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Social Justice and the Legitimacy of Slavery: The Role of Philosophical Asceticism from Ancient Judaism to Late Antiquity
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Were slavery and social injustice leading to dire poverty in antiquity and late antiquity only...
Through the Eye of a Needle: Wealth, the Fall of Rome, and the Making of Christianity in the West, 350-550 AD
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Jesus taught his followers that it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for...
After Lives: A Guide to Heaven, Hell, and Purgatory
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One of the most profound, deeply affecting questions we face as human beings is the matter of our...
Minding the Modern: Human Agency, Intellectual Traditions, and Responsible Knowledge
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In this brilliant study, Thomas Pfau argues that the loss of foundational concepts in classical and...
Poetry For Dummies
The Poetry Center, John Timpane and Maureen Watts
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Sometimes it seems like there are as many definitions of poetry as there are poems. Coleridge...
Gnomon: A Novel
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Near-future Britain is not just a nation under surveillance but one built on it: a radical...
Science fiction
The Book on Mediums: A Guide for Mediums and Invocators
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The Book on Mediums, also known as The Mediums Book, was written by Allan Kardec and originally...
Bob Mann (459 KP) rated The Last Letter from Your Lover (2021) in Movies
Aug 9, 2021
Engaging love story (at least, the one in the 60's) (2 more)
Lush production values, especially production design and cinematography
Great cast - especially Shailene Woodley and Ben Cross
A proper old-fashioned love story that older viewers will appreciate.
Is "chick flick" a phrase that you can use these days? I guess not, since it infers that a movie is only of interest to a particular gender. Perhaps "Sunday afternoon film" is a better phrase. And "The Last Letter From Your Lover" is a real SAF.
Positives:
- "They don't make them like this any more" the saying goes. This is a love story cum melodrama that is well told by director Augustine Frizzell, in only her second feature. The film zips backwards and forwards between different time periods, trusting the audience to keep up with where we are. The dialogue is suitably soupy for a film of this type, based on a Jojo Moyes book (who wrote "Me Before You", also well-filmed). I've seen a critic review in "The Times" where they mocked the sentimentality of the love letters: but part of me would love to say "OK - let's hear what you would have written"!
- The story ticks all the boxes to keep you engaged. Although never moved to tears, a scene towards the end of the movie certainly generated a lump in the throat.
- All the leads are great. Shailene Woodley has been a personal favourite actress since her amazing turn in "The Descendants". And she certainly doesn't disappoint here.
- The production design is lush, particularly with the 60's scenes of London and the Riviera (reminiscent for me of the recent remake of "Rebecca"). This is nicely brought out by the cinematography (by George Steel), with some of the scenes being 'hang on the wall' beautiful to look at.
- It's wonderful to see the late Ben Cross in the movie, and he gives an excellent and touching performance. Cross died of cancer in August 2020 at the age of just 72. This is probably not his last movie, since he was in another - "The Devil's Light" - currently in post-production. Such a sad loss to the industry.
Negatives:
- The movie tries to construct a love story in the 60's and one in the present day 2020's, contrasting the different rules and values at play. The 60's one works; the 20's one really didn't for me. Ellie comes across as a very unlikeable person. The contrast between the lack of communications in the 60's (waiting at a station, not sure if someone will turn up or not) and today's chat/SMS rich 'always on' world could perhaps have been brought out more. With my Dr Bob directorial hat on, I would have ditched the present-day love story entirely and focused in on two professional detectives uncovering the past together: not everything needs to involve love and sex.
- The film has a couple of rain sequences that are highly unconvincing. One Riviera in-car scene particularly made me chuckle. "TURN FIRE HOSE ON!" You can almost see the blue sky and people cavorting on the beach behind them!
Summary Thoughts on "The Last Letter from Your Lover": There are actually few films around these days that feature love stories outside the teenage years. This is an 'old-fashioned' film that will appeal to an older age group, looking for style, romance and escapism. It reminded me in turns of movies like "The Two Faces of January" and "The Age of Adeline" in its mood and presentation. I'm probably not the target audience for this movie and I really enjoyed it. But the illustrious Mrs Movie Man probably is. And she declared that she absolutely loved it!
Ignore the sniffy newspaper and ex-newspaper critics. I'd declare this to be a "recommended".
(For the full graphical review, please check out One Mann's Movies on the web, Facebook or Tiktok. Thanks.)
Positives:
- "They don't make them like this any more" the saying goes. This is a love story cum melodrama that is well told by director Augustine Frizzell, in only her second feature. The film zips backwards and forwards between different time periods, trusting the audience to keep up with where we are. The dialogue is suitably soupy for a film of this type, based on a Jojo Moyes book (who wrote "Me Before You", also well-filmed). I've seen a critic review in "The Times" where they mocked the sentimentality of the love letters: but part of me would love to say "OK - let's hear what you would have written"!
- The story ticks all the boxes to keep you engaged. Although never moved to tears, a scene towards the end of the movie certainly generated a lump in the throat.
- All the leads are great. Shailene Woodley has been a personal favourite actress since her amazing turn in "The Descendants". And she certainly doesn't disappoint here.
- The production design is lush, particularly with the 60's scenes of London and the Riviera (reminiscent for me of the recent remake of "Rebecca"). This is nicely brought out by the cinematography (by George Steel), with some of the scenes being 'hang on the wall' beautiful to look at.
- It's wonderful to see the late Ben Cross in the movie, and he gives an excellent and touching performance. Cross died of cancer in August 2020 at the age of just 72. This is probably not his last movie, since he was in another - "The Devil's Light" - currently in post-production. Such a sad loss to the industry.
Negatives:
- The movie tries to construct a love story in the 60's and one in the present day 2020's, contrasting the different rules and values at play. The 60's one works; the 20's one really didn't for me. Ellie comes across as a very unlikeable person. The contrast between the lack of communications in the 60's (waiting at a station, not sure if someone will turn up or not) and today's chat/SMS rich 'always on' world could perhaps have been brought out more. With my Dr Bob directorial hat on, I would have ditched the present-day love story entirely and focused in on two professional detectives uncovering the past together: not everything needs to involve love and sex.
- The film has a couple of rain sequences that are highly unconvincing. One Riviera in-car scene particularly made me chuckle. "TURN FIRE HOSE ON!" You can almost see the blue sky and people cavorting on the beach behind them!
Summary Thoughts on "The Last Letter from Your Lover": There are actually few films around these days that feature love stories outside the teenage years. This is an 'old-fashioned' film that will appeal to an older age group, looking for style, romance and escapism. It reminded me in turns of movies like "The Two Faces of January" and "The Age of Adeline" in its mood and presentation. I'm probably not the target audience for this movie and I really enjoyed it. But the illustrious Mrs Movie Man probably is. And she declared that she absolutely loved it!
Ignore the sniffy newspaper and ex-newspaper critics. I'd declare this to be a "recommended".
(For the full graphical review, please check out One Mann's Movies on the web, Facebook or Tiktok. Thanks.)
BankofMarquis (1832 KP) rated The Midnight Sky (2020) in Movies
Dec 26, 2020
Moody and Atmospheric
Ever since his stint on ER, I have been a fan of George Clooney’s - and not just because he is charming and charismatic on film - but because I find that he brings an interesting facet to whatever character he inhabits
.
And with his latest effort THE MIDNIGHT SKY (Directed by Mr. Clooney, as well) he does not disappoint as his performance - and his Direction - are fascinating to watch.
Based upon the novel by Lily Brooks-Dalton, THE MIDNIGHT SKY tells the tale of a lone scientist (Clooney) in a remote, arctic research station, who is one of the few remaining people on an Earth that has become uninhabitable. He rushes to warn some returning astronauts to avoid their home planet.
A thoughtful, moody film. THE MIDNIGHT SKY will not be everyone’s cup of tea - and you have to be in the mood for something somewhat slow and contemplative - but if you are, you will be rewarded with a rich tapestry of visuals and performances that will be, ultimately, fulfilling.
Let’s start with what works - George Clooney. His direction and his performance as Augustine, the scientist, are both sparse and compact. Neither of these facets have an extraneous movement or tone and they work hand-in-hand to deliver the film that Clooney, obviously intends to give us.
Visually, this film is beautiful to look at - inter cutting the vast emptiness of space to the vast, snowy emptiness of the Arctic. The images that Clooney was able to create was well worth watching this film for.
Clooney was also fortunate enough to cast a variety of stellar performers in a film that has very few roles, so the ones that are there better deliver the goods - and they do. From Ethan Peck (Spock in Star Trek:Discovery) who plays the young Clooney in a flashback (I am very glad they chose to do this as opposed to “de-aging” Clooney) to the Astronauts: Felicity Jones, David Oyelowo (who I continue to like more and more every time I see him), Kyle Chandler and Tiffany Boone. All strike the right tone for the moodiness of this film.
Special notice should be made for Damien Bechir’s astronaut, Sanchez. He was terrific in the limited screen time he had and elevated every scene he was in. Bechir has become one of those performers who I get excited about when I see that he is going to be involved in a screen project.
What doesn’t work? Well…as I stated before…the pacing. It is slow (almost coming to a stop) at times. Since this is a film that will be streamed via Netflix, I can see many, many folks grabbing their phones at times, which is too bad, for the moodiness - and pace - worked for me (or at least the for the mood I was in while watching this).
My other issue with this film is the contrived circumstances that both Clooney and the Astronauts find themselves in. It isn’t enough that Clooney has to journey across rugged Arctic terrain to find a more powerful antennae to communicate with the Astronauts, we have to throw in cracking and melting ice to it. And, of course, just as the Astronauts connect with Clooney, a surprise meteor shower damages the communication array. These contrivances just wasn’t need for the type of movie this film was trying to be. It’s almost as if the Studio Heads said “it’s too slow and talky - put some action in this thing”.
But, if you are able to stay with this film, the ending pays off very well, indeed. I found that it earned it’s ending and I walked away moved and satisfied.
Letter Grade: B
7 stars (out of 10) and you can take that to the Bank(OfMarquis)
.
And with his latest effort THE MIDNIGHT SKY (Directed by Mr. Clooney, as well) he does not disappoint as his performance - and his Direction - are fascinating to watch.
Based upon the novel by Lily Brooks-Dalton, THE MIDNIGHT SKY tells the tale of a lone scientist (Clooney) in a remote, arctic research station, who is one of the few remaining people on an Earth that has become uninhabitable. He rushes to warn some returning astronauts to avoid their home planet.
A thoughtful, moody film. THE MIDNIGHT SKY will not be everyone’s cup of tea - and you have to be in the mood for something somewhat slow and contemplative - but if you are, you will be rewarded with a rich tapestry of visuals and performances that will be, ultimately, fulfilling.
Let’s start with what works - George Clooney. His direction and his performance as Augustine, the scientist, are both sparse and compact. Neither of these facets have an extraneous movement or tone and they work hand-in-hand to deliver the film that Clooney, obviously intends to give us.
Visually, this film is beautiful to look at - inter cutting the vast emptiness of space to the vast, snowy emptiness of the Arctic. The images that Clooney was able to create was well worth watching this film for.
Clooney was also fortunate enough to cast a variety of stellar performers in a film that has very few roles, so the ones that are there better deliver the goods - and they do. From Ethan Peck (Spock in Star Trek:Discovery) who plays the young Clooney in a flashback (I am very glad they chose to do this as opposed to “de-aging” Clooney) to the Astronauts: Felicity Jones, David Oyelowo (who I continue to like more and more every time I see him), Kyle Chandler and Tiffany Boone. All strike the right tone for the moodiness of this film.
Special notice should be made for Damien Bechir’s astronaut, Sanchez. He was terrific in the limited screen time he had and elevated every scene he was in. Bechir has become one of those performers who I get excited about when I see that he is going to be involved in a screen project.
What doesn’t work? Well…as I stated before…the pacing. It is slow (almost coming to a stop) at times. Since this is a film that will be streamed via Netflix, I can see many, many folks grabbing their phones at times, which is too bad, for the moodiness - and pace - worked for me (or at least the for the mood I was in while watching this).
My other issue with this film is the contrived circumstances that both Clooney and the Astronauts find themselves in. It isn’t enough that Clooney has to journey across rugged Arctic terrain to find a more powerful antennae to communicate with the Astronauts, we have to throw in cracking and melting ice to it. And, of course, just as the Astronauts connect with Clooney, a surprise meteor shower damages the communication array. These contrivances just wasn’t need for the type of movie this film was trying to be. It’s almost as if the Studio Heads said “it’s too slow and talky - put some action in this thing”.
But, if you are able to stay with this film, the ending pays off very well, indeed. I found that it earned it’s ending and I walked away moved and satisfied.
Letter Grade: B
7 stars (out of 10) and you can take that to the Bank(OfMarquis)
Sarah (7798 KP) rated The Midnight Sky (2020) in Movies
Dec 27, 2020
Predictable and cliched
The Midnight Sky is a science fiction film directed by George Clooney, the latest in a long line of Netflix originals to hit our screens, based on the 2016 book ‘Good Morning, Midnight’ by Lily Brooks-Dalton. George Clooney plays Augustine, who encounters young girl Iris (the adorable Caoilinn Springall) after remaining on earth following a global apocalypse. Together they must travel across the Arctic to reach a weather station that will allow them to warn returning spaceship, the Aether, captained by Adewole (David Oyelowo) and crewed by Sully (Felicity Jones), Mitchell (Kyle Chandler), Sanchez (Demián Bichir) and Maya (Tiffany Boone).
The trailer for this had me concerned. It looked very similar to many other sci-fi/end of the world films (think Sunshine, Interstellar, even The Day After Tomorrow) and nothing about it looked particularly original. I had hoped that the trailer might be misleading, but I’m afraid to say that this is every bit as lacklustre and predictable as the trailer implied.
Visually this looks stunning, both the set design and the special effects have obviously had a decent amount of time and money invested in them. Alongside this, Alexandre Desplat’s score is beautifully ephemeral and haunting, and accompanies the story well, feeling very in keeping with both the Arctic and the space settings. And aside from a decent cast, I’m afraid these are the only good things I can say about this film. The main problem is the story itself, it’s entirely predictable and suffers from every space and sci-fi mishap you could ever think of, from unexplainable drifting off course to the destruction of important equipment (comms of course, would you expect any less?) due to an unpredicted meteor strike. And this cliched predictability just makes the story so dull and drawn out over its two hour runtime.
To be honest, the whole film itself and the actions of the characters just doesn’t make any sense. You have a pregnant astronaut, who has virtually no sexual chemistry with the man she’s having a baby with, and who’s allowed to go outside into space with little concern over her or her baby’s well-being. A scientist who falls into sub-zero Arctic water which appears to have little impact on his health. And a child walking around in a summer dress with bare legs in the Arctic climate. Admittedly this latter point is addressed towards the end of the film in a rather obvious and over used plot twist, which is still rather unsatisfying. There’s also the large number of unexplained plot points. I’m all for keeping the watcher guessing and hate films that feel the need to over explain every aspect of the plot, but The Midnight Sky takes the opposite approach and explains barely anything. If you go into this expecting to find out what caused the radiation apocalypse or what happened to the rest of earth’s population you’ll be sorely disappointed. It also makes references to a K-23 colony ship that the Aether hasn’t heard from, yet provides no explanation or background as to the outcome of said ship, and also gives us flashbacks to Augustine’s past yet with little reason other than to provide an “A-ha” moment for the aforementioned plot twist. And the decisions made by the astronauts on the Aether once they’ve found out about Earth’s fate are just laughably ridiculous especially considering the fate of the rest of the population.
Despite the promising cast and effects, The Midnight Sky is yet another disappointing Netflix original that is light years away from some of the more brilliant sci-fi stories that have come before it.
The trailer for this had me concerned. It looked very similar to many other sci-fi/end of the world films (think Sunshine, Interstellar, even The Day After Tomorrow) and nothing about it looked particularly original. I had hoped that the trailer might be misleading, but I’m afraid to say that this is every bit as lacklustre and predictable as the trailer implied.
Visually this looks stunning, both the set design and the special effects have obviously had a decent amount of time and money invested in them. Alongside this, Alexandre Desplat’s score is beautifully ephemeral and haunting, and accompanies the story well, feeling very in keeping with both the Arctic and the space settings. And aside from a decent cast, I’m afraid these are the only good things I can say about this film. The main problem is the story itself, it’s entirely predictable and suffers from every space and sci-fi mishap you could ever think of, from unexplainable drifting off course to the destruction of important equipment (comms of course, would you expect any less?) due to an unpredicted meteor strike. And this cliched predictability just makes the story so dull and drawn out over its two hour runtime.
To be honest, the whole film itself and the actions of the characters just doesn’t make any sense. You have a pregnant astronaut, who has virtually no sexual chemistry with the man she’s having a baby with, and who’s allowed to go outside into space with little concern over her or her baby’s well-being. A scientist who falls into sub-zero Arctic water which appears to have little impact on his health. And a child walking around in a summer dress with bare legs in the Arctic climate. Admittedly this latter point is addressed towards the end of the film in a rather obvious and over used plot twist, which is still rather unsatisfying. There’s also the large number of unexplained plot points. I’m all for keeping the watcher guessing and hate films that feel the need to over explain every aspect of the plot, but The Midnight Sky takes the opposite approach and explains barely anything. If you go into this expecting to find out what caused the radiation apocalypse or what happened to the rest of earth’s population you’ll be sorely disappointed. It also makes references to a K-23 colony ship that the Aether hasn’t heard from, yet provides no explanation or background as to the outcome of said ship, and also gives us flashbacks to Augustine’s past yet with little reason other than to provide an “A-ha” moment for the aforementioned plot twist. And the decisions made by the astronauts on the Aether once they’ve found out about Earth’s fate are just laughably ridiculous especially considering the fate of the rest of the population.
Despite the promising cast and effects, The Midnight Sky is yet another disappointing Netflix original that is light years away from some of the more brilliant sci-fi stories that have come before it.