Film reviews: The Punk Syndrome | Bullet to the Head | Hyde Park on Hudson | Antiviral

The Punk Syndrome (TBC)

Directed by: Jukka Kärkkäinen, Jani-Petteri Passi

* * *

REMINISCENT of Jerry Rothwell’s similarly themed 2008 documentary Heavy Load, The Punk Syndrome focuses on another band of adults with learning difficulties who’ve gravitated towards the DIY ethos of punk to make their voices heard. In Jukka Kärkkäinen and Jani-Petteri Passi’s entertainingly rough-and-ready doc, it’s the four members of Finnish punk band Name Day whose committed, attitudinal approach to music allows the filmmakers to explore first hand some of the difficulties and frustrations that arise from having autism or Downs Syndrome.

Taking a defiantly unsentimental view of their subjects, they approach the band the way they would any rock group: filming them verité-style and searching for drama in the conflicts that erupt as they attempt to balance their on-stage life with the realities – both good and bad – of their home lives. Here, the filmmakers have also been blessed with a wonderfully cantankerous frontman in Pertti Kurikka, whose frequent attempts to enforce his creative vision on the band leads to some amusing clashes. What shines through most strongly, though, is both the sense of camaraderie and the personal benefits each band member takes from the experience. It also reinforces why punk, in its purest form, continues to be the music of choice for society’s outsiders.

Bullet to the Head (15)

Directed by: walter hill

Starring: Sylvester Stallone, Sung Kang, Jason Momoa, Christian Slater

* *

NOW that The Expendables has provided Sylvester Stallone with another vaguely successful franchise beyond the Rocky and Rambo films, he seems to be getting another crack at making the kind of terrible action film that has traditionally exposed his inability to engage with audiences outside of his franchise roles.

Exhibit A? Bullet to the Head, a deadening graphic novel adaptation destined to fall onto the scrapheap of past Stallone clunkers such as Cobra, Lock Up, Daylight and that dismal Get Carter remake. That the film also marks the return of director Walter Hill after an 11-year hiatus is even more depressing, particularly since some of the film’s early action scenes have the kind of pleasing old-school brutality one might expect from the director of The Warriors, Southern Comfort and Extreme Prejudice.

Sadly, Hill seems intent on recycling gags and mismatched buddy routines from 48 Hours and Red Heat as Stallone’s double- crossed, ridiculously named hitman Jimmy Bobo teams up with a Korean- American detective (Sung Kang) to bring down a corrupt real-estate developer. Even watched in an indulgent frame of mind, this is dull, retrograde rubbish.

Hyde Park on Hudson (15)

Directed by: Roger Michell

Starring: Bill Murray, Laura Linney, Olivia Colman, Olivia Williams

LIKELY rushed into production the moment The King’s Speech conquered all before it, this rather shameless wannabe prequel attempts to cash in by

exploring the origins of the “special relationship” forged between Britain and America during King George VI and Queen Elizabeth’s first state visit to the United States in the summer of 1939. Hosted by polio-crippled president Franklin Delano Roosevelt (Bill Murray) in his titular country estate, it’s an occasion for broad culture-clashing comedy as the First Family’s refusal to stand too much on ceremony winds up the Queen (played by Olivia Colman) but wins over the nervous, stuttering Bertie (Samuel West), who finds a father figure in FDR.

Largely charmless as this is, it’s nothing compared to the curious story that director Roger Michell and screenwriter Richard Nelson have deployed as a framing device. Told from the point of view of FDR’s “fifth or sixth” cousin Daisy (Laura Linney), the film becomes a rather coy exploration of the president’s sexual peccadilloes, with Daisy kept around to provide some “relief” for the president – and let’s re-iterate: her cousin – from the stresses of running the country. It’s icky stuff, not helped by Murray giving perhaps the worst performance of his career. And I include Garfield 2.

Antiviral (15)

Directed by: brandon Cronenberg

Starring: Caleb Landry Jones, Sarah Gadon, Malcolm McDowell

* * *

THE apple doesn’t fall far from the tree in this debut feature from Brandon Cronenberg, son of body horror pioneer David Cronenberg. Set in a dystopian future in which society’s sick obsession with fame has resulted in an eruption of genuine maladies, Antiviral certainly shares plenty of DNA with the likes of Shivers, Rabid, Videodrome and The Fly.

But credit where credit’s due: the younger Cronenberg demonstrates a sure touch when it comes to creating striking visuals and he’s also managed to come up with an intriguing, well-thought-through concept to explore a much-pored-over subject. That concept involves a private clinic that peddles the viruses of ill celebrities to the obsessive fans that worship them. With a lot of money involved in cultivating cell cultures from desirable celebrities, there’s also a thriving black market for such things, which makes temptation rife among the clinic’s employees.

One such employee is the film’s pallid-looking protagonist Syd Marsh (Caleb Landry Jones) who stumbles into a sinister situation after injecting himself with the virus of the world’s most desirable celebrity, unaware that it has already killed her. What follows is an intriguing and fairly stylish mix of sci-fi, horror and detective movie tropes that suggest Cronenberg might soon step out from his father’s shadow.

Bullhead (15)

Directed by: Michaël R Roskam

Starring: Matthias Schoenaerts, Jeroen Perceval, Jeanne Dandoy

* * * *

THIS brutal Belgian crime movie features a stunning lead performance from Rust & Bone’s Matthias Schoenaerts. A cattle farmer who doubles as an enforcer for more criminal enterprises, his character may not be a million miles from the

bare-knuckle brawler he played in Jacques Audiard’s drama, but he has been furnished with such a rich, distinctive and wince-inducing back-story that it’s hard not to be simultaneously enthralled and repelled by him.

This is Jacky, a steroid-abusing man-mountain whose uncle is involved in sale and supply of illegal (and highly profitable) growth hormones for cattle. When an undercover cop investigating the trade is killed, this somewhat dubious side of the family business is thrown into disarray, with Jacky in particular determined to opt out. What’s fascinating about Bullhead, though, is that while director Michael R Roskam has created a convoluted but airtight plot involving undercover investigations, betrayals and revenge, it doesn’t go in the direction one might expect.

Instead, beginning with a flashback to a horrific incident in Jacky’s childhood, it becomes a fascinating study of man’s primal instincts, one that explains Jacky’s bulked up physique and his raging anger but also explores his crippling feelings of inadequacy in a way that is utterly compelling and tragic.

Film reviews: The Punk Syndrome | Bullet to the Head | Hyde Park on Hudson | Antiviral | Bullhead