Black Death (2010)

“I believe hunting necromancers and demons serves men more than it serves God."

This film seems appropriate right now, does it not? Personally I'm not scared for my own safety, really, nor that of either Mrs Llamastrangler or Little Miss Llamastrangler. We are all young and healthy. I'm more worried about my retired parents, the likelihood that at least someone I know is probably going to die when our current plague washes over us properly. And, given our circumstances, I've no idea what the Hell we're going to do for childcare if... when the schools close.

Anyway, this is an oddly redolent film and it's an act of defiant black humour to blog it. I suspect that, within weeks or days, it will become tasteless. Some readers, I fear, will already find it so, but let us not be too quick to cast aside the consolations of black humour.

I fear also that this film is rubbish. Oh, it's well-made in its impressive German locations and the cast- led splendidly by Carice van Houten, a very young Eddie Redmayne and the ever-doomed Sean Bean, is magnificent. The plot rattles on nicely with a nice twist at the end with Langiva only having drugged Averill, with Osmund the one who killed her. But it's rubbish nonetheless. I don't mind historical inaccuracies, especially in the name of artistic licence, but this film makes no attempt to research or approximate the England of 1348. The opening narration refers anachronistically to a "germ". All the characters have cod-Anglo-Saxon personal names which would be centuries out of use. And, of course, while mediaeval people lived in a world of superstition, they were not barbaric enough to burn women as witches until at least a century after this. And we may get an amusing tour of the tropes of plague- the obligatory flagellants and plague doctors, but the latter belong to the seventeenth century.

Worst of all, while I love the scene in which the encroaching Christian part is drugged and seized like Vortigern at the Night of the Long Knives, the idea of a whole village renouncing Christianity in favour not even of paganism but what seems to be atheism is not even slightly plausible. A pity; change the details and set the film in a fantasy world and it would be a nicely told and splendidly violent tale. But when historical inaccuracies are this fundamental they are not a small detail but a major flaw. Sadly, this is rubbish.

Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald (2018)

“You never met a monster you couldn’t love.”

Well, this is a very different beast to its nice little understated predecessor. No more do we get a nice little New York adventure with a small, likeable cast; no, this is a big, world-building epic more the style if the Harry Potter movies. Indeed, not only do we have a couple of scenes in Hogwarts (Jude Law’s youthful Dumbledore is already headmaster), we even get a younger Maggie Smith, presumably cut and pasted from The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie. Mostly, though, we get the awesome spectacle of 1920s Paris, and lots of cool CGI monsters.

The big bad is Grindelwald, played by Johnny Depp... and I wish I could make head or tail of the claims and counter-claims between him and Amber Heard. Which one of them is the abuser? Which one of them is it ok to like? It’s weird seeing either of in films at the moment although J.K. Rowling is clearly very much on his side for insisting on casting him despite a great deal of criticism. Anyway, he’s rather good as a persuasive demagogue between the wars, a type of character which has certain associations. Interestingly, his rally near the end doesn’t make it clear that he’s a baddie. But we shall see.

Tina, Jacob and Queenie are back although, in a powerful scene, Queenie’s allegiance is changed, while Zoe Kravitz impresses with a powerful, tragic performance as Leta Lestrange. But the focus, and the mystery, is on Credence, clearly a powerful pure-blood ripped from his true family, and only at the end do we discover who he truly is. It’s a mystery used to splendid dramatic effect.

This is a fast-moving, eventful epic, and feels more like a chapter than a film in itself. All the same, I much prefer it to the Harry Potter films in similar style and am enjoying the world building in spite of not being any kind of Harry Potter fanboy. I’m greatly looking forward to the next one.

Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (2016)

“Well, the first symptom would be flames out of his anus...”

 Ok, I admit it- I'm finding it difficult to watch Eddie Redmayne in anything without thinking of The Theory of Everything, and Mrs Llamastrangler concurs. But that's no reflection on him as an actor, and his standout performance here simultaneously reminds me of Matt Smith in Doctor Who and something entirely new. Not only that, but this is a splendidly entertaining film full of magical beasts, imaginative concepts and fast-paced excitement from the pen of J.K. Rowling.

The Doctor Who connection extends, perhaps, to Newt's wonderful suitcase being bigger on the inside, with one of the funniest scenes being Jacob trying to force his portly frame inside it, but then I'm a Doctor Who fanboy. If I were a Harry Potter fanboy, on the other hand, I'd be squeeing over this look at the world of magic in 1920s New York, where Muggles are "no-maj" and there is a new witch hunt from the "New Salemers", with that song from the little girl being the creepiest thing in the film by far.

But we also see the different ways wizards organise themselves in America, and still have time to namedrop both Hogwarts and Dumbledore, although the mythology is never allowed to overshadow the tumultuous events, where even the baking of a strudel involves some awesome CGI. It's a film that triumphantly mixes the epic, the cool, the funny and the tragic, with budding lovebirds Queenie and Jacob forced to part, with his muggle memories having to be erased. Still, there's a hopefully ambiguous ending and there are many reasons to await the sequel. Good, exciting, fast-paced fun.

The Theory of Everything (2014)

"While there is life, there is hope."

I'm quite familiar with Stephen Hawking's career from reading both his biography and A Brief History of Time, both a considerable number of ears ago and t was inevitable, I suppose, that a major film should be made about his life and relationship with Jane; as we can see from A Theory of Everything, the events of Hawking's life are extremely well suited to being dramatised; it's not surprising that the film is bloody good. But what is surprising is that the performance from then-newcomer Eddie Redmayne is so utterly transcendent. At last I can see what the fuss was about. The Oscar is well-deserved.
Redmayne excels both as the awkward young man and as the older Hawking in his iconic chair.

The film starts with a shot of said iconic wheelchair and then immediately flashes back to the young Hawking riding a bicycle through the colleges of Cambridge in 1963- quite an effective contrast- on the day he meets Jane, and the film shows the development of his relationship with Jane, his meteoric career and the terrible gradual progress of his motor neuron disease. He's given two years to live, and that seems normal for the condition; I'm led to wonder why it is that he's fortunately survived for all these years.

The film shows us Hawking's stubborn, ambitious, attractively humorous and non-self-pitying personality but also the awful pressures on Jane of looking after Stephen with three small children in tow. The pressures on their relationship are shown with sympathy. It's also wonderful to see his colleagues treating him as normally as possible, a real sign of respect.

There are some nice directorial touches, with a cup of coffee symbolising a black hole, but the film rightly stands on its performances and the emotional heart of its story. This is a superb film.