FILM REVIEW: BUCK

Madman Films
Now Showing






Much like last year's Bill Cunningham New York, Cindy Meehl's documentary, Buck, focusses on one man who has made his passion his life's work.

Buck Brannaman, like photographer Mr. Cunningham, seems to be one of those fortunate few who successfully subscribes to the adage 'find something you're good at and try to make money from it', although one suspects Buck (and Bill) would do what they do regardless of the financial rewards.

Buck is an advocate of natural horsemanship, or in more romantic terms, he's a horse whisperer: able to bend the untamed horse to his will without the use of physical duress. He hosts clinics where, rather than 'breaking a horse in', Buck uses the term 'starting', and his approach speaks as much to the animal as it does the owner.

Not so much believing that horses are people too, Buck very much subscribes to the notion that the horse is a mirror into the soul of its owner. He doesn't get all mystical about it, but he's often proved correct in his theory that if the horse is troubled, the owner probably is too.

Not that Buck Brannaman is without his own dark past. Abused by his father, who had Buck and his older brother perform rope tricks on television and as part of a travelling show, he was fostered out following his mother's death when he was still a child.

Buck's now elderly foster mother appears in the film (she tells a wonderful joke in the closing credits, where we are also see that Buck and his brother are still in touch, although he doesn't appear in the doco), and her and her husband's approach to child rearing (they raised 23 foster children, all boys) no doubt influenced Buck's world outlook.

Rather than dwell in the past or repeat the cycle of abuse, Buck chose a positive path, one which benefits both horse and owner - and his family. He's married and a father, with a wife and teenage daughter who intermittently join him as he travels the United States helping "horses with people problems".

Buck may not be a hard hitting documentary but it has its hand-to-your-mouth moments, one in particular involving a disturbed horse that even the 'horse whisperer' cannot save. But as a study of someone who loves what he does and does good in the bargain, it serves as a wonderful example to us all.

FILM REVIEW: THIS MEANS WAR

20th Century Fox Films
Now Showing




Love is battelfield, Pat Benatar famously sang, and when two best friends who also happen to be C.I.A. operatives clash over the same woman, it proves to be the case. But all is fair in love and war - with the emphasis on the latter.

Following a botched operation in Hong Kong, agents FDR (Chris Pine) and Tuck (Tom Hardy) are assigned to desk duties. Tuck decides the forced down time might be a good time to seek out some romance, and signs up to an online dating service.

That's how he comes to meet Lauren (Reese Witherspoon), a product tester by day, who decides she also needs some loving following the news that her recent ex-boyfriend is now engaged to be married.

It's following her successful first date with Tuck that Lauren meets FDR (waiting in the wings should his buddy need rescuing) and sparks also fly. Pretty soon Lauren, encouraged by her incorrigable married friend, Trish (Chelsea Handler), is dating both men, unaware of their connection.

And soon enough, Tuck and FDR also become aware of the situation, but rather than FDR doing the honourable thing and ending his involvement, Tuck insists they both continue to date her - it won't affect their friendship.

Of course it does, and as things begin to heat up between each couple, tensions escalate between the once inseparable friends; each enlisting a trio of underling agents to spy on and undermine the others' romantic assignations with Lauren. Before long it's spy planes and sleeper darts at 20 paces.

If you've seen the trailer for This Means War then you've practically seen the entire film, for it reveals all but which man Lauren will eventually choose. Not that it matters. Witherspoon's Lauren seems to be the proxy through which Tuck and FDR can consummate their bromantic feelings for one another. Seriously, Freud would have a field day with these guys' relationship.

But director McG, and his four screenwriters, don't delve too deeply into that minefield, preferring to keep the laughs and action the focus of this rom-com. And surprisingly, it works. Pine and Hardy are both good fun (and easy on the eye), and Witherspoon is a good sport, even if any (lesser) actress could have filled the role.

Opening two days early on Valentine's Day, This Means War is a perfectly inoffensive if innocuous date night film.

FILM REVIEW: THE GREY

Icon Film Distribution
Now Showing





Alive meets Jaws. That's one thumbnail description of the Joe Carnahan-Liam Neeson feature, The Grey, a survival tale with wolves instead of a shark. And while that description may sum it up succinctly, it misses the point of the film entirely.

When a plane carrying workers from an Alsaskan oil drilling operation crashlands in the frozen wilderness, only eight men walk away from the wreckage. Lucky for them, one of those men is Ottway (Neeson).

Hired by the oil company as a sniper to keep wolves and other aggressive wildlife from attacking the workers when in the field, Ottway is a good man to have around in a crisis. Level-headed, stoic and no bullshit, he also knows a thing or two about wolves.

That knowledge will come into its own soon enough when Ottway realises they have crashed inside the territory of a pack of wolves (a mix of real and not-so convincing GCI animals) who don't take kindly to outsiders, and start taking out the interlopers one-by-one.

Rather than fight, the survivors (which include Dermot Mulroney, Dallas Roberts and Frank Grillo) choose flight, heading into the nearby woods where Ottway believes they have a better chance of fending off the wolf pack. But it's Mother Nature who will test these mens' physical and psychological fortitude.

There's little about Joe Carnahan's The Grey to suggest this is the same guy who directed the 2010 film version of The A-Team. That action film folly also starred Neeson, who deserved better, and perhaps the star felt Carnahan was capable of more also.

With a screenplay co-written with Ian McKenzie Jeffers, based on his own short story, Carnahan has made a film which matches both the beauty and horror of nature with man's similar capacity for good and evil, as well as his deep-rooted desire to survive no matter the situation or what awaits him should he do so.

That's not to say The Grey is without its share of bumps (the quasi-existensialism is sometimes too much) or action film cliches, but the reliably stoic presence of Neeson, who can bring gravitas to the silliest of situations (see 2008's guilty pleasure, Taken), goes a long way to overcoming those obstacles. Like Ottway, he's a good guy to have around in this type of situation.

Note: there is a very brief scene post-credits which doesn't really add anything to the film but may provide some form of closure for those who need it -- and those who don't want to be left out of the post-film conversation.

FILM REVIEW: THE VOW

Sony Pictures
Now Showing




Just how far would you go for love? Or more precisely, to reclaim your love? In The Vow, a romantic drama "inspired by real events", a car accident sees one half of a married couple lose part of her memory -- her entire relationship with her husband -- and the other half of the couple trying desperately to bring it - and win her - back.

Leo (Channing Tatum) and Paige (Rachel McAdams) are a happily married Chicago couple, seemingly still in the honeymoon phase of their marriage, when fate, disguised as a big ass truck, intervenes; smashing into their parked car and sending Paige through the windscreen.

She survives the accident but once she wakes from her induced coma it seems a chunk of her memory didn't. Paige can't remember ever having met Leo, let alone marrying him and making a life with him. I'm an artist? I was studying law. Who's the President? Obama?! And if we're married, why don't you know my parents?

Paige's parents are played by Sam Neill and Jessica Lange, who are given scant to do but fill the role of well-moneyed wasps and minor villains. They don't much care for Leo and they see their daughter's predicament as an opportunity to repair their once strained relationship.

All the while, Leo is competing against the in-laws, Paige's ex-boyfriend (a smarmy Scott Speedman), and Paige herself, struggling to come to terms with the Paige that Leo so loves, to win his wife back.

Surprisingly, it's Channing Tatum who walks away with 'best in show' honours in The Vow. His lovesick puppy look works for the material, even more so when he doesn't speak (and shirtless doesn't hurt either). McAdams, always a warm screen presence, who has yet to find that great role following her breakthrough in 2004's The Notebook, is again likeable here but for the most part she's outperformed by her changing hairstyles.

But neither can overcome the flatness at which all of these events play out. There are no peaks or valleys; everything unfolds on the same lacklustre wavelength. And for a romantic drama, The Vow is seriously lacking in both departments as well as any sense of urgency (it's a long 104 minutes).

Whether that has to do with the direction of feature film debutant, Michael Sucsy (who made the acclaimed television miniseries Grey Gardens, with Drew Barrymore and Ms. Lange), or the five credited screenwriters (including Sucsy) is probably six of one and half a dozen of the other.

You won't be missing anything if you don't choose The Vow as your date night viewing this Valentine's Day, and much like McAdams' Paige, you'll soon forget it if you do.