Woah, he's giving that pig a piggyback.

Hunt for the Wilderpeople

(2016)

(SPOILERS) The accolades for Taika Waititi’s latest are of a piece with those for his previous picture, What We Do in the Shadows, in that they’re slightly over-effusive. Hunt for the Wilderpeople strikes unqualified gold with the odd couple relationship between Julian Dennison’s rotund juvenile delinquent Ricky and Sam Neill’s gruff bushman Hec, or “Uncle” as he objects to Ricky calling him. However, it’s less convincing when it comes to Waititi’s erratic comedy quality control. He’s more Paul Hogan than Monty Python.

Maybe such broadness of temperament is an Oz/Kiwi thing, or maybe it’s simply that Waititi’s always a draft or two from honing his material as precisely as he might. It could also be, without going all Mary Whitehouse on Hunt, that there’s a central awkwardness in what passes itself of as a family movie running a central plot motor wherein Uncle is accused of paedophilia (or being “a molesterer”). Even the Carry On… movies would have blanched at the scene in which Ricky is assumed to be describing how he was forced to masturbate Hec. Oh, those earthy New Zealanders and their loveable lewdness! If Victor Salva had been passing by the set, no doubt Waititi would have convinced him to cameo, just for added yuks.

There are jarring tonal shifts throughout, though, as the picture lurches from a poignant scene in which Hec loses Bella to Waititi delivering an indulgent (and not very funny) cameo as the minister at her funeral. Elsewhere, he seems fixated on lobbing us copious pop culture references (The Terminator, The Lord of the Rings, Thelma and Louise), but as randomly as Zuckers and Abrams rather than the at least germane manner Pegg and Wright would, while a stark rites of passage sees Hec putting down his beloved pooch.

It’s almost as if Waititi’s a little shy of letting the grounded, relationship side of the tale tell itself and feels obliged to pep it up in any way he can. Which is a shame, as this is definitely a case of less being more. It doesn’t help that, most of the time, the gags are verging on the second rate. At points too, he will compound this by feeding a character a line because it’s funny, not because they’d say it (Ricky’s “Too soon?” after suggesting Hec remarries), or allow a scene to pass purely because it’s been through his random reference generator (a vision of the ever-phallic ‘80s Flake advert anachronistically materialises before Ricky’s eyes when he meets Kahu, which can be added to the pile of inappropriate moments – if you were nursing the illusion this was a family movie). Generally, the sketch comedy routines are much more successful in the improvised vibe of Shadows, where hit and miss is par for the course. Here, his bungling social services worker (Rachel House) and redneck hunters tend to miss. Waititi even has Dennison administer a passing-out pratfall at one point, which indicates he’s been watching some kids’ TV for research too.

And yet, the Hec-Ricky relationship is genuinely touching (not in a Jimmy Savile sense, although that’s just the kind of gag Waititi would have cracked), and the early scenes with Rima Te Wiata as Bella succeed so profoundly in establishing her as a huge-hearted, kindly soul, that we’re entirely on board with these two lost ones making a fist of things. Sure, the template for Juvie Ricky just needing someone who will accept him and understand him is broad brush, but such uncynical sincerity is entirely appropriate for a kids’ movie. Just not the proliferation of child molestation jests.

Once the manhunt is well underway, Waititi loses focus on his trajectory rather, introducing Rhys Darby in one of his lesser cameos (I do like his bushman outfit, though) and a car chase that may have been a calling card to Marvel (although I’ve yet to be convinced of his blockbuster chops) but feels more like it’s there because referencing another movie is all he can think of for a big finale (which it doesn’t really need anyway).

Neill, who is also on board for Thor Ragnarok, has maybe his best big screen role since Dean Spanley, and it can’t be understated how much he makes Hunt for the Wilderpeople worthwhile for all its rocky passages, effortlessly inscribing it with heart and gravitas. Dennison makes up what he lacks in range and timing with enthusiasm, as the key quality is his strong chemistry with his elder. Maybe Waititi should take on a writing partner (I wonder if the better gags in Shadows didn’t come from Jermain Clement), to lend his screenplays that extra polish. Then he might make a really great movie. A majestical one.

Agree? Disagree? Mildly or vehemently? Let me know in the comments below.

Comments

Mondo bizarro. No offence man, but you’re in way over your head.

The X-Files 8.7: Via Negativa I wasn’t as down on the last couple of seasons of The X-Files as most seemed to be. For me, the mythology arc walked off a cliff somewhere around the first movie, with only the occasional glimmer of something worthwhile after that. So the fact that the show was tripping over itself with super soldiers and Mulder’s abduction/his and Scully’s baby (although we all now know it wasn’t, sheesh ), anything to stretch itself beyond breaking point in the vain hope viewers would carry on dangling, didn’t really make much odds. Of course, it finally snapped with the wretched main arc when the show returned, although the writing was truly on the wall with Season 9 finale The Truth . For the most part, though, I found 8 and 9 more watchable than, say 5 or 7. They came up with their fair share of engaging standalones, one of which I remembered to be Via Negativa .

Isn’t it true, it’s easier to be a holy man on the top of a mountain?

The Razor’s Edge (1984) (SPOILERS) I’d hadn’t so much a hankering as an idle interest in finally getting round to seeing Bill Murray’s passion project. Partly because it seemed like such an odd fit. And partly because passion isn’t something you tend to associate with any Murray movie project, involving as it usually does laidback deadpan. Murray, at nigh-on peak fame – only cemented by the movie he agreed to make to make this movie – embarks on a serious-acting-chops dramatic project, an adaptation of W Somerset Maugham’s story of one man’s journey of spiritual self-discovery. It should at least be interesting, shouldn’t it? A real curio? Alas, not. The Razor’s Edge is desperately turgid.

You have done well to keep so much hair, when so many’s after it.

Jeremiah Johnson (1972) (SPOILERS) Hitherto, I was most familiar with Jeremiah Johnson in the form of a popular animated gif of beardy Robert Redford smiling and nodding in slow zoom close up (a moment that is every bit as cheesy in the film as it is in the gif). For whatever reason, I hadn’t mustered the enthusiasm to check out the 1970s’ The Revenant until now (well, beard-wise, at any rate). It’s easy to distinguish the different personalities at work in the movie. The John Milius one – the (mythic) man against the mythic landscape; the likeably accentuated, semi-poetic dialogue – versus the more naturalistic approach favoured by director Sydney Pollack and star Redford. The fusion of the two makes for a very watchable, if undeniably languorous picture. It was evidently an influence on Dances with Wolves in some respects, although that Best Picture Oscar winner is at greater pains to summon a more sensitive portrayal of Native Americans (and thus, perversely, at times a more patr

Schnell, you stinkers! Come on, raus!

Private’s Progress (1956) (SPOILERS) Truth be told, there’s good reason sequel I’m Alright Jack reaps the raves – it is, after all, razor sharp and entirely focussed in its satire – but Private’s Progress is no slouch either. In some respects, it makes for an easy bedfellow with such wartime larks as Norman Wisdom’s The Square Peg (one of the slapstick funny man’s better vehicles). But it’s also, typically of the Boulting Brothers’ unsentimental disposition, utterly remorseless in rebuffing any notions of romantic wartime heroism, nobility and fighting the good fight. Everyone in the British Army is entirely cynical, or terrified, or an idiot.

It’s not as if she were a… maniac, a raving thing.

Psycho (1960) (SPOILERS) One of cinema’s most feted and most studied texts, and for good reason. Even if the worthier and more literate psycho movie of that year is Michael Powell’s Peeping Tom . One effectively ended a prolific director’s career and the other made its maker more in demand than ever, even if he too would discover he had peaked with his populist fear flick. Pretty much all the criticism and praise of Psycho is entirely valid. It remains a marvellously effective low-budget shocker, one peppered with superb performances and masterful staging. It’s also fairly rudimentary in tone, character and psychology. But those negative elements remain irrelevant to its overall power.

My Doggett would have called that crazy.

The X-Files 9.4: 4-D I get the impression no one much liked Agent Monica Reyes (Annabeth Gish), but I felt, for all the sub-Counsellor Troi, empath twiddling that dogged her characterisation, she was a mostly positive addition to the series’ last two years (of its main run). Undoubtedly, pairing her with Doggett, in anticipation of Gillian Anderson exiting just as David Duchovny had – you rewatch these seasons and you wonder where her head was at in hanging on – made for aggressively facile gender-swapped conflict positions on any given assignment. And generally, I’d have been more interested in seeing how two individuals sympathetic to the cause – her and Mulder – might have got on. Nevertheless, in an episode like 4-D you get her character, and Doggett’s, at probably their best mutual showing.

I tell you, it saw me! The hanged man’s asphyx saw me!

The Asphyx (1972) (SPOILERS) There was such a welter of British horror from the mid 60s to mid 70s, even leaving aside the Hammers and Amicuses, that it’s easy to lose track of them in the shuffle. This one, the sole directorial effort of Peter Newbrook (a cameraman for David Lean, then a cinematographer), has a strong premise and a decent cast, but it stumbles somewhat when it comes to taking that premise any place interesting. On the plus side, it largely eschews the grue. On the minus, directing clearly wasn’t Newbrook’s forte, and even aided by industry stalwart cinematographer Freddie Young (also a go-to for Lean), The Aspyhx is stylistically rather flat.

You’re a disgrace, sir... Weren’t you at Harrow?

Our Man in Marrakesh aka Bang! Bang! You’re Dead (1966) (SPOILERS) I hadn’t seen this one in more than three decades, and I had in mind that it was a decent spy spoof, well populated with a selection of stalwart British character actors in supporting roles. Well, I had the last bit right. I wasn’t aware this came from the stable of producer Harry Alan Towers, less still of his pedigree, or lack thereof, as a sort of British Roger Corman (he tried his hand at Star Wars with The Shape of Things to Come and Conan the Barbarian with Gor , for example). More legitimately, if you wish to call it that, he was responsible for the Christopher Lee Fu Manchu flicks. Our Man in Marrakesh – riffing overtly on Graham Greene’s Our Man in Havana in title – seems to have in mind the then popular spy genre and its burgeoning spoofs, but it’s unsure which it is; too lightweight to work as a thriller and too light on laughs to elicit a chuckle.

The best thing in the world for the inside of a man or a woman is the outside of a horse.

Marnie (1964) (SPOILERS) Hitch in a creative ditch. If you’ve read my Vertigo review, you’ll know I admired rather than really liked the picture many fete as his greatest work. Marnie is, in many ways, a redux, in the way De Palma kept repeating himself in the early 80s only significantly less delirious and… well, compelling. While Marnie succeeds in commanding the attention fitfully, it’s usually for the wrong reasons. And Hitch, digging his heels in as he strives to fashion a star against public disinterest – he failed to persuade Grace Kelly out of retirement for Marnie Rutland – comes entirely adrift with his leads.

You know what I sometimes wish? I sometimes wish I were ordinary like you. Ordinary and dead like all the others.

Séance on a Wet Afternoon (1964) (SPOILERS) Bryan Forbes’ adaptation of Mark McShane’s 1961’s novel has been much acclaimed. It boasts a distinctive storyline and effective performances from its leads, accompanied by effective black-and-white cinematography from Gerry Turpin and a suitably atmospheric score from John Barry. I’m not sure Forbes makes the most of the material, however, as he underlines Séance on a Wet Afternoon ’s inherently theatrical qualities at the expense of its filmic potential.

Now In Full Color, with a Happier Ending

Search This Blog