Under the Radar - Great films that may have passed you by: Madeo

Madeo (Mother) - Joon-ho Bong - 2009

Let’s play a little word association game. I’m going to say something, and then I’m going to try and guess the first word that comes into your head. Ok here goes: ‘amazing filmmaking nations’.

You’re thinking ‘Korea’ aren’t you? No? Well then you obviously haven’t seen Mother, in which case read on!

Since the early noughties, South Korean cinema has begun to grow and it is one of the few nations in which Hollywood films don’t dominate at the box office. Bong Joon-ho’s Madeo is just one example of the growing confidence of this industry.

The film centres around the relationship of hapless, seemingly mentally retarded Do-joon (Won Bin) and his long suffering, but ultimately loving Mother (Hye-ja Kim). When a high school girl is found murdered and left for all to see atop a building in the centre of their village, all fingers instantly point to Do-Joon. However, determined that her son is innocent, his mother sets out to find evidence to the contrary, and will stop at nothing to overturn the conviction.

Submarine: Sinking Ship or Riding the Waves to Success

Anyone reading this, who is in their late teens, twenties or above, will know that sometimes adolescence can suck, and sometimes it can be brilliant, but very rarely does it follow along the same (slim, toned, sexy, spot-free, care-free) lines of coming of age films like American Pie.

I can’t speak for the entire population, but my teenage years were more ‘Inbetweeners’ than ‘Skins’, so it was really refreshing to go to the cinema and watch a film which honours and celebrates these awkward years of life, rather than trying to pretend it’s an easy ride of parties, booze and casual sex.

I’m talking about Richard Ayoade’s debut film Submarine, which tells the incredibly ordinary, but incredibly well observed tale of a 15 year old boy growing up in Wales; his life, his first love, and how he deals with his parents' failing marriage.

Under the Radar - Great films that may have passed you by: Let the Right One In

Låt den Rätte Komma In (Let the Right One In) - 2008 - Thomas Alfredson

It’s almost as if Hollywood enjoys ruining films. It’s as if they take pleasure out of watching a highly original concept, translating a foreign script into english, americanising it, throwing in some filmic clichés and generally taming it for their mass market.

I could name a hundred different examples, but the one I have chosen is Thomas Alfredson’s Låt den Rätte Komma In (Let the Right One In), recently ‘re-imagined’ (seemingly an industry term for ruined) and released as Let Me In.

One to Watch: Christopher and his Kind

When David Tennant finally called it quits on his tenure as the Doctor, all eyes were on his next role. Sadly it transpired to be the the incredibly damp 'Single Father' on BBC.

It was a very safe choice of follow-up, which didn't particularly test any of his acting ability, or help him reach a wider viewership than he had whilst on Doctor Who.

It did however, manage to break any question of potential type-casting.

The current Doctor Matt Smith (who has been unfairly branded an 'unknown' until this point), who also seems eager to avoid potential type-casting, has done a Daniel Radcliffe and chosen a bold and challenging role to break up his performance on Doctor Who.

Under the Radar: Great films that may have passed you by: The Fall

The Fall - 2006 - Tarsem Singh

‘Fantasy film is just escapism’ say the skeptics and critics of the genre. 

Wrong. 

For a film to be successful you have to invest in the world of the story; you have to become part of it. Its function is to transport viewers away from their cinema seats to the world on screen, rendering all films escapist to a certain extent.

The thing about fantasy is that it transports us to a world completely different from our own.

Oh, wrong again?

In actuality, fantasy cinema merely presents our own social anxieties and problems metaphorically.  In the same way that children create ghost stories for old buildings, and Freud believed dreams help us to solve problems in our daily lives, escaping to a fantasy world, whether it be on screen or in our own heads, can be therapeutic.

Under the Radar: Great films that may have passed you by: Brick

‘High School Drama’ and ‘Great Film’ are two phrases that you don’t often find together in the same sentence, paragraph of review. Usually High School teen flicks are pretty plotless and formulaic, adhering to a number of genre stereotypes; the geek, the outcast, the jock and the cheerleader and how their lives are (superficially) affected by the presence of the other.

Even the great, intelligent High School films - I’m thinking Cruel Intentions and The Breakfast Club - are party to these conventions.

But once in a while a writer jots these clichés down on a piece of paper, rips them up and throws them in the bin. Or in the case of Brick, chuck them into a pile of Film Noir standards, mixes them up and create an incredibly interesting take on the two genres.