East is East (UK, 1999)
Directed by Damien O'Donnell
Starring Om Puri, Linda Bassett, Ian Aspinall, Jimi Mistry

There's a long-running tradition in British cinema of finding humour, particularly black humour, in the grimmest and most oppressive circumstances. This tradition arguably reached its peak during the British New Wave of the 1950s and 1960s, whose legacy remains felt in the works of Ken Loach, Mike Leigh and to a lesser extent Andrea Arnold. But even though the days of Kes and A Taste of Honey may be long gone, there have been a trickle of films which have kept this tradition going while putting their own stamp on matters. And while not up there with the best work of Loach and Leigh, East is East does deserve commendation.Based on the autobiographical novel and stage play by Ayub Khan-Din, East is East examines the culture clash of Pakistani George Khan (Om Puri) as he struggles to raise his large family in early-1970s Salford. The strife on the streets, epitomised by posters of Enoch Powell, is nothing compared to the hardship Khan's children and wife endure under his iron rule. While Khan is committed to upholding Pakistani traditions, arranging the lavish weddings of his sons and daughters, his offspring are more interested in living life the British way, filled with nightclubs, snogging and questionable art projects.The look of East is East harks back to the kitchen-sink dramas which were spawned from the British New Wave. There are strong hints in Jimi Mistry's character of Saturday Night and Sunday Morning: Mistry fills in for Albert Finney as a vessel of burgeoning rage and frustration, desperate to break out and abandon the cell in which he finds himself. The youngest son, who spends most of the film hiding his face with a parka, is as downtrodden and victimised as the protagonist of Kes, to the point where we expect him to run away towards the end.But on top of these gritty references, East is East is also a close cousin of more upbeat, feel-good dramas like The Full Monty or Brassed Off. The influence of the latter is plain to see in the opening scene, which features a military parade marching through crowded urban streets. Damien O'Donnell would later direct the life-affirming drama Inside I'm Dancing, and is most at home with the lighter, more uplifting sections of the film. But like both Brassed Off and The Full Monty, there is depth to East is East as well as delight. Just as The Full Monty is a film about unemployment that just happens to involve strippers, so East is East is an often powerful drama which just happens to be cheerfully funny.The first big plus point of East is East is its balance, not just in terms of the two races or cultures but in its approach to tackling the stereotypes of each of them. It never falls into the trap of reducing either culture to a caricature, whether by having the Pakistanis as intolerant and impetuous or the English as overly cultured and aloof. It completely punctures racial prejudice, using the extremes of Khan and his bigoted white neighbour to demonstrate how futile and destructive prejudice can be. It depicts intolerance as something which, while directed outwards, is corrosive inwards, damaging the things you care about the most.In a similar fashion, East is East has a very fair attitude towards integration. It could be called the Bible of cinematic multiculturalism, at least of the kind being espoused by 1990s politicians. It acknowledges Britain's history as a melting-pot of different cultures, languages and religions, co-existing often uneasily but with ultimately rich and distinctive results. The Khan family outside of George are keen to integrate, retaining aspects of their existing identity while embracing their new home and all it has to offer. George, on the other hand, is so insistent upon keeping what he deems to be Pakistani identity alive, he doesn't believe anyone else's opinion is remotely valid or important.George justifies his attitude through his traditional role as head of the family. This is the one aspect of Pakistani culture (as presented in the film) which Britain shares: wives and children are expected to defer almost lovingly to the iron will of the husband and father, even when they are convinced he is in the wrong. The role of women is a key issue in East is East, with the recurring theme of arranged marriages and the association of progeny being 'sold off' to satisfy or please another family.British cinema has a long tradition of strong female protagonists, particularly in urban dramas. While much of the British New Wave was criticised for being male-centric, or masculine in tone and outlook, works like A Taste of Honey and to some extent The L-Shaped Room pointed to the strength of women in circumstances which would appear to be inferior and weak. Linda Bassett's long-suffering Mancunian mother is a descendent of the kind of roles that Rita Tushingham used to get: she's the one who most comes into her own in the film, eventually managing to stand up to George while somehow still managing to love him.Looking at the way that East is East was marketed, you could be forgiven for seeing it as a parochial, quaint little comedy designed to illicit cheap laughs from the export market. The French title, Fish and Chips - la comédie qui croustille! ("Fish and chips - the crunchy comedy!"), bears no resemblance to the content of the film. And then there's the American poster, in which the Asian characters are shoved out of sight at the top in favour of a white blonde chewing bubblegum - a decision which says quite a lot about the underlying prejudices of film distributors and marketers.While there are many moments in the film which will make you laugh or chuckle, the predominant feeling is one of tension and bittersweetness. We genuinely enjoy spending time with the characters, but the relationship is weighted down by the threat of the father figure and the restrictive power of tradition and expectation. Like the best work of Terrence Rattigan or Alan Ayckbourn, we find ourselves almost screaming at how the younger characters are hemmed in by their elders, with any deviation deemed to be disobedience or the worst form of vulgarity.The central performances in East is East capture this burgeoning sense of havoc and frustration which is always threatening to erupt. Om Puri is a commanding and terrifying screen presence, packing out every shot like a dark shroud drawing darkness over proceedings. Linda Bassett gives as good as him, refusing to descend into the cliché of the stoic Northern housewife and remaining convincing throughout. Jimi Mistry, who recently appeared in The Arbor, is deeply charismatic, channelling Albert Finney and melding it with the swagger of John Travolta in his prime. And Jordan Routledge does very well in his role as the youngest son, blending the mischievous and the fearful to perfection.There are a couple of problems with East is East which prevent it from attaining greatness. Some of the supporting characters are underdeveloped, something which is particularly true of the two Northern girls trying to woo the Khan sons: while Emma Rydal get some room for manoeuvre as Stella, Ruth Jones' character arc doesn't move much beyond the fact that she's fat. More problematic is the ending: with all that has happened, including the violence, you wouldn't expect Linda Bassett to stay with her husband. Perhaps the film is making a point about integration: if he leaves, it would turn the message of the film on its head and imply that the two sides cannot integrate after all. That's completely understandable, but in terms of the familial relationship in and of itself, it feels contrived.East is East is an interesting addition to both the coming-of-age genre and the tradition of culture-class comedies. Its flaws are more or less forgivable and do not significantly encumber or hamper the comedy. After 12 years its emotional impact as is strong as its political relevance, both of which are unlikely to fade in the further passage of time. Warts and all, it is essential viewing for anyone interested in British cinema.

Rating:
Verdict: Enjoyably smart and bittersweetly funny

Senna (France/ UK/ USA, 2011)
Directed by Asif Kapadia
Starring Ayrton Senna, Alain Prost, Frank Williams, Ron Dennis

Innovation and artistic value are not properties which disappear when a genre enters the mainstream, and nowhere is there more evident than in documentaries. There are copious examples of recent efforts which have found a relatively wide audience while pushing the genre envelope, from Kevin Macdonald's nail-biting Touching the Void to more introspective works like The Arbor and Of Time and the City. Continuing this trend is Senna, a really great documentary which could be one of the year's best films.Senna is a documentary about the late Formula 1 racing driver Ayrton Senna, which is constructed entirely from archive footage of him. This incorporates TV race coverage, press interviews, TV appearances in Brazil, behind-the-scenes footage and family home video. Although other voices appear over the footage, there is no consistent narration to impose a particular version of events over what we see. Senna is allowed to tell his own story, like he is reading from pages of a diary which switches between the first and third person.One of the instant advantages of this approach is that Senna avoids the cliché of the talking head. These are individuals connected with the subject or more contemporary commentators, whose often platitudinous insights can drag even the best documentary into tedium and mediocrity. But just as Julien Temple's rock documentaries have sought to capture the feel of a band rather than just what people have said about them, so Asif Kapadia makes us instantly immersed in the character of Senna as he saw himself, rather than just the reputations he accrued.Another coup of Kapadia's film is that it makes the televisual cinematic. Normally when TV footage is put on the big screen, it looks out of place because of a difference in aspect ratio or frame rate which breaks the flow. But Kapadia does not let this happen, blowing up the footage very carefully and reframing key scenes so that we zoom in on the characters' faces and emotions. The pace of the film, both as a thrill ride and a piece of storytelling, keep any technical quibbles out of our minds, so that even when the footage is grainy or incomplete, we don't complain.Senna explores a number of themes related to racing driving and the personality and attitudes of the drivers therein. There is a repeated mention of "real driving", the pure sensation of driving for its own sake, in which the goal is not simply winning but winning through pure talent and passion alone. It is this pure devotion to what he loves that made Senna stand out from the other drivers, and which led him to become a national hero in his home country of Brazil.Senna's complaints about racing technology mirror concerns in the sport as a whole, and comment on how the nature of Formula 1 has changed since he started racing in the 1980s. The tipping point comes in 1992 when Williams introduce new suspension technology on their car; at this point Senna's form begins to decline because he cannot adjust his pure style of driving to technology designed to make the driver do less work.

Within this there is a comment on how technology determines not only the style of racing but also the personality of the driver. In the middle of the film there is a conversation between Senna and Jackie Stewart, in which they talk about the changes in technology and how that has affected the flair of different drivers. The implication is the less there is for a driver to do in a race, the less there is for the driver to be, with said individuals hiding behind endorsements and statistics in the absence of real, passionate charisma.This difference in approach is further communicated in Senna's bitter rivalry with Alain Prost. Senna races with a pure spirit and an often reckless urge to win at any cost - he is not content to play the political games and he never does it for the money. But Prost, who is nicknamed the Professor, is content to play those games and drive according to mathematical calculations - if he can win a championship by staying in fifth, he will stay in fifth.Much has been written about how Prost comes out as the villain of the film, and it is undeniably true that at the height of their respective careers both men hated each other. But in fact, their relationship is far more complicated than simple rivalry. Beneath the public scrapes involving crashes and back-chatting, there is some form of mutual underlying respect which these men retained throughout their careers. In spite of completely different styles and attitudes, both men were willing to acknowledge the other's talent, which might explain why Prost currently serves as a trustee for Senna's charity.If we wish to paint the documentary purely in terms of heroes and villains, then the true antagonists are the Formula 1 regulators. The film examines the conflicted and clouded politics of professional racing and how the rules designed to make racing fair and exciting often go against the very things the drivers (or at least Senna) want. In one sequence, the FIA President Jean-Michel Balestre emphasises a particular regulation, only for the majority of drivers to vote against upholding it. In another, there is a heated disagreement about racing lines on the starting grid which leads to a spectacular crash involving Senna at the start of a race.But although Senna focuses on the physical effort and talent involved in racing, an equal amount of its focus is on the spiritual aspect of the sport. Senna was a devout Roman Catholic who prayed to God before each race, and who believed that God had called him to drive this fast and in this way. The way Senna talks about God often drifts in Chariots of Fire territory, so that you almost expect him to say: "when I drive, I feel his pleasure". But the documentary also shows that this relationship was not straightforward; the first time Senna feels God's presence, he crashes at Monaco, throwing away a huge lead and losing the race.Because the outcome of the subject is widely known, certain moments in Senna take on an eerie quality so that they become harbingers of his tragic death. When he goes on Brazilian TV after becoming world champion, a girl kisses him and wishes him a happy new year for every year up until 1993, the year before he died. In 1991 he talks about having many years ahead of him and still so much to achieve. Like Amazing Journey, the film touches on the possibility that certain individuals are so prodigiously talented that they were not put on this Earth to make old bones. And like Keith Moon, Senna's death was both a tragic accident and something to be expected by the way he lived his life.Even if you're not a fan of Formula 1, or particularly interested in the spiritual side of sport, there is more than enough in Senna to get your heart racing. Some of the racing footage is genuinely scary, as cars pass within inches of each other through corners and the on-board cameras give you a sense of speed with wider shots would not. Senna's driving throughout is extraordinary, and in appreciating this we follow his emotional journey. We feel his intense anger at being disqualified from the Japanese Grand Prix in 1989, and both his joy and immense pain after having won in Brazil in 1990 despite having to drive the last few laps in a single gear.There are aspects of Senna's life which remain absent from the documentary, such as his relationships with women and his influence on popular motoring, such as working with Honda on the NSX. But all in all this is a great documentary which is gripping, insightful and highly emotional. It does justice both to the man and to the ideals for which he stood, while leaving plenty of things open to interpretation. Like Senna himself, it is accomplished, thrilling and ultimately heart-breaking.

Rating:
Verdict: One of the year's best films

We're very nearly at the end of 2010, and with much of the Christmas dinner still working its way through my system, it's time to sit back, take stock and put forward my Top 10 list comprising the best films of this year.

I could waste time repeating all the usual caveats about having not seen everything, and all this being just opinion, but to be honest if you've been reading my reviews you probably know that already. Instead, let's just dive straight in.

10. The Arbor
A gripping if uneven documentary about the life and legacy of playwright Andrea Dunbar which straddles the divide between fiction and reality. By having the cast lip-sync to recordings of Dunbar's friends and relatives, what could be a straightforward biopic is transformed into a Rashomon-like exploration of the fractured nature of truth and how the past lingers in the present. One of the most unusual films of the year and a must-see for anyone interested in the documentary tradition.
Full review available here

9. The Illusionist (L'illusionniste)
Seven years after he charmed the pants off us with Belleville Rendez-Vous, Sylvain Chomet returns with an equally charming and uniquely crafted effort based on an unfilmed screenplay by Jacques Tati. While not as compelling or rounded as his debut, the film is still a visual delight with beautiful design and characterisation rooted in dry wit and subtle pathos. The film marries a well-judged relationship between an ageing illusionist and a young fan with social undercurrents about the decline of variety and the age of rock'n'roll.Full review available here

8. Burke and Hare
John Landis returns to the big screen in style with a really good black comedy about enterprising 18th-century murderers. Simon Pegg and Andy Serkis enjoy strong chemistry as the gags flow thick and fast, and the film is rooted in Landis' brilliant combination of horror and humour. Its lush period setting accurately recalls the classic Ealing comedies of the 1950s, and the film's knowing economies with the truth work largely to its advantage. Worth seeing just for the cameos from Paul Whitehouse and Tim Curry.Full review available here

7. Green Zone
One of the most underrated films of the year and another solid addition to the Paul Greengrass canon. A very well-constructed, technically accomplished and ultimately substantial conspiracy thriller, with Matt Damon cementing his status as one of Hollywood's best leading men. Bourne-style action set-pieces are ably intertwined with relevant discussions of the role of media in modern warfare and the fragmented nature of both the enemy and the allies. A film which ticks all the action movie boxes and hurls The Hurt Locker into the middle of next week.Full review available here

6. The Ghost Writer
What looked at one point like Roman Polanski's last film now stands as a fine addition to a stunning back catalogue. While ultimately a minor work which draws heavily on The Tenant, the film is a great old-fashioned thriller in its own right; a film which is less about political allegory and more about the powers-that-be and the faceless, nameless figures which try in vain to keep them in check. Ewan McGregor gives his best performance in years as the title role and the final shot is textbook Polanski: chilling, bitter and cynical.Full review available here

5. Scott Pilgrim vs. the World
Edgar Wright's third film is a visually astounding and heartfelt love letter to all things comic-book and video game, with a beautifully-judged coming-of-age story at its centre. Career-best performances from Michael Cera and Mary Elizabeth Winstead elevate the film above other quirky teen affairs to create a film as much about accepting responsibility as it is about defeating psychic vegans. A hilarious film which never misses a beat.Full review available here

4. Kick-Ass
After grabbing our attention with Stardust, Matthew Vaughn turns comic-book conventions on their heads in this flesh-ripping adaptation of Mark Millar's comics. The film combines knowing humour with rich pastiches of Batman and Spiderman, approaching the darker and tougher aspects of comics while keeping its tongue firmly in cheek. Visually outstanding and with brilliant stunt choreography, this represents a real departure from the light-to-dark cycle of comic adaptations and set the bar high for Christopher Nolan's next work.Full review available here

3. The Social Network
David Fincher returns to form spectularly with an intelligent, intriguing and labyrinthine examination of the founding of Facebook. Combining the visual intimidation of Zodiac with a razor-sharp script from Aaron Sorkin, Fincher manages to do what Noah Baumbach never managed: to take a bunch of hideous, chauvinistic intellectuals and make them engaging and entertaining. But the film is also a gripping analysis of the way in which technology comes between friends, the ruthlessness of capitalism and the changing nature of nerds.Full review available here

2. A Single Man
Colin Firth gives a career-best performance in Tom Ford's ravishing and heartbreaking debut based on a story by Christopher Isherwood. Ford's outstanding visual palette, which draws on the work of Michelangelo Antonioni, is the fitting sheen to a tender examination of grief and the powers of deception which we employ to protect ourselves in everyday life. The film is less a thesis on sexuality than a poignant and meticulous portrait of one man struggling to appear in control when everything about him hints towards chaos and meltdown. An emotional triumph.Full review available here

1. Inception
Having come perilously close with The Prestige, Christopher Nolan finally delivers his masterpiece with a daring blockbuster notable not only for its intelligence but its nuance and emotional resonance. What begins as a heist movie set inside the minds of its protagonists blossoms into a full-blown examination of dreams, addiction, grief and redemption, contained in a brilliantly designed cinematic world and underscored by spectacular action. Inception is the pinnacle of Nolan's career, marrying thematic complexity with visual astonishment to create a memorably mesmerising masterpiece.Full review available here

Honourable Mentions
Shutter Island (USA, dir. Martin Scorsese)
The Kids Are All Right (USA, dir. Lisa Cholodenko)
The Killer Inside Me (UK, dir. Michael Winterbottom)
Winter's Bone (USA, dir. Debra Granik)

Roll on 2011 :)

Daniel x

The Arbor (UK, 2010)
Directed by Clio Bernard
Starring Christine Bottomley, Manjinder Virk, Robert Emms, George Costigan

In an age where demographics and target audiences are everything, The Arbor is a film which genuinely defies genre. Nestling somewhere between a documentary and an art film, between a Crimewatch re-enactment and the work of Mike Leigh, it is extremely difficult to pigeonhole it or to compare it readily with any film on a similar subject. Taken on its own terms, it is a tough and often harrowing portrayal of Bradford and its inhabitants in a particular time and place, and while not perfect, it contains much which will intrigue and stimulate.The Arbor is a biopic of the late Bradford playwright Andrea Dunbar, a single mother with three children by three different partners. Her first play, The Arbor, was premiered in London when she was 18 years old. This and her later works - Rita, Sue and Bob Too and Sheila - looked candidly at life on Bradford estates, dealing with subjects like teenage pregnancy, drug addiction and extra-marital affairs. After Rita, Sue and Bob Too was adapted into a film, Dunbar's output declined and she became known as a heavy drinker. She died of a cerebral haemorrhage in 1990, aged just 29.

While such a story contains enough drama and struggle for any run-of-the-mill biopic, there is very little about The Arbor that could be called run-of-the-mill. The film mixes documentary footage of Dunbar and her family, sections of The Arbor staged in the open air, and footage of actors playing members of her family. The gimmick (if that's not too churlish a term) is that the actors are lip-syncing to audio clips of the actual individuals; when their lips move, the real-life people are speaking.
There have been other projects which have used people lip-syncing to recordings in various ways. Think of the Creature Comforts shorts by Aardman, where the voices of the British public are synced up to animations of different animals. Or, to some extent, the fantasy sequences in The Singing Detective, in which Michael Gambon reminisces (or fantasises) about singing old jazz standards in a club. But these comparisons are quite fleeting and don't begin to describe what effect this device has.

It would be tempting to describe it as a Brechtian device, something which is designed to alienate an audience, causing them to realise the artifice of what they are seeing. But that isn't really true either, since the predominant effect is not alienation. The lip-syncing may seem odd at first, but it's done in such a technically proficient manner that you very rarely find yourself distracted by it. Even when the actors' sequences are intercut with footage of Dunbar's real-life children and parents, you don't find yourselves struggling to identify with whatever or whoever is on screen.The Arbor has two central themes, both of which are brought out in a fascinating and original way by this device. The first is an examination of the truth as something which is clouded and fragmented - we have one figure, with multiple stories surrounding her and different viewpoints on the events that befell her. There is a Rashamon-like disagreement among the characters as to what Dunbar did and what she was like, and like Rashamon it is up to us to decide who is telling the truth. Lorraine, her second child, hates her mother and can't forgive her for what she did, while her first-born Lisa won't hear a word against her.

By having actors lip-sync to actual recordings of actual dialogue, we are presented with a series of convincing but conflicting accounts about an individual we know very little about. If it was just the actors speaking, it would be relatively easy to discover the author's inherent bias, and find out where the blame lay, at least in the mind of the filmmakers. Under these circumstances, we have no such luxury and there is no clear right or wrong. Late in the film, there is a staged reading from A State Affair, a play about Andrea Dunbar lifted entirely from the words of Bradford residents who knew her. We hear the mixed reaction of Dunbar's offspring and we are forced to question how well any of us can know anyone.The second theme of The Arbor is about the impact of the past and how it lingers in the present. From this perspective, the lip-syncing represents how the ghosts of the past still communicate through our present selves. The events of Dunbar's tragic and troubled life are replicated to some extent by what happens to her children. Lorraine in particular goes through a number of abusive boyfriends, gets into drugs and ends up in prison. Beyond Lorraine's remarks about her mother, the film gives very little clue as to how much her predicament is down to Andrea, compared to more general social problems or her own free will and foolishness.

The subjects dealt with in The Arbor are every bit as tough as those covered in Dunbar's plays nearly 30 years beforehand. There is frequent talk of drug abuse and addiction, along with prostitution, multiple teenage pregnancies, child mortality and alcoholism. When written out as a list like this, one might expect the film to go through these problems like a tick-box of 'working-class misery', or for the inhabitants of Bradford to be manipulated by a director wanting to take pot shots at modern Britain. But instead, the film treats these subjects in a very un-manipulative way. There is a great deal of shock and sadness on the part of the viewer, which comes simply from the way in which people talk about these things so candidly.Although it defies genre and comparison, the film to which The Arbor bears the closest resemblance is Savage Grace, Tom Kalin's twisted and difficult examination of the life and times of Barbara Daly Baekeland. On the surface the films couldn't be more different; The Arbor is a realistic account of 'the poor', while Savage Grace is a hyper-stylised, heavily choreographed examination of the filthy rich. But in both cases, the approaches which these films take are probably the only way you could have told these respective stories. It's very hard to make a film about 'underprivileged' individuals without resorting to clichés, stereotypes or mawkish sentimentality, and The Arbor deserves credit for steadfastly avoiding any of these.

The problems with The Arbor lie less in its ideas than the manner in which they are executed. After Andrea Dunbar dies just shy of the hour mark, the film steadily begins to lose its focus; it stops being a biopic per se but isn't quite sure where the stories should go from there. It becomes a film less about the character of Andrea than about the impact of her lifestyle, something which is even harder to pin down. It goes back and forth between Lisa, Lorraine and other relatives, all of whom have interesting things to say but to much less of an end.

From a more technical point of view, the film is lacking in some of its editorial decisions. On at least three occasions the screen fades to black at a point which seems like a fairly satisfying place to end. But on each occasion another scene starts up soon after, which gives the distinct impression of a film which either doesn't know how to end or which has multiple endings, none of which are conclusive. This could be intentional on the part of the filmmakers, showing how Dunbar's life and legacy will carry on beyond these stories. But even with that in place it still feels rather clumsy.The Arbor is one of the most unusual and striking films released this year, and should be praised for taking such an odd idea and carrying it through in such an enthralling way. Aside from a number of tough moments, it has technical and narrative flaws which prevent it from being a complete success. But you would be hard-pushed to find another documentary which is this hard-hitting, or another art film which is this understated. An intriguing and insightful piece of work.

Rating: 3.5/5
Verdict: A powerful and insightful portrait-of-sorts