Black Mirror: White Christmas

 “It's just a state change...

Ok, I haven't blogged any Black Mirror since 2017. This is literally because I happen to be at this particular episode, I feel it has to be blogged at Christmas and, er, I happen to have forgotten to blog it for three Christmases in a row.

However long it’s been, though, it’s always magnificent to be exposed to the dark, twisted, dystopian imagination of Charlie Brooker, and this is a particularly good episode. Starting with two men seemingly in an Arctic outpost on Christmas Day, this delivers thought-provoking shocks and twists within a clever and highly satisfying narrative that draws four different stories into one.

As well as the script, the cast is superb, headed by the excellent Jon Hamm. There’s some impressive directing, too, particularly during Greta’s mind-bendingly trippy operation. But it’s all about the ideas, mostly revolving around the consequences of “z-eyes” which add various apps to our eyes. Hence you can “block” people in real life, or invite pick-up artists to remotely advise you as you gatecrash an office Christmas party. There is, really, a simple premise behind all the evil twists here, but the twists themselves are devastating- especially the first and last ones.

There’s much ruminating on the ethics of things like privacy, child custody, crime and punishment, and the ethics of how we should treat artificial intelligence, but it’s all done as subtext to stories about very real and sympathetic characters. This is genius telly, and the most twisted Christmas ever. I’ll never again listen to Wizzard in the same way.

(This week has been hectic, so fewer blog posts and I’ve had to blog short things where I could. Fear not, things are proceeding as ever- I’m alternating Life on Mars and The Crown, squeezing in a bit of Sex Education, The Mandalorian and Once Upon a Time when Mrs Llamastrangler and I watch them, and films on weekends. The Christmas period may be weird though. And I’ll be doing more Black Mirror early in the New Year

(Review)

(Summary of what I’m blogging)

The War of the Worlds: Part 3

"I should like a bacon sandwich."

Sigh. I've been procrastinating about watching this final episode and yes, like the series as a whole, it just isn't very good. Is there any way I can avoid this blog post just consisting of me metaphorically putting this 55 minutes of telly over my knee for a sound spanking?

Well, no one sets out to make bad telly. It's well shot, particularly the action sequences with the CGI Martian. The acting is not so much bad- everyone is competent- but, Robert Carlyle aside, lacking in charisma. And you can see glimpses at times of the fact that Peter Harness is the same writer who has done so much good stuff in the past- the coda of Amy describing to little George is rather lovely. So is the ambiguous note of hope as the clouds seem to clear at the end. Will George live? Will Amy's and Ogilvy's typhoid cure be rolled out? Will they manage to grow crops and survive the winter? Will Ogilvy ever get that bacon sandwich? We can just about imagine that they might. Or not.

But such glimpses do not good telly make. Fundamentally, I think, the structure doesn't work. The first episode was ok, with its linear narrative and the fun of Edwardian Surrey facing an invasion from Mars, in spite of the charisma-free leads. But, for this episode and the last, the split narrative- the flashback to the invasion and the "present" day of the red weed and civilisation breaking down- not only makes the narrative actively less dramatic but adds nothing to the subtext or characters.

Yes, I can see that it would have been worse narratively to have an episode culminating in the Martians dying and another one on the later years of red weed and starvation. But why have the latter at all? If it's a crude metaphor for the climate crisis then it doesn't work; the red weed isn't man made, however much the subtext- in the original novel here and too didactically articulated by George here- may be that this is the British Empire getting its just desserts. Nor do I like how George's idealism is shown as naive and unrealistic. I'm no socialist- my heroes are John Lilburne, John Maynard Keynes and Henry George, not Keir Hardie or the Webbs-  but I don't like how socialism is caricatured here.

I suppose, then, that this is quite well made. But the whole thing is woefully misconceived and, in spite of some good work in paces, sadly a bad piece of television.

The War of the Worlds: Part 2

"This isn't our planet any more."

Oh dear. The first episode was flawed but had promise, and Peter Harness is a writer with a good track record. Yet this second episode is a load of turgid dross that bodes I’ll for a final episode which I will only be watching because of this blog. What went wrong?

There were issues with the first episode, certainly. Rafe Spall has no charisma. And the original novel is perhaps more justly famous for the barriers it become than for its quality. But there’s nothing in this first episode to suppose a mess like this may follow. Essentially we have two narratives- a main one in 1905 after the initial invasion as chaos ensues but, eventually, the Martians die for reasons which aren’t entirely clear unless you happen to have read the novel or, indeed, seen any of the numerous screen versions. The framing narrative is set a few years later, on a much redder Earth, with the Martians long gone but their terraforming has seeming to have turned Earth into a red planet which is slowly becoming less capable of supporting humans- and, one assumes, more hospitable for those of Martian extraction.

This is an attempt to insert the current climate crisis into the story, essentially wrapping up the invasion early on after a number of set pieces so that we can focus on a theme which obviously resonates for our age. But this is ill-conceived; we still don’t care about the characters, particularly not George, and the constant striving in both narratives for the couple to reunite just simply fails to be interesting. Instead we are left with the ideals and while, yes, the obvious subtext is laudable, it feels very much crowbarred in. And what exactly is this saying? The climate crisis here isn’t man made, as ours is. The parallel is crude.

So yes- the tripods look good. So does the reddened world a few years on. Eleanor Tomlinson and Robert Carlyle are good. But the whole thing just fails as a drama and that is down, I’m afraid, to the script.

The War of the Worlds: Part 1

“I mean, something can’t erupt from Mars and end up in Surrey.”

I know, I’m a week behind, but here I am blogging this. After all, following Jonathan Strange I could hardly miss another adaptation of a classic geek novel by Peter Harness and while, I think, this isn’t quite as good- much like the source material, to be honest- it’s a solid and welcome return of War of the Worlds to its period roots- although why they set it a few years after the novel’s publication dare of 1898 I have no idea. Edward VII is king but the Tories are clearly in power, going by the prominent role of a monocle-free Uncle Joe Chamberlain, so it’s only a few years later- presumably 1902 as Ogilvy mentions Mars has been equally close in ‘94 and ‘98.. Why change the period so very slightly?

Nevertheless, the whole thing looks superb. That goes for both the period setting and the visual effects, which either goes light on the CGI or wears it lightly. The direction cannot be faulted. And the script takes an intelligent approach of taking Wells’ plot and approach and adding drama- so Wells’ unnamed narrator is now George, and he is scandalously living in sin with Amy while technically still incestuously married- and because his ex won’t sign the papers he won’t get a divorce until she dies. Ouch. All this, and the ensuing friction with George’s brother Frederick, adds depth. So does the use of the imperialistic Chamberlain as politician of choice- after all, the subtext of the novel is to turn the behaviour of the imperialistic British against us.

Eleanor Tomlinson is splendidly charismatic, and Robert Carlyle excels against type as the scholarly Ogilvy. But there’s a charisma vacuum in the person of Rafe Spall, who doesn’t make us like or care about George. So, in spite of the top notch production and Peter Harness’s script, I’m a little ambivalent, not only about Spall but whether Wells’ novel as source material can lead to good drama; there are reasons why it’s often been departed from.

Let’s hope the remaining two episodes don’t rely much on Spall.

The BFG (2016)

“Dreams are so quick!”

“Yeah, on the outside. They’s long on the inside.”

I read the novel as a kid, of course. And I’ve seen (and blogged) the cartoon with David Jason. But nothing, aside from Roald Dahl’s original work of brilliance, can top this wonderful Spielbergian fairytale.

Spielberg seems to be evolving in his recent work; there are similarities between this and Ready Player One in the confident use of CGI which achieves spectacle without overdosing us in a CGI landscape, and the confident creation of a well-thought-out world- giant country is dark, yes, but also very fairytale, and the use of hand held cameras to show us Sophie’s point of view during the action sequences is deeply effective. Even the setting, the Britain of the early ‘80s with cars to match, is fairytale in its iconic use of London cityscapes, a London where all streets are cobbled, the only drinking establishments are traditional pubs and buses abound.

Mark Rylance is simply a triumph as an unusually melancholic BFG, as you’d expect, the definitive portrayal. Ruby Barnhill inhabits Sophie perfectly, and I’m glad to see she kept her native northern vowels. And Penelope Wilton is, of course, perfect casting for the Queen.

The tale is told with verve and economy, with a mildly melancholic ending and some extra little set pieces- I loved the scene with Fleshlumpeater (the splendid Jemaine Clement) using cars as roller skates. This is probably the definitive film of the splendid novel, and another fascinating example of late Spielberg, with his inspired ability to create successful CGI worldscapes which work.

Kidulthood (2006)

"You can put it in my arse as well. It hurts, but I don't mind."

This is an extraordinary debut from Noel Clarke as a writer and, which is sort of the point, a bloody good film. Doesn't half make me feel old, though, and I'm only 38.

Are teenagers really like this in London, with the bullying, the drugs, the incomprehensible slang, the relentlessly hard gang mentality, and the horrifying level of bullying? I'm 38, and I feel old. I don't live in London, fortunately, but I'm still terrified about the bullying my daughter could experience when she starts school.

It's a brilliantly directed film, with some wonderful touches, and a superb script is brought to life by a largely unknown cast, although Cornell John and Alison Newman are both familiar faces from Eastenders. It deals with bullying, gang culture, teen suicide, teen pregnancy, and, in a subtle way, racism, although this seems to be one issue which is actually shown to be less of a problem than one might expect. Most depressing, perhaps, is the universally subservient attitude the girls have towards the boys: it's as if feminism never happened.

All this builds towards a tragic and dramatic ending which leaves us wanting more. This isn't necessarily the sort of film is usually watch, and I only watched it because it was written by Noel Clarke of off of that Doctor Who, but I enjoyed it immensely.