OUT NOW: Better Man (Michael Gracey, 2024)

The story of UK pop star Robbie Williams (Jonno Davis), his rise as part of the boy band Take That, and eventually solo stardom.

Before this movie, I had not thought about Robbie Williams in years.

After spending a good chunk of the nineties in America, I came to live in New Zealand at the end of 1999. So that meant I missed the beginning of Williams’ rise as a solo star. And I had no awareness of Take That until much later.

In 1999, Williams released the compilation The Ego Has Landed as an entree to breaking into the US market. Ironically, this was the album that introduced me to him, when someone decided to buy it for my family shortly after we settled in NZ.

So I ended up getting a good dose of Williams’ most popular songs, and became a bit of a fan for a few years.

Eventually he fell out of my rotation. 

Occasionally he would pop up on the telly, or I would catch a snippet of a new song, but that was about it.

The first news I had heard about the movie was that Williams was playing himself. I probably dismissed it as pure ego.

But then the reveal came out that Williams was being played by a CG chimpanzee.

That conceit - and the ridiculously good notices - made me pay more attention.

This movie is great. 

I have not seen Michael Gracey’s previous film The Greatest Showman. I was once forced to listen to the soundtrack on repeat during an all-day road trip so had no desire to watch it.

Better Man has me reconsidering that embargo.

The film manages to avoid feeling like a typical biopic by focusing on a key section of the subject’s life, and a key arc in the character’s personal development.

This is a cinematic story, one in which time and space, reality and fantasy, are permeable and subject to being shaped to suit the shifting perspective of Williams:

• The sense of abandonment 

• The first taste of success

• The high of fame and the crushing sense of failure after he left Take That

While Davis gives a good sense of Williams’ bravado, there is a constant unease - an underlying awareness of the doubt and self loathing that drives the star’s need for fame and broad acceptance.

As a musical, Better Man is exceptional. And part of what makes it so powerful is that it has a clear-eyed, empathetic view of its central character.

But it would be pointless if the film was not successful as a musical. And as a pure audiovisual experience, it is great.

What I loved about it is that this is a musical designed for the medium of film. This is not a stage show transferred to the big screen.

The highlight of the film is ’Rock DJ’, staged as a choreographed dance number down a London street.

As the band advances down the street, extras scatter and coke together, our heroes make a series of rapid costume changes and the increasing hysteria of the band’s fandom seems to cause every element of the environment collapse into chaos.

Taking the functional place of a montage, it is an exhilarating set piece that does a far better job of capturing Take That’s rapid, massive success,, capturing the speed and excitement of becoming the centre of popular culture.

The decision to cast Williams as a digital simian pays off in a couple of different ways. Practically, it blends Davis and Williams into one entity.

Jonno Davis - with face and singing voice replaced - does a great job as Williams. It never comes across as an impersonation. 

The added benefit of the digital ape is that it enables the actor and the movie are at a remove from their source.

Gracey has stated he was inspired by Williams’ comment about feeling less evolved. At a certain point, I completely forgot about the surrealism of this choice.

The selection of songs is tasteful - the filmmakers do not stray from the big hits (my friend noted the large number of covers), but they all fit the emotional states that they are trying to capture.

It is not better than it had any right to be. It is good.

It is refreshing to see a mainstream movie that is unconcerned with literalism, and is willing to throw that away in favour of expressing a deeper, and more emotionally truthful version of its story.

Frankly, it is just good to watch a musical that loves musicals and is not afraid of that the genre can do.

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Lili (Charles Walters, 1953)

When she learns her only family has passed away, orphan Lili (Leslie Caron) stumbles into a nearby circus, where she finds solace in a company of puppets operated by the distant Paul (Mel Ferrer).

TW: Some discussion of suicide.

I watched this movie years ago. I had seen Leslie Caron in An American in Paris and developed a crush. I wanted to see what else she had done.

I ended up watching Lili and Gigi - not because they rhymed, they were the titles I could get my mitts on.

I do not recall much about Gigi beyond it being long, and Caron’s bizarre Eliza Doolittle accent.

Lili was stickier. Something about this strange story of a young girl talking to puppets made it stick in the brain.

Rewatching it, I was amazed at how dark it is. And the first act, leading up to the introduction of the puppets, is a nightmare.

The film opens with our sixteen-year-old heroine being threatened with sexual enslavement. She then becomes infatuated with someone who clearly does not care about her.

Trapped in a circus, with no friends or family to fall back upon, she is at her lowest point.

She leans against the ladder to the trapeze.

The score builds as she looks up at the towering structure, exaggerated by a matte painting and a low angle.

She even begins climbing the ladder. 

At this place, when Lili is at her lowest, that she (and the viewer) are introduced to the puppets.

The puppets draw Lili out of her shell, until she is able to sing.

A crowd is drawn by the spectacle.

Thus the film's strange, disturbing overlapping impulses are brought together: on one level, these interactions act as a form of therapy and comfort for the young girl. But they are orchestrated by a man who only seems capable of interacting with her through the puppets - he knows how to push her buttons, and seems to be incapable of not trying to hurt her.

There is a selfishness to Paul's relationship, a masochism to his affection and empathy that frame Lili's interactions with his creations.

And then there is the fact that Lili's interactions with the puppets are a show, a spectacle for public consumption.

The show is just a series of improvisations, in which Lili and the puppets discuss whatever has been troubling her. And that mix of fantasy and real emotion is the selling point of the show.

The film does not seem to recognise the perversity of its central conceit, and the mise-en-scene only seems to reinforce it.

Made on a modest budget, Lili takes place in the (clearly stage-bound) confines of the carnival. Lili’s horizons feel small.

Her one solace is the nightly conversations with the puppets.

Paul is unable to express himself empathetically without the puppets as a vehicle.

Despite knowing he is there, Lili is still able to separate him from his creations, and treats them as separate entities.

Even the purity of these conversations is undermined by a sense of exploitation and routine - she even has to wear the same clothes. 

She is trapped in a space of childlike innocence and trauma. 

Leslie Caron’s performance is a bit limited. She conveys a childlike sense of incomprehension (her big eyes are a special effect by themselves), but the story is so fable-like, she does not get a lot of room to expand.

A strange, unsettling picture, Lili is worth a watch. It might not succeed as a romance, but as a masochistic psychodrama?

You be the judge.

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BITE-SIZED: The Hunted (William Friedkin, 2003)

Survival expert L.T. Bonham (Tommy Lee Jones) is hired by the FBI to track the murderer of a group of hunters.

Bonham’s quarry turns out to be Aaron Hallam (Benicio del Toro), a former decorated soldier he had once trained.

Haunted by his actions in special ops, Hallam is on a paranoid rampage of destruction.

Will Bonham be able to stop him?

My earliest memory of this movie was a poor review in the back of Empire magazine.

I was a reader for over a decade, but I have not read it since the late 2010s. The older I get, the more I feel its influence shaking away.

But every now and then, I catch a film that I have never seen but which has been already framed by my impression of the word from Empire.

The Hunted is the kind of thriller I love. I wish I had caught it earlier.

It is not a game changer, and I cannot say I am head-over-heels with the film. But in its pared-down ferocity, the film is effective.

The opening scene - a flashback to the antagonists' wartime experiences - almost feels like a different movie: lit and staged in a way that betrays its artifice, it works toward creating vividness of memory and trauma, heightened to its most essential, visceral elements.

Once we are dropped into the present, that vivid colour is replaced chilly blue filters. The film is grounding the viewer in the character's present.

Tommy Lee Jones’s entrance - tracking, freeing and treating a wolf - is a near wordless exercise that establishes Bonham as Del Toro's equal. In the following. scene, he tracks down the hunters responsible for the snare and doles out a suitable punishment.

The movie is wonderfully spare, moving from a scene of Del Toro’s Hallam getting a medal to a nightmare of his war experiences - whatever glory or status is immediately negated but showing what he lost to gain that piece of metal.

Then the movie cuts to 4 years later, he is in the Oregon woods, turning the tables on a group of hunters.

The story is basic, but the execution is so minimalist it turns the movie into an action movie haiku.

The plot is not worth paying attention to. The film is purely concerned with Hallam’s pursuit, and ends once he has caught his prey.

Filled with practical effects and stunts, it feels like the cleanest, most technically polished Seventies thriller ever made.

When Bonham finally kills his former student, it almost feels like an animal being put down.

The movie ends back at Bonham’s cabin. He looks out and watches the white wolf he saved at the beginning of the movie. 

At least one predator he saved is free to live in its natural environment.

Related

To Live and Die In LA 

Rampage 

Cruising

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The Mark of Zorro (Rouben Mamoulian, 1940)

Don Diego Vega (Tyrone Power) returns home to California to discover his home under the thumb of a corrupt magistrate Don Luis Quintero (J. Edward Bromberg) and his violent enforcer Captain Esteban Pasquale (Basil Rathbone).

Disturbed by the plight of the people, Don Diego adopts the masked moniker of Zorro to strike back and bring down the regime…

A week or so ago, I finally watched The Adventures of Robin Hood. The movie is great, I will probably scribble something about it, but more importantly it reintroduced me to a genre I had not watched since I was a child:

The swashbuckler. 

Robin Hood aside, most swashbucklers involve pirates and sailing ships. One of the other exceptions is Mark of Zorro.

Like Adventures of Robin Hood, Mark of Zorro is technically a remake of a silent original, starring the original American action star Douglas Fairbanks.

Despite its origins, The Mark of Zorro is a movie with a long shadow. Well-regarded since its release, it is often held up as one of the finest adventure films ever made.

It has been referenced both overtly - The Mask of Zorro feels like a loving sequel - and in more subtle ways (Batman fans will recognise it as the movie that young Bruce Wayne watches the night his parents died).

 

With its story of a nobleman moonlighting as a masked avenger, righting wrongs, it is easy to see the inspiration for the caped crusader. It also feels a lot like Robin Hood.

Watching this movie after The Adventures of Robin Hood made the viewing experience slightly surreal as it shares that film’s villain (Basil Rathbone) and Friar Tuck (Eugene Palette). It was like going into the remake right after watching the original.

Tyrone Power was an idol of the 40s and 50s. I have heard of him but this is the first movie of his I have seen.

Like Errol Flynn, he made a name for himself in swashbucklers, but then made the transition to the stage and more dramatic roles. He famously passed away of a heart attack while filming a sword fight for Solomon and Sheba.

He is an interesting contrast to Flynn.

Flynn feels chaotic, with a devil-may-care attitude and sexual charisma to burn.

Power is positively conservative by comparison. He is equally athletic, but comes with a pedigree. If Flynn feels like a man of the people, Power feels more blue blood.

He may romance Linda Darnell but his intentions seem completely wholesome.

When Flynn’s Robin Hood whisks Olivia De Havilland’s Maid Marion away at the end, it feels like they are about to have a different kind of climax.

Power is a joy, playing up the foppishness of his public persona but without going too broad. He appears more as a disconnected nepo baby, uncomfortable with even the vaguest inconvenience. It is totally believable that his foes dismiss him.

Earlier, I referenced the familiarity of the supporting cast.

It is a good example of how the studio system worked, taking character actors known for playing a specific type and plugging them into similar roles. Hence why you have Eugene Palette essentially playing Friar Tuck (completely with sword fight) and why you have Basil Rathbone playing a variation of Guy of Gisborne. 

Rathbone also came with the pedigree of being a trained swordsman. 

Something I have picked up on in my own enjoyment of action movies (or movies driven by action, like musicals) is when characters show physical ability through casual behaviour: Rathbone’s stretch as he prepares to duel Power is not a subtle example but conveys experience and the character’s casual sadism - this is a man who sees death as a sport.

While Rathbone is great, J. Edward Bromberg is the most interesting of Zorro’s antagonists as Don Luis Quintero, the corrupt mayor of Los Angeles.

Self-serving and cowardly, he is willing to throw anyone under the bus. He is also one of the comic highlights of the movie. His final speech, in which he informs the townsfolk that he intends to retire, is a delightful series of increasingly morose proclamations as the audience voices their displeasure with jeers and laughter.

While I have loved diving into the swashbucklers, one recurring issue is how poor the women’s’ roles are in these movies.

And that extends to The Mark of Zorro. While the other elements of the film feel like they are punching above their weight, the romance is a bit prosaic.

Linda Darnell does not get much to do but look beautiful and provide a reason for our hero to realise living in California is not so bad after all. Her one real scene - confessing her desires to Zorro, disguised as a priest - is a comic highlight, but she is basically serving as an unknowing straight man

While watching Robin Hood and the other swashbucklers, I was struck by the unity of their underlying disdain for the greed of the landed gentry. Even the heroes come from the same class, they recognise the inequalities of the world around them, and the films are about our heroes finding various ways to redistribute their wealthy victims’ resources.

Most of these movies were made during the Great Depression, and it feels a part of the text in Mark of Zorro. 

One of the most striking elements is how grim Los Angeles county is in the eraly parts of the movie. Maybe it is the effect of being shot in black and white, but the movie takes its time to show the brutality of the new regime.

This sequence starts as a case of mistaken identity - Don Diego introduces himself as the son of the Alcalde (magistrate) of the county, ignorant of the fact that his father has been forced from office.

He learns of the new state of the people as a stranger. While coming from a high status background, the film positions Don Diego as an outsider, and someone that everyone underestimates.

What is fascinating about the movie from a contemporary perspective is how unfussy the movie is about its title character. We get motivation for why Diego becomes Zorro, and that is it. We do not get any sweaty scenes showing our hero putting together his vigilante persona and costume. 

Zorro is introduced with speed - riding on his horse and publicising his goal with a poster (like Batman, he understands the power of branding).

  

The final sword fight in The Adventures of Robin Hood is fantastic - this one is even better.

It helps that the characters in-movie are trained swordsmen (there is a great bear where Rathbone actually stretches before the duel).

Trading barbs and blades around an office, the pair’s battle is also one over the privileges afforded by the landed gentry.

There are few action sequences in the picture but it moves at a clip (only 94 minutes!) and makes up for it with a fantastic final duel and pitched battle.  

Maybe because of the parallels with Batman, I was surprised at how closed the ending is. 

Our hero has saved the people and found love.

The movie’s character arc is simple - he starts the movie as a soldier, excited to be at the centre of the action.He treats his return home as purgatory

By the end of the film, he has found purpose and contentment with matrimony.

Order has been restored - the corrupt ruler has been replaced by a more benevolent one, all classes seemingly united. Going back to the contemporary context of the film’s making, it feels like an allegory for Roosevelt’s America; not remaking the old order but re-working it to a more egalitarian model

The film had no sequels, although it paved the way for Power to challenge Errol Flynn as a swashbuckling hero.

It made me want more Zorro, but it also made me want to check out more movies in the swashbuckler genre.

Check back in - the Midnight Ramble will be swashing more buckles shortly.

Related

Mask of Zorro

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