Film noir double shot
POUR YOURSELF SOME SCAMS, LIES AND SLEIGHT OF HAND WITH AN UNFORGETTABLE ENDING
NIGHTMARE ALLEY (M)
Director: Guillermo Del Toro
(The Shape of Water)
Starring: Bradley Cooper, Cate Blanchett, Rooney Mara, Toni Collette, Willem Dafoe.
The pros and cons of life as a pro con
Whoa! With Nightmare Alley, what is being slid across the bar towards you is a double shot of first-rate film noir.
No ice. No mixer. All you will be getting is one stiff drink, poured slowly – very, very slowly – into a fancy glass.
Boozers beware: this concoction has a kick like a mule.
However, it is the wait for that kick to happen that will alternatively frustrate or fascinate a majority of viewers.
Without issuing any spoilers whatsoever, it could be argued that the entire movie is merely clearing the runway for its extraordinary final scene – a close-up of a featured character with one last statement to make.
This moment descends from a great height and lands impressively. In fact, once seen, it is never to be forgotten. Nevertheless, if you want to experience that moment, you’re going to have to first bid farewell to two-hours-plus of your life.
Personally, I think it is a fair trade. However, you will be quite within your rights to walk away believing you have been conned.
All of which is absolutely appropriate for a movie like Nightmare Alley, which is awash with scams, lies, shonky sleights of hand and treacherous tricks of the trade.
Many of these deceptions will be perpetrated by a shady fellow named Stanton Carlisle (Bradley Cooper).
However, before he masters his cunning craft, Stanton has some learning to do. Which is why, for reasons not immediately apparent, he joins a low-rent travelling carnival outfit in the late 1930s.
Every performer in this neverending freak show has a specialist knack for emptying the pockets of the public, and Stanton lifts the best intel from all of them.
The first half of the story focuses exclusively on Stanton’s days as a carny, and few would deny Nightmare Alley spends a touch too much time there. (If it wasn’t for Toni Collette, in fine form as a skilled teller of fortunes and seductress of circus workers, the movie might have tanked right here.)
However, all is mostly forgiven once the narrative skips a few years to a time where Stanton now sits at the top of the tree as a live performer, playing to packed houses everywhere as a convincing reader of minds.
High on his own supply of ego, greed and notoriety, Stanton fails to realise that the two women in his life are about to cause one pile of trouble that he won’t be able to make disappear with a theatrical wave of his hand.
Molly (Rooney Mara) is his dutiful wife, a former carny herself who is s his only link to the old days. Lilith Ritter ter (Cate Blanchett) is a psychologist who gets Stanton thinking there might be more value made of his gifts than merely charging a dollar a ticket.
Adapted from a long-forgotten book (which itself spawned a fondly remembered 1947 movie of the same name) by Oscar-winning g filmmaker Guillermo del Toro, Nightmare Alley has the look of a prestige production and the feel of f a pulp paperback.
If you can bring along deep reserves of patience and constant suspicion of all that you see, then your journey down Nightmare Alley will not conclude at a dead end. Nightmare Alley is now showing in general release.
SCREAM (MA15+)
General release
Welcome back to Woodsboro. Population? Getting smaller with
each passing day now that yet another Ghostface killer is up and running. (And stabbing. Quite often just above the shoulders. A literal pain in the neck, that Ghostface.)
Anyway, while the mysterious masked psychopath teases, torments and terminates a new generation of victims (all of whom have links to casualties from past Screams), this gleefully reckless reboot finds a few justifiable reasons to bring back franchise foundation players such as Neve Campbell, Courteney Cox and David Arquette. Like the 1996 original, this ‘re-quel’ (a label coined by the filmmakers) has a field day listing, mirroring and mocking a truckload of tropes specific to the horror genre.
While you don’t need to have seen any of the earlier instalments to be both suitably enthralled and appalled, a little Screamology 101 will definitely up the fun factor.
Of all the recent revivals to hit the market – especially those Matrix and Ghostbusters flicks – this is the best by far. Co-stars Melissa Barrera, Jack Quaid.
THE TRAGEDY OF MACBETH (M)
Selected cinemas; streaming on Apple TV+
This haunting, impeccably mounted adaptation of the immortal Shakespeare play foregoes all need for showy performances or flashy sets, and simply opts for sheer cinematic power.
Even if you have had your fill of Shakespeare for the screen, this is the one y you really y should be making an exception for. It re really is that good. No, make that great.
Propelle Propelled by devastatingly nuanced and restrained acting displays from
Den Denzel Washington and Frances M Mcdormand in the leading le roles, a d deliberately sparse p production (filmed in black-andwhite) w makes the B Bard’s ancient tale o of murder, madness an and treachery feel ver very much of this mom moment in time.
Pur Purists will be relieved to learn that t writer-director Joel Coen ( working solo without brothe brother Ethan) has stayed faithful to the orig original text, leaving all nips, tucks and changes of pace to the flawless line delivery techniques of his impressive cast.
Much of the action unfolds in cold, grey, stripped-back spaces which only serve to enhance the high calibre of performance deployed here. Tough, testing and bluntly forceful stuff. Co-stars Brendan Gleeson,
Harry Melling.