Suffragette

Tags

2010's, Anne-Marie Duff, Ben Whishaw, Brendan Gleeson, Carey Mulligan, Drama, Helena Bonham Carter, Meryl Streep, Sarah Gavron, Suffragette

To celebrate 100 years of women getting the right to the vote in the UK, I decided to review the drama Suffragette.

Film Title

Suffragette

Director

Sarah Gavron

Starring

• Carey Mulligan as Maud Watts
• Helena Bonham Carter as Edith Ellyn
• Anne-Marie Duff as Violet Miller
• Brendan Gleeson as Steed
• Ben Whishaw as Sonny Watts
• Meryl Streep as Emmeline Pankhurst

A deftly done movie that blends fiction and truth, Suffragette charts the rise of the foot soldiers in the fight for women to receive the vote. Well acted and personal, it’s a movie that really strikes to the heart of the cause and what it meant for future generations.

The story begins in 1912, London. Women have for some time peacefully campaigned for the right to vote but their voices have gone unheard. We meet a working class laundress named Maud Watts. She’s had a tough life of abuse and turmoil from men , though she has some comfort at home with her husband Sonny and son George. One day, she is caught up in a demonstration by suffragettes who break all the windows in the West End. Although she doesn’t know it yet, this event and further ones will have a big impact on her. For more demonstrations and talk of women getting the vote takes place, also featuring brutality from the police and the authorities. Having been so downtrodden in her life, Maud gradually aligns herself with the local firebrand Edith Ellyn. After hearing a speech by Suffragette leader Emmeline Pankhurst, Maud is now fully involved with the cause. This in turn earns the scorn of those closest to her and her husband refuses to let her see their son, but these sacrifices stiffen Maud’s spine and further her desire to fight for the vote. For Maud and the women she marches with are determined to gain equality, no matter what the cost.

There’s a real urgency and immediacy to the direction of Sarah Gavron. She excellently showcases the shared strength of women and employs a camera that always seems to be moving. It captures the whirl of events and the gathering storm of demonstrations that the suffragettes take part in, from smashing windows to hunger strikes and blowing up postboxes. Abi Morgan’s script finely dramatizes the struggles of women at the time and how through actions, they were gearing up to have the same rights as men. The main story is fact-based here and is inspiring as well as important in what it depicts. Suffragette features fictional characters interspersed with real life figures in the movement, such as Emmeline Pankhurst and. The biggest message of Suffragette is how far these brave women were willing to go in order to get the vote and eventually equality. These were women from all walks of life who were united by a common goal and were prepared to go the extra mile to have their voices heard. What they went through was extraordinary and often brutal. We see women beaten, humiliated, force-fed and in the course of Suffragette. It’s not easy to watch, but that’s the idea. Women fighting for the right to vote went through a lot and this movie is a testament to them. This is an important story that needs to be told and in this very way. Alexandre Desplat is the person providing the building score that gains in momentum as events take flight and the fight begins to increase in steam and volume.

Carey Mulligan is the lead in Suffragette and boy does she deliver. She has this ability to be totally unaffected and filled with conviction without resorting to histrionics. Her face, that speaks so many volumes, is a marvel at depicting Maud’s shift from bystander to fighter and makes us feel every beat. Helena Bonham Carter shines as a leading member of the group and one of experience, while Anne-Marie Duff is fine as the forceful and agitator of the suffragettes. Then we have Brendan Gleeson as a police inspector caught in between sympathizing with the women and enforcing the law. Ben Whishaw, finding some depth and unpredictability than some parts he is given, displays both a caring attitude to his wife and then a deep coldness when he feels she has shamed him. It’s something I’m not used to seeing by Whishaw, but damn if he doesn’t do it well. Though I expected to see more of Meryl Streep as Emmeline Pankhurst, her cameo is satisfying and provides a rallying cry to Maud and a whole host of women.

An unflinching and inspiring movie that never sugar coats the brutality and resistance that was met by women campaigning for the right to vote, Suffragette has much to recommend in its reels.

28 Days Later

Tags

2000's, 28 Days Later, Brendan Gleeson, Christopher Eccleston, Cillian Murphy, Danny Boyle, Horror, Megan Burns, Naomie Harris, Noah Huntley

Film Title

28 Days Later

Director

Danny Boyle

Starring

• Cillian Murphy as Jim
• Naomie Harris as Selena
• Brendan Gleeson as Frank
• Christopher Eccleston as Major Henry West
• Megan Burns as Hannah
• Noah Huntley as Mark

Danny Boyle’s intensely mounted and terrifying horror 28 Days Later successfully delivers shocks, scares and relatable characters trying to survive in a world of post-apocalyptic wreckage. Sharply scripted and genuinely frightening, it is zombie horror at its finest.

In the beginning, a group of animal activists break into a secret research facility where chimpanzees are being held and experimented on. Despite the warnings of a scientist who catches them that the primates are infected with a highly contagious and violent virus, the trio opens the cages and are subsequently and brutally attacked. 28 days later in a London hospital, a bicycle courier by the name of Jim wakes from a coma. Dazed, he wanders out into the streets where he is greeted by a grim silence and everywhere deserted. Just as he is making a connection of what happened, he is attacked by a ravenous hoard of zombies. Thankfully, he is saved by Selena and Mark, who take him to refuge. The unflinching and very tough Selena explains that while Jim was in a coma, the highly contagious rage virus spread like wildfire among the population, resulting in death and collapse of society. The infected can spread the virus through blood and biting Jim is warned. Moving from place to place with the two survivors, Jim sees how dangerous the situation is when Mark is infected and Selena kills him. They are joined later by optimistic cab driver Frank and his young but very mature daughter Hannah. Continually moving and dodging attacks from the infected, through a radio broadcast, the quartet hears of alleged safety provided by an army camp. But with the virus quickly spreading and supplies dwindling, can the group survive when they come to see that this supposed safety they have been promised could be just as dangerous as the hoards of ravenous zombies on their tail?

Danny Boyle delivers kinetic direction that puts the audience right in the middle of the savagery and battle for survival. Yet what really impressed me about his directing was the way that he kept the pace going but didn’t ignore the character development. Boyle uses these flourishes to punctuate 28 Days Later with moments of tenderness between the core characters, before unleashing the hellish threat of infection and violence upon them. The tight script also gives the characters real emotion that makes us want them to survive the horrific ordeal. The roving camerawork highlights the race for survival and how these characters are on the move constantly. A grimy visual style creates a darkly authentic portrait of society gone to ruin, in an almost allegorical way. Haunting images abound but nothing beats the eerie silence and genuine sense of discomfort emitted from the scenes of Jim walking around an abandoned London seeing that the world he once knew has been altered. There is something so chilling about those scenes that I can’t put my finger on. And 28 Days Later deserves credit for the redesign of the usual sloping zombies in the horror genre. Here they are fast-moving and very frightening things and seeing them will stay in your head for a long time. A dark score of ambience and ever-growing intensity keeps the pace of the film ticking over and induces goosebumps in the process. I think it’s fair to say that 28 Days Later is not just another zombie movie, it has more to it than that and it rises above many other films in the genre.

Cillian Murphy wonderfully portrays the disoriented and shocked nature of Jim, who awakens to find his world upside down and very dangerous. Murphy makes the character sympathetic as well as capable of surviving these dire circumstances he has been thrust into. Making a very strong impact is Naomie Harris in her performance as Selena. A battle hardened fighter who doesn’t beat around the bush and won’t back down, Harris excellently gives voice to a character that has resided herself to the fact that she must do whatever she can to go on living and how weakness is not an option. Lighting up the supporting cast is Brendan Gleeson displaying gruff charm and affable kindness as Frank, who manages to find something to smile about most of the time despite the situation he is in. A slimy turn from Christopher Eccleston as a corrupt major who poses another dangerous threat to the group brings another face of shock to the piece. The only real acting casualties in this film are a bland Megan Burns and an underused Noah Huntley. Other than that, the cast is strong and very reliable.

Intense, deeply unsettling and brutally compelling, 28 Days Later is one effective slice of terror.