FIVE NIGHTS AT FREDDY’S (2023)

The union of puppetry and cinema, the former being one of the oldest visual artforms and the latter being one of the most sophisticated and glamorous, might seem like an awkward union, but the history of puppet trickery in motion pictures is surprisingly rich, stretching back to the days of Lotte Reiniger in Weimar Germany. Whilst many here in the UK got their first exposure to handcrafted puppetry through Gerry Anderson’s colourful Thunderbirds series for ITV, the realm of puppets on cinema has been dominated by Jim Henson. Whilst Mr. Henson and his troupe will forever be synonymous with the world-famous Muppets, which began life on television before jumping onto the silver screen in numerously elaborate and enjoyably madcap adventures, let us not forget Henson and company’s more idiosyncratic and macabre one-off efforts, whether it be the darkly enchanting The Dark Crystal (1982) or the grotesque and sepulchral creations seen in Dreamchild (1985) and The Witches (1990). Playing in cinemas now is a movie in which the malevolence of the Jim Henson effects company is on full display: Five Nights at Freddy’s by Blumhouse.

An adaptation of a computer game from 2014 that went viral and swiftly garnered a robust fanbase and spawned a mini franchise, FNAF, directed by Emma Tammi, is about a bunch of animatronic mascots of a popular American restaurant chain that go on a bloody rampage after closing time. Whilst my thoughts on most of the genre output from Mr. Blumhouse’s studio has been less than glowing, I do confess that I enjoyed this FNAF movie a whole lot more than I expected – and believe me, nobody is more surprised by that statement than I am. Granted, I’d say that the majority of my enjoyment is rooted in the practical animatronics provided by the Jim Henson Creature Shop, whose expertise is put to sparkling usage here. I imagine that those who watched and enjoyed the spellbinding work of Henson or the late Stan Winston, the latter being the special effects wiz responsible for The Terminator (1984), Aliens (1986) and Pumpkinhead (1988), should find this a lot of fun.

Sadly, any and all praise I have for this movie begins and ends with the animatronics. The story is basic and plodding and nauseating in how generic and predictable it plays out, but the real shocker is how bloodless it all is. As to the quality of the playing, the only source of solace comes in the pleasant form of Matthew Lillard.

KILLERS OF THE FLOWER MOON (2023)

Perhaps we should all be thankful that The Irishman (2019), the legendary Scorsese’s slow-burning Netflix-backed crime saga, wasn’t his last hurrah. Such a statement is not made out of malice or spite with regards to The Irishman, a fine film by a more than fine filmmaker, but rather because Mr. Scorsese’s latest project is a brilliant and brutal movie that boldly shows that the great octogenarian behind the camera still has plenty to say and do as far as filmmaking is concerned.

First, some history: In the early 19th century, President Jefferson acquired the states of Kansas and Oklahoma from the French in the politically astute Louisiana Purchase. These lands had been inhabited by the natives since time out of mind but by the end of the 19th century those same natives were forcibly moved to a presumably worthless patch. The Osage people were granted the small town of Pawhuska, but it became their fortune (or misfortune) that the very land they would settle on would be revealed to be among the most oil rich in the whole of the United States. By the twenties, the Osage found themselves catapulted to America’s most wealthy. Naturally, such ostentatious wealth did not go unnoticed by the white population; one of these, an avaricious and Machiavellian entrepreneur named William Hale, orchestrated a string of manipulation and murder that would separate the Osage from their riches. The tycoon marries his boneheaded nephew, a Great War veteran named Ernest Burkhart, off to heiress of the wealthy Native American clan. Unfortunately for Hale, he didn’t bank on Ernest actually falling in love with the ‘Injun‘, thus initiating a tug-of-war for Ernest’s soul.

At first glance, Killers of the Flower Moon, based on David Grann’s excellent and detailed book of the same name, resembles something of a departure for the veteran director, lacking the familiar hallmarks of his previous filmography; those vintage pop songs you may have heard in Mean Streets (1973) or Goodfellas (1990) are nowhere to be heard, and the kinetic, almost balletic camerawork of a Raging Bull (1980) is also largely absent. Nevertheless, Killers is still, thematically at least, very much a Scorsese picture. All of the pictures in the director’s oeuvre – including Kundun (1997), arguably the least Scorsese-like of all on the surface – concern, to some degree or another, observations about power, male dominated society and the inward struggles regarding faith and honour. In this regard, Killers not only seamlessly fits into Scorsese’s filmography, but also might be one of his richest thematically. Whilst it might sound a tad snooty and even stupid, I think the finest and most fitting compliment one can grant Scorsese’s latest is that it feels like a “film”, not a “movie”. Such a description invites (perhaps rightly) hostility on the grounds of it being hollow or elitist, I know, but as I sat there in the cinema, looking up at the screen for three-and-a-half hours, that was the dominating thought that kept emerging in my brain.

This is a difficult film to neatly categorise – is it a crime flick? A criminal and political thriller? A western? A Romeo and Juliet tragic romance of star-crossed lovers? A Coenesque black comedy? – but what is beyond doubt is that Scorsese, his cast and crew have constructed an utterly gripping tale about greed and systemic injustice at the rotting heart of a still-burgeoning nation and its crude racial hierarchy. It may feel deceptive and perhaps a tad disrespectful to class this as enjoyable given its weighty subject matter, but while it may not possess the instant and gratifying rewatchability of a Goodfellas or a The Wolf of Wall Street (2013), such a timely motion picture such as this sits alongside Scorsese’s very best. It’s a deeper, fuller, more thoughtful film than any he’s released in years, being less a document of a vile and violent crime and more so a chilling thesis on damnable commerce and colonialism, how systemic and serial murder is treated as a nonchalant and mundane activity and how power is gained through corruption and corruption gained through power. As the film reached its third act I recalled a quote from Spencer Tracy’s character in Stanley Kramer’s Judgment at Nuremberg (1961) which, I believe, encapsulated the deep, sick and intimate scale of the horrors depicted and how easily such things can happen:

“The principle of criminal law in every civilized society has this in common: Any person who sways another to commit murder, any person who furnishes the lethal weapon for the purpose of the crime, any person who is an accessory to the crime – is guilty.“

As Hale, longtime Scorsese collaborator Robert De Niro, armed with a shrewdly avuncular, almost owlish visage, delivers a compelling, crooked performance, a masterclass in subdued and banal villainy. Despite the outwardly affable demeanour, De Niro’s cattle baron who devilishly masterminds the atrocities that befall the Osage people is – no hyperbole – evil incarnate, which is thoroughly impressive given De Niro’s track record of playing unhinged psychopaths for Scorsese before in Taxi Driver (1976) and his remake of Cape Fear (1991). This is De Niro’s strongest showing in quite some time. Meanwhile, Leonardo DiCaprio, an actor seemingly incapable of giving a bad job, is quite the showstopper as the feckless but useful pawn that De Niro uses to commit his dastardly and deadly ordeals. Most vivacious among the players, however, is the doe-eyed, dignified Lily Gladstone who is quietly sublime as the mercurial, emotional heart and soul of the narrative, possessing the grace of an actress from the silent epoch. Her occasional, radiant smile is pleasantly surprising for whenever it does grace the screen it appears that it has endured an odyssey from the earnestness that seems to be her natural position. Given that her role is mostly observational, Gladstone arguably has the most taxing task of the trio of primary players but the pride and paranoia in her composed face and intelligent eyes stays with you long after the credits start to roll.

It’s easy to see where Scorsese’s sympathies lie in bringing this story about a tragedy that befell the indigenous people to the big screen. The film opens and closes with Osage ceremonies, one mourning death whilst the other celebrates life. Everything in between is a gut-wrenching, twisted love story told against a backdrop of lies and deceit. A cynical argument could be made that, deep down, this is mere pulp fiction masquerading as something profound, but it’s raised to epic proportions by a director who, at his best, is a genuine artist of the medium. The realism of the photography, the hypnotic décor and distinctive music adds further dimension to what is already a masterly, mature motion picture. Every scene teems with life (or death), characters that are vividly drawn and imagery so vivid and sometimes so horrifying that it sears into the mind.

Watching Killers of the Flower Moon is a bittersweet experience. Not only because of the harrowing subject matter or the fact that it’s a patient, handsomely-crafted piece of technically perfect filmmaking but rather because whilst viewing it one slowly became unerringly cognisant of the fact that the deeply distressing day when Scorsese is forced to hang up the clapperboard for good is ominously drawing nearer.

And yet, whilst it is unlikely that this chilling conspiracy procedural will prove to be Scorsese’s swansong (he is already confirmed to be at work with DiCaprio on another David Grann adaptation), Killers of the Flower Moon is nevertheless a fitting addition to his luminous legacy, faithful to Mr. Grann’s book, a vital document on a lamentably overlooked chapter in American history and a fitting ode to the Osage nation.

THE EXORCIST: BELIEVER (2023)

From what I understand, Ellen Burstyn (who played the mother in the original) turned down the script for The Exorcist: Believer several times until they eventually offered her a paycheque she simply couldn’t turn down. I think that pretty much tells you all you need to know about this anaemic, unimaginative movie.

The Exorcist (1973) by the late William Friedkin is, along with Romero’s Night of the Living Dead (1968) and Carpenter’s Halloween (1978), one of the pillars of American horror cinema; a truly terrifying, powerfully played, intelligently scripted tale of terror with a plethora of iconic scenes and stolid performances and plenty going on beneath the surface to elevate it above the usual crass crap that pollutes the genre. By comparison, the scariest thing about Believer is how boring it is. This is so shamefully schlocky, so soulless, so stupid that it almost defies earthly logic. If this movie (which I might add is intended to be the first part in a new trilogy) had a face, I would happily slap it with all my might.

In a year crammed with dull, disappointing, disrespectful cash-ins (looking at you, Dial of Destiny), The Exorcist: Believer takes home the gold prize in this category.