Movie Reviews: The Life Ahead packs a hefty emotional punch and there might be an Oscar for Sophia Loren
In this strangest of years, it’s not inconceivable that Sophia Loren might bag herself an Oscar nomination for her role in (12A), her first film in more than a decade. Loren plays Madame Rosa, a former streetwalker in Bari who now earns a living by offering an unofficial foster-mother service for the children of prostitutes.
When she is approached by Dr Coen (Renato Carpentieri) to take in the 12-year-old orphan Momo (Ibrahima Gueye), Madame Rosa refuses, and not least because Momo recently robbed her in the street. Soon, however, Momo has found a place in Madame Rosa’s home, which is a refuge for everyone but Madame Rosa herself: still traumatised by the events of her childhood, when she survived the horrors of Auschwitz, the aging Madame Rosa is terrorised by her own memories. Directed by Sophia Loren’s son Edoardo Ponti, this remake of Madame Rosa (1977) is something of a paean to multi-culturalism, as the Jewish Madame Rosa takes in the young Senegalese immigrant, and in turn reaches out to the local Muslim shopkeeper for help when Momo threatens to run wild. The story tends to sidestep the potentially disastrous elements of its subplots (such as when Momo gets involved with local drug dealers), focusing instead on the relationship that develops between the warring leads, and Ponti is rewarded with two excellent performances. Loren’s stately, iconic presence is gradually eroded as her character slips into fugue states and her mind reverts to experiencing the fears of her childhood, while the young Ibrahima Gueye is simply superb as the semi-feral Momo who gradually comes to trust in love and embrace his pain and loss. The result is a bittersweet drama that favours sweetness and light over gritty realism, but which nonetheless packs a hefty emotional punch. (Netflix)
Another Hollywood icon pops up in (15A), which is set in 1972 and based on the true story of ‘the biggest bank heist in US history’. Harry Barber (Travis Fimmel) is a happy-go-lucky goof obsessed with Steve McQueen who can’t believe his good fortune when his Uncle Enzo (William Fichtner) ropes him into a scheme to heist President Richard Nixon’s re-election slush fund. Enzo’s thinking is that because the slush fund is illegal, Nixon won’t be able to call the cops; besides, the President is otherwise engaged with all that nasty Watergate business. Naturally, things do not go according to plan …
Written by Ken Hixon and Keith Sharon, and directed by Mark Steven Johnson, Finding Steve McQueen is a politically inspired crime caper that hits all the expected beats, but does so in a charmingly offbeat way. The crooks, led by Enzo, are nowhere as smart as they think they are, while the good guys, led by FBI investigator Howard Lambert (Forest Whitaker), aren’t quite as smart as they need to be. In the middle is Harry Barber, the wannabe Steve McQueen who relates the story of the heist to his girlfriend Molly (Rachel Taylor) — and it’s entirely typical of Harry’s luck that Molly’s father happens to be the sheriff of the local PD. Travis Fimmel is hugely likeable in the central role, playing a doofus with a mega-watt smile and a rather tenuous grasp on reality; even so, we find ourselves rooting for him, and especially as he’s ripping off ‘Tricky Dicky’ Nixon. There’s good support too from William Fichtner as the Nixon-hating Enzo, while Forest Whitaker quietly steals every scene he’s in as the lonely, self-effacing but dogged investigator. Clever, tense and cartoonishly implausible, the movie never quite manages to achieve Steve McQueen’s studied cool, and is all the more enjoyable as a result. (various platforms)
(15A) stars Megan Fox as Samantha O’Hara, the leader of a group of mercenaries dispatched to a remote part of Africa to rescue a young woman taken hostage by human traffickers. When the mission goes awry, and the unarmed mercenaries flee for their lives across the unforgiving landscape, they find themselves pursued by the traffickers and preyed upon by a rogue lioness with a taste for human flesh.
Written by Isabel and MJ Bassett, with MJ Bassett directing, Rogue is a tense thriller that starts out in promising fashion, and is further enhanced by the twist that leaves the mercenaries unarmed, but the story is gradually undermined by poor FX: the action sequences are solidly done, but the predatory lioness seems more flickering hologram than killer beast. Megan Fox clearly has a blast playing the hardboiled O’Hara, snapping off orders and kicking all manner of ass, but her star power isn’t strong enough to carry the film alone, and especially when the storytelling veers wildly between thrilling scenarios, ludicrously simplistic twists and crass characterisations. (various platforms)
