Lebanon

Film distribution in Britain is hardly awash with Israeli product and yet by one of those curious quirks of fate I've ended up seeing *two* Israeli movies in as many days. Lebanon might be the higher profile of the pair but I much preferred the tender and sad Eyes Wide Open. Lebanon's concept of confining the action to the tank's interior while limited the outside world to what can be seen through the tank's viewfinder sounds like an intriguing premise. It does indeed convey the squalor and claustrophobia of the 4 soldiers, but the zooms of the viewfinder rapidly start to feel like a gimmick instead of a valid artistic choice. In fact at times it becomes worryingly voyeuristic, focussing on the distressed or lifeless faces of the Lebanese. There's no attempt to put the war in context, and like Waltz with Bashir, it pretty much lets the Israelis off the hook. The complicity of central command with the Phalangists is the exception. Their brutality inevitably conjures up the spectre of Sabra and Shatila but otherwise it's a thoroughly inward-looking film.

Eyes Wide Open

Eyes Wide Open ends with an ambiguous image: Aaron, respectable family man once more, revisits the spring outside Jerusalem where he swam with his soon-to-be lover Ezri. He immerses himself anumber of times before finally disappearing under the water. Are we to view this as a suicide attempt or as something more metaphoric? Certainly the spring is the location where Aaron was first led astray ("when did you last leave Jerusalem?" Ezri asks him) but it's also the beginning of his rebirth (Aaron tells the rabbi that he was dead before he met Ezri and now he's alive) Is it even possible to go back to his previous existence once Ezri departs?
The ultra-Orthodox community where both men live is not an environment where their love can flourish. Initially Aaron rebuffs Ezri's advances by claiming that resisting temptation will bring both of them to God and to the outside world he seems initially to be trying to redeem the young man (already thrown out of his previous yeshiva) However this only torments them further. Ironically they finally succumb in the cold store of the butcher's shop that Aaron owns, and their affair plays out in the confines of this building, yet from the start it is doomed. Ezri, the only character who is true to his nature, is viewed with hostility by the community; his former lover pretends nothing happened and coldly rejects him; and prying eyes are everywhere. Even worse, members of the synagogue take it upon themselves to be the upholders of morality - and Aaron himself is one of them. He is one of the trio that visit a young transgressor. The man may claim that he and the girl Sara are deeply in love but her father has arranged a marriage for her and the obstacle must be removed. It's no surprise when Aaron finds himself the recipient of such visits, complete with threats of a boycott and broken windows. Posters proclaim "A sinner in the neighbourhood" and Ezri is ostracized, and later beaten up while Aaron does nothing to help. Once more the young man is driven away. Love, it appears, is no match for persecution and intolerance.

Robin Hood

Ridley Scott's Robin Hood and Richard Lester's elegiac Robin and Marian bookend the legend itself. Both cleverly utilise the well-known tale, with the latter showing the outlaw and his companions at the end of their lives, gathering themselves for one final battle. Robin Hood on the other hand shows us the genesis of the legend, with subtle tweaks. King Richard, so often viewed as the ultimate saviour of England, here dies at the beginning of the film. The Sheriff of Nottingham is a marginal, ineffective figure, and certainly no match for the ruthless traitor Godfrey. Robin himself has a double identity: the humble archer, who fought alongside King Richard on Crusade, ends up impersonating the noble Locksley initially in order to return home. However, he retains his new identity at the specific request of Locksley's blind, elderly father. Marian meanwhile is a feisty independent woman, as befits someone who has been responsible for her husband's domain during his 10 year absence, yet also keenly aware of her potential vulnerability - with no heir, the death of both her husband and father-in-law would leave her destitute. Amid all these slight revisions there's nonetheless an undoubted thrill at the first sight of Friar Tuck or realizing that Robin's antagonist in an early scene is the future Little John. Historians of course had best take a deep breath and ignore the usual Hollywood embellishments (Magna Carta? really?) and the geography is deeply confusing (for such a small island nation it's alarmingly easy to wonder where on earth the characters have ended up this time). The less said about some of the accents the better. Yet it's a pleasingly gritty Middle Ages, where even King Richard's crown looks more like a helmet, and ordinary people are thoroughly at the mercy of the nobility. Definitely not Errol Flynn then, but on its own terms it has merit.

Lion's Den

A prison movie with a difference, Lion's Den focuses on the females inmates in the mother-and-child wing. In doing so it manages to both cunningly disguise the cliches of the genre (lesbian relationships, fights, riots) and be deeply unsettling. The children remain with their mothers until they are 4 so their formative years are spent incarcerated in a run-down cell block. Julia gives birth and raises her child while in jail for murder (although it's never clear what actually transpired between her, the injured Ramiro and the dead Nahuel). Despite inevitable tensions, there's a communal approach to childcare - Marta initially feeds baby Tomas as Julia can't cope (a crying baby sets off a chain reaction of wailing children and shouting prisoners) - and the children do attend a kindergarten inside the prison. The bars of a prison door double as a climbing frame and colourful stickers adorn the grimy window of a cell, while the maternal bond is never in doubt. One woman cuts her wrists when her child reaches the age for removal and Julia falls apart when her mother takes Tomas. It's a tricky dilemma: prison is clearly no place for these young children (they can't run around in a park or make new friends or do any of the things other children do) and yet they also need to be with their mothers. This is the heart of the film, and as Tomas grows physically so does Julia emotionally, reflected in her hair changing from a dyed blonde mane to a brunette crop. The wish-fulfilment ending only emphasises the true impossibility of the situation.

City of Life and Death

Remarkably, considering this is a Chinese film based around the infamous Rape of Nanking in 1937, the closest we have to a protagonist is Kadokawa, a young Japanese soldier. There's no hero, rather a selection of people from different walks of life struggling to survive in an occupied city. Considering that the film doesn't fudge the atrocities committed, it's a remarkably restrained piece of work. The black and white cinematography helps, occasionally feeling like newsreel footage but mostly radiating an air of sober melancholy. Not that it's dull film-making. There are virtuoso sequences, such as the cross-cutting of the massacre of Chinese POWs or the framing and editing of the Japanese celebration of victory. Elsewhere classical film-making alternates with handheld camerawork, and the framing is unerringly spot-on (amid the chaos of a small room, as soldiers attempt to drag away women, one unexpectedly - and shockingly - lifts a small child onto a windowledge, opens the window and throws her out; Kadokawa, standing benumbed amid the draped beds of the "comfort women") Survival is a lottery: a young boy somehow survives the massacre that kills his idol Lu; the bodies of the luckless "comfort women" are piled on carts; Tang swaps places with a disguised Chinese officer, in effect sacrificing himself as amends for collaborating with the Japanese. There might not be much character development but the characters themselves are impressively nuanced. The Japanese commit appalling acts but are never actually demonized. Rabe might be a Nazi but he (futilely) attempts to defend the refugees in the Safety Zone (and is recalled by an irritated Hitler). Tang only wants to protect his family but his actions result in the massacre of wounded Chinese soldiers in the Safety Zone and the murder of his daughter and sister-in-law. Kadokawa kills a woman out of mercy before freeing 2 prisoners. It's not an easy watch by any means but it's never exploitative or hectoring. It doesn't need to be. The events are powerful enough to grip the viewer.

Iron Man 2

The problem with many sequels is that they are swamped by the urge to be bigger and better than the original. Mostly this merely equates to being louder, more frenetic and less coherent. Very rarely do they end up better (The Dark Knight is a notable exception) Iron Man 2 isn't necessarily better than its predecessor but it does remember what made the first one such a wonderful, enjoyable surprise: RDJ's mercurial, witty performance; a focus on the human amid all the metallic suits; and exciting action set pieces. Stark is now juggling the demands of being a superhero, fending off the unwelcome attention of the government, running a multinational corporation and battling with his own mortality (ironically the thing that keeps him alive is also the thing that is killing him) He's more snarky and reckless than ever, unwilling to recognize that he's alienating the people who care about him.
As in The Dark Knight, the law of unintended consequences comes into play. Venal business rival Justin Hammer aims to produce his own version of the Iron Man suit to sell to the military, despite an inherent incompetence (there's a running joke about the essential shoddiness of Hammer's military hardware). Far more dangerous is Ivan Venko, a man with a vendetta against the Stark family. A tech genius to rival Stark, he's also far more cunning than Hammer who foolishly thinks he can control Venko purely because of his wealth. The set piece at the Monaco Grand Prix sets up key character beats (Stark's bravado and vulnerability, Pepper's loyalty) and establishes the very real threat posed by Venko. Seen to be fallible, Stark's world teeters on the brink of collapse: his enemies circle, his behaviour becomes increasingly erreatic and he drives away his closest allies Pepper (even as he realizes he loves her) and Rhodey (who makes off with one of the suits after a bout of robotic fisticuffs that wrecks Stark's malibu mansion)
If there's one problem with the film it's the need to exist on 2 separate levels - on its own terms and as a piece of the Avengers jigsaw puzzle. Cue Nick Fury appearing to lecture Stark and provide exposition (the file helpfully entitled Avengers Initiative is hilariously heavy-handed); Black Widow infiltrating Stark Industries (and in a great scene taking out ALL of Hammer's security while Happy's struggling to deal with one guard); and Stark's resourceful yet amusingly disrespectful use of Cap's shield. As for the Iron Man films themselves, there remains just a small, lurking suspicion that too much action involving men in iron suits and/or robots hitting merry hell out of each other might ultimately become just a tad repetitive - though Jon Favreau (unlike Michael Bay) thankfully seems to understand that the action works as well as it does because the audience feels empathy with the characters. The Iron Man suit is indeed incredibly cool but it would count for little without the fascinatingly flawed Tony Stark inside it.