All The Money In The World (2017)

Director: Ridley Scott
Writer: David Scarpa
DOP: Dariusz Wolski
Cast: Michelle Williams, Christopher Plummer, Mark Wahlberg

The story of the kidnapping of 16-year-old John Paul Getty lll and the desperate attempt by his mother to convince his billionaire grandfather Jean Paul Getty to pay the ransom.

I had no idea that the film was based on real events and it was quite strange that I wasn't aware of the name Getty, considering the fact that he was the first person to become a dollar billionaire. He had made his money by building oil tankers  that are used to bring oil from Saudi Arabia to the West. He had married five times and had maintained a harem. He was into his 80s when the events depicted in the film happened. I sussed out the basic premise of the film from the trailer and since I didn't know it was based on true events, had no idea how it was going to play out which is always good.

The film made news when Ridley Scott decided to recast Christopher Plummer as Jean Paul Getty in the aftermath of Kevin Spacey allegations, after having almost finished post-production. Plummer was the original choice for Ridley but had cast Spacey due to his marketability, ha ha. I'm glad he made the change because Spacey as the character in his 80s with prosthetics didn't look good at all. Christopher Plummer is amazing in the role as is Michelle Williams as the distressed but strong mother.

The only complaint I've about the film is its dull look due to the colour choices. The opening scenes of it is like a homage to Fellini films. Ridley started directing films late, as a 40-year-old, and it is ridiculous how hard he is working in his late 70s. He is kind of hit and miss in terms of conversion and this one is a hit.

Rating: 4/5

Matchstick Men (2003)

Director: Ridley Scott
Writers:  Eric Garcia, Nicholas Griffin, Ted Grifiin
Cast:      Nicolas Cage, Alison Lohman, Sam Rockwell

A phobic con artist and his protege are on the verge of pulling off a lucrative swindle when the former's teenage daughter arrives unexpectedly.

Nicolas Cage's recent filmography can be described as a sea of shit. But in between he gives gems like Bad Lieutenant and Kick-Ass. Matchstick Men is one such turn even though some might find all his twitching and mannerisms to be bordering on ridiculousness. Sam Rockwell is playing a typical Sam Rockwell role (think Seven Psychopaths) and Alsion Lohman is excellent as the daughter. The twist in it can be pretty much guessed from the get-go but that is not a big problem because they don't play it up to that extent. The film is basically about humanizing Nicolas Cage's character with the introduction of a father-daughter relationship in his life. The humor helps in tiding over what can be deemed as sentimentality. 

It is a very good watch as long as you find Nicolas Cage's performance in it to be not very distracting. At first, I found it to be a bit irritating but wasn't a problem  as the film progressed. It is an adaptation of Eric Garcia's novel with the same name which came out in 2002. It is always good to see Ridley Scott doing a normal kind of film as we normally associate him with films of 'epic' nature. 

Rating: 3.5/5

The Martian (2015)

Director: Ridley Scott
Writers:  Drew Goddard, Andy Weir (Book)
Cast:       Matt Damon, Jessica Chastain, Jeff Daniels, Chiwetel Ejiofor

During a manned mission to Mars, Astronaut Mark Watney is presumed dead after a fierce storm and is left behind by his crew. But Watney has survived and finds himself stranded and alone on a hostile planet. With only meager supplies, he must draw upon his ingenuity, wit and spirit to subsist and find a way to signal to Earth that he is alive.

It is an adaptation of Andy Weir's 2011 novel with the same name and keeping in with its tone the film also uses humor to convey the story. I haven't read the book and so I cannot comment on whether the film did justice to it but I had a great time watching it. If a film can bring a tear to your eyes at the right point of time then it means that they got it more or less right. It doesn't really try to stress on the psychological aspects of being stranded on an alien planet and works more like a survival story based on botany and engineering. What we get from Matt Damon is a consistent attitude throughout the film laced with humor and wit. One of the biggest challenges in these kind of films is  to do expositions in a smart way and this film got a lot of it to do since he is sciencing the shit out of it to survive. Most of it is done by making him talk to the on-board cameras as he documents it and many times he is talking loudly to himself, a natural thing to do to keep your wits in such a scenario. I felt they gave enough respect to audience's intelligence and it didn't feel like they were doing too much explanation of the stuff that is happening. I am sure Honest Trailers will edit out enough footage from it to make you feel the opposite. 

Ridley Scott is bit of a hit and miss these days and is someone who is widely considered to have peaked quite early in his career with Blade Runner and Alien. 'Thelma & Louise' and 'Gladiator' are also considered as great films by many but i disagree on the latter which I think is overrated. 'The Counselor' got universal hatred while I actually enjoyed that film immensely. 'The Martian' will certainly be considered to be among his best films. He is 78 now and still going strong. As it stands, my ranking of his films, that I have watched, is as follows (with lot of stress of rewatchability):

1. Blade Runner
2. The Martian
3. Alien
4. The Counselor
5. Thelma & Louise
6. Kingdom of Heaven
7. Gladiator
8. Black Hawk Down
9. Prometheus
10. Body of Lies

So, overall, the Martian is a great watch and I regret the fact that I missed it during its theatrical run. I would have caught it had it was made available in any format other than 3-fucking-D. Most of its set were built in Budapest, Hungary and the Martian looking scenery was took from Wadi Rum, Jordan- a popular destination for Mars based films. No Astronaut movie would be complete without a David Bowie number and it is the 'Starman' song of his that gets used in this film. As far as space/alien planet based films go, I think it will be among my all time-favorites along with Kubrick's '2001: A Space Odyssey' and both these films couldn't be further apart in tone. If I were to compare with films from recent times, the obvious candidate would be Gravity which was all about getting the viewers experience space through its stunning visuals in 3D with a simple survival story to support it. 'The Martian' is more about the mechanics of survival and will age more gracefully with time since it got a more interesting central character and lot of other things. It is the highest grossing Ridley Scott film till date with a worldwide gross of close to $600 million. 

PS: It is a habit of big budget Hollywood films these days to pander to Chinese audience as it is a big market. The Martian manages to do that in the most graceful manner possible and it was also refreshing to see it not opting to put the possible monetary discussions that would have gone on if such a scenario occurred as well as any nationalistic jingoism. It is a feel-good-film that was done very right. 

Rating: 5/5

Kingdom of Heaven (2005)

Director: Ridley Scott
Writer:    William Monahan
Cast:       Orlando Bloom, Eva Green, Jeremy Irons, Edward Norton, Liam Neeson

Balian of Ibelin, travels to Jerusalem during the crusades of the 12th century, and there he finds himself as the defender of the city and its people. In the beginning of the film, Balian (Orlando Bloom) is a blacksmith, in a French village, grieving after his wife's suicide. He meets Lord of Ibelin- Godfrey (Liam Neeson) who tells him that Balian is his bastard son and invites him to the Holy Land. Godfrey dies on the way and Balian becomes Lord of Ibelin. Jerusalem is under the rule of the leper king, Baldwin (Edward Norton), who doesn't have any direct descendants and is about to die. When he dies, the kingdom will pass to his nephew, whose mother (Eva Green) has romantically fallen for Balian. Her husband is baying for a war with the Muslim king Saladin- with whom Baldwin has a truce as long as the Muslim pilgrims are protected. Everything comes to a head when the leper king dies.

The characters in the film are fictionalized versions of their Historical counterparts. The first time I watched it some years back, I wasn't that aware about the intricacies concerning crusades, and since then I have watched the BBC series-Crusades which was presented in a comical manner by Terry Jones (of Monty Python). It certainly helps in appreciating the film more in terms of understanding the negative light it casts on the fanatical Christians. It was those times when Europe was largely under the influence of Roman Catholic Church and was going through what we now call as the Dark Ages. The misguided missions of Crusades were representative of the European decline with it being an exercise that put barbaric European Christians against  the Islamic empire in its glory years. One could criticize the film for the extremely binary nature of its character portrayal. The actions taken by the negative Christian characters are extremely irrational and suicidal which would have made more sense if they were seen to be doing it because of religious reasons. I guess it is understandable because to have a much more nuanced story would be extremely difficult within the scope of a feature film when the scale is this big. Another big millstone for the film is of course its lead actor, Orlando Bland (© Mark Kermode), and I don't know how he was trusted with such a big role. He is surrounded by such good actors in this film that it really felt like giving Roy Hodgson the responsibility to manage an all star football eleven. 

Got to say that, despite all this, film is still a great watch. At least the director's cut version of it which I watched. It was released in a 144 minutes version which received only a mixed response from critics and general audience. The reaction to the DC, which is forty five minutes longer, was much better and this is another one of those Ridley Scott films that got mishandled by the studios. The film didn't do well in North America but got good response from rest of the world and particularly from Muslim countries. It came out in 2005, a post 9-11 world which was again going through turbulence which was again dangerously described as a clash of civilizations, compounded by Bush's crusades comment. Some took exception to how negatively Christians were portrayed in the film relative to Muslims, but I guess it was justified since it is much more intended towards western audience. Cinematography is absolutely stunning and the battle scenes were breathtaking. Soundtrack was also memorable and the performances from Edward Norton, a masked one, and Jeremy Irons were particularly excellent. It would have been even greater if they had cast someone good instead of Orlando Bloom as its lead. It is a much more memorable film than Gladiator, which is much more acclaimed.

Rating: 4/5

                                                                       

The Counselor (2013)

Director: Ridley Scott

Writer:   Cormac McCarthy
Cast:       Michael Fassbender, Cameron Diaz, Brad Pitt, Javier Bardem, Penelope Cruz

The Counselor is out of his element after a drug deal he enters into go unintentionally bad and he is blamed for it.

This is Cormac McCarthy's first made for film script and it deals with themes like greed, its consequences and death. The film received highly unfavorable reviews and was a disaster at box office. Still I had hopes for it when I watched because of the talent involved and the fact that Fassbender and Pitt usually chooses their films well. I was not disappointed. Its the best film Ridley Scott has done for years. Biggest problem people have with the film I think is the un-likability of its characters. I don't understand why one feels the need to have a character to sympathize for. Closest we have are Fassbender's 'The Counselor' and Brad Pitt's world weary middle-man. Cameron Diaz plays the role of super-villain but its another role in the mold of Anton Chigurh from 'No Country For Old Men', but done differently. There are several set-piece scenes especially involving deaths and the famous 'Cameron Diaz fucking the car scene'. As the film goes on it enters into the surreal with philosophical discussion going on between 'The Counselor' and characters who just have a single scene in the film.

Some of the conversations are a bit forced especially at the beginning of the film but it improves as it goes on. The plot details are irrelevant and the film is like a Shakespearean tragedy. I will definitely watch it again.

Edit (3.12.2018): Re-watched it. Underrated. Extended cut it was this time round. 

Rating: 4/5

Thelma & Louise (1991)

Director: Ridley Scott
Writer:   Callie Khouri
Cast:      Susan Sarandon, Geena Davis, Harvey Keitel, Brad Pitt, Michael Madsen

An Arkansas waitress and a housewife shoot a rapist and take off in a '66 Thunderbird.

It is something you don't expect from Ridley Scott who generally makes ambitious sci-fi films and historic epics. Thelma and Lousie is essentially a road comedy with some caricatured characters, Hans Zimmer's music and fantastic visuals. Scott is said to have watched Terence Malick's 'Badlands' for inspiration and that  is reflected in the film. It also reminded me of Tony Scott and Quentin Tarantino's 'True Romance'. It is certainly one of Scott's best film.

Rating: 4/5

Alien (1979)

Director: Ridley Scott
Writers:  Dan O'Bannon, Ronald Shusett
Cast:      Sigourney Weaver, Tom Skerritt, John Hurt
The crew of a commercial deep space mining ship, investigating a suspected S.O.S, lands on a distant planet and discovers a nest of strange eggs.

The film has aged well considering its made in 1979. The fact that the Alien is not shown fully and we get only fleeting glimpses mostly helps. Its a well made horror film with a great tagline: 'In space, no one can hear you scream'. Many of its iconic scenes have been copied in many other films and all.

Rating: 4/5

Prometheus (2012)

Director: Ridley Scott
Writers:  Jon Spaihts, Damon Lindelof
Cast:      Michael Fassbender, Noomi Rapace, Charlize Theron, Guy Pearce, Idris Elba
A team of explorers discover a clue to the origins of mankind on Earth, leading them on a journey to the darkest corners of the universe. There, they must fight a terrifying battle to save the future of mankind.

Good things first-fantastic visuals and great performance from Fassbender as usual. Bad things-basic plot is laughable. The film tries to be cheesy as well as ambiguous at the same time and doesn't come out well. Overall a decent watch and we have to see if they make a sequel to this.

Rating: 3/5

Blade Runner 2 (?)

Director: Ridley Scott
Seems Ridley Scott is gonna make another blade runner film. Not sure whether it would be a sequel, prequel or side sequel. Original Blade Runner was a loosely based adaptation of Philip K.Dick novel 'Do androids dream of electric sheep'. It has several cuts with the final cut being the best one. When the film was released it was spoiled by studio interventions.

Prometheus (2012)

Director: Ridley Scott
Writer:    Damon Lindelof, Jon Spaihts
Cast:      Michael Fassbender, Charlize Theron, Idris Elba, Noomi Rapace
Ridley Scott will be directing a side sequel to 1979 film Alien set in the same world. The cast looks excellent. I haven't seen Alien but heard only great things about it.