Image Credit: Universal Pictures
Welcome to the latest edition of Weekend Watch, where I recommend (or occasionally warn against) movies or TV shows I’ve been checking out. This week, Sam Rockwell is spying, and a kid is facing his fears. Follow James on Twitter: @jamwhite and Threads/Instagram: @jammerwhite
Director Matthew Vaughn has dedicated the last few years of his career to making movies set within the Kingsman universe, mixing spy tropes with bawdy humour and a little (at times, a lot) of the old ultraviolence. They’re entertaining and occasionally controversial and even managed to have a prequel that didn’t feel like too much of a stretch.
He’d be forgiven for pivoting back to something else for his latest, but it would seem that he’s still happy to play in the espionage world with Argylle. It has some of the Kingsman energy, but tones down the sexual jokes and bloody violence.
Argylle is the story of Elly Conway (Bryce Dallas Howard), an introverted spy novelist who seldom leaves her home. But she’s drawn into the real world of espionage when the plots of her books featuring a cheesily charming spy called Argylle (Henry Cavill) get a little too close to the activities of a sinister underground syndicate. When Aiden (Sam Rockwell), a spy, shows up to save her (he says) from being kidnapped or killed (or both), Elly and her beloved cat Alfie are plunged into a covert world where nothing, and no one, is what it seems.
Vaughn’s new film has had plenty of press speculation about its provenance –– the film is purportedly based on a planned series of novels by an actual Elly Conway, though no one can seem to find her and plenty of people have started to wonder whether Taylor Swift wrote the book (only one has been seemingly finished so far) partly because of the Scottish fold cat and his backpack carrier that feature heavily in the plot. I don’t give that idea much credence –– though I firmly believe Swift can do whatever she sets her mind to, she has been a little busy of late preparing for and dominating a giant world tour.
The origins aside, the film itself (which has a script by Jason Fuchs), is a frothy spy caper that boasts some solid performances from Howard and Rockwell and, to a lesser degree (only because of screen time, not talent, let me be clear), Henry Cavill, John Cena, Bryan Cranston, Catherine O’Hara and Ariana DeBose. And Vaughn’s style is clear –– over the top action sequences (several of which suffer from a plastic sheen that belies even the movie’s playing with the genre conventions).
If you go with the film’s vibe, you’ll find some fun with this one, even if it does stretch your patience at two hours and 19 minutes and starts to fling far too many twists (and that’s all I’ll say about the narrative) at the audience.
In its defence, Argylle does at least let Henry Cavill be funny and gives Sam Rockwell the chance to dance. And for that, I celebrate it.
Argylle is in UK and US cinemas now.
Image Credit: Netflix
It might not have the chequered history of last year’s Netflix charmer Nimona (which is now nominated for an Oscar, so all’s well that ends well), but Orion And The Dark has a shadow looming over it –– and I don’t mean the anthropomorphic figure of darkness who brings the night. Instead, the new film, a collaboration between Netflix and DreamWorks Animation, feels like it’s being thrown on to the former’s servers with little fanfare.
Which is a shame, since it is a delightful, witty, early-in-the-year treat.
Directed by Sean Charmatz, Orion And The Dark is written by Charlie Kaufman (with additional screenplay material from Lloyd Taylor, who worked on Nimona, by way of coincidence), Orion focuses on the titular boy (Jacob Tremblay), who is a fizzing motherlode of fears and neuroses. He’s irrationally afraid of bees, dogs, the ocean, cell phone waves, murderous gutter clowns, and even falling off of a cliff. But of all his fears, the thing he’s the most afraid of is what he confronts on a nightly basis: the dark. So, meeting the literal embodiment of creeping darkness (even one voiced by Paul Walter Hauser) is not the gateway he expected to help him face his fears.
Ostensibly the story of someone forced into confronting his issues, it delves into subjects you rarely see in family animated output. And the film is told in such a clever, enchanting way, it puts it ahead of much of what is on offer right now. Not to throw shade on another family-friendly film launching on streaming this weekend, but it’s a relief that Orion isn’t the 307th example of the hero’s journey, as popularised by the likes of Harry Potter, Percy Jackson and so many kids’ movies. No basic magical battles against a villain here.
And Orion’s own story is just one layer –– there’s also a smart, thoughtful take on the nature of storytelling itself to be found lurking as an older Orion tells his story to his young daughter, which is perhaps not a surprise given Kaufman’s presence. This is, after all, the man who wrote Adaptation.
Boasting a varied, entertaining voice cast and some striking visuals (the whole thing has the look of a sketch book, and there are moments of real beauty), Orion And The Dark is definitely one to watch.
Orion And The Dark is on Netflix now.