Phantom Thread (2017)

          The new film from Paul Thomas Anderson, Phantom Thread, is another wonderful masterpiece from a unique and seemingly unequaled talent. Anderson makes stories that are very much ABOUT things, conveying reams and reams underneath their actual plots. This began with his breakout hit Boogie Nights (1997), which while ostensibly about a young man entering the porn industry as a new star in the 1970s, it was also about nothing less than the death of artistry in the cultural industries of that decade, which made way for the crass commercialism of the Reagnite 1980s. And as recently as Anderson’s last film Inherent Vice (2014), the story took in the fading glory of the fabled hippie set of late 1960s California, being set at its very precipice in the year 1970.
          All of this is to say that, Anderson has a reputation as an unsubtle, overambitious filmmaker, broadening his scope exponentially until each of his features contains multitudes of narrative layers and themes. So it comes as something of a surprise to feast on Phantom Thread, which is about little more than its own small, intimate narrative. There are no sweeping, overarching themes taking in generations and broad spectrums. This could be due to the fact that this is his first film shot and set outside his native California, being set in the England of the 1950s. But either way, this is no slight on the film, as it only sharpens the focus of the story, burnishing it into an even more intimate and singular portrait of a complex artist and an even more complex courtship.
          Legendary dressmaker Reynolds Woodcock (Daniel Day-Lewis) is the creative force behind the Woodcock fashion house, managed by his sister Cyril (Lesley Manville), he designs dresses for the rich and famous of 1950’s London, as well as for foreign royalty. During a period of recuperation at his country retreat, he meets and becomes instantly fascinated with waitress Alma (Vicky Krieps), whom he invites to live with him. She becomes his muse, but the particulars of their relationship remain unspoken, as friction builds between Alma, Reynolds and Cyril.
          Let’s address the elephant in the room in Phantom Thread: this is Daniel Day-Lewis’ final film performance, as he has stated on numerous occasions that he has now retired from acting. As tragic as this is, as easily the best and most naturally gifted actor working today, he has gone out on a high of magnificent proportions. This is an assured, confident and mesmerising performance that absolutely commands attention at all times. Day-Lewis has always had an uncanny ability to entirely subsume himself into his characters, and that is no different here. The merest subtle gestures of the body, and of the facial features communicate boundless depths.
          This is not to say that Woodcock himself is an entirely likeable character. He, as well as the other two members of the central trio Alma, and Cyril, are all layered, complex characters, circling each other with veiled looks and subtle glances. Woodcock is an absolute slave to his work, with everything else subservient to it, including the two women in his life. Equally, he would be nowhere without what each offers him in their living and working relationships. Cyril is half manager, and half surrogate wife and mother, giving him praise when he needs it, but also strong enough to buck against his fits of passive aggression with quiet superiority. So Alma threatens that dynamic when she is brought in, causing friction and tension. At first Woodcock relishes this as an artist does a newly discovered muse, but her insistence on upending the staid status quo eventually moves him to nearly detest her. This is when Alma sees what she can uniquely offer him that he needs, and the power in their relationship begins to shift without him even knowing it.
          With Daniel Day-Lewis, Vicky Krieps and Lesley Manville performing an absolute storm in front of the camera, with the beautiful London townhouse acting in for the Woodcock house and studio doing the rest of the visual heavy lifting, Anderson can flex his muscles behind the camera. Thrillingly cinematic, his camera does not just observe the action, it’s practically a participant. Some of the shots here are almost embarrassingly intimate, with severe close ups of the actors emphasing their separation from each other. A particular highlight comes early in the film as Woodcock takes Alma to his country retreat, to the attic room that is his studio, featuring a lovely visual of an empty dress mannequin which Alma then takes the place of. He continues to measure her for a dress, with the camera roving over the tape measure, Woodcock’s concentrated expression, and Alma’s seeming bewildered fascination as she begins to realise what power there is in becoming the muse of a formidable artist. It’s a breathlessly exciting sequence, scored by Jonny Greenwood’s luxurious, opressive string score.
          Things continue to build until we are left with what is a nearly unclassifiable movie that is simply endlessly fascinating to behold. It becomes a somewhat gothic romance that is peopled with unsympathetic characters in the most exciting sense. As a portrait of the depths and rigours of the artistic temperament it is equally fascinating, and as a portrait of two people barely hiding their contempt for eachother while simultaneously falling madly in love with one another through a mutual understanding of what they each need from the other and can get from no one else, it is utterly revelatory.

Coco (2017)

          The release of a new Pixar movie is still guaranteed to send intense ripples of excitement through any moviegoer, let alone film critics. Their run of unmatched and inspired creativity has dried up in recent years, with only Inside Out (Pete Doctor, 2015) truly matching their past glories since at least 2010. But that initial run of movies from Toy Story (John Lasseter, 1995), all the way up to that 2010 release Toy Story 3 (Lee Unkrich), is still a stunning canon of animated films, unique in their superior quality, but different enough from each other to see each one as a huge creative leap forward from the last.

          Which brings us to Coco, an original story after back-to-back sequels from the Pixar braintrust. Having said that, this is an original story in so far as the premise, and the characters, are brand new. But the bones of the narrative are truly tried and tested, a solid, dependable framework that goes nowhere unexpected. It would have been a joy to see what Brad Bird would have created from the premise of Coco, whose own Pixar movies, The Incredibles (2004) and Ratatouiolle (2007), practically sparkle with narrative unpredictability.

          Young Miguel (Anthony Gonzalez) is the youngest in a family of shoemakers in small town Mexico. The whole family is employed in the family business, and have been ever since Miguel’s great, great grandfather walked out on his wife and daughter to pursue a music career. This event in the past has lead to a ban on music for all members of the family. Miguel harbours a secret passion and longing to be a musician, and he hopes that since finding out that his great, great grandfather was the famous singing sensation Ernesto de la Cruz (Benjamin Bratt), his dream will become a reality.

          The largest portion of Coco’s narrative takes place in the Mexican Land of the Dead, an afterlife traditional to Mexican cultural heritage. And you’ll notice that the above plot synopsis makes no mention of this section of the movie. There is a LOT to unpack in Coco’s narrative before things get to the inevitable quest to make it home before sunrise. From establishing the family’s history, to the ban of music, to Miguel’s love of music, to his and Mexico’s adoration of Ernesto, to Miguel’s plan to win the town’s singing competition, to the complication that launches Miguel into the Land of the Dead. Many of these threads could warrant their own entire movie and not be at a loss for story.

          By the time we get to the Land of the Dead, and there are more new characters to meet, and an entire fleshed out infrastructure to develop, things have become so stacked that it’s a relief to get to the basic fetch quest once its established what Miguel is going to do to try to get home again. Brevity is not a virtue of Coco, which in one sense is admirable, particularly for a family film, but in another there is a longing for a slightly more streamlined narrative, with one or two plot threads dropped entirely, that would more fully flesh out Miguel and his own needs and wants.

          The other major disappointment is the Land of the Dead itself. After a stunning journey there across a floating bridge made of Mexican marigold petals, and the initial reveal of a towering city verse of houses upon houses stretching as far as the eye can see, to discover that the Land itself is nothing more than a town full of dead relatives as skeletons, with normal buildings, government, law enforcement, and standard earthly recreational activities seems a missed opportunity. There is little mystery or magic about the afterlife as presented here, which makes Miguel’s journey through it feel even more pedestrian.

          Despite all this, there is much to enjoy and even love about Coco. It is certainly never boring, and the sentiment expressed by the story of a young man needing to reconnect to his family and his ancestors, while still being a unique individual, is expertly played out when the focus is on the family unit alone. By the film’s end, it would take a particularly hard heart not to shed a tear. There is also a clear reverence for the warmth and distinctiveness of Mexican culture, with many aspects coming into the film’s overall witty pastiche. Thankfully any sense of cultural appropriation is happily somewhat undermined by an excellent uniformly Mexican and Mexican-American voice cast. And there is undoubtedly applause to be given for a family film, particularly one from Disney, that so directly deals with death, mourning, and the afterlife.

          This a warm, often lovely movie animated expertly by the now top of their league animators at Pixar. There is joy in virtually every frame, and it rarely stops for breath throughout its nearly two hour runtime. While it might not break the mould in a story sense, this is still a winning feature, and still head and shoulders above virtually all other animated fare.