Cumberbatch’s space and time oddity powers left-field delight
Dir: Scott Derrickson With: Benedict Cumberbatch, Tilda Swinton, Chiwetel Ejiofor Runtime: 115 minutes
COULD there be a better choice than Benedict Cumberbatch to play Marvel Comics’ Doctor Strange? If the actor had not been so busy taking Sherlock Holmes into the internet age, Cumberbatch would have been a dream fit for Doctor Who (sorry, Mr Capaldi), so why not go the whole magic, mysticism and time travel hog as a superhero sorcerer?
Cumberbatch – startled otter looks, goatee and all – duly nails the part of the good-ish Doctor from the off. If the film as a whole is not quite as satisfying, one might blame superhero fatigue, an increasingly widespread condition broughtonbyHollywood churning out one comic book movie after another, ad tedium. Symptoms of this malady, which mostly strikes those over 25, include intermittent boredom and crashbangwallop-induced headaches.
When first we meet Doctor Stephen Strange he is more routinely odd than psychedelically off the wall. A brilliant but infuriatingly arrogant neurosurgeon, Strange has it all: The glittering career, the fabulous New York apartment, the clothes, a woman who loves him (Rachel McAdams playing a fellow surgeon) and the fast car. One of these will cause him to become a broken man, desperate to find a solution to what ails him.
That search for answers leads him East, not to Edinburgh but to the Himalayas, where he meets The Ancient One (a bald Tilda Swinton). The Ancient One tells him that she knows how to use the spirit to heal the body. As a man of science and medicine, Dr S initially rejects this as hokum, but The Ancient One, having lived a long time and learned a thing or two along the way, eventually wins him over to her side.
There follows the always enjoyable sequence in which the budding do-gooder is schooled in superhero ways, with the film calling to mind, because of its Eastern flavour, the old television series Kung Fu, with David Carradine.
But once he has his powers, what will the doctor do with them? Should he return to his old life, or does a higher calling await?
By this time, writer-director Scott Derrickson (Deliver us from Evil, The Exorcism of Emily Rose) is getting into his stride with the film’s other great strength, apart from Cumberbatch – its special effects. In scenes reminiscent of Christopher Nolan’s Inception, Derrickson and his crew create worlds within worlds, the fantastic and weird only a time portal away from the dull and everyday.
It takes a strong supporting cast to get a look in with all this going on, and the picture largely has one. Swinton is as fine a piece of casting as Cumberbatch, that ethereal beauty making her seem right at home in this weird world.
Chiwetel Ejiofor, playing Strange’s fellow warrior Mordo, lucks out in being given some of the screenplay’s hokier lines, and it doesn’t help that he tries to deliver them with Shakespearean solemnity. McAdams makes the most of her fleeting appearances as an A&E doctor, while Mads Mikkelsen has a giddy old time as Kaecilius, a mystic master who has gone to the bad.
There is another not-so-secret weapon Derrickson’s picture deploys to get and keep the viewer on its side – a cast-iron sense of humour. Though playing an American, complete with accent, Cumberbatch puts a British spin on the gags, gently mocking the ridiculousness of the whole superhero thing, all the while clearly relishing being part of it.
It is when Doctor Strange moves away from its winning weirdness and settles into the more familiar features of the genre (set-piece street battles, characters trying to explain the frankly barmy plot as they go along) that the film grows a touch wearisome.
Derrickson and Cumberbatch are not done yet, though, coming up with a strong finish that promises more to come.
Can the universe take another superhero franchise? You might well wonder. If anyone can claim a place for himself in a crowded market, Cumberbatch’s Doctor Strange can. The good doctor, one imagines, will be seeing much more of this character. **** Dir: Yeon Sang-ho With: Yoo Gong, Soo-an Kim Runtime: 118 minutes STOP me if you’ve been on this train before – mysterious virus attacks city, turns citizens into zombies, cue running, screaming, gnawing at necks and general frenzy.
Yes, Train to Busan has all of that, but for its wit, style, pace and sheer inventiveness, this is one zombie movie worth hunting down this weekend.
Single parent Seok Woo is a fund manager living in Seoul with his daughter Soo-an (Soo-an Kim). Soo-an wants to visit her mother in Busan, so workaholic Seok Woo opts reluctantly to take her.
All appears normal as the journey gets underway, save for that sick person who has just scrambled on board …
What is marvellous about animator-turned-features director Yeon Sang-ho’s live action debut is the way he cues up cliches only to demolish them.
There is a lot of running away from zombies, for example, but how does one do this on a moving train? Just as satisfying are the well fleshed-out characters, from the cynical first time dad to the hard-faced businessman who does not want to share the first class compartment with anyone, and to heck with the murderous horde on the loose.
Sang-ho over-eggs the pudding at times (there are some distressing scenes) and the score is jarring, but this picture flies by like a bullet train. Glasgow Film Theatre; Cineworld Renfrew Street, Glasgow, and Aberdeen; Cameo, Edinburgh.