Eye In The Sky is a tense drama from director Gavin Hood (Tsotsi, Rendition, er X-Men Origins: Wolverine) that focuses on a joint British/American drone mission over Kenya targeting terrorists.
Essentially it's a look at the morals of using such weapons and the debate over if collateral casualties can be accepted. We follow almost a real time as Helen Miren's Colonel leads a mission from a bunker in Surrey with the intent of capturing terrorists leaders whilst an American crew in Nevada control a drone overhead, Kenya forces operate on the ground and Alan Rickman's General and Government ministers watch from a room in Whitehall.
Circumstances change on the ground quickly and the operation is forced to change from capture to kill as the terrorists move to a house secure on the ground and appear to be preparing a suicide bomb attack. However a young girl is spotted selling bread close to the house in the projected blast radius.
What follows is a series of conversations and debates over what action to take, the legality of it and if there is will to fire on the house with the girl so close. It's a fairly neat simplified encapsulation of the issue.
The different points of view are presented evenly with nothing being sensationalised; the military look at things in terms of one life is to save many more later, the ministers debate the potential political and PR repercussions and the crew in charge of the drone agonise over will result of the actions they take.
Suffice to say I glad I'm not in position to have to make such a choice, indeed nearly all of the characters in the film struggle with it and keep passing things up the chain of command. Rickman and Mirren's military veterans whilst seemingly deal with the situation dispassionately are still crucially shown to be rounded people, not just hawks, who know full well the human cost of warfare.
The film benefits for not making up the mind of the audience for them at the end, matters are resolved but we are shown the price.
Director hood does well to avoid things feeling too stagey in a production that basically takes place in a few small rooms whilst avoiding, aside from a one piece of fanciful technology, making things too 'hollywood thriller'. Recommended.
Sunday 15 May 2016
Sunday 1 May 2016
Captain America : Civil War
Much, much, much better than Batman v Superman.
Well, that's the key point out of the way. The third Captain America film takes it's central plot cue from the Civil War comic storyline, but that's pretty much it as apart from the idea that governments would call for superhero oversight it plays out very differently from the source comics.
This is a good thing. The story presented here is for the large part much more sensible, it does however falter as the core argument effectively takes a back seat fairly quickly and the ongoing conflict between the heroes depends upon Cap'n being a bull headed jerk who is unwilling to trust most of his team mates and see no irony in distrusting other's judgement whilst being convinced that he is literally always right about every decision.
The idea of the requirement supervision is introduced with a sequence discussing the impact of events in the last few Marvel films, much in the same way BvS looks to address the destruction in Man Of Steel, it's a smart move that helps to bring a bit of realism into the MCU. Combined with this a world weary Tony Stark is approached by a grieving mother who lost her son in the events of Age Of Ultron.
So Tony believes the introduction of oversight by the UN is the right thing. As someone points out The Avengers are essentially a PMC operating with unimaginable power across borders with out answering to or consulting with anyone. It's hard point to disagree with.
Anyway Rogers dislikes the idea and give a vague reasoning of feeling that governments have 'agendas', it's a weak point of the film that he never really manages to explain what troubles him or why he believes his judgement is infallible. Instead the conflict is driven by his pursuit and defence of a reappeared Winter Solider. He even concedes that his former friend has indeed killed a lot of innocent people.
So that's Tony and Rogers, everyone else basically just sides with one of them with a quick line or two of dialogue. Basically a setup that had the chance to provide a lot of real character drama is not really treated that way, which is a missed opportunity. Although the plot does hold a couple of nice twists as the Avengers are indeed being manipulated for what I thought was a fascinating reason.
There are lot of positives in the film elsewhere. The action sequences are lively and creative, showing the playfulness and imagination that was so badly lacking from DC's recent big hitter.
All the various heroes have very much their own distinct style, none more so than the newly introduced Black Panther, which help make the central stand off sequence at the airport a great sequence. It's a pacy with a well judged tone that includes humour and acknowledgement that these are friends having a fight in amongst the brawling.
The the two stand outs in the sequence are surprisingly Paul Rudd's Ant-Man, a brilliant mix of star-struck and goofily effective. And the other standout is Tom Holland's Spiderman. Possibly the best screen incarnation to date of the character. Unfortunately the two only really feature in this one stretch.
Strangely to me the film felt much more like an Iron Man film the third Captain America entry because I found Tony's position much more sympathetic (and the two characters have roughly equal screen time) and he actually seems to have the greater emotional journey especially when tragedy strikes his friend Rhodey. In fact Tony even comes over to Roger's side towards the end only for a reveal to again see Rogers be, well a jerk, rather than trying to diffuse a situation.
In general it's not as strong as Winter Soldier was as a film but it's still a solid entertaining couple of hours that just lacks that edge of drama it feels like it could of had. It'll be interesting to see where the storyline goes especially since in the end Rogers comes away as both a criminal and with no real sense of justification for his actions.
Still, better than BvS. But I am wondering if X-Men:Apocalypse might be this blockbuster season's superhero winner.
Well, that's the key point out of the way. The third Captain America film takes it's central plot cue from the Civil War comic storyline, but that's pretty much it as apart from the idea that governments would call for superhero oversight it plays out very differently from the source comics.
This is a good thing. The story presented here is for the large part much more sensible, it does however falter as the core argument effectively takes a back seat fairly quickly and the ongoing conflict between the heroes depends upon Cap'n being a bull headed jerk who is unwilling to trust most of his team mates and see no irony in distrusting other's judgement whilst being convinced that he is literally always right about every decision.
The idea of the requirement supervision is introduced with a sequence discussing the impact of events in the last few Marvel films, much in the same way BvS looks to address the destruction in Man Of Steel, it's a smart move that helps to bring a bit of realism into the MCU. Combined with this a world weary Tony Stark is approached by a grieving mother who lost her son in the events of Age Of Ultron.
So Tony believes the introduction of oversight by the UN is the right thing. As someone points out The Avengers are essentially a PMC operating with unimaginable power across borders with out answering to or consulting with anyone. It's hard point to disagree with.
Anyway Rogers dislikes the idea and give a vague reasoning of feeling that governments have 'agendas', it's a weak point of the film that he never really manages to explain what troubles him or why he believes his judgement is infallible. Instead the conflict is driven by his pursuit and defence of a reappeared Winter Solider. He even concedes that his former friend has indeed killed a lot of innocent people.
So that's Tony and Rogers, everyone else basically just sides with one of them with a quick line or two of dialogue. Basically a setup that had the chance to provide a lot of real character drama is not really treated that way, which is a missed opportunity. Although the plot does hold a couple of nice twists as the Avengers are indeed being manipulated for what I thought was a fascinating reason.
There are lot of positives in the film elsewhere. The action sequences are lively and creative, showing the playfulness and imagination that was so badly lacking from DC's recent big hitter.
All the various heroes have very much their own distinct style, none more so than the newly introduced Black Panther, which help make the central stand off sequence at the airport a great sequence. It's a pacy with a well judged tone that includes humour and acknowledgement that these are friends having a fight in amongst the brawling.
The the two stand outs in the sequence are surprisingly Paul Rudd's Ant-Man, a brilliant mix of star-struck and goofily effective. And the other standout is Tom Holland's Spiderman. Possibly the best screen incarnation to date of the character. Unfortunately the two only really feature in this one stretch.
Strangely to me the film felt much more like an Iron Man film the third Captain America entry because I found Tony's position much more sympathetic (and the two characters have roughly equal screen time) and he actually seems to have the greater emotional journey especially when tragedy strikes his friend Rhodey. In fact Tony even comes over to Roger's side towards the end only for a reveal to again see Rogers be, well a jerk, rather than trying to diffuse a situation.
In general it's not as strong as Winter Soldier was as a film but it's still a solid entertaining couple of hours that just lacks that edge of drama it feels like it could of had. It'll be interesting to see where the storyline goes especially since in the end Rogers comes away as both a criminal and with no real sense of justification for his actions.
Still, better than BvS. But I am wondering if X-Men:Apocalypse might be this blockbuster season's superhero winner.
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