Last Night in Soho [2021)

First off.

I am in love with Thomasin McKenzie.

I think Saoirse Ronan has lost her touch.

Kat Dennings doesn’t even bother with films anymore.

And Thora Birch is too much of a liberal moron.

But then all actors are liberal morons, aren’t they?

Except for a precious few.

Jon Voight.

James Woods.

Rob Schneider.

Kirstie Alley.

Robert Davi.

Jim Caviezel.

Secondly.

This film is a masterpiece.

Edgar Wright is the best filmmaker in the world right now.

Is he better than Jean-Luc Godard?

No.

But Godard is not making films for mass consumption.

Is he better than Wes Anderson?

BY A MILLION FUCKING MILES!!!

Don’t get me wrong.

Wes Anderson made one perfect film.

And that film was The Grand Budapest Hotel.

And that film wouldn’t have been perfect without Saoirse Ronan.

That’s how important her presence in that film was.

Saoirse has made another perfect film.

Hanna.

But her others are mediocre.

Brooklyn.

Meh.

Lady Bird.

Even more meh (not a good thing).

Saoirse has gone astray.

Just as Thora Birch went astray.

Ghost World is a perfect film.

And American Beauty is close to perfect.

For my money, Homeless to Harvard is her other perfect film.

Kat Dennings films kinda suck.

Her masterpiece is actually 2 Broke Girls.

I’m serious.

But that’s not cinema.

Twin Peaks is cinema.

Even though it’s a TV show.

Histoire(s) du cinéma is the best film ever made.

And it was made for TV.

Homeless to Harvard is a Lifetime movie.

Made for TV.

It is not cinema.

Not exactly.

But it may be a perfect film.

Wes Anderson made his perfect film with Saoirse Ronan.

And he made a good film (Tenenbaums).

The rest are shite.

I did not understand Edgar Wright’s film language when I first saw Shaun of the Dead.

I thought it was crap.

How wrong I was!

Here is my contention.

Every Edgar Wright film is perfect.

Shaun of the Dead?

Yes.

Hot Fuzz?

Yes.

The World’s End?

Yes.

Baby Driver?

Yes.

Scott Pilgrim?

Yes.

And this film is perfect too.

But this is not quite the Wright you are used to.

This is a genuinely scary film.

But it stands up with Psycho, Rosemary’s Baby, and The Shining as one of the four best horror films ever made.

Edgar Wright films are all about detail.

But not the twee obsession with detail that Wes Anderson has.

Edgar Wright is overflowing with talent.

Wes Anderson is not.

Anderson needed Saoirse Ronan to make his perfect film.

And there was a bit (just a bit!) of grit in Grand Budapest.

Saoirse is missing from his other films.

And there is no real grit in any of the others.

Tenenbaums is good.

But the Wes Anderson players are tiresome.

Is Bill Murray amazing?

Yes.

But are his performances in Wes Anderson films his best work?

Absolutely not.

No more Jason Schwatzman (for fuck’s sake!).

Is Luke Wilson a great actor?

Yes.

What’s his best film?

Masked and Anonymous.

Maybe it’s Paltrow and Hackman which make Tenenbaums good.

For my money, Luke Wilson is the one who makes that film go.

But it is not on the same level as Grand Budapest.

Last Night in Soho is the Grand Budapest of the ’20s.

We’re in the ’20s now.

Are they roaring?

Like a fucking mouse.

Last Night in Soho is a gazillion times better than No Time to Die.

This film has everything the Bond film didn’t.

Substance.

Competent directing.

A story worth sticking with.

And so it is fitting that Diana Rigg’s last role should absolutely trump the death of James Bond.

The one George Lazenby film was WAY better than No Time to Die.

The death of love is more sad than the death of the hero.

Diana Rigg is the linchpin in the Bond franchise.

Pull that thread, and the sweater unravels.

Léa Seydoux is boring as fuck in the Bond films.

She was great in Blue.

But she was nothing compared to the one who carried that film (Adele Exarchopoulos).

Exarchopoulos made one perfect film.

Blue is the Warmest Color.

None of her other films are even good.

Wright makes what Youth in Revolt might have been.

He is not glib.

This is not a hipster film.

Michael Cera (who has made one perfect film [Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist]) is, mercifully, NOT in Last Night in Soho.

[correction…Kat Dennings DID make one perfect film]

Thomasin McKenzie’s obsession with ’60s London music is real.

It’s not a fucking Austin Powers joke.

Rita Tushingham is wonderful as Gram.

Excellent casting.

[take note, Bond franchise]

Thomasin hooks up with a black dude.

No big deal.

Take note, Bond franchise.

NOT EVERY FUCKING PERSON HAS TO BE BLACK IN ORDER FOR A FILM TO BE VIABLE!!!

Thomasin’s love interest is a black fellow.

I have no problem with that.

He does a good job.

For fuck’s sake…he doesn’t even have a Wikipedia page!

Michael Ajao.

Fine acting!

There can be important black characters WITHOUT A FILM BEING A WOKE FUCKING JOKE (like the recent Bond film).

No big deal.

Don’t make it a big deal.

It has to fit with the story.

The story is the most important thing.

The writers of the Bond film (Purvis and Wade) have allowed their name to be attached to the fucking pathetic shit of No Time to Die.

So you get a kiwi to speak in a Cornish accent.

GREAT ACTRESS!

Thomasin McKenzie.

Say that name with me.

Jacinda Ardern’s father (or mother?) was a horse.

Ugly bitch.

Ugly soul.

Thomasin McKenzie is the best thing to ever come out of New Zealand.

However, there has been one perfect kiwi movie: Eagle vs Shark.

Synnøve Karlsen is so fucking annoying in Soho.

And she was supposed to be.

So, good job (I guess).

Every film needs a villain.

And Jocasta (Karlsen’s character) is the real villain of this film.

Thomasin is different.

Jocasta beats her down.

Mentally.

A stingy spirit.

Can never share in any of her joys.

Do you know anyone like that?

But Thomasin is troubled.

Hallucinations?

Maybe.

Seeing ghosts?

Maybe.

We’re trying to solve a case here.

Cold case.

Maybe a lot of cold cases.

Maybe a serial killer.

To the Belle and Sebastian bedsit.

Salad days are short-lived.

Don’t underestimate Sandie Shaw.

Always something there to remind me.

1964.

Puppet on a string.

Gotta pay your dues.

As a wind-up bird girl.

Brian Epstein.

Giorgio Gomelsky.

Andrew Loog Oldham.

ABKCO.

The influence of Vertigo upon Last Night in Soho cannot be understated.

The red of the Café de Paris.

The blonde of Anya Taylor-Joy’s hair.

And Thomasin’s hair.

[also, don’t underestimate Bergman’s Persona]

The glance to the side.

It’s not Jimmy Stewart.

It’s Thomasin.

Allusions to The Way of the Dragon and The Lady from Shanghai in the mirrors.

Sure, a bit of Pulp Fiction.

But that’s just for the kids.

Edgar Wright’s grasp of cinema history is way deeper than some Tarantino bullshit.

And yet, he likes zombies.

And shitty horror films from the ’80s.

I mean REALLY shitty, camp ones.

Slasher films.

Back to Vertigo.

Kim Novak’s apartment is bathed in green neon.

But Thomasin’s bedsit is a red, white, and blue homage to Godard.

An homage to Une Femme est une femme.

Dancing.

Dancing girls.

Prostitutes.

Vivre sa vie.

Pink dress fembot.

Pew pew.

Thomasin is way sexier than Anya Taylor-Joy.

Thomasin is the girl next door.

The frumpy hair of Homeless to Harvard.

I love it.

It must be this way.

To juxtapose the transition to Swinging Sixties glamour.

Is Trump just culture jamming with his vaccine tack?

Either that, or the hero has become the villain.

Did the D.C. swamp make Trump into a swamp zombie?

Maybe no one comes out clean.

International law was broken.

War crimes.

All these Wright films have zombies.

Or robots.

Faceless automatons.

A bit of Dragon Tattoo.

We all like a good microfiche scene!

Is Terence Stamp her father?

If Sandie is her mother?

Could be.

Otherwise, she would be the daughter of a prick.

But Stamp tried to save Sandie.

Arsenic and old lace.

The ones you never suspect.

Sicario.

“Buried” in the walls.

Decomposing.

Poe.

Gacy.

Wright’s “sympathy for the serial killer”.

What happened to these people that made them monsters?

Don’t underestimate Truffaut’s Fahrenheit 451 (his only English-language film…and a flat-out masterpiece).

In the world of Edgar Wright, it is records.

Vinyl.

Not books.

And sometimes the elderly want to die with their memories.

They are not going anywhere.

They are not fleeing.

It’s been a good life.

Going down with the ship.

Up in flames.

The shitbags want their deaths avenged.

After all, they were just horny, well-to-do dads who needed a little excitement.

Prostitution.

It’s the law, after all.

Murder is murder.

Crimes of passion.

By reason of insanity.

Not guilty.

Not insane.

But traumatized.

But Thomasin has been on the adventure.

She knows what Sandie has been through.

Trump was abused for four years.

That is true.

And he fought like a champ.

Is there no justice?

Is it culture jamming (I ask again)?

Confusion.

Keeping his enemies off balance.

Getting a foot in the door.

Truth Social will censor “hate speech” with a Silicon Valley AI bot.

In order to get on Apple App Store and Google Play.

But the roll out is delayed?

Lie about the vaccines.

“Safe and effective”.

Move in for the kill shot.

Against whom?

Big Pharma and the New World Order.

But we have to call out serial killers for who they are.

If you are saying the COVID vaccines are “safe and effective”, you are spreading misinformation that is endangering the lives of those who hear and trust you.

CDC: 11,879

Open VAERS: 23,149

Neither safe,

https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/vaccines/safety/adverse-events.html

https://openvaers.com/covid-data/mortality

nor effective.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-covid-deaths-2021-vaccines-b1963790.html

10,000-20,000 vaccine deaths should be read as 100,000-200,000 vaccine deaths because of this:

https://www.bmj.com/rapid-response/2011/11/02/underreporting-vaccine-adverse-events

And correlation does not necessarily equal causation…unless this (peep the myocarditis…you think that’s all JnJ? [nigga please!]):

https://openvaers.com/covid-data

But the election was stolen.

Or was it allowed to be stolen?

When will the other shoe drop?

Or does the other shoe even exist?

This charade is going to go on until 2024?

Maybe Sandie is not her mother.

-PD

The Spy Who Dumped Me [2018)

Texts.

Lessons.

Spying.

Why does our world persist?

Spy spoof in the mode of The Brothers Grimsby.

And while this film is nowhere near as good as Sacha Baron Cohen’s underrated triumph, it is still quite a good film.

There are some really great action sequences here which rival the Bond franchise.

Which brings up a point.

As there are very few Bond movies, these spoofs must be what the top talent do when they’re not making a legit Bond film.

Justin Theroux is good when he punches into a wall.

He’s also good at the jukebox.

But he’s not Mulholland Drive good.

More importantly, Mila Kunis apparently works at Trader Joe’s.

Which gets to tiki root strata.

And she’s Ukrainian.

Which is doubly or triply weird.

Interesting van work.

Like WarGames.

Biden.

Similar shootout to Tosca.

Great car sequence with Kunis and Kate McKinnon.

And the methed-up driver.

One of the highlights.

An actual “what if” of spy films invading on the real world.

More actual gagging.

The difficulty of hiding a thumb drive.

Suffused with Ukrainian connections.

Ivanna Sakhno is truly excellent in this film.

Funny as fuck…trying to find two dumb American girls in Europe.

Great scene through scope.

I’m really tired of seeing Gillian Anderson in these kind of roles.

What the fuck.

Johnny English Reborn (good film…bad role) and How To Lose Friends & Alienate People.

The bit with Snowden is pretty genius.

Ska!

McKinnon in Cirque du Soleil is a little retarded.

Scene in Tokyo also excessive (literally) and pointless (likewise).

But I really enjoyed this film.

Sam Heughan is decent.

The writing is good.

Good job by director Susanna Fogel.

-PD

National Treasure [2004)

The funny thing about propaganda…

You don’t realize you’re under its sway…until you’re no longer under its sway 🙂

Ahh…

Like that great song by the Stones.

Just what ARE those lyrics???

But never mind.

Let’s back to the point.

JUST WHAT KIND of propaganda would this be?

It is with every bone of logic in my body that I soberly assess National Treasure to be Masonic propaganda.

Watch it.

Prove me wrong.

Especially from the beginning.

Near the top of the film.

This is OVER THE TOP endorsement of Freemasonry AND of the Knights Templar.

Ok.

So what?

It’s STILL a good film.

A REALLY ENJOYABLE FILM!

And we’re gonna get down to the nuts and bolts of it…

But I just want to point out another thing which had previously escaped me about this flick.

Nicolas Cage is effectively channeling Alex Jones throughout the entirety of this motion picture.

The accent.

The posture.

The wardrobe.

THE MANNERISMS!

I can’t believe I never caught this!!!

So there you have it.

The protagonist (not at all an “anti-hero” in the context of this film) is a “conspiracy theorist”.

But! BUT!!!

The protagonist also emanates from a clear lineage in thrall to Freemasonry.

You think I’m kidding?

Watch this flick and observe the clear propagandistic tone* re: George Washington and the rest of America’s “founding fathers”.

“At least nine…”

Signers of the Declaration of Independence.

But I fucking love this movie.

Let me get to a very important component right off: Diane Kruger.

Though she seriously sullied her career by appearing in what might be the worst film ever made (Tarantino’s Inglorious Basterds), Kruger is a goddess of IQ herein.

And her chemistry with Cage is palpable.

Not least, Justin Bartha makes this whole thing quasi-believable.

On its own merits, National Treasure “works”.

Bartha is a lot like Ben Whishaw in the recent Bond films.

A computer geek cast in a very sympathetic light.

And Jon Turteltaub made a pretty fucking great film here.

A lot like a 007 flick!

Witness Cage as he shucks his janitor uniform for a tux.

Straight out of the opening from Goldfinger.

But Benjamin Franklin Gates [Nicolas Cage] is more a “workingman’s” Bond.

A nut job.

A reader.

A NERD!

Yes.

Although Gates tries to use his “Submariner” as collateral to get his $100 bill back, we don’t really believe it.

We don’t for a second believe that Gates wears a Rolex.

Cage yes, Gates no.

Which is one of the ways this film goes off the rails.

For all of Cage’s acting prowess, he comes off more as a “star” than a true nerd.

Unfortunately, that is damaging for the narrative of this picture.

But all-in-all, National Treasure is a film I want to return to time and again.

The story seduces.

For God and country.

The Freemasonry stuff is a little weird.

[ok, a LOT weird]

But it makes us face the facts re: George Washington, et al.

And brings up a tangential and potentially-timely question:

“Is President Trump a Mason?”

I must admit: I have seen Trump make this hand gesture ABOUT A MILLION FUCKING TIMES!

trumpMason

So what?

In fact…there is AT LEAST another possibility.

Is Trump’s ostentatious display of “Freemason” hand signals a PRETENSE?

In other words, is Trump PRETENDING to be a Freemason??

It’s possible.

But who the fuck really cares???

If George Washington was a Freemason (and he was), then that kinda serves as a cornerstone of expectations (to say the least).

I’m not a Freemason.

I could care less.

Fuck ’em.

But there is an important caveat.

Was the secrecy of Freemason lodges an essential aspect of communications security leading to victory in the American Revolution?

And what about the French Revolution??

Again, these possibilities seduce.

Suffice it to say, National Treasure can be a strangely enthralling work if viewed through the lens of theory on propaganda films as well as through the kaleidoscopic peephole of current events.

Something certainly seems afoot in the USA.

I am even reluctant to utter its name.

Mostly because I know not what it is.

This new era of the republic.

Trump as President.

Hard-pressed on all sides.

The winner, fair and square.

Elected by the rules of the country.

The Electoral College.

Which rewards the residual “statehood” of lands which chose to join the USA.

At any rate, things seem far from settled.

Indeed, there is a war going on in the United States.

And it is mostly being waged in the realm of “the spectacle”.

President Trump has an OVERWHELMING MAJORITY of the mass media AGAINST HIM.

It is almost comical 🙂

I would liken it to rats having been driven from a burning ship.

Or termites running for cover during a house fire.

Something is off.

Clearly, the media “darling” (that repulsive shell of a human being, Hillary Clinton) did not ascend the throne.

And the owners of the corporate mass media continue to take her defeat VERY POORLY 🙂

Indeed, Trump is positively “mature” compared to the childish response of the U.S mass media.

Which begs the question: WHAT ARE THEY SO AFRAID OF???

And further: did an “outsider” REALLY win the White House 12 months ago?

Judging from media reaction, Trump must be a fucking Messiah.

And further judging from the bungling media info warfare, the psychological operations techniques being employed IN CONCERT by the U.S. mass media ARE HOPELESSLY DAFT 🙂

Every time Jim Acosta tries to rip Trump, it just adds fuel to the #MAGA fire.

Every time the White House press corps comes off as a Mormon Tabernacle Choir of homogeneity (anti-Trump in tenor), the “deplorables” who voted Trump in are proven right.

To be quite frank, I would hate to be on the other side.

The U.S. Democratic Party appears to be trying to reinvent the wheel…AND FAILING BADLY 🙂

But let us leave the chisel of disingenuous chiselers behind for the time being.

Merry Christmas.

May you know joy.

May the Lord Jesus Christ shine upon you today.

May that grace which surpasses all understanding soothe your heart and uplift your spirit.

May a twinkle of love float lightly into your life tonight.

And may it bloom into charity and generosity forevermore.

-PD

2 Comments

Skyfall [2012)

If you wait too long, you lose the impression.

I was way behind on trying to support my compatriots. It is not necessary to agree. What I champion is freedom of expression.

And so we try to remember the mood…the efficacy of cinema in the hands of Sam Mendes.

Perhaps the first “real” director to approach the Bond franchise after having had success beforehand.

Mendes will always have a place in my heart for his deft touch directing Thora Birch in American Beauty.

Fortunately we can look forward to a second contribution in the forthcoming Bond film Spectre.

But for now we have this.

What of it?

I should dispense with self-congratulatory pomp at this time rather than let it distract me.

Yes, I have now seen all of the Bond films from Eon Productions. You can access the reviews of all 23 pictures here on my site by clicking the Bond tab.

Now that we have that out of the way…

The first glaring bit of strategic signaling occurs when we learn that our MacGuffin is a hard drive.

Of course, it’s what’s on the hard drive which makes this worth mentioning.

NATO agents embedded in terrorist groups.

For anyone with a knowledge of Operation Gladio this brings up a troubling association.

To wit: the possibility that the organizations are controlled by NATO for cynical purposes.

This was, and continues to be, a fundamental aspect of geopolitics. False-flag terror.

Perhaps Mendes (or the writers of the film) knowingly left this bread crumb to add a quasi-credibility to what has often become a propagandistic series for the power elite.

Whatever the case may be, the opening sequence is generally good.

Let’s face it: it’s getting harder and harder after 23 films to have James Bond do something novel.

His seeming demise before the credits roll make us think of that horribly daft episode from the Connery days:

You Only Live Twice.

Ralph Fiennes is unlikable from the start, but we learn why as the film progresses.

Mendes does a nice job of faking us out on several occasions. We even suspect Bond as a terrorist briefly.

Another breadcrumb: the depleted uranium bullet fragments from Bond’s shoulder.

With this we are brought back to that stain upon U.S. military operations over the past 15 years.

Keeping in mind the research of Doug Rokke, we might again be seeing an attempt by the Bond franchise to relate with an increasingly informed viewer base.

Think on your sins?

Well, all cinematic sins are forgiven once director Mendes has occasion to mold and shape the lights of high-rise Shanghai into a sci-fi backdrop for good old fashion ass kicking.

Modigliani.

We are meant to associate the extra-terrestrial eyes with Bérénice Marlohe. Like the grey-eyed goddess Athena, we will later meet her in the shower (ohh-la-la!).

When all else fails in a film, have the location shift to Macau.

Indeed, the best dialogue comes between Daniel Craig and Mlle. Marlohe at the casino bar. It reminds us of that fleeting bit of verbal mastery aboard the train in Casino Royale when Craig and Eva Green took turns sizing each other up.

Enter Javier Bardem.

Bardem is certainly among the most convincing villains in the entire Bond pantheon. Something about that bleached-blond hair gives us a creepy feeling every time his character Raoul Silva is shown.

Bardem’s acting, particularly around the time of his character’s first appearance, is world-class.

Ben Whishaw does a fine job as the new Q (though we miss John Cleese and, of course, Desmond Llewelyn).

Credit Sam Mendes with a deft portrayal of the battle between old ways and new.

New is exemplified by the new Q: cyber-reliance.

Old is exemplified by the crusty James Bond: HUMINT.

This film almost telegraphs the Zeitgeist which would spawn Edward Snowden as global hero, but it casts such genius (>145 IQ) as the enemy in Bardem’s character.

[As a side note, I should like to add that Snowden’s story would have to be most ingenious cover ever if found to be inauthentic. Such iron-clad credibility no doubt came at a steep price for the NSA (see PRISM). Though farfetched, one never knows to what lengths the Western national security state will go next to try and salvage its tenuous hold on global hegemony. All things considered, his defection to the public side (in the interest of the general public) seems to be authentic and highly admirable.]

Skyfall becomes less successful when Bardem has Hannibal Lecter lighting cast upon him during the glass-cage treatment later in this film. This is an unimaginative bit of filmmaking beneath the level of director Mendes.

As trivial as it may seem, Mendes later redeems himself with a simple shot of approaching figures reflected in the chrome of a side-view mirror. It doesn’t hurt that the mirror in question is attached to an Aston Martin DB5.

Overall, the successes of this film should rightly be attributed to Sam Mendes. That said, this is not a masterpiece. It is a very good, yet flawed, film.

Here’s hoping Mendes knocks it out of the park with Spectre. Cheerio!

-PD

8 Comments

paulydeathwish

cinema dossier

Tag Archives: Bond

The Spy Who Dumped Me [2018)

National Treasure [2004)

Skyfall [2012)