Out on 25 January and 1 February
Tom Hardy co-stars with Tom Hardy. Cotillard and Fassbender do Shakespeare. Yes, heres the new DVD and Blu-Ray releases coming out in the next two weeks. Click on for our reviews of Legend, Bad Boys, Bad Boys II, Godard: The Essential Collection, Sicario, Macbeth, Kiss Of The Spider Woman, The Friends Of Eddie Coyle, Irrational Man, Maze Runner: The Scorch Trials, Infinitely Polar Bear, A Touch Of Zen, Five Dolls For An August Moon and The Walk. For the best movie reviews, subscribe to Total Film.
LEGEND
From Bronson to Bane, from Warriors Tommy Conlan to Max Rockatansky, Tom Hardy has been such a protean force of nature in recent years that the notion of casting him as both of the Kray twins seems not so much an audacious flourish as an appropriate deployment of thespian resources. Why shouldnt Britains leading cinematic chameleon play the criminal siblings who lorded over Londons swinging 60s underworld with a lethal combination of thuggish brutality and seductive showbiz glamour? The movies have clearly mastered the technical demands of allowing one actor to give multiple performances in the same frame, a sleight of hand now so familiar its been seen in everything from The Social Network to Harry Potter. Doubling (or tripling) up is now essentially a straightforward acting challenge: one Hardy rises to so speedily and (apparently) effortlessly you can literally count the seconds it takes you to stop noticing. The real question, then, is not why one (supremely gifted) actor should be tasked to play both halves of this deadly duo, but whether Hoxtons least welcome contribution to British society merit being depicted on screen at all. Ronald and Reginald liked nothing better than welcoming celebrities, sports figures and unwary politicians to their various clubs and drinking establishments, cannily aware their guests reflected glory helped deflect attention from their less palatable activities. Doesnt making films about their exploits even ones as ropey as this years no-budget The Rise Of The Krays and The Fall Of The Krays bestow upon the long- deceased double act precisely the kind of prestige and pre-eminence they so keenly courted in life? It is a dilemma Brian Helgelands biopic tacitly addresses with its title, one that immediately alerts us to the stylised, quasi-mythical prism through which the LA Confidential writer has chosen to view his subjects. Although ostensibly based on John Pearsons seminal biography The Profession Of Violence a book, incidentally, that is scathingly critical of pretty boys Gary and martin Kemp and their 1990 effort The Krays Legend largely opts to shun the niceties of recorded fact, opting instead to elevate the brothers to the status of latter-day folk heroes. Witness the opening narration by Reggies luckless wife Frances (Emily Browning) a woman, were told, who is not careless with the truth that unironically proclaims them to be gangster princes of the city they meant to conquer over a lingering shot of their black limousine gliding through Sohos nocturnal neon. Is this really London in the 1960s? Or is Helgeland slyly harking back to even older era that of the classic Warner Brothers gangster pictures of the 30s and 40s, with Hardy and Hardy filling in for Bogie, Cagney and Edward G. Robinson? If so, hes chosen the right men. As Reggie, Hardy is the epitome of raffish, laid-back virility: a romantic soul whod much rather woo Brownings virginal Frances with kind words and lemon sherbets than police his manor with a knuckleduster-ed fist. Hes the good angel to Ronnies bad; Hardy transforms totally to present the older sibling as a monstrous, leery grotesque with a hair-trigger temper. The result is a uniquely combustible duo, not least in an ingeniously constructed scene where they knock 10 bells out of each other on the dance floor of their Esmeraldas Barn hotspot. It is clear that neither Kray is particularly burdened with a moral centre. Yet Legend has one anyway in the shape of Frances, a sacrificial lamb whose initial attraction to Reggie (and, to a lesser but not insignificant extent, Ronnie as well) is gradually replaced by a fear and loathing of everything they represent. Kate Hardie, you may recall, occupied a similar role in the 1990 film. Brownings narration, though, serves to empower this unfortunate bit-player in the Kray family soap opera, even if it does require Helgeland to extend her involvement in the story far beyond that that Frances herself endured during her tragically truncated existence. Legend benefits additionally from lively supporting turns from David Thewlis, Paul Bettany and Paul Anderson (an actor who can currently be seen alongside Hardy in Oscar hopeful The Revenant), while Christopher Ecclestons performance as dogged copper nipper read inadvertently recalls Let Him Have It, another period story involving crime and punishment that The Krays Peter Medak directed. But ultimately this is Hardys film, serving both as a thunderous display of his stellar power and a triumphant vindication of his insistence that he play both brothers. Sure, his job was made easier by Helgeland finding a ghoulish strain of gallows humour in Ronnies psychosis, a quality as redeeming and, yes, as fanciful as Regs mushy streak of emotionalism. It would hardly be the Krays, though, if they didnt have some unfair weaponry (claw hammer, anyone?) hidden up their sleeves. Sadly, theres not a single Hardy to be heard on the audio commentary, a solo effort by Helgeland thats backed by interviews and, on Blu-ray, featurettes and an interactive map of the Krays East End stomping ground. Also: pre-order Blu and get a now you see Ronnie/now you see Reggie lenticular sleeve. EXTRAS: Commentary > Interviews > Interactive map (BD) > Featurettes (BD) Director: Brian Helgeland Starring: Tom Hardy, Emily Browning, David Thewlis Digital HD release: 18 January 2016 DVD, BD, Steelbook, VOD release: 25 January 2016 Neil Smith
BAD BOYS 1 & 2 20TH ANNIVERSARY COLLECTION
The eight years between the first Bad Boys and the second were important ones for its stars and director. Will Smith followed his ice-cool turn as gun-toting Miami copper Mike Lowrey with Independence Day, two Men In Blacks and an Oscar nod for Ali, while Michael Bay cemented his status as Hollywoods new action supremo with The Rock and Armageddon. Sure, both suffered flops in the interim: Wild Wild West in Smiths case, Pearl Harbor in Bays. Neither, however, were so crushing for BB II to serve in any way as a life raft. For Martin Lawrence, though, that is precisely what it was after an eight-year wilderness full of flops (Black Knight, National Security), numerous legal and health-related troubles and just one bona fide hit (Big Mommas House). Inevitably, then, this 20th anniversary reissue has a larger resonance than just a hedonistic celebration of Will power and Bayhem. it is also a cautionary tale on the fickle nature of an industry that can cast out as quickly as it embraces a lesson both Smith and Bay have had reason to reflect on in the dozen years since the Bad Boys sequel detonated in cinemas. Its true, too, that putting the Boys back to back presents a handy object lesson in the perils of blockbuster franchise-forming. The 95 original, for all its flaws, at least had freshness on its side, the then-novelty of watching two relatively unknown black stars headlining a movie being matched by the visceral thrill of a kinetic directing style that gave both John Woo and Tony Scott a run for their money. Its also very funny, thanks to a switcheroo plot device that requires smith to ape Lawrences homebody tetchiness and Martins Marcus to approximate Lowreys lady-killing prowess. In Ta Leoni, meanwhile, Bad Boys has a female lead who could not only go toe to toe with her male counterparts but also jaw to jaw this being a rare actioner whose explosions risked being drowned out by its rat-a-tat gabbing. But fast forward to 2003s Bad Boys II and the recipe has lost some of its flavour. An ugly homophobic tone has crept into Smith and Lawrences bad-boyish banter, while the film itself keeps making a point of their ethnicity not least by having them gatecrash a KKK meeting in the opening few minutes. You cant fault the spectacle, typified by one high-speed highway chase in which Mike and Marcus have to dodge cars ejected from a hijacked loader. The fact, though, that its shooting required the extensive closure of a vital Miami thoroughfare makes it not so much a crowd-pleasing set-piece as a directorial ego trip one symptomatic of a double bill whose successes and excesses go together like bullets and bloodshed. EXTRAS: Featurettes > Music videos > Deleted scene > Production diaries > Commentary (BB) Director: Michael Bay Starring: Martin Lawrence, Will Smith BD release: 25 January 2016 Neil Smith
GODARD: THE ESSENTIAL COLLECTION
Its hard to fully grasp the impact of the French New Wave now that most of the techniques it pioneered go unnoticed everywhere from reality TV shows to Marks & Spencer adverts. But when Jean-Luc Godard started running his camera through the streets of Paris on a wheelchair, improvising tracking shots in Bout De Souffle AKA Breathless (1960), he really was rewriting the language of cinema. Still directing at the age of 85, Godard now has more than 100 credits to his name. This Blu-ray boxset contains only five but theyre a handful of the enfant terribles most iconic and influential early masterpieces. We kick off with seminal New Wave text Breathless: a heady collision of life, death, love, art, sex, philosophy, chain-smoking and boundless cinematic reinvention. Nearly six decades on, its still intoxicating stuff and still effortlessly, impossibly cool. From there, we see his camera fall in love first with then-wife Anna Karina in the subversive anti-musical Une Femme Est Une Femme (1961) and then with Brigitte Bardots bum in the sprawling meta-cinema of Le Mepris (1963). The Orwellian surfaces of Alphaville (1964) offer the biggest intellectual chill of the set. But the surprise standout is Godards glorious perversion of his famous gun and a girl maxim the Bonnie And Clyde-esque Pierrot Le Fou (1965). Perfectly restored on Blu cleaned up but not over-polished and bristling with feature length docs, interviews and retrospectives, its a monumental collection. The sort that should come with a warning: other films may seem very dull after viewing EXTRAS: Intros > Documentaries > Featurettes > Interviews Director: Jean-Luc Godard BD release: 1 February 2016 Paul Bradshaw
SICARIO
The idea of crossing the line dominates Denis Villeneuves taut, pounding war-on-drugs thriller, in the way that the desert-snaking US-Mexico border fence looms in its stunning aerial landscapes. Showing off his Prisoners-honed gift for tense set-pieces, Villeneuve even stages his sweatiest shoot-out sequence in a Bridge Of The Americas border traffic jam (theres a crafty mock-up explanation in the extras). In this access-all-areas package, he and screenwriter Taylor Sheridan show their painstaking construction of the white-knuckle ride from legit to lawless taken by Emily Blunts upstanding FBI agent Kate Macer when a black ops government task force enlists her. From the grabby Arizona house-of-body-horrors raid that blows the story open, Sheridans take-no-prisoners script uses Kates idealism and Blunts raw-edged nervy POV to make us gawp at the horrors (and sheer scale) of the US war on drug trafficking. Granted, the film goes long and strong on the shock tactics of Josh Brolins Delta Force crew and Benicio Del Toros mysterious enforcer Alejandro (not least a tyre-squealing Mexican prison grab). Unlike Soderberghs 360-degree take on the drugs trade in Traffic, its uninterested in whether an ends-justifies-the-means militarised war on trafficking is right or wrong. Instead theres a Zero Dark Thirty-ish concentration on the immoral tactics (kidnap, torture, dangerous coalitions) that law enforcement ends up resorting to in terrifyingly rule-free zones. Ballsy, gun-and-run filmmaking predominates, even when the story swerves unnervingly off-piste late on. But Del Toros understated, dead-soul performance (cinematographer Roger Deakins detects the mournful strength of Robert Mitchum in him) carries it off. But the real star is found in Deakins extraordinary visual artistry. His melding of light and dark brutally bright Mexico streets, an ingenious infra-red night tunnel raid give the borderlands crackling atmosphere. Paired with Jhann Jhannssons ominous, pulsing score, it makes the landscape the cruellest character on screen. EXTRAS: Featurettes (BD) Director: Denis Villeneuve Starring: Emily Blunt, Benicio del Toro, Josh Brolin DVD, BD, Digital HD release: 1 February 2016 Kate Stables
MACBETH
With its brutally focused narrative punctuated by visceral warfare and eerie fantasy, its no surprise that so much of cinemas A-list Welles, Kurosawa, Polanski has tackled Shakespeares fabled Scottish play. Justin Kurzel (Snowtown) has big boots to fill in only his second feature, but delivers an astutely judged and exquisitely moody addition to an already impressive canon. Kurzel offers a curious blend of the mythic and the muddy, trying to print the legend and the reality. Tackling Macbeth with bloody aplomb, he achieves a tremendous balance between sensory experience and a pessimistic anti-hero portrait. The trick with filming Shakespeare is to translate the bards remarkable language into sights and sounds. Kurzel houses Macbeth in a memorably bleak, rainswept campsite and surrounds him with ochre skies that feel as if his bloody ambition has infected the landscape. Allied to the dirge of his brother Jeds score, Kurzels sound and fury signify plenty enhanced by an intelligent adaptation that uses voiceover to condense the plays length and adds fresh touches (a fourth witch; a tragic backstory) to draw out subtexts of grief and despair. Michael Fassbender excels as a man being beaten by his demons, whispering soliloquies with palpable self-loathing, and is well matched by Marion Cotillard, whose alert eyes register Lady Macbeths trajectory from scheming kingmaker to aghast monster-maker. Kurzels penchant for gnarly faces also brings us plausible career soldiers in Paddy Considine (as Banquo) and Sean Harris (as Macduff). Extras comprise four featurettes and an interview with Kurzel heres hoping his Assassins Creed reunion with Fassbender/Cotillard is every bit as bold. EXTRAS: Interview > Featurettes Director: Justin Kurzel Starring: Michael Fassbender, Marion Cotillard, Paddy Considine Digital HD release: 25 January 2016 DVD, BD, Steelbook release: 1 February 2016 Simon Kinnear
KISS OF THE SPIDERWOMAN
Two chalk-and-cheese cellmates in a squalid South American prison find friendship and respect in this touching drama. William Hurt plays the transgender Luis, imprisoned for corrupting a minor; sharing his space is Raul Julias political prisoner Valentin. The only respite from their ordeal? Luis elaborate re-telling of an old Nazi spy movie. While it was Hurt who bagged an Oscar for his troubles, Julia is just as moving as a man clinging to his beliefs as the fascist stooges manipulate, torture and even poison him. Powerful, provocative and groundbreaking. Extras include a featurette on source novelist Manuel Puig and a whopping photo gallery. EXTRAS: Making Of > Featurettes > Gallery Director: Hctor Babenco Starring: William Hurt, Ral Juli, Sonia Braga, Jos Lewgoy DVD, BD format release: 25 January 2016 James Mottram
THE FRIENDS OF EDDIE COYLE
Americas mean streets have rarely looked as frugal as in Peter Yates downbeat adaptation of George V. Higgins classic crime novel about the luckless Eddie (Robert Mitchum), so desperate to avert an imminent prison sentence hell turn informant. While the set-pieces share a brisk efficiency familiar from the directors earlier Bullitt, Yates strips this world of glamour. Instead, the emphasis is on Higgins wiry dialogue as a brilliant Mitchum finds tragedy in world-weariness, the dishevelled flipside to his famous screen villains. EXTRAS: Interviews > Booklet Director: Peter Yates Starring: Robert Mitchum, Peter Boyle, Richard Jordan | Dual format release: 25 January 2016 Simon Kinnear
IRRATIONAL MAN
Welcome back to Woody Allen world, in which no hot young woman can resist the brilliant mind of a paunchy older male. This time its Emma Stones Jill, a philosophy student besotted with her professor, Abe (Joaquin Phoenix), a depressed genius who decides that the only way out of his funk is to commit a transgressive act. Like Crimes And Misdemeanors, this explores the morality and minutiae of murder, but breaks no new ground. Indeed, with its student/teacher fantasy and constant clanging references (Kierkegaard, Kant) this feels more a Woody spoof than the real thing. Extras comprise red-carpet soundbites (sans Allen). EXTRAS: Featurette Director: Woody Allen Starring: Joaquin Phoenix, Emma Stone, Parker Posey DVD, Digital HD release: 1 February 2016 Stephen Kelly
MAZE RUNNER: THE SCORCH TRIALS
If The Maze Runner was a YA dystopia in the Hunger Games mould, then the challenge for this beyond-the-maze sequel is to make the outside world just as interesting. It succeeds, against the odds, by shifting from walled paranoia to a wasteland zombie thriller, with the same group of resourceful escapees now turning their athleticism, good looks and skepticism to wider questions about the state of the world. The series arcing storyline is the weak link here the 2017 trilogy-closer has its work cut out but this is a steady genre pic. Hefty extras flaunt the FX process EXTRAS: Commentary (BD) > Featurettes (BD) > FX breakdowns (BD) > Deleted scenes > Gag reel > Galleries Director: Wes Ball Starring: Dylan O'Brien, Kaya Scodelario, Thomas Brodie-Sangster, Giancarlo Esposito DVD, BD, Digital HD release: 1 February 2016 Nathan Ditum
INFINITELY POLAR BEAR
Executive-produced By J.J. Abrams and starring a Golden Globe-nominated Mark Ruffalo, this small-scale 70s-set dramedy is about as far removed from The Avengers as you can get (even if theres a little Hulk in Ruffalos manic-depressive character). He plays Cam Stuart, a bipolar sufferer struggling to raise his two daughters in the absence of wife Maggie (Zoe Saldana). From the moment we see him sitting cross-legged on the grass in his pants, Ruffalo is an engaging, unpredictable presence. But writer/director Maya Forbes lets the final act drift aimlessly, leading to a shoulder-shrugging, ho-hum finale. EXTRAS: Commentary > Deleted scenes > Q&A Director: Maya Forbes Starring: Mark Ruffalo, Zoe Saldana, Imogene Wolodarsky DVD release: 25 January 2016 James Mottram
A TOUCH OF ZEN
The grand-daddy of all wuxia movies and a potent influence on Star Wars, Kill Bill and The Matrix King Hus Ming dynasty-era epic slips fluently between genres, from comedy to romance to ghost story to political thriller to metaphysical fantasy. This is the complete three-hour original and superb it looks too in this restoration, with Hus poetic vision of misty Taiwanese landscapes given full value. As the bumbling hero Shi Jun gurns a bit too much, but Hsu Feng makes a fine heroine, stern and dauntless. Beefy extras include a Hu doc and critic David Cairns video essay. EXTRAS: Commentary > Documentary > Video essay > Booklet Director: King Hu Starring: Feng Hsu, Chun Shih, Ying Bai Dual format release: 25 January 2016 Philip Kemp
FIVE DOLLS FOR AN AUGUST MOON
More horny whodunnit than genuine giallo, Mario Bavas effort holds guilty pleasures for fans of Italian chintz. The setting: a sun-baked private island. The suspects: a group of scheming industrialists and their glamorous WAGS. The tone: Austin Powers meets Agatha Christie. The colours and camerawork entrance even when the melodramatics fail to, the film retains a time-capsule curiosity, and the scene where Edwige Fenech stripteases in a room full of bored-looking Euro cardigans to twanging jazz couldnt be more 70s if it went on strike in beige bell bottoms. EXTRAS: Commentary > Documentary > Isolated music/FX track > Booklet Director: Mario Bava Starring: William Berger, Ira von Frstenberg, Edwige Fenech Dual format release: 1 February 2016 Matt Glasby
THE WALK
Joseph Gordon-Levitt stars as Philippe Petit, the French street performer who made history when he wire-walked between the Twin Towers in 1974. If youve seen James Marshs Oscar-winning doc Man On Wire there wont be much new in Robert Zemeckis dramatisation, which is hampered by endless voiceover and whimsical to-camera asides. In cinemas IMAX especially it worked simply because of the breathtaking final third and the majesty of the stomach-flipping 3d. On the small screen, the effect is inevitably reduced, though Dariusz Wolskis ace cinematography still inspires awe. EXTRAS: Featurettes > Deleted scenes Director: Robert Zemeckis Starring: Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Charlotte Le Bon, Guillaume Baillargeon DVD, BD, 3D BD release: 1 February 2016 James Mottram
