Designated Survivor

Designated Survivor, is one of those shows that makes you slap your hand squarely on your forehead when you hear the premise and wonder why has it never been made into a film or television series before.

On every occasion of the State of the Union speech at the Capitol Building in Washington DC, one member of the then President's cabinet is placed in a secure undisclosed location in case the very worst scenario takes place and all of the remainder of the cabinet are killed.  This individual would then be sworn in and become the new Commander-in-Chief of the United States of America.

In the pilot episode, this worst case scenario takes place as the Capitol Building is blown up by a devestating explosion in an attack far worse than 9/11.  Our protagonist is Tom Kirkman, and is portrayed by Kiefer Sutherland; Kirkman is the Secretary of Housing and Development who on the morning on the speech was about to take an Ambassador role in Canada after being removed from the cabinet.  Kirkman's plans have now changed forever.

After being sworn in swiftly we cut to Kirkman throwing up in a marble bathroom in the White House as the size of the task before him dawns on him. This is the most human part of the pilot which is very by-the-numbers; it states that he is well over his head, he never wanted to be the President, his son is a rebel and the military want him out before he has even begun.

Yet Kirkman knows what is required of him whilst his Chief of Staff Aaron (Adan Canto) tries to input his own ideology on the new man in charge, the same for the head of the military who wants him to command an attack on any Middle Eastern terrorist group so that America can have an enemy to face down.

Three episodes into watching the show on Netflix - which screens episodes weekly - the show is one of the better things I have seen on that service in recent months. It is a show fittingly of the time and portrays some of the best traits of America on to the screen; the ability to rise up from the ashes of a major disaster, the opportunism of individuals to make a difference and the pride of the nation circumvented through one role.  It also shows the worst; the class divide, the distrust of politicians and that glasses do not look good on TV.

Sutherland is a great piece of casting, taking the man who was Jack Bauer in 24 - the renegade who took over post 9/11 and would single handedly take on any terrorist with his bare hands, he was the best of America (brave and patriotic) and the worst of America (torture).  Here he gives Kirkman an air of nobility and decency reminiscent of President Bartlett from the West Wing and the current President Obama, but also a man who knows he is way in over his head but is capable of greater things if he has support.

Support comes from his wife Alex (Natasha McElhone), his speech writer Seth Wright (Kal Penn - sarky and honest) and his former assistant Emily (Italia Ricci) who is now a special adviser.

There are some beats that fall flat, the role of Special FBI Agent Hannah Wells (Maggie Q) is a little bit misguided, would an agent really be this selfish and even at work following the disappearance and death of a significant other.  At the moment Hannah's story is one of the threads that is not ringing true at the moment, but as she digs deeper into the explosion at the Capitol perhaps her role will grow and lead to interaction with the President.

One more thought on his name. Kirkman. Is he meant to be Kirk-man, like a nod to Captain Kirk of Star Trek, the head of the Enterprise with a rag tag of people who do not have much faith in him and yet he must show leadership when others are better qualified (Republican survivor Kimble/Spock) and win over support from naysayers (Aaron/Bones) and entrust those vital to the cogs of the machine (Seth/Emily; Scotty and Chekov)

The series is gripping without shouting out from the rooftops saying look at this, it has plot points that are sometimes telegraphed - yes the teenage son would leave his illegal drugs and roll of money in his sock drawer - but it always ends on a genuine surprise that you do not see coming. Can it sustain this over 22 episodes in a full season and seasons to come? This reviewer sure hopes so.

My Sports Personality of 2016

It is always difficult to make a case for the illustrious Sports Personality of the Year or SPOTY as it is now reduced to a hashtag in this day and age. It is even harder to nominate or make the case for someone during an Olympic year when the shortlist of 10 nominees is harder and harder to sustain.

The problem with it being only 10 nominations, they probably should extend it to a full dozen in this special year of British sporting achievement, is that the 10 nominations will be strictly limited to Olympian medallists and them alone.

While I am all for the rightful adulation of our British sportspeople, considering that 20 years ago we returned from an Olympic Games with only two rowers worthy of first class seats on the flight back. Now we have a flight full of first class seats it still remains the regular people sitting at the top table. This year you are guaranteed to see nominations for Andy Murray, Mo Farah, Bradley Wiggins and the double Tour de France winner Chris Froome, who also got a bronze medal in the Individual Mens Time Trial.

My hope is that the nominees will draw up a shortlist and the fact that we did so well in minority sports will help the exposure for those same sports. Yet you add to those first four people the names Laura Trott (two Olympic Golds this year, four in total) and her fiancee, Jason Kenny (three Gold medals, making it six in total). That makes 6 people already.

Add double Olympic Gymnastic gold medallist Max Whitlock and Britain's first swimming Olympic Gold medallist Adam Peaty and you now have 8.  So based on the BBC criteria of 10 on the shortlist that leaves just two space. Luckily it has been a bad year for football with England doing so poorly in the European championships although the unlikely tale of Leicester City may generate a nomination for Jamie Vardy, yet when was the last footballer to genuinely have a personality?

Lewis Hamilton could garner a nomination if he retains his Formula 1 crown, although his poor media relations and childish behaviour in press conferences may put a dent in that.

Perhaps a nomination to cover the successful British sports teams, Kate Richardson-Walsh was captain of the Women's Hockey Team who won Gold on a Friday night and had the nation rapt with attention, it would be a nice nomination to commemorate her service to the sport also. Joe Root has again been England's best cricketer in all three formats of the game. A nomination for the England rugby union team perhaps in the form of Maro Itoje who was dominant throughout the Six Nations and the triumphant tour of Australia.

All valid claims I am sure you will agree and yet my nomination goes towards someone whose early calendar success was a surprise, as pleasant a surprise as Leicester City; who kept on climbing her rankings ladder with a drive and ambition rarely seen in her sport by British people and whilst she did not perform well in the Olympic games nevertheless she has maintained her form all year and is now ranked in the Top 10 of the world.  An achievement unheard of certainly for nearly 30 years in the world of British tennis.

My nomination goes to Johanna Konta, a young woman who plays with a determination and belief in her ability that stemmed from her unlikely run to the semi-finals of the Australian Open in January.  A succession of five victories that started with her defeating Venus Williams in straight sets and ultimately succumbed to the eventual winner and now World No.1 Angelique Kerber.  This success maintained and despite poor showings at the Grand Slams at Roland Garros and Wimbledon by her now high standards, she returned again and won her first WTA title at Stanford beating Venus Williams on her home turf at the end of July.  

This led to her fourth round exit at Flushing Meadows, which again was a second week exit. Gone are the days now when British players apart from Andy Murray, turn up and leave a Grand Slam within 48 hours. Konta has eyes on making the end of season Tour Finals in Singapore, she did herself a massive favour by reaching the final of the China Open last weekend losing to Agnieszkwa Radwanska in the final. Konta sits in the 8th and final position to reach the payday week another good week in Hong Kong will do her a great help again.

It is her ambition to keep improving, her desire to be a good role model to younger players and the achievement of getting as far as she does despite her limitations as a smaller frame in comparison to the taller bigger players on tour such as the Williams' sisters, Kerber, Kvitova and Radwanska. These players may be stronger, but the heart Konta has shown to come this far whilst keeping her private life out of the papers and doing it always with a smile on her face speaks volumes.

The award is Sports Personality of 2016, voters should remember that 2016 is not restricted to a two week festival in Rio.  It happens all year and all year Johanna Konta has played at a level beyond our expectation of her, for that she should be rightly lauded and acclaimed.

Amanda Knox

Following on from the unparalleled success of Making A Murderer, Netflix return with another true crime documentary this time focusing on a highly publicised case instead of a stranger than fiction case as Steven Avery's was.

In November 2007, Amanda Knox a 20 year old American student from the University of Washington was doing a year of study and work in Perugia, Italy. There she was sharing a room with young British introvert Meredith Kercher. On November 2nd, Kercher was brutally murdered by an unknown assailant.  Five days before, Knox had met Raffaele Sollectio at an opera and they started an intense love affair.  Being the room-mate, and being very different from the quieter Kercher; the Italian police force in haste mode with the eyes of the world watching needed to make a quick arrest. Therefore, Knox and Sollectio were arrested and ultimately jailed for the murder of Kercher.

However, the appeals court found that the DNA evidence given as fact in the trial was not sufficient and after review it was found that the presence of Kercher's DNA on the supposed knife that stabbed her was not collaborative with the belief that this knife killed her.  Errors from the police force and the mistakes forcing testimony from scared and innocent individuals, are themes were as an audience are used to following the goings on in Wisconsin.  Sometimes, if you say something enough times a lie becomes fact in the mind of the meek and weak.

The evidence given to us proves that Knox and Sollectio were innocent of the crime, the refusal to believe their collective alibi that they were together in Raffaele's apartment that night was detrimental to the integrity of the Italian Polizi.

You get a sense that the Perugian authorities were fascinated by the eyes of the world falling on their small city with a sex crime demanding action and results.  This need for results and creation of exposure is evoked by the presence of Nick Pisa, journalist of the Daily Mail at the time of the case.

Pisa (ironic he has an Italian name) was the right man in the right place to tell the story for his career, but the way Pisa describes how he went about fabricating and fluffing up the piece to make it more a tale of sordid depravity and sex scandal leaves as bad a taste in the mouth as you had when watching the Prosecutor in the case of Steven Avery. The constant use of words such as sex and the creation of 'Foxy Knoxy' is indicative of a journalistic profession now becoming as sordid as the stories they supposedly cover, with moral integrity jettisoned for the front page headline. The old adage is 'sex sells' and Pisa followed this motive to the nth degree reveals an ugly face of tabloid journalism.

Interestingly, the film by Rod Blackhurst and Brian McGinn start off the film making you think Knox was lucky to get away with it, she acts aloof in front of the camera and the establishing shots of her in her home cooking surrounding by her cats are shot like a thriller before becoming a mix of talking heads and archive footage a la Errol Morris's The Thin Blue Line.

They may well have had an intention to do something different to normal documentaries, and the poster of her eyes only refers to a line she says, 'You look in my eyes for guilt' but calls back to the films of Hitchcock and the girl in trouble who is more than she appears, but the truth is out and she was found innocent.

All in all, the documentary is restricted by the 90 minute running time when something closer to two hours would have been warranted for a case that gripped the world.

LFF 2016: Certain Women

In the last ten or so years of reviewing films and witnessing the beginning of genuine brilliant careers and attending film festivals around the country, you get to see films from all walks of life, that gestate somewhere and manifest into a whole project that appears in your home city. It is a privilege to witness them when they come to fruition.

And yet you sometimes search for the roses amongst the odour. You always miss the boat on certain auteurs or writer-directors who are swooned over by peers and critics of the current age, and yet you miss their coming out party. You try to second guess yourself and wonder maybe it is your point of view or background that is not doing justice to the film, and sometimes it just cannot be helped.

Certain Women, is that sort of film.  Kelly Reichardt, is rightly acclaimed as a light for female directors in the still male dominated world of popular cinema from her feminist western Meek's Cutoff to her fable Wendy and Lucy. Reichardt comes from a less heard voice of middle America, telling stories rarely seen and sometimes pushed to the boundaries of social documentary. 

Reichardt has also hit upon a budding relationship with Michelle Williams (Brokeback Mountain) as her muse of sorts. This film is based upon the short stories of Maile Meloy who herself is from Montana, where the film is set.

The palette of the film is stark and grey, the tone of the film is ponderous and plodding. From the start of the film with a long cargo, freight train coming from the east to the west - establishing the new settlers coming out west perhaps - the shot goes on for as long as the cast and early production members are listed. We then cut to a clandestine affair taking place between lawyer, Laura Wells (Laura Dern) and Ryan Lewis (James Le Gros). The set up looks clandestine due to the lack of discussion between the two and his abrupt departure.

We follow Laura as she deals with an injury lawsuit client Fuller (Jared Harris) who took an early pay-off and thus denied himself a big pay day in court. His own shortcomings come to a head when he takes a security guard hostage when seeking evidence of his being screwed by the system, this belief becomes fact when Laura recites to the illiterate Fuller her statement to the corporation she was meant to be fighting.

From his arrest, we cut to Gina Lewis (Williams) who is married to Ryan, the guy we saw having an affair earlier. Gina has aspirations of building a house with sandstone and attempts to take some from an elderly man who lives on his own, there is tension between Gina and Ryan which serves as reason
for his affair.

Then we cut to a horse handler, Jamie (Lily Gladstone) who on an evening drive goes into a night class where people are. There she meets the teacher Beth (Kristen Stewart) who gives the class as extra income despite the 8 hour round trip to Belfry from Livingstone.

Jamie seeks solace from her loneliness by listening to Beth's classes and their brief discussions in a diner before her long journey home.  Beth stops coming to the classes due to the arduous journeys prompting Jamie driving to Livingstone to see her one more time.

That is the synopsis as best I can describe, not a lot else happens throughout the film, with the ponderous framing and narrative taking shape as I describe it.  There is not a lot of incident and a lot of plot points are not resolved or concluded; Gina does not learn about Ryan's affair, Laura is forgiven by Fuller for her shortcomings and the film ends with Jamie back in the stables with her horses.

To be cruel you could call this film boring, having seen versions of slow cinema, it felt stale that with a cast of this much talent there was not a lot asked of them in terms of character development.  However, the film is an attempt to comment on the alienation and loneliness felt by people in the less populated states of America, where you work to live and live to work. Yet you hoped for more of an emotional impact, however, this perhaps Reichardt's modus operandi, she wants you to see how other people live in poverty.

The role of farm hand Jamie, is beautifully played by Lily Gladstone who does the most with what she is given, gaining the most emotional resonance when she departs Beth and Livingstone, welling up as she drives away from what she felt was a genuine connection with somebody else.

It is those sort of connections that were lacking throughout the film that was reaching for contemplation but left this reviewer frustrated.  Overall a shame as it does not do justice to the beautiful landscape photography captured by Christopher Blauvelt (The Bling Ring).

Certain Women will be released in the USA by IFC Films on October 14th.

Thoughts On...Requiem for a Dream

Continuing my trend on being way ahead on the cultural sphere, I am reviewing a film I have never seen before. It is always good to catch up on films that captured a moment in their cultural zeitgeist and were popular at that moment in time; and to see if it maintains and has withstood.

Having come across Trainspotting on the occasion of its 20th anniversary it is interesting to encounter Requiem for a Dream, the acclaimed Darren Aronofsky film of 2000 that garnered much critical attention and Oscar buzz.

The reason the film got so much attention was that it has that independent feel that was paramount at that moment led by the Weinsteins bankrolling Steven Soderbergh and the like. Aronofsky fitted into this with his debut feature Pi, an off the wall, black and white film that wore its intelligence proudly.

In Requiem though he takes an adaptation of a Hubert Selby Jr novel and makes a hellish journey of drug addict's total dependency on drugs, how it changes people, how they become different and how those drugs become the only important thing in life - more than love, family and personal health.

Sara Goldfrab (Ellen Burstyn) is a lonely widow who is somewhat estranged from her only son Harry (Jared Leto), a drug addict along with his girlfriend Marion (Jennifer Connolly) and best friend Tyrone (Marlon Wayans).

Aronofsky's style in this film is to film extreme close-ups of his cast experiencing the highs of the drugs being taken, it requires the actors to be shot with bags under their eyes and not look glamorous.  Burstyn deserves special credit (she lost to Julia Roberts for Best Actress at Oscars for Erin Brockovich) for simply deteoriating on screen - her character is the most intriguing as Sara makes you wonder, did she fake that phone call and send herself that application form because of her loneliness and the need to belong with the other women in her apartment building.

As the film proceeds and builds up to the finale where nobody gets what they wants and everyone loses out, the director cranks up the editing and the soundtrack creating a visual language where not a lot is said but everything shown speaks volumes to us.  The editing is cut of more drug sachets being opened, cut, snorted as characters wince, scream and shout.

The film is a cruel and hard watch by the end and yet its the sort of film that all children aged 15-18 should watch as an educational tool to combat drug use; the message is loud and clear. You end up down and out, injured, mad and ultimately alone.

The acting is superb (bar Leto's awful accent) and the music by Clint Mansell is iconic to the point of being the most memorable facet of the film.

Required viewing but not necessarily essential.