed-off autistic son (Owen Suskind, who wrote the novel on which the film is based) learns to communicate with them solely through Disney film quotes.

For our generation, the Disney nostalgia alone is enough to warm the heart, but the capacity of cinema to speak beyond language and ability is palpable. This is a story about how stories can save, how they can define us in the best possible way.

Ready your feels, homies. Disney gunnin’ for ’em.

tl;dr Wouldn’t be the first time.

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MISS PEREGRINE’S HOME FOR PECULIAR CHILDREN

Imagine Professor X got a sex change and an orphanage, and you might have Miss Peregrine’s Home For Peculiar Children. (Funnily enough, screenwriter Jane Goldman actually wrote X-Men: First Class.) The bestselling YA novel from 2011 has been brought to the screen by Tim Burton, and feels much closer to his sensibilities than the abysmal Alice films.

Jacob (Asa Butterfield of Hugo and Ender’s Game) has his life shattered by a tragedy at home, but the disaster leads him on a journey that ends at the titular abode of Miss Peregrine (Eva Green). Her house is a necessary safe-haven for children with ‘oddities’, particularly given their nasty enemies, led by Mr. Barron (Samuel L. Jackson).

Anyone else getting the A Series Of Unfortunate Events vibe? The trailer’s inventiveness is promising, and I’ll take any excuse for 90 minutes of Eva Green’s eyes. I would strongly consider orphaning myself for this woman.

tl;dr It’s not just the children that are peculiar.

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WEDNESDAY, MAY 9

Iran’s golden age of naturalist cinema continues with this debut tale of intersecting lives in modern Tehran by director Vahid Jalilvand.

When a wealthy philanthropist (Amir Aghaei) offers 30 million tomans via an ad to ‘someone in need’, he attracts an enormous crowd of Tehran’s most desperate, three of whom make up the focus of the film.

Our cinematic insights into one of the Middle East’s most notoriously closeted nations are proving increasingly fascinating, but none has yet topped A Separation. Jalilvand certainly holds Asghar Farhadi in high esteem, and may yet rise to his ranks.

tl;dr The story of a sad person who makes hella bank.

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And now for THE VERDICT – maybe you only get to see one of these flicks on the big screen, and you don’t wanna waste that night out. So, drum roll please…