ARE YOU READY TO BECOME SOMETHING NEW... "THE LOBSTER"

I saw the trailer for The Lobster some time ago. I thought it was categorically the funniest thing I have seen in years. I then, like a muppet, missed in the cinema. I was overjoyed when it came out in VOD and I actually watched it absolutely ages ago, practically on the day it came out. Its director Yorgos Lanthimos is not a household name yet – but he is getting there. And those who HAVE heard of him tend to give a knee jerk YES! Or NO! response. If you haven’t tried him out yet, you really should give his work a whirl – see which camp you end up in!

The Lobster takes place in a dystopian near future. There (as in quite a few places here, as a matter of fact), being a couple is categorically the most important thing you have to achieve in your life. However fewer invitations to dinners and awkward conversations are the least the singletons of this universe have to worry about. If you find you are single, you have 45 days to find a partner. If you fail, you are transformed into an animal of your choice and released into the wild. Now, of course the process in monitored, the moment you report you have become single to the authorities you are transported to a special facility with other singletons where you have to endeavour to find a partner. Our tale follows David (Colin Farrel) who is recently divorced. He has just started his stay in the facility and has a whole world of new characters to meet, make friends with and hopefully date. Oh the whole place looks like a slightly eccentric holiday village, but David is under no illusions. The real question is whether he will survive – and if he does, in what form…

Yorgos Lanthimos is one of those –black and white – kind of directors. You either adore him and, like me, think he is the best thing since moving images on a screen, or think he is crass, extreme and all together hard to watch. His films are definitely not for the faint of heart. In my particular case I found watching Dogtooth (the first film I ever watched by Lanthimos) a weirdly sado-masochistic experience. Yes, definitely hard to watch. Harder than a lot of things I have ever seen in fact. But also weirdly pleasurable… And why? I guess because he has the rather dubious talent of being able to give you the kind of shock the goriest slashers do, only without the gore and blood and in a very innocuous looking setting. And let’s be honest here – it is rare to find the kind of film that gets that kind of visceral response out of you in the day to day cinematic market. I don’t necessarily think it’s a matter of shocking to get publicity and bums on seats. It actually is the job of all art to make you feel things. To make you react. To make you think. There is a little too much playing it safe, a little too much staying within your comfort zone when it comes to films these days I feel. That is sort of why Hollywood films are less of my day to day consumption and more of an occasional treat. I need the films that I watch actually do something to me – and if you are of the same tribe as me I can promise you that The Lobster will smack you around the head  several times and leave you spinning like a top…

Like all of his other films, this universe of Yorgos Lanthimos is unforgiving. The rules are as harsh as they are eccentric and disobedience is really not an option. Well. I say that, but in this universe – as in, I strongly suspect, most others – as long as you give the illusion of going by the rules, you can get away with, well, a certain amount… This, in the film has hilarious results that I will not be discussing here today as a lot of the film counts on the element of surprise to make it work. The film does, however, become a Kafaesque dance where our characters have to apply an endless set of rules to the most intimate areas of their lives. And what makes the film even funnier is the fact that most of us – without being aware of it – do this anyway. You know those little things called social norms we are all so attached to. Yeah… I am willing to bet you any money that you will be giving them a hefty amount of thought after you have watched this little number.

Of course the brilliance of the actors only adds to the success of the dance – Colin Farrel is the perfect slightly bumbling everyman helping us understand this universe as we try to figure it out ourselves. Ably assisted by the likes of John C. Reily, Ben Whishaw and Rachel Weisz who all participate in this straight faced – in fact deadly serious – dance with conviction and gusto that will have you cringing and crying out for them as the story takes its twists and turns…

In short, the first thing Lanthimos does when he takes you into a universe is tear up the rule book, the second is to throw you into the ring at a no-holds-barred cage fight. It is something you definitely need to decide on for yourself – but if you survive the fight, well, the benefits are absolutely glorious…

BECAUSE YOU CAN'T REALLY STOP REVISITING THE PAST... "BRIDESHEAD REVISITED"

" If you asked me now who I am, the only answer I could give with any certainty would be my name: Charles Ryder. For the rest: my loves, my hates, down even to my deepest desires, I can no longer say whether these emotions are my own, or stolen from those I once so desperately wished to be." Put your hand on your heart and tell me that is not one of the hardest hitting opening lines you have ever heard in your life. I expected this film to be good. I also expected it to be a typical “Merchant Ivory” type period piece. You know, good quality stuff you can depend on and guess the outcome of. Well the outcome in this case is pretty clear as the story is told in flashback, but you pretty much bank on being able to guess how you got there. I was wrong. Oh God I was so wrong…

The above-mentioned Charles Ryder is an aspiring artist. When he utters these words he is approaching middle age, the country is in the throes of the Second World War and much of what Charles Ryder had before, in the way of prestige and happiness, he has lost. He is embittered and hardened now and this is the story of how it came about. Ever since his first year at Oxford, leaving a rather sad home where his widowed and disillusioned father makes not the slightest effort to make him feel wanted or loved, Charles’ fate is inexorably tied up with the aristocratic Flyte family. A chance (very chance) meeting with Sebastian Flyte, the youngest son of the family leads to a friendship Ryder is not likely to forget for the rest of his life. Now, as we all know, families are complicated things. When they work, they work very well, but if not, it can be hell on earth. And the odd thing is, society is such a thing that, the deepest, darkest holes can remain perfectly masked by social conventions, especially if you’re as high up the social ladder as the Flytes. Charles may dream of being like them, but really he has absolutely no idea what he is getting himself into…

This film taught me without a shadow of a doubt what the fuss is about love triangles. No, it is not the love triangle you think. It is a LOT more complicated than that. In fact, the last sentence pretty much sums up the entire film. I love this film because it does not offer any simplistic solutions. Nor does it offer up simplistic problems, as is typical with tragedies and dramas generally. If the film is over two hours long, it’s because, much like life, the problems the family has are so complex. And, even though the film is set mainly in the 1920’s, at the end of the day, they are so similar to the problems we have today. But that is the mark of a brilliant story is it not? Universal themes in local setting as it were. The Flytes may be aristocracy but they battle with matters like family rifts, upbringing, the concept of duty and the dark, dark fingers of the past reaching out to grip the three Flyte children, never giving them a hope to breathe freely. Religion comes into it, as does sexuality. So does social background. And the result? Not a grand tragedy, as a lot of mainstream films would have it, but a quiet pathos as the pain and darkness are, for another generation, safely tucked away behind social convention. And again, much like real life, the real pain comes from the fact that in the end, try as one might, there is very little one can do, if anything at all. Charles Ryder is about to come face to face with the true face of Brideshead, the home of the Flytes. And sometimes, all the love in the world cannot help a person break free from their past…

Apart from the realistic tragedy Brideshed revisited superbly portrays, a word simply must be said for the acting. Emma Thompson stars as one of the most memorably horrible characters I have seen. And yet, as tempted as one is to passionately hate Lady Marchmain, Thompson gets her just right, so we can’t fail to understand her either – even though we don’t really want to… And then there is Matthew Goode – Charles Ryder – who I had a niggling feeling I had seen before. I had. In A Single Man (as Jim, the partner who dies), along with Match Point and Watchmen among other things. Oh and then there is Ben Winshaw who plays Sebastian. I can confirm, yes that IS the guy who plays the new Q in Skyfall. Do your really need any more convincing folks? Just go watch the film already. This one is in my top 10 any day of the week.