brockfal

This version of the Frankenstein story has to be one of Guillermo del Toro's best. It's a pretty much perfect fit for his style of filmmaking, mixing gothic drama with fantasy myth and poignancy. So here he is, tackling the well known tale of Frankenstein, injecting an epic sweep and magnificence, whilst keeping its original heart and its message intact.

The film is split into two parts, and I thought the first half, 'Frankenstein's tale' worked brilliantly and powerfully, with Oscar Isaac as Frankenstein and Christoph Waltz particularly good, but the second part 'the creature's tale' was less effective, though Jacob Elordi does do excellently as the creature. Overall this is an excellent film, though it's hard to set aside memories of James Whale 1930's version, Hammer in the late 1950s, or indeed the Mel Brooks comic take, and those influences are indeed felt. Del Toro also introduced a sort of supernatural angle which some will not like, but overall, I thought this very successful, and it compares well to the many earlier versions.

If you're a long term fan of Led Zep like me you will love this documentary about how the four band members got together and started up. Yes, it's an 'origin story', but there are no struggles touring in small venues to small audiences using a small van here - these four immense talents were big from the start. It's fascinating hearing Page, Plant, Jones, and the voice of the long gone Bonham talk about how it was early on, that is up to the second album, but it's really it's the old archive footage that amazes. Some of LZ's earliest performances were luckily captured in film and really are something else, with several outstanding clips. There are no great revelations or spicy amusing stories, and though it's clear that a lot has been left out, even a little bit padded out, if you're a fan or into Rock history, watch.

It's a lyrical and elegiac journey as we follow the life of a man (Joel Edgerton) from the late 19th century onwards working in remote regions building the US railroads and on logging teams, falling in love, experiencing the up and downs of life, and as he tries to make sense of it all. This film is marvellous in so many ways and has a great poetical sense of landscape and time. It's beautiful, absorbing, and although it's very much about one man's thoughts dreams and experiences, it's also perhaps a profoundly universal and moving tale about life itself.

Low key, and clearly heavily influenced by Terence Malick, Train Dreams is visually stunning, subtle in approach, and is terrifically written, with outstanding direction by Clint Bentley. I thought everything about this film was top notch, including many fine performances and memorable scenes, and although frequent narration is used, it manages to enhance rather than distract. One small criticism is the dialogue was sometimes garbled, and so subtitles proved useful.