ANIMAL KINGDOM- Review

I have a confusing relationship with crime films. While I can always appreciate the technical achievement of the Godfather trilogy or Goodfellas, they can often leave me cold if there aren't any relatable characters. I think In Bruges is brilliant, but DePalma's Scarface is an overlong and over-hyped mess of a film that (I'll say it again) ruined Al Pacino. And that part's got nothing to do with the crime part.

A crime film that's been hoovering up acclaim for over a year ahead of its UK release this Friday is Animal Kingdom. Set in Melbourne, we follow a family of armed robbers called the Codys, as they effectively go to war with the police. J Cody is a teenager whose mother overdoses on heroin right in front of him, and so he's sent to live with his grandmother and his uncles. J shortly becomes embroiled in the escalating feud between his family and the police, and finds his life may depend on where his loyalties lie.

Maybe my difficult relationship with the genre is the reason why it's taken me so long to actually put down my review. Happily, it doesn't glamourise crime, not by any stretch of the imagination, and for that it should be applauded. Nonetheless, I have spent a couple of hours just looking at the last two paragraphs and listening to "All Out Of Love" by Air Supply, which is put to excellent use in both the film and its trailer, and trying to articulate my feelings about it. It's not only that it's difficult to put my own spin on a film in which I can't particularly relate to any of the characters, but also because it's tough to adequately sum up its brilliance.

OK, actually, Guy Pearce played a character who's very sympathetic at times. At one point, I hear he was pegged to play Harvey Dent in The Dark Knight, and his performance as dedicated cop Leckie is just as I imagine his spin on that character would have been, even if he's wearing Gary Oldman's Jim Gordon facial hair. I didn't really care about any of the other characters, but that's not to say they aren't interesting to watch. Writer-director David Michôd's admirable feat is to present us with characters who made me want to run away screaming and yet still hold my attention for the duration.

Let's be clear- it is a very good film, exceptionally well made, and complemented by a cast at the peak of their powers. But it also inhabits a very grubby world, in which the animal kingdom of the title refers more to the Circle of Life than criminals being the king of the jungle. Within the first ten minutes, we're told in no uncertain terms that crooks must come undone. The Codys are crooks. Remember how the title of There Will Be Blood became a prophecy that filled you with dread all the way through watching the film? This film's mantra- all crooks come undone- is no less unsettling.

That dreadful statement eventually becomes reassurance, as the terror of the criminal characters, amped up and embellished all the way through, grows almost unbearable. Largely, it's down to Ben Mendelsohn, who plays Pope. Pope is the most batshit terrifying character you've seen in a film in at least the last 12 months. His short temper and frightening brutality makes him an absolute force of nature- he's like Hitchcock's Bomb Theory in action, as we wonder just what the fuck he's going to do next as soon as we see him in a scene.

He's the most outright scary actor in the film, but the most formidable performance comes from the Oscar-nominated Jacki Weaver as the Codys' matriarch, Smurf. As a character, she's a veritable lioness- though initially passive and subservient to her male offspring, she becomes fiercely protective of her ability to dote on her family. When that character turns nasty, Weaver packs a mighty dramatic punch, and she just keeps building in power all the way through the film. While Pope's inhumanity is the terror of the film, Smurf's humanity is somehow more disquieting at certain points.

All of the ingredients would be there for me to have really loved Animal Kingdom if I could only say that newcomer James Frecheville was an identifiable hero, as J. Instead, I found him to be a pretty lifeless character. Pulled between the moral obligation asserted by the police and the fierce loyalty of his mad relatives, there should be more conflict there than Frecheville really conveys. But then it's not all his fault- there's a point late on in the script at which I just completely stopped rooting for his character. It's a small action, but one which utterly ruined any iota of sympathy I might have had for him.

If crime films are your bag, then you absolutely cannot miss Animal Kingdom. It's intense, terrifying and compelling from start to finish in its treatment of the crime movie expectations. Aside from the lead character, there's a bunch of superbly drawn and often disgusting characters, performed by the cast with blistering skill. It comes back to that Air Supply song, in the end- for me at least, I'm now unable to hear that song without thinking of this film. The song isn't even hugely important in the grand scheme of things, but an inextricable link has been forged between that song and this brilliantly made film. Likeable or not, it's still pretty much unforgettable.

Animal Kingdom is showing in selected cinemas nationwide from tomorrow.
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If you've seen Animal Kingdom, why not share your comments below?

I'm Mark the mad prophet, and until next time, don't watch anything I wouldn't watch.

Visit Boston! - THE TOWN Review

Hiding under the yoke of an entirely innocuous title, The Town is Ben Affleck's second directorial effort after the superb Gone Baby Gone. It's about a gang of highly skilled and meticulous thieves in Charlestown, Boston- an area that we're told has produced more bank robbers and car thieves than anywhere else on the planet.

When the clean-up of a bank robbery gets messy, Doug, the brains of the operation, forges a relationship with Claire, the bank manager they took hostage. Claire is unaware of their connection to each other, but dogged FBI agent Frawley is doing his utmost to find any evidence to incriminate the gang and send them to prison for life.

Having seen Good Will Hunting, Gone Baby Gone and now The Town, I think Ben Affleck's trying to tell us something about Boston in his writing. He hates the place. He really just has contempt for Boston- although the latter two films are more about how everyone who lives there is a scumbag, even Good Will Hunting has Affleck's character threatening to kill Will if he doesn't get out of their shit hometown and make something of himself. Not to say that it's a verité perspective on the city, but let's say he's not concerned with tourism films.

Whether Boston's a corrupting force or a symbol around which criminal elements rally, there's no denying that it's a character all by itself in Affleck's directorial works so far. In The Town, we see that he's grown as a director since his first film, developing a mean eye for what makes a great action sequence as well as making some edge-of-the-seat intense moments without the need for jump-scares or chase scenes.

The narrow sidestreets of Charlestown make for a surprisingly claustrophobic car chase midway through the film, one of the standout sequences of the year, but there's just as much excitement in a scene where three characters sit together at an outdoor diner. Affleck's less remarkable in front of the camera than he is behind it, but he certainly gives a much better performance in this than he has elsewhere. And it's so perfectly acted by the rest of the cast that it's hard not to give credit for his perfect casting of those other roles.

While it's a film that's better than any one of its performances alone, there are almost too many fantastic turns in it, without enough room to breathe. For me, the standout was Mad Men star Jon Hamm as Frawley, a cop who's decidedly less dapper than Don Draper, but he's relentlessly watchable. He's better than your average tenacious FBI guy because of some of the excellent dialogue he gets, which Hamm delivers with an acid tongue and a knowing smirk. Jeremy Renner is also marvellous as Jem, Doug's volatile best friend- a loose cannon played so well that we could've stood to see a whole lot more of him.

If anything, that's the major drawback of The Town. While it's a somewhat welcome deference to 1970s crime drama crib-sheets, its supporting characters are never entirely fleshed out. Not that I need or want to know everything about underused characters played by Blake Lively, Pete Postlethwaite or Chris Cooper, but the performers put so much into them that you wish they could be explored more. Although it works for Cooper and Postlethwaite, who make blistering impressions in their respective brief roles, the women of the film are sidelined.

It's a very macho film, to be sure, but that's no excuse for the way Blake Lively and Rebecca Hall's Claire are so easily forgotten by the viewer at certain stages. Lively gives a career-changing performance, de-glamming enough that she convinces as the damaged-goods hooker who trails around after Doug, but she doesn't have much to work with in the sprawling narrative. It's particularly unforgivable with Hall though- happy as I was to see Frawley connecting the dots and zinging perps with verbal barbs, Claire's relationship with Doug serves more as an inciting incident than a compelling romance.

If only these problems had been redressed, I would really be trumpeting The Town as a serious contender at the next Oscar ceremony, and perhaps after snubbing Gone Baby Gone, the Academy may feel they at least owe Ben Affleck one of the ten Best Picture nominations. What holds it back from being up there with the very best of the year is in how he doesn't explore his characters as thoroughly as he did in his debut feature. There's nothing here so thought-provoking as to parallel the jaw-dropping decision that Casey Affleck's character makes at the end of Gone Baby Gone.

The Town does make an old formula seem very fresh and exciting by way of its excellent direction and outstanding cast, but it's slightly lacking in character depth. It's supremely understated, but simultaneously more commercial and accessible than Gone Baby Gone. It's clear that Ben Affleck will shake off any detrimental reputation very shortly if he keeps this up- he's an even-handed director who could go on to carve out a career as great as Clint Eastwood's. In the meantime, enjoy an intense crime thriller that's smart enough to excuse any flaws.

The Town is now showing in cinemas nationwide.
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If you've seen The Town, why not share your comments below? If Affleck does carry on making films of this calibre, I'm really serious about that Clint Eastwood thing- he just needs to get the Boston rage out of his system first...

I'm Mark the mad prophet, and until next time, don't watch anything I wouldn't watch.