Movie reviews: Ant-Man, True Story, The Gallows

Ant-Man (12A) may be one of the more improbable luminaries in the pantheon of comic book heroes, given that his powers are derived from his ability to shrink to a miniscule size, but this origin tale of how Scott Lang (Paul Rudd) becomes the tiniest superhero of them all is arguably Marvel’s most engaging movie.

The story opens in 1989, when scientist Dr Hank Pym (Michael Douglas) refuses to allow his radical new technology be used for military purposes.

Decades later, when Pym’s protégé Darren Cross (Corey Stoll) threatens to unleash his own version of the technology — which involves the weaponisation of ant-like creatures — Pym offers convicted burglar Lang the opportunity of redemption by way of an audacious heist designed to destroy Cross’s plans for world domination.

Director Peyton Reed applies the same broad narrative strokes as can be found in most other superhero tales, of course, but where Ant-Man scores is in the characterisations, and particularly that of Scott, who is for the most part a feckless adult who craves a proper relationship with his daughter, Cassie (Abby Ryder Fortson).

Rudd is terrific as the self-deprecating, self-doubting Scott, his deadpan humour neatly intersecting with the script’s nods and winks to the Marvel universe (the ant-man apparatus, Dr Pym tells Scott, “isn’t just cute technology like the Iron Man suit”).

Rudd gets strong support from Evangeline Lilly, playing Pym’s daughter and Scott’s love interest, although Michael Peña, as Scott’s hilariously larcenous buddy Luis, steals the show every time he appears on screen. All told, it’s an action-packed thriller with real heart.

True Story (15A) is a richly ironic title for a movie — which is based on real events — that documents in its early stages the fall from grace of New York Times reporter Michael Finkel (Jonah Hill), whose career is derailed when he files a story making claims he is later unable to corroborate.

Badly wounded, Finkel retreats to Oregon to lick his wounds, and is subsequently shocked to discover that Christian Longo (James Franco), who is accused of murdering his wife and three children, has been arrested in Mexico while travelling under Finkel’s name.

Grasping the opportunity to rehabilitate his reputation, Finkel establishes a rapport with Longo, and the pair set to work on a book that will reveal the truth about what really happened to Longo’s family.

The feature-length debut from director Rupert Goold (who co-writes the script with David Kajganich, adapting Finkel’s own account of his relationship with Longo), True Story is an enthralling psychological drama, not least because we are never sure how far we can trust either Longo or Finkel to do the right thing.

Strongly reminiscent of the classic true-crime story In Cold Blood, it’s a tale that attempts to come to terms with the kind of mind capable of horrific cruelty (the opening sequence is both poetic and brutally heart-wrenching), but also explores the extent to which Finkel is prepared to overlook Longo’s amorality in pursuit of the exclusive that will remake his career.

James Franco is superb as Longo, a chillingly charming sociopath with the haunted face of an El Greco saint, his performance more than compensating for the miscasting of the avuncular Jonah Hill as a hardnosed reporter.

The Gallows (12A) opens in 1993, with home-movie footage of a high school play which ends in tragedy when a young actor, Charlie Grimmel, is accidentally hanged on stage.

Two decades later, the school decides to stage the play again, with football player Reese (Reese Houser) in the lead role.

Persuaded by his friend Ryan (Ryan Shoos) to wreck the production by destroying the set the night before the play is due to open, Reese, Ryan and Ryan’s girlfriend Cassidy (Cassidy Spiker) break into the school after dark — only to find that the theatre is haunted by the ghost of Charlie Grimmel, all the exits are mysteriously barred, and someone, or something, is bent on lethal revenge.

Written and directed by Travis Cluff and Chris Lofing, The Gallows is a humdrum horror riddled with plot holes from the very beginning (would any school ever restage a play that went so horribly wrong in the past?).

Houser, Shoos, Spiker and Pfeifer Ross are all persuasive as irritatingly self-absorbed teens, but the conceit of the ‘found footage’ style — Ryan is filming everything on his digital cam-recorder — isn’t particularly novel, and the frights are few and far between.

Indeed, with its theatre setting, cast of precocious teens and even a creepy janitor wandering around, The Gallows works best as a homage to virtually any Scooby-Doo episode you’ve ever seen, and is about as plausible and scary.