The Idealist/Idealisten (2015) - Thrilling Cold War true story scandal served by Rosendahl and Co.

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The Danish and American flags melt together on this tension-establishing poster for Christina Rosendahl's The Idealist

A radio journalist in Eastern Jutland, Denmark in 1988 latches himself onto a story, which will henceforth define his career: The crash of a US B52 airplane carrying four thermonuclear bombs in Greenland back in 1968, - at a time in which the enormous Northern territory was supposed to be free of nuclear weapons, and the secret aftermath of the affair, in which a large groups of Danes cleaned up the mess and got seriously ill.

 

The Idealist is written by Lars Kristian Andersen (Flame & Citron/Flammen & Citronen (2008)), Simon Pasternak (Sex, Drugs & Taxation/Spies & Glistrup (2013)), Birgitte Stærmose (Camino (2023)) and great Danish filmmaker, co-writer/director Christina Rosendahl (Supervoksen (2006)). It is based on the actual Thule base scandal.

Rosendahl and Co. have weaved together a surprisingly good and very debate-opening Cold War film here, a journalistic drama with grand political and principal perspectives more so than a thriller perhaps, but it is terrifically thrilling nevertheless, especially for Danes and Greenlanders. But really the conflict here with a giant allied super power in a bind in relation to basically a lilliput nation has much wider relevance, and the lies and weapons race during the Cold War has frightening perspectives and consequences the world over.

Peter Plaugborg (Ditte & Louise (2015-16)) is excellent as Brink, the energetic, idealistic and naive journalist protagonist; and so is Søren Malling (The Promised Land/Bastarden (2023)) as the leader of the clean-up workers, who collaborates with him. Smaller parts are also handled with the foremost professionalism by both Danes and Americans. The story is very large, and it goes around the Greenlanders' position in the matter. In the same way, it remains unclear how Brink in the first case gets onto the scandalous story. The Idealist is still impressively made and exceedingly well edited.

 

Related posts:

 

Christina Rosendahl: 2020 in films - according to Film Excess

The Good Traitor/Vores Mand i Amerika (2020) - Tenderness and no-nonsense Danish and world history meet in great Rosendahl war drama 

 

 

Watch a trailer for the film here

 

Cost: 20.5 mil. DKK, approximately 2.88 mil. $

Box office: 372k $

= Box office disaster (returned 0.12 times its cost)

[The Idealist premiered 19 March (Nuuk, Greenland) and runs 114 minutes. The film disappointed at the Danish box office, selling only 39,661 tickets, coming to 372k $. The film was also released in Norway, Brazil and Argentina, likely with tiny results, as these are not reported at Box Office Mojo, where the Danish result figures. The film won 1/10 Robert award nominations, (Denmark's Oscar). Rosendahl returned with Vold i Kærlighedens Navn (2017, documentary) and theatrically with Vores Mand i Amerika (2020). Plaugborg and Malling both returned in The Shamer's Daughter/Skammerens Datter (2015). 1.6k+ IMDb users have given The Idealist a 6.9/10 average rating.]

What do you think of The Idealist?

Oppenheimer (2023) - Nolan treats aficionados of history, politics, science - and cinema

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Cillian Murphy as the titular haunted nuclear physicist before his horrific invention on this fiery poster for Christopher Nolan's Oppenheimer

 

J. Robert Oppenheimer studied nuclear physics in Europe before planting the new scientific discipline in America. With WWII underway and the nuclear race on to create the mightiest bomb the world had ever seen, the US government instructed him to invent and make them said weapon first.

 

Oppenheimer is written, co-produced and directed by English master filmmaker Christopher Nolan (Following (1998)), whose 12th feature it is. It is based on the real life Oppenheimer and the biography American Prometheus (2005) by Kai Bird (The Outlier (2021)) and Martin J. Sherwin (Gambling with Armageddon (2020)).

The film tells the awe-inspiring tale of the creation of the atomic bombs that ravaged Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945, effectively ending the last open tangent of the war, forcing the Japanese to surrender. It is focused on the scientific race, the many strong and opinionated minds involved; in the personal costs for Oppenheimer and his family for the 'greater cause', the mammoth undertaking and the haunting and world-changing result of all their efforts. A large portion of the film is also dedicated to understanding the detrimental aftermath of the invention and specifically the way in which the overwhelmingly leftist (Socialist and Communist) scientists became chains around Oppenheimer's feet in the following Cold War era.

Cillian Murphy (The Party (2017)) does a bang-up job as Oppenheimer, appearing emaciated and troubled, apparently lost in the role. Robert Downey Jr. (Wonder Boys (2000)) gives arguably the best performance of his career SPOILER as the chameleon-like admiral Lewis Strauss, a formidable portrayal of a paradoxical, vindictive man. The cast is a very long chain of notable talents, as most every actor in the world today dreams of working with Nolan. Especially worth highlighting are Benny Safdie (Good Time (2017)), Josh Hartnett (Inherit the Viper (2019)) and Tom Conti (StreetDance 2 (2012)) in the very small but pivotal role as Albert Einstein. Excellence is all around, and the film is also a thrilling work from a production standpoint, and the 70 mm IMAX color and B/W (the latter is a first) photography (by Hoyte Van Hoytema (Spectre (2015))) is uniquely cinematic. The film is gorgeous and piercing. 

The story is told in appropriate epic length with only appropriate flourishes, and the perspectives of the bomb in 1945 as well as today reverberate clearly for all who see Oppenheimer. It is a frightful (but great) historical and biographical film.  

 

Related posts:

Christopher Nolan: 2020 in films - according to Film Excess

Tenet (2020) - Nolan blows smoke up your ass 

Top 10: Best UK movies reviewed by Film Excess to date 

2017 in films - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I] 
2017 in films - according to Film Excess 
Dunkirk (2017) - Nolan champions cinema with masterful war movie  

Top 10: Best future-set movies
Interstellar (2014) - Nolan heads to space in opulent, exciting epic
2014 in films - according to Film Excess
The Dark Knight Rises (2012) or, Batman and the Storm, Darkness, Anarchy, Evil, Depression
2010 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED III]
2010 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED II]
2010 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I]
2010 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess  
Inception (2010) - Nolan's best is a grand piece of action sci-fi, perfectly awesome nonsense 

2008 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED II]  
2008 in films - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I]
2008 in films - according to Film Excess
The Dark Knight (2008) - Nolan's best Batman 

The Prestige (2006) - Nolan's overrated magician picture 
Batman Begins (2005) or, Modern, Dark, Smooth Batman 
Memento (2000) - Nolan's overrated amnesia mindfuck   
Following (1998) - Nolan's ineffectual debut

 

 

Watch a trailer for the film here

 

Cost: 100 mil. $

Box office: 400.3 mil. $ and counting

= Too early to say (but already a big hit)

[Oppenheimer premiered 11 July (Paris) and runs 180 minutes. Nolan shopped his Oppenheimer script around to the big Hollywood studios due to his split from Warner Bros. after his anger at their streaming strategy for films during the China Virus pandemic, hurting the release of his Tenet (2020). Universal Pictures gave him an extraordinary deal that he took: A 100 mil. $ budget, another 100 mil. $ for the marketing of the finished film, a 90-120 day exclusive theatrical release 'window', a three week space before and after the film with no films released from the company, and a 20 % first-dollar gross payment. The film's 3 biggest name stars Matt Damon (All the Pretty Horses (2000)), Downey Jr. and Emily Blunt (Jungle Cruise (2021)) all accepted 4 mil. $ salaries and undisclosed back-end percentage deals. Shooting took place from September 2022 - February 2023 in Zurich, Switzerland, New Mexico, California, including in Los Angeles, and in New Jersey. The film's release alongside new offering Barbie inspired a viral social media meme, 'Barbenheimer', which increased interest for both films: Oppenheimer opened #2, behind Barbie, to a 82.4 mil. $ first weekend in North America, where it still ranks #2 in its 2nd weekend and has grossed 174 mil. $ at time of publishing. The film has yet to open in 5 markets in August, including South Korea, Italy and China. IMDb's users have rated the film in at #28 on the site's Top 250 list, sitting between Life Is Beautiful (1997) and The Green Mile (1999). Nolan does not have his next film announced yet. Murphy returns in Small Things Like These. Oppenheimer is certified fresh at 94 % with a 8.60/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

 

What do you think of Oppenheimer? 

Hiroshima Mon Amour (1959) - Beauty and passion in the midst of devastation in Resnais' striking images

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A muscular man's back, a woman's red lips and a backdrop of stirring, passionate red indicates strong sexuality on this poster for Alain Resnais' Hiroshima Mon Amour

A beautiful French actress ventures into a heartfelt affair with a local man in Hiroshima, Japan, where she spends a short visit, and their relationship is reconnected later in the new city built up after the nuclear bomb.

 

Hiroshima Mon Amour is written by Marguerite Duras (Le Camion (1977)) and directed by Alain Resnais (Ouvert pour Cause d'Inventaire (1946)). The original French title translates to 'Hiroshima my love'.

A poetical narration and a visual side that packs several scenes that radiate clean beauty are linked to footage of the horrors of the nuclear bomb and its at times horrific consequences, - as life inevitably goes on, not undisturbed by these horrors, but nevertheless still, as here, in the guise of a beautiful, loving couple.

The plot side of the film becomes distant and unreal, but the strong camera work (by cinematographers Michio Takahashi (Itohan monogatari (1957)) and Sacha Vierny (Stavisky/Stavisky... (1974))) keeps one fixed on this remarkable, unique film.

 

 

Watch a 1-minute clip from the film here

 

Cost: Unknown

Box office: Unknown

= Uncertain but likely a big hit

[Hiroshima Mon Amour premiered 8 May (Cannes Film Festival) and runs 90 minutes. Resnais was reportedly commissioned to make a documentary on the nuclear bomb attacks in Japan in the vein of his Holocaust documentary Night and Fog (1956). Shooting took place from September - December 1958 in France and Japan. The film was kept out of the main competition in Cannes out of a fear that it would offend the Americans with its representations of the devastation caused by their nuclear attacks. The film's box office performance at the time is regrettably not reported online, but it was likely highly successful, not least due to its erotic allure. It has also been re-released numerous times. It was nominated for the Best Original Screenplay Oscar, lost to Billy Wilder and I.A.L. Diamond for The Weekend. It also won 1/3 BAFTA nominations and a National Board of Review award, among other honors.  Together with The 400 Blows (1959) and Breathless (1960), Hiroshima Mon Amour was among the most important films in the French New Wave. Resnais returned with Last Year at Marienbad (1961). Emmanuelle Riva (For Sasha/Pour Sasha (1991)) returned in Le huitième jour (1960); Eiji Okada (Lady Snowblood/Shurayukihime (1973)) in Subarashiki musumetachi (1959). Hiroshima Mon Amour is certified fresh at 98 % with an 8.80/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

 

What do you think of Hiroshima Mon Amour? 

Godzilla/ゴジラ (Gojira) (1954) - A Japanese king is born ...

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An original, text-heavy poster for Ishirô Honda's Godzilla

Two battleships mysteriously sink, and soon after the 'superstitious' are proven to be right: An ancient monster named Gojira has been reawoken to life by nuclear bombs after two million years of hibernation, and he is ready to trash Tokyo!

Godzilla is written by Takeo Murata (A Man in the Storm/Arashi no naka no otoko (1957)) and co-writer/director Ishirô Honda (Aoi shinju (1951)), with Shigeru Kayama (Half Human (1958)) contributing story elements.
The acting is sometimes overdone in a silent film kind of way, but it has charm just like the rest of the film. And because Godzilla comes out of the Japanese seas, where the Hiroshima and Nagasaki nuclear attacks wrought previously unimaginable death, destruction and havoc, which helped end WWII just under a decade prior the film's release, the film's coupling of the timely theme of weapons of mass destruction with the metaphoric title monster never rings false.
The effects are many and exciting, and the iconic theme by Akira Ifukube (Yôsô (1963)) is effective. Godzilla is a classic of profound meaning and a film that I can't wait to rediscover again some day.

Related posts:

Godzilla franchise:  Shin Godzilla/シン・ゴジラ (Shin Gojira) (2016) - A sensational Japanese comeback
Godzilla (2014) - The best US Godzilla

Watch a trailer for the 2014 re-release of the film here

Cost: 60 mil. ¥, approximately 165k $
Box office: In excess of 4.1 mil. $
= Mega-hit (returned at least 24.84 times its cost)
[Godzilla was released 3 November (Japan) and runs 96 minutes. About the monster Honda 
said that he "took the characteristics of an atomic bomb and applied them to Godzilla." The 
original Japanese name for the monster, Gojira, comes from welding together gorira [gorilla] 
and kujira [whale]. Honda asked 30 crew members prior to production to read the script and 
decide if they believed in it or not, as he only wanted to work with those with confidence in the
film. A stop motion approach as utilized in King Kong (1933) was scrapped in favor of 
suitmation, as the alternative would have been too time-consuming. The first version of the 
Godzilla suit weighed 100 kg (220 pounds). The main Godzilla actor Haruo Nakajima could 
spend only 3 minutes inside the suit before passing out, and he lost 20 pounds during filming. 
Still Nakajima went on to portray Godzilla and other monsters until his retirement in 1972. 
The monster's roar was created with instruments; a leather glove and a contrabass, altering 
the pitch and speed of the noise created. Principal photography took place in Japan, including
Tokyo, lasting 51 days. Honda would usually work shirtless in hard weather and suffered 
sunburns that left permanent scars on his back. Special effects photography took 71 days. 
The film  sold 9.6 mil. tickets in Japan, grossing 1.6 mil. $ there as the year's 8th highest-
grossing film in Japan. It sold 835k tickets in France in 1957,  probably in the same trimmed 
and cut Americanized version with US actor Raymond Burr, which was released in North 
America in 1957 as Godzilla, King of the Monsters!, and which grossed 2 mil. $ in North America. It 
has made another 562k $ in North America  in 2004 and 2014, as the original version was 
reportedly shown for the first time in the West. Roger Ebert gave the film just 1.5/4 stars, 
translating to three notches lower than this review. Godzilla started the longest-running 
franchise in movie history, spanning to date 36 movies, 32 of them from Japanese Toho and 
4 from Hollywood. Godzilla returned in Godzilla Raids Again/Gojira no gyakushū (1955).  
Honda returned with Koi-gesho (1955). Godzilla is certified fresh at 93 % with a 7.67/10 
critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of Godzilla?

Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb/Dr. Strangelove (1964) or, The Wrong Men, the Wrong Suits, the Wrong Invention

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The simultaneously humorous and anxiety-provoking poster for Stanley Kubrick's Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb

QUICK REVIEW:

A crazy US general sends the code to his country's eternally flying B52s to launch a nuclear attack against the USSR.SPOILER Bad communication, courtesy, stupidity and hostility figure prominently in the following, sudden finality of the human race.

Peter Sellers (The Pink Panther (1963)) is outstanding in three roles (!) as vice general, president and ex-Nazi doctor Merkwürdigliebe [Strangelove]. But Sterling Hayden's (The Asphalt Jungle (1950)) bodily fluid-obsessed general is just as absorbing.
The whole scenario is in terms of style and atmosphere realistic, so that the ramifications of the rapidly impending doom onscreen are utterly striking and provoke equally strong inclinations to laugh and cry at the depicted folly of man. Strangelove really confronts each of its audiences with the unpredictable, dangerous idiocy that might rest at the core of the person sitting next to you, and is brilliant at that.
Master New Yorker filmmaker Stanley Kubrick (The Shining (1980)) wrote the script with Terry Southern (Barbarella (1968)) and Peter George (Hong Kong Kill (1958)), loosely based on the latter's novel Red Alert (1958). It is a unique masterpiece that is also strange in the way that I personally feel I can't bear to watch it again for some reason, even though I greatly admire it.

Related posts:
Stanley Kubrick: A.I. Artificial Intelligence (2001) - A robot fairytale with both heart and mind (concept only)
Top 10: The best adaptations reviewed by Film Excess to date  The Shining (1980) - Kubrick's descent into madness is a timeless masterpiece
Barry Lyndon (1975) - Kubrick's elegant 19th century costume whopper 
A Clockwork Orange (1971) or, Outrage! The intellectual sci-fi-prison-crime-drama Shocker!
2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) or, Humanity and Space

Peter Sellers in Stanley Kubrick's Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb

Sterling Hayden in Stanley Kubrick's Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb

George C. Scott in Stanley Kubrick's Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb

In lieu of a trailer for the film, watch instead here one of the legendary war room scenes from it, prominently featuring George C. Scott and Sellers

Cost: 1.8 mil. $
Box office: 9.4 mil. $ (North America only)
= Uncertainty
[Sellers playing multiple roles was initially on insistence of studio Columbia Pictures, because they thought his playing a character with multiple identities had made Kubrick's last film, Lolita (1962) a hit. The titular character was mostly inspired by German rocket scientist Wernher von Braun, who was recruited by the US after World War II. The film was scheduled to be released on Nov. 22 1963, the day President Kennedy was assassinated. The release was therefore changed to January 1964, and a few minor things in the film were altered. The film was a hit, making 4.4 mil. $ in North America on its initial run, and garnered 4 Oscar-nominations: Best Picture, Director, Adapted Screenplay and Actor (Sellers). Strangelove has been re-issued at several different times in different countries since its release. Even without a world gross made public, we can certainly label it a huge hit. Kubrick wanted Terry Gilliam to direct a sequel to the film, scripted by Southern, in 1995, but the plans never materialized, and Gilliam only learned of it after Kubrick's (and Southern's) death. It is also on Roger Ebert's list of great films, and was voted the 5th best film ever by Sight & Sound's poll in 2002. Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb is #49 on IMDb's Top 250 and it is certified fresh at 99 % with a 9 critical average on Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb?
Are there any masterpieces that you admire but for some reason can't bear to watch again?

24 - season 2 (2002) - Jack Bauer's great first return

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+ Best Thriller of the Year

Jack and the major characters of 24's second season

24's second run deals with the peril that the show was obviously made for: Islamic terrorism. 18 months after the events in the first season, a nuclear bomb gone missing forces the now elected President Palmer home from a fishing holiday, and Jack out of his slacker lifestyle to reinstatement with the Counter Terrorist Unit.

The following plot account contains SPOILERS: 

CTU gets blown up, and chief Mason subsequently falls in the line of duty, - masterfully acted by Xander Berkeley (Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991)). Paul Schulze (Nurse Jackie (2009-15)) is then introduced as a new office superior, and it is very evident why the creators increased his part in the following season; a very well acted part again. Slightly cheesy romantic intrigues surface at the broken down office. A subplot about an upscale LA wedding with a possible alien terrorist involvement unfolds surprisingly. Sarah Wynther (Jerks (2000)) and Laura Harris (Final Safe (2011)) are good as the yin-yang Warner sisters in this plot strand.
The merciless bad-woman of season 1, Nina Meyers' re-unification with the CTU office is played up as of almost mythic importance. First lady Sherry Palmer again writhes behind her husband's back, and yet she remains a  joy to watch due to Penny Johnson Jerald's (Automatic (1995)) talent. The president is derailed by an internal cabinet coup-de-grace, and Jack actually dies, (for a short while), when things are at their worst.
The ultimate thugs of season 2, however, turn out to be Westerners: Great German actor Thomas Kretschmann (King Kong (2005)) and Saw-famed Tobin Bell (In the Line of Fire (1993)). They do well in the episodes leading up to the big, final struggle in the LA Coliseum.
The biggest issue for the show is, once again, the increasingly unlikely storyline of Jack's daughter, Kim Bauer (Elisha Cuthbert (My Sassy Girl (2008))). In season 2, she leads a bloody escape with a girl she babysits from the girl's violent father through LA, gets into a car accident, is chased by a puma, takes refuge with a hermit who locks her up in his scary safe-room; she escapes, but gets into a store hostage situation that turns extremely bloody again; but she gets out intact, and then has a final run-in with the mad father, whom she shoots. Her reactions to the conflicts around her are obviously supposed to be recognizably human, but are in fact totally incomprehensible. She is a ridiculous element and once again a faulty character that should have been written out of the series long ago.

But 24 is still a highly suspenseful series without equal, and the cliffhanger in the last episode creates chaos in a most thrilling way.

Best episode:

15 - written by Joel Surnow (The Equalizer (1985-86)), Robert Cochran (The Commish (1991-95)); directed by Ian Toynton (Bones (2007-15))
The bomb goes off

Related posts:

24 season 1 (2001) - TV action milestone

2002 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I] 
24 - season 3 (2003) - Viral suspense peak of great show

In lieu of a trailer for the season, no longer on Youtube, here is a part of Sean Callery's Emmy-winning score for the show to get you in the mood

Cost: Unknown
Box office: None - TV-series
= Unknown
[24 season was first shown 29 October 2002 - 20 May 2003 and spans 23 43-minute episodes, with the first episode 51 minutes long, totaling approximately 1,040 minutes. The season began the show's use of the Air Force One set initially created for Air Force One (1997). Lead Kiefer Sutherland (Taking Lives (2004)) was upgraded to producer as well for the season. The viewer ratings in North America were up more than 3 mil. from the first season to an excellent 11.73 mil. average for the season, which also received a rating of 83/100 on Metacritic, based on 23 reviews. The season was nominated for 9 Emmys, winning two, for Sean Callery's (Jessica Jones (2015), TV-series) score and one for singe-camera editing, and for 3 Golden Globes, which it didn't win any of. 143,625 IMDb-users have given 24 an average rating of 8.4/10.]

What series is TV's best replacement for 24 today?
What do you think of 24 season 2?