Usually, it is fairly easy to pigeonhole a movie. Comedy, drama, romance, sci fi, horror, action. Those are the easy ones. It gets slightly more complicated as you branch off into hybrids like dramedy, Menippean satire, docufiction or rom com. Then, along comes a movie like “Bones and All,” a new, queasy genre buster starring Timothée Chalamet, Taylor Russell and Mark Rylance, and now playing in theatres.
Based on the 2015 novel of the same name by Camille DeAngelis, it is something I’ve never seen before, a romcanrofi, ie: a romantic, coming-of-age cannibal road film.
When we first meet Maren (Taylor Russell), she is a seventeen-year-old high schooler, being raised by single father Frank (André Holland). She appears to be a normal teen, sneaking out to a slumber party with schoolmates and the like, but when her taste for human flesh reveals itself, Maren and her dad have to hit the road before the police turn up.
When Maren turns eighteen, her father disappears, tired of hiding her terrible secret. Leaving the teen to fend for herself, he leaves behind some money, her birth certificate and a tape recording describing her life, from her first cannibalistic incident when she was just three-years-old, to providing details about Janelle (Chloë Sevigny), the mother who abandoned Maren when she was an infant.
On a search for answers, Maren hits the road, landing in Ohio, where she meets Sully (Mark Rylance), an older cannibal who says he could smell a fellow “eater” from blocks away. Like Maren, Sully is a drifter, but he’s not looking to answer life’s questions, he’s on the hunt for food. “Life is never dully with Sully,’ he snorts.
Sully teaches her the tricks of the trade, how to pick victims and feed without attracting attention, but something about him makes Maren uncomfortable and she moves on to Indiana where she meets Lee (Chalamet), a fine young cannibal who becomes her partner in life and death.
“Bones and All” isn’t exactly a horror film. The subject matter might be horrifying and there are some stomach-churning sound effects that won’t easily be forgotten, but this is more a coming-of-age love story as Maren adapts to her ever-changing circumstances.
The blood and guts are kept to a minimum, mostly serving as a vehicle for the movie’s metaphor of cannibals as anyone who has ever felt like an outcast. Maren and Lee are the ultimate others, a compulsive couple who aren’t treated as monsters, but as two people living outside of collective norms. Come for the cannibals, stay for the languid, sensitive essay on life on the fringes of society.
Seductive and strange, director Luca Guadagnino anchors the movie with his two leads, Chalamet and Russell. Both are driven to extremes by their appetites, while, at the same time, searching for acceptance and a place to call home. Both actors bring humanity to their characters, concentrating on their personal journeys rather than the monstrous aspects of their personalities. Their performances give the eccentric story a universal feel even if it is a very specific topic.
“Bones and All” has more to do with relationship road movies like “Two-Lane Blacktop” and “Badlands” than it does “Cannibal Holocaust.” It’s a haunting tale, if a little languorous for its own good, that makes a meal out of its allegory.
“Life is not an oyster,” says Maurice Flitcroft in “The Phantom of the Open,” a new feel-good film starring Mark Rylance and now playing in theatres. “It’s a barnacle.” It’s a rare moment of despair for the endlessly optimist man who followed his passions, in an unlikely journey to becoming a British folk hero.
Flitcroft, a 46-year-old crane operator I the same shipyard in Barrow-in-Furness, England, where his father and grandfather worked, but after dabbling in painting, music and even stunt driving, he adopted the Oscar Wilde quote, “We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars,” as his mantra.
He encourages his wife Jean (Sally Hawkins), his stepson Michael (Jake Davies) and twins Gene and James (Christian and Jonah Lees) to go for it and live their dreams.
In 1976, facing unemployment, Flitcroft takes up golf with an eye toward playing in the oldest golf tournament in the world, the British Open. He’s never played before, but has determination, heart and a belief, “an open championship should be open to everyone.”
Unbelievably (although this is a true story) he qualifies and in the qualifying round scores a catastrophic 121, 49 over par, a record for worst score that has yet to be broken. British Open organizer Keith Mackenzie (Rhys Ifans) is outraged—”I want him banned from every club in the country!”— but the press love the plucky golfer’s underdog story and the public, both at home and abroad, embrace him as an inspiration. “Practice is the road to perfection,” he says.
“The Phantom of the Open” is as sweet as Flitcroft’s tea. He takes six sugars in every cuppa, and that sugar rush keeps him and the movie moving forward.
Falling in line with Brit, true-to-lie-feel-good movies like “Fisherman’s Friends,” “Eddie the Eagle” and “Calendar Girls,” or jovial television shows like “Ted Lasso,” this one is kept aloft by masterfully amiable performances from the cast led by Rylance and Hawkins.
Rylance practically beams light as the upbeat dreamer. What could have been a caricature of a whimsical fantasist is tempered by the actor’s considerable comedic skill as well as his ability to find the core of humanity in every character he plays. It would have been easy to play Flitcroft as a broad character with a head full of dreams and nothing more, but Rylance sees to it that we see the person not the farce.
“The Phantom of the Open” is kind of old fashioned, but contains solid laughs and dives deep to reveal the class prejudices the crane operator suffered as he pursued bis dream. Most importantly, it is about the importance of following your heart, no matter where it takes you, to find happiness.
Richard joins host Jim Richards of the NewsTalk 1010 afternoon show The Rush for Booze and Reviews! Today we talk about the the stylish crime drama “The Outfit,” the college horror “Master” and the “adult” scares of “X.” Then, we learn about the most stylish man who ever lived and the drink named after him.
Mark Rylance is tailor made to play the lead role in “The Outfit,” a new gangster film set entirely inside a bespoke suit maker’s shop. I own up to the stupid joke in the first sentence of this review, but it is true. Rylance astounds as the “cutter”—tailors are best at sewing on buttons and not much else he says—at the center of the action in this twisty-turny chamber piece.
Set in the mid-1950s, the movie revolves around Leonard Burling (Rylance), a former Savile Row cutter who lovingly details the process of making a suit from scratch in the film’s opening voiceover. “This isn’t art,” he says proudly, “it’s a craft.”
Working the front desk is his assistant Mabel Sean (Zoey Deutch), a young woman who has her sights set on a horizon far beyond the tailor shop.
Discreet and meticulous, Burling makes beautiful clothes for his Chicago clients, including members of the Boyle Gang, the heavies who run the neighborhood. “If we only allowed angels in here,” he says, “we’d have no customers.” His services to the gangsters extend beyond making them look good. His store also doubles as a drop spot for the Boyles, a safe place for Richie (Dylan O’Brien), son of the Boyle Gang boss, and the ambitious mobster Francis (Johnny Flynn), to pass messages back and forth.
Burling stays out of the way, rarely makes eye contact with the tough guys and is unfailingly polite. “I don’t judge,” he tells Richie. “I just don’t want to be involved in whatever it is you do.”
Unfortunately, when it becomes clear there’s a rat in the Boyle Gang who may, or may not, be making surreptitious tapes of their criminal activities for the FBI, Burling is drawn into their nasty business.
What unfolds from this point is a whip-lash inducing game of twister as the character’s motivations tie the story in knots. Manipulation, deceit, double dealings and death are the name of the game in this literate, adult thriller. Although “The Outfit” was written for the screen by director Graham Moore, who took home an Oscar for writing “The Imitation Game,” it feels like a stage play. From the minimal sets—the whole thing takes place in two rooms—to the intimate performances and the intricate, wordy script, it is unabashedly and wonderfully theatrical.
An understated performance from Rylance sets the tone for the ensemble cast. His enigmatic character is a sounding board for everyone from the gangsters who cause all the trouble to Mabel, the neighborhood woman who just wants to see the world. The characters fit together like puzzle pieces to really bring this story alive.
“The Outfit” is a small film that is unafraid to rely on the characters and the words and not elaborate set pieces to make an impact. Writer, director Moore has made a film that, unlike how Burling feels about his life’s work, emphasizes both craft and art.
Movies about giant things hurdling through space toward Earth are almost as plentiful as the stars in the sky. “Armageddon,” “Deep Impact” and “Judgment Day” all pose end-of-the-world scenarios but none have the satirical edge of “Don’t Look Up.” The darkly comedic movie, now in theatres but coming soon to Netflix, paints a grim, on-the-nose picture of how the world responds to a crisis.
Jennifer Lawrence is PhD candidate Dr. Kate Dibiasky, a student astronomer who discovers a comet the size of Mount Everest aimed directly at our planet. Her professor, Dr. Randall Mindy (Leonardo DiCaprio), comes to the alarming conclusion that the comet will collide with Earth in six months and fourteen days in what he calls an “extinction level event.”
They take their concerns to NASA and the White House, but are met with President Janie Orlean’s (Meryl Streep) concerns about optics, costs and the up-coming mid-term elections. “The timing is just disastrous,” she says. “Let’s sit tight and assess.”
With the clock ticking to total destruction Dibiasky and Mindy go public, but their dire warnings on the perky news show “The Rip”—“We keep the bad news light!”—go unheeded. Social media focusses on Dibiasky’s panic, creating memes of her face, while dubbing Mindy the Bedroom Eyed Doomsday Prophet.
As the comet hurdles toward Earth the world becomes divided between those willing to Look Up and do something about the incoming disaster and the deniers who think that scientists “want you to look up because they are looking down their noses at you.”
Chaos breaks out, and the division widens as the comet closes in on its target.
It is not difficult to find parallels between the events in “Don’t Look Up” and recent world occurrences. Director and co-writer Adam McKay explores the reaction to world affairs through a lens of Fake News, clickbait journalism, skepticism of science, political spin and social media gone amok. In fact, the topics McKay hits on don’t really play like satire at all. The social media outrage, bizarro-land decisions made by people in high offices and the influence of tech companies all sound very real world, ripped out of today’s newspapers.
It’s timely, but perhaps too timely. Social satire is important, and popular—“Saturday Night Live” has done it successfully for decades—but “Don’t Look Up,” while brimming with good ideas, often feels like an overkill of familiarity. The comet is fiction, at least I hope it is, but the reaction to it and the on-coming catastrophe feels like something I might see on Twitter just before the lights go down in the theatre.
It feels a little too real to be pure satire. There are laughs throughout, but it’s the serious questions that resonate. When Mindy, on TV having his “Network” moment, rages, “What the hell happened to us? What have we done to ourselves and how do we fix it?” the movie becomes a beacon. The satire is comes easily—let’s face it, the world is full of easy targets—but it’s the asking of hard questions and in the frustration of a world gone mad, when McKay’s point that we’re broken and don’t appreciate the world around us, shines through.
Despite big glitzy Hollywood names above the title and many laugh lines, “Don’t Look Up” isn’t escapism. It’s a serious movie that aims to entertain but really wants to make you think.
“The Trial of the Chicago 7,” now playing in theatres, sees Aaron Sorkin return to the courtroom twenty-eight years after he put the words “You can’t handle the truth,” into Jack Nicholson’s mouth. This time around he’s re-enacting one of the most famous trials of the 1960s, using transcripts from the actual proceedings as a basis for the script. There is no one moment as powerful of Nicholson’s “truth” declaration but there is no denying the timeliness of the film’s fifty-two-year-old story.
Here’s the basic story for anyone too young to know the difference between Yippies and Yuppies.
The trial, which was originally the Chicago Eight until Black Panther leader Bobby Seale (Yahya Abdul-Mateen II) had his case severed from the others, saw 60s counterculture icons Abbie Hoffman (Sacha Baron Cohen) and Jerry Rubin (Jeremy Strong) of the Youth International Party (the aforementioned Yippies), and assorted radicals David Dellinger (John Carroll Lynch), Tom Hayden (Eddie Redmayne), Rennie Davis (Alex Sharp), John Froines (Daniel Flaherty), and Lee Weiner (Noah Robbins) charged with conspiracy and inciting to riot stemming from their actions at the anti-Vietnam War protests in Chicago, Illinois, during the 1968 Democratic National Convention.
Behind the prosecution desk is the young and meticulous Richard Schultz (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) acting as assistant to the truculent chief prosecutor Tom Foran (J. C. MacKenzie). On the defense is lawyer William Kunstler (Mark Rylance), a boldfaced name in civil rights litigation. On the bench is Julius Hoffman (Frank Langella), a conservative judge who once presided over an obscenity case against Lenny Bruce.
Those are the players and to a person they deliver solid performances, making the most of Sorkin’s snappy, rapid-fire dialogue. Of the ensemble cast Baron Cohen stands out, handing in a straight dramatic role; there’s no Mankini in sight. He’s too old by half to play the character who once famously urged kids to, “Never trust anyone over thirty,” but maintains the edge that make his comedic characters so memorable.
Sorkin, who also directs, has made a period piece that reverberates for today. A bridge that spans the five decades from the actual events, it’s a bit of history that comments on contemporary hot button topics like protest, civil rights and police brutality. The sight of Seale, the lone African American defendant, bound and gagged at the judge’s order, is a potent reminder of racial injustice in the penal system. Re-enactments of police brutality during the riots and the consequent discussion of who is to blame for the violence, the protestors or the bill club swinging cops could be ripped from today’s headlines.
“The Trial of the Chicago 7” isn’t perfect. Gordon-Levitt’s character is a cypher, a prosecutor who breaks with his colleagues at a crucial moment and Hoffman is played as a pantomime villain, but as a reminder of how history is repeated, it is a compelling watch.
You don’t have to overtax the Google machine to find negative comments about being on set with Steven Spielberg. Type in “working with Steven Spielberg” and in 0.57 seconds 20,900,000 results appear, including an article where Shia LaBeouf rants, “He’s less a director than he is a f—ing company.”
LaBeouf’s resume is dotted with Spielberg-produced or -directed films like Disturbia, Transformers, Eagle Eye and, most famously, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, but if Spielberg ever does the same search it’s unlikely they’ll ever pair up again. “You get there, and you realize you’re not meeting the Spielberg you dream of,” LaBeouf told Variety. “You’re meeting a different Spielberg, who is in a different stage in his career.”
But that’s pretty much it for the negativity. There’s a story about Crispin Glover suing Spielberg for using his likeness in Back to the Future Part II and the critical drone that his films are overly sentimental, but primarily it’s LaBeouf against Spielberg and the world. Most of his other co-workers have nothing but praise for the filmmaker Empire magazine ranked as the greatest film director of all time.
This weekend he returns to theatres with Ready Player One, a sci-fi film that brings a virtual reality world called the OASIS to vivid life. Star Tye Sheridan calls the director a great and passionate collaborator who makes everyone feel equal on set. Co-star Ralph Ineson calls Spielberg “one of the most iconic figures of the last 100 years,” adding that it was difficult to takes notes from him on set. “When he is speaking to you your mind vaguely goes blank the first few times because your internal monologue just goes, ‘My god, Steven Spielberg is giving me a note.’ And then you realize you haven’t actually heard the note.”
All directors give suggestions on set, but it seems it’s the way Spielberg speaks to his actors that sets him apart.
Ed Burns remembers making a mess of several takes on the set of Saving Private Ryan to the point where Tom Hanks said to him, “I’ve seen you act before, and this isn’t acting.” Afraid he would be replaced, he got nervous and continued to blow take after take but Spielberg didn’t offer guidance. Two weeks passed. The cast started laying bets on who would be fired first.
Turns out, no one was fired and Burns learned a lesson he would later take into his own directorial efforts like Sidewalks of New York. The actor reports that Spielberg said, “I like to give my actors three takes to figure it out. If I step in after the first take and give you a note, especially with young actors, you’ll hear me rather than your own voice.”
Burns calls the experience “a life changer” adding it taught him that being a director is “about knowing when to give direction.”
The superstar director says the listening lesson was learned early in life. “From a very young age my parents taught me probably the most valuable lesson of my life: Sometimes it’s better not to talk, but to listen.”
There’s someone else Spielberg keeps in mind when making a film. “I always like to think of the audience when I am directing. Because I am the audience.”
In brand crazy Hollywood “Ready Player One,” the new sci fi film from Steven Spielberg, is an everything-old-is-new-again hybrid. Based on the novel of the same name from author Ernest Cline it’s not a reboot or reimagining of a comic book or old film. It’s an original story that may appeal to folks who say the movies only recycle ideas. At the same time it’s stuffed to the gills with enough pop culture icons to warm the hearts of any nostalgic moviegoer.
It’s 2045 and the world is a mess. Cities are a hodgepodge of dystopian horrors, overcrowded, polluted and corrupt. For the people, whatever joy can be mined from the desolate, depressing life comes from immersing themselves in a virtual reality world called OASIS (Ontologically Anthropocentric Sensory Immersive Simulation). “Except for eating, sleeping and bathroom breaks,” says Wade Watts (Tye Sheridan), “everyone does everything in the OASIS.” Based on 1980s movies, pop culture and videogames, it’s a technological escape from the all-too-real societal ills that make life miserable. “These days reality,” Wade says, “is a bummer.”
When OASIS creator James Halliday (Mark Rylance) died he created a way for Watts and his on-line Gunter pals—egg hunters—to find a way out of their IRL problems. The creator left behind an Easter Egg—if you don’t know that an Easter Egg is a hidden game message or image, give up now—amongst the game’s familiar pop culture characters. Whoever finds the three keys that unlock the Easter Egg will inherit the OASIS empire. Money, power, the whole nine yards. Watts, who lives in a vertical trailer park called The Stacks in Columbus, Ohio, along with his digital team the High Five, work to navigate the game and change their lives. In a race against time, they must beat the Sixers, an army of gamers employed by evil corporation Innovative Online Industries, in a war for control of the future.
Think your kids spend too much time playing video games? Get a load of Wade, Art3mis (Olivia Cooke), Aech (Lena Waithe), Daito (Win Morisaki) and Shoto (Philip Zhao). This crowd are best friends, although for most of the movie they have never met on terra ferma. They spend all their time on line, forming friendships, falling in love and eventually fighting for their real life lives.
“Ready Player One” takes off like a rocket. There’s a lot of set-up and Spielberg finds a way to impart information and keep it lively. He fills the screen with an industrial view of the future, contrasting Wade’s dour real life with his vivid on line adventures, visually developing the push and pull between reality and virtual reality that fuels the film’s story. A wild car race, featuring Freddy Krueger, King Kong and the Batmobile, establishes the OASIS in a way that the minutes of exposition surrounding it never could. It also establishes the film’s love of spectacle over story.
Spielberg dives deep into the VR world, intoxicated by the endless possibilities of mixing-and-matching pop culture iconography with an adventure story. When Wade says, “The limit of reality is your own imagination,” he could very well be talking to the director. The result is a frenetic film that is fun for a while but the whimsy soon gets bogged down with feverish detail. It’s a little too long, there’s too much exposition, too many twists for a story that can be boiled down to the notion that we should spend more time in the real world.
A tribute to “The Shining” is often quite fun and there are moments of levity but it isn’t about anything other than the adventure. The commentary on our own virtual lives are never expanded upon. Of a spark of on-line love between Art3mis and Wade, who hadn’t yet met outside OASIS, Art3mis says, “You only see what I want you to see. You don’t know me.” It’s a good starting point for a conversation about what happens when avatars become real people but instead we get more exposition.
“Ready Player One” is pure escapism that begs the question, Will there ever be a video game movie that really works? The function of storytelling is vastly different between videogames and film and yet filmmakers try for a amalgam, the best of both worlds. What we usually end up with is what Steven Spielberg finds in his treatment of “Ready Player One,” a film that honours the spirit of the games at the expense of great storytelling.
Baby Driver: Although it contains more music than most tuneful of movies “Baby Driver,” the new film from director Edgar Wright, isn’t a musical in the “West Side Story,” “Sound of Music” sense. Wallpapered with 35 rock ‘n roll songs on the soundtrack it’s a hard driving heist flick that can best be called an action musical.
The Big Sick: Even when “The Big Sick” is making jokes about terrorism and the “X-Files” it is all heart, a crowd-pleaser that still feels personal and intimate.
Call Me By Your Name: This is a movie of small details that speak to larger truths. Director Luca Guadagnino keeps the story simple relying on the minutiae to add depth and beauty to the story. The idyllic countryside, the quaint town, the music of the Psychedelic Furs and the languid pace of a long Italian summer combine to create the sensual backdrop against which the romance between the two blossoms. Guadagnino’s camera captures it all, avoiding the pitfalls of melodrama to present a story that is pure emotion. It feels real and raw, haunted by the ghosts of loves gone by.
Darkest Hour: This is a historical drama with all the trappings of “Masterpiece Theatre.” You can expect photography, costumes and period details are sumptuous. What you may not expect is the light-hearted tone of much of the goings on. While this isn’t “Carry On Churchill,” it has a lighter touch that might be expected. Gary Oldman, not an actor known for his comedic flourishes, embraces the sly humour. When Churchill becomes Prime Minister his wife, Clementine (Kristin Scott Thomas) makes an impassioned speech about the importance of the work he is about to take on. He raises a glass and, cutting through the emotion of the moment, says, “Here’s to not buggering it up!” It shows a side of Churchill not often revealed in wartime biopics.
The Disaster Artist: The key to pulling off “The Disaster Artist” is not recreating “The Room” beat for beat, although they do that, it’s actually about treating Wiseau as a person and not an object of fun. He’s an outrageous character and Franco commits to it 100%. From the marble-mouthed speech pattern that’s part Valley Girl and part Beaker from The Muppets to the wild clothes and stringy hair, he’s equal parts creepy and lovable but underneath his bravado are real human frailties. Depending on your point of view he’s either delusional or aspirational but in Franco’s hands he’s never also never less than memorable. It’s a broad, strange performance but it may also be one of the actor’s best.
Dunkirk: This is an intense movie but it is not an overly emotional one. The cumulative effect of the vivid images and sounds will stir the soul but despite great performances the movie doesn’t necessarily make you feel for one character or another. Instead its strength is in how it displays the overwhelming sense of scope of the Dunkirk mission. With 400,000 men on the ground with more in the air and at sea, the sheer scope of the operation overpowers individuality, turning the focus on the collective. Director Christopher Nolan’s sweeping camera takes it all in, epic and intimate moments alike.
The Florida Project: This is, hands down, one of the best films of the year. Low-budget and naturalistic, it packs more punch than any superhero. Director Sean Baker defies expectations. He’s made a film about kids for adults that finds joy in rocky places. What could have been a bleak experience or an earnest message movie is brought to vivid life by characters that feel real. It’s a story about poverty that neither celebrates or condemns its characters. Mooney’s exploits are entertaining and yet an air of jeopardy hangs heavy over every minute of the movie. Baker knows that Halley and Moonie’s well being hangs by a thread but he also understands they exist in the real world and never allows their story to fall into cliché.
Get Out: This is the weirdest and most original mainstream psychodrama to come along since “The Babadook.” The basic premise harkens back to the Sidney Poitier’s classic “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner.” In that film parents, played by Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn, have their attitudes challenged when their daughter introduces them to her African American fiancé. The uncomfortable situation of meeting in-laws for the first time is universal. It’s the added layers of paranoia and skewered white liberalism that propels the main character’s (Daniel Kaluuya) situation into full-fledged horror. In this setting he is the other, the stranger and as his anxiety grows the social commentary regarding attitudes about race in America grows sharper and more focussed.
Lady Bird: Greta Gerwig’s skilful handling of the story of Lady Bird’s busy senior year works not just because it’s unvarnished and honest in its look at becoming an adult but also, in a large degree, to Saoirse Ronan’s performance. I have long called her ‘Lil Meryl. She’s an actor of unusual depth, a young person (born in 1994) with an old soul. Lady Bird is almost crushed by the weight of uncertainty that greets her with every turn—will her parents divorce, will there be money for school, will Kyle be the boy of her dreams, will she ever make enough cash to repay her parents for her upbringing?—but Ronan keeps her nimble, sidestepping teen ennui with a complicated mix of snappy one liners, hard earned wisdom and a well of emotion. It’s tremendous, Academy Award worthy work.
The Post: Steven Spielberg film is a fist-pump-in-the-air look at the integrity and importance of a free press. It’s a little heavy-handed but these are heavy-handed times. Director Spielberg and stars Tom Hanks and Meryl Streep are entertainers first and foremost, and they do entertain here, but they also shine a light on a historical era whose reverberations are being felt today stronger than ever.
The Shape of Water: A dreamy slice of pure cinema. Director Guillermo del Toro uses the stark Cold War as a canvas to draw warm and vivid portraits of his characters. It’s a beautiful creature feature ripe with romance, thrills and, above all, empathy for everyone. This is the kind of movie that reminds us of why we fell in love with movies in the first place.
Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri: The story of a mother’s unconventional war with the world is simple enough, it’s the complexity of the characters that elevates the it to the level of great art.
Wonder Woman: Equal parts Amazon sword and sandal epic, mad scientist flick, war movie and rom com, it’s a crowd pleaser that places the popular character front and centre. As played by Gal Gadot, Diana is charismatic and kick ass, a superhero who is both truly super and heroic. Like Superman she is firmly on the side of good, not a tortured soul à la Batman. Naïve to the ways of the world, she runs headfirst into trouble. Whether she’s throwing a German tank across a battlefield, defying gravity to leap to the top of a bell tower, tolerating Trevor’s occasional mansplaining or deflecting bullets with her indestructible Bracelets of Submission, she proves in scene after scene to be both a formidable warrior and a genuine, profoundly empathic character.
