The Herald - The Herald Magazine
THIS WEEK’S BEST FILMS
Dietrich’s wonderful musical number, See What the Boys in the Back Room Will Have, co-written by future Guys and Dolls composer Frank Loesser.
Mission: Impossible – Fallout (2018) (Film4, 9pm)
Impossible Missions Force agent Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) receives word that the terrorist network fronted by Solomon Lane (Sean Harris) is poised to take delivery of stolen plutonium. The sale is being brokered by an arms dealer called the White Widow (Vanessa Kirby) and Hunt must infiltrate the exchange to prevent the payload falling into the hands of Lane’s deranged disciples. His fellow IMF operatives join the mission, but the team’s movements are closely monitored by the CIA’s August Walker (Henry Cavill). Mission: Impossible – Fallout is the sixth and arguably best instalment of the globe-trotting franchise. While other blockbusters rely heavily on digital trickery, this film places its most expensive special effect, leading man Cruise, in almost every adrenaline-pumping shot.
WEDNESDAY
American Made (2017) (Film4, 9pm)
WA pilot Barry Seal (Tom Cruise) is haemorrhaging enthusiasm for his job as he provides for his wife Lucy (Sarah Wright) and children. He makes a little money on the side by smuggling Cuban cigars into America in his hand luggage. This illegal practice is rumbled by CIA handler Monty Schafer (Domhnall Gleeson), who coerces Barry into working for the US government by flying reconnaissance missions over
Central America to take photographs of the emerging communist threat. During one covert flight, Barry meets members of the high-powered Medellin cocaine cartel, who exploit his greed by employing him to transport narcotics back to America. Based on a true story of outlandish lies, American Made recreates the late 1970s and 1980s with a swagger.
White House Down (2013) (5Star, 11.05pm)
John Cale (Channing Tatum) is an ex-soldier who is assigned to protect
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Speaker of the House Eli Raphelson (Richard Jenkins), when he would much rather be part of the Secret Service detail guarding President James Sawyer (Jamie Foxx). An interview for promotion goes badly and John licks his wounds by joining his daughter Emily (Joey King) on a guided tour of the White House – just as a heavily armed paramilitary group led by Emil Stenz (Jason Clarke) prepares to take control of the building. With the President’s life in the balance, John gets a chance to prove himself after all. This action thriller was rather overshadowed by the similar Olympus Has Fallen, but it’s a lot more fun.
THURSDAY
A Man for all Seasons (1966) (Sony Movies Classic, 4.30pm)
Based on Robert Bolt’s play, this classic historical drama stars Robert Shaw as Henry VIII who wishes to divorce Catherine of Aragon so he can marry Anne Boleyn (Vanessa Redgrave). However, this leads to a clash with his chancellor, Sir Thomas More (the Oscar-winning Paul Scofield, reprising his stage role), who refuses to support the annulment – or Henry’s plan to make himself head of the Church of England. The wonderful performances inject life into what could have felt like a history lesson, and A Man for All Seasons deservedly picked up another five Oscars in addition to Scofield’s, including Best Picture.
Valkyrie (2008) (Film4, 11.15pm)
The Second World War is raging, but the tide is turning increasingly in favour of the Allies, and a number of senior German officers believe Adolf Hitler must be removed from power and the conflict brought to an end. Recruited into this secret group is
Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg
(Tom Cruise), a young and well respected war hero who has grown disillusioned with Hitler and the insidious reach of the SS. The charismatic soldier is pushed to the forefront of the plan to assassinate Hitler, but you don’t need a historian to tell you that his mission doesn’t go quite to plan. Cruise is solid in the
lead, though a little more of his usual charm wouldn’t have gone amiss. British thespians Kenneth Branagh, Bill Nighy and Tom Wilkinson easily convince as highranking German officers.
FRIDAY
Long Shot (2019) (BBC1, 10.45pm)
When he was 13, journalist Fred
Flarsky (Seth Rogen) fell hopelessly under the spell of his 16-year-old babysitter. Decades later, the girl of his hormone-addled dreams, Charlotte Field (Charlize Theron), is Secretary of State for the United States, who has just been endorsed by President Chambers (Bob Odenkirk) as his successor.
Luckily for Fred, Charlotte needs an idealist to add verbal firepower to her speeches and she asks him to join her on the long and winding road to the White House. Directed by Jonathan Levine, Long Shot is a crowd-pleasing comedy of burning political ambitions and shameless media intrusion. Gender parity and climate change are
0easy targets for scriptwriters Dan Sterling and Liz Hannah and they land punchlines with forcible precision.
Manchester by the Sea (2016) (BBC2, 11.20pm)
Lee Chandler (an Oscar-winning Casey Affleck) works as a janitor in a small apartment building in Chicago. Out of the blue, he receives a telephone call to say his older brother Joe (Kyle Chandler) has suffered a heart attack. By the time Lee arrives at the hospital, Joe has passed and the younger sibling must break the tragic news to his truculent 16-year-old nephew,
Patrick (Lucas Hedges). A meeting with family lawyer Wes (Josh Hamilton) reveals that Joe named Lee as Patrick’s legal guardian. Set in and around the titular coastal community, Manchester by the Sea is an elegiac drama, which eloquently explores universal themes of grief, guilt and sexual awakening through the eyes of a 40-year-old handyman whose outlook on life is as threadbare and tattered as the winter jacket he wears atop his overalls.