Rogue One : A Star Wars Story

So Rogue One is Star Wars with the Saving Private Ryan filter turned up. And it works.

This is a very different feeling Star Wars film and justifies the “A Star Wars Story” tag that sets it apart. Yes, the tone is darker than the other films as expected and don’t be fooled by stories of re-shoots done to lighten things. If anything the lighter material went into the trailers but not the final cut of the film. But it’s other things that set it apart.

The combat sequences are much more intense; dynamic, gritty and in a first for a Star Wars film actually quite harrowing in places. For example in an earlier sequence we witness an Imperial patrol attacked in a city street with innocent civilians very much caught in the cross fire. There are echoes of the likes of Black Hawk Down.

This is maximised in the final third as hopelessly outmatched Rebel forces on a beach sacrifice themselves to create a distraction whilst in orbit above them their colleagues mount a frantic assault to make sure it’s not in vain.

Astonishing is the best word I can think of to describe the climatic space battle, with cinematography that really places you right in the middle of the action as fighters swoop and dive around fleets of ships. It’s the best execution of this kind of action I’ve seen and is peppered with imaginative flourishes.

The strength of the action is backed up by the rest of the writing in deepening the experience. Whilst the basic story is a fairly straightforward men on a mission tale it’s the characterisation of those on the mission that make it work.

Here we get shades of grey as we see Rebels in conflict with each other over the lengths they’re prepared to go to. We’re told Forest Whitaker’s Saw Gerrera is an extremist who’s gone too far but this is after we’ve seen Diego Luna’s Cassian shoot down an unarmed colleague without pause to ensure he won’t talk upon capture.

Meanwhile Mendelsohn’s Krennic brings something different to the table as the villain. He starts with a  naked ambition to rise up the Imperial rank but slowly switches to desperately fighting for his position and survival after an encounter with Darth Vader.

Felicity Jones’ Jyn is also very different to any of the heroes we’ve see in the series before. At one point when asked if she’s ok with seeing Imperial flags flying over every planet she replies “It doesn’t matter if you never look up”. She’s not in it for the cause at the start and whilst later she joins the Rebellion her main motivation is a fight for absolution for her father.

A sequence roughly half way through featuring Jyn brings all that works so well in the film together at once. We watch as Jyn witnesses a final message from her father, Jones wordlessly showing the heartbreak and new resolve in her face as at the same time the Empire demonstrate the terrifying power of their new weapon. (Something which now is probably now more impactful as it’s lower setting resembles something sill devastating but with real world familiarity).

A haunting beautiful sequence and for me the moment the film really comes together after a slightly choppy opening.

It’s true that some of the other characters in our team are sketched with out as much detail but even then it’s a different vibe to what we’ve seen before. Donnie Yen and Wen Jiang are two believers in the Force trying to hold onto their faith and Riz Ahmed’s defecting Imperial pilot is man finding himself suddenly out of his depth.

Many are comparing it to Empire Strikes Back and they are both sombre pieces but I’d argue that Rogue One is the more complex in terms of it’s characters and generally depiction of the central conflict and probably a darker film overall seeing as during a couple of parts it even effectively comes across as a horror film.

Without giving too much away the biggest issue I had with it were some moments of ‘uncanny valley’where CGI has been used to reintroduce some characters into the story. It’s striking but does have that sense of unreality to it.

I also admit I’m not sure how well it would work for people who aren’t a fan of Star Wars to start with. I believe it would still stand by itself if you approached it as a Vietnam or World War II film, I’ll be interest to see if I gauge some people’s thoughts on that.

Deadpool

Time for some longer thoughts on Deadpool.  Currently the film is performing very well and has already it's taken four times it's relatively modest $56m-ish budget.

It is being suggested that this shows there is an appetite for comic book adaptations that are aimed at an adult audience instead of the typical 12A/PG-13 bracket. I'm not so sure, I think it more suggests there is a market for filthy, crude and violent comedies that have good marketing.

I wouldn't expect a 'straight-laced' X-Men film pitched at an 'R' to perform as well, although admittedly Blade did well enough to produce a couple of sequels but tellingly it was marketed as a horror-action picture rather than a comic book property at time of it's release.

Anyway as for the film itself, Deadpool starts with energy and a high level of imagination with in particularly amusing credit sequence. Although as soon as this sequence ends there is the first signal that the film might not be able to keep up the level of creativity.

This is because the first major sequence is a retread of the test footage that infamously lead to the film being green lit in the first place. It still a fairly striking sequence but you do wonder about why after a few years it's still being re-used.

From here we get the perfunctory entrance of two other X-Men characters who serve to be butt of a few jokes and the disappear again until the final reel showdown before we flash back to how Wade became Deadpool.

Its a standard approach of a desperate man making a bad choice to trust someone dodgy, the issue for me being though that nature of the constant smirking, smutty script doesn't really allow any kind of drama to breathe and in particular it's hard to sense any sincerity in the central relationship when it's basically a string of sex jokes and not a lot else.

Indeed the female characters are very poorly served. Wade's girlfriend is established into the story as a hooker, is kidnapped working in a strip joint and not given much else to do then offer sex or look a bad sad when required. Apart from that we have a teenage 'goth' girl cliché and strong woman who Colossus doesn't want to fight because she's a woman. Neither of which grows at all beyond those very basic outlines.

So when we get to the inevitable "I'm too ugly to face my love" cliché it feels hollow but then I despite being constantly told otherwise I didn't think Wade's scarred face was all that bad.

Meanwhile as the films on it falls into a standard three pattern building to the final reel showdown with an undeveloped villain with very vaguely sketched powers. In that way the film actually matches Marvel Studios own origin story films by having a forgettable antagonist.

In terms of how he plays it, if you seen Reynolds in Blade : Trinity, you know how he plays it. Which is fun for a bit but does start to wear thin the longer it goes on as sadly whilst in comic form Deadpool's ISP of breaking fourth wall is not taken advantage of fully. There are a few fourth wall breaking moments (including a good gag about breaking the fourth wall side a fourth wall break) but I felt so much more could have been made of it. The chance was there to not only deliver a few pop culture gags but really work in some satire on the nature of super-heroes and movie genres.

But having said that I did laugh a number of times and there is cracking joke about our very own David Beckham. I just fell it could have been funnier if they'd stepped back from the crudity a little and approached things a bit smarter.

Oh, the post credits scene is nicely done as is the post post credit one.