Resident Alien theatre review

What is Resident Alien?  Is it a play?  There is no story to speak of.  Is it a biography?  Of sorts.  A tribute?  Yes.  It is a one man show and a character study and a warm-hearted tribute to an entertainer whose chief talent was his captivating personality.  Quentin Crisp was undoubtedly eccentric, but he was also educated and quick-witted.  He was a fascinating man.  So much so that a show in his honour need not bother with a plot, or a clever premise, or dramatic reenactments of his early life.  Simply seeing the man embodied is enough to grip the audience for as long as it takes for him to impart the wisdom he wishes to share.

For he also demonstrated surprising wisdom; Crisp was nothing if not insightful.  His way with words and his manner of delivery mean that the most serious of matters can be made frivolous, and the most complex issues reduced to a snappy phrase. Yet within these glib soundbites and witticisms is great truth.  That was his genius: to succinctly express life's struggles and overcome them with style.

His is a legacy worth learning about, and seeing Resident Alien is an enjoyable way to start.

See Roy Ward bring Crisp to life while you can.  It's as close as you'll get to the real thing.

Motel theatre review

Four stories take place in one motel room.  The stories are unrelated, but the curmudgeonly motel owner appears in each, to varying degrees of importance.  As the format might suggest, the play is something of a mixed bag.

Each story has great dramatic potential, but the development of the characters is lacking, to the point that I found I was often not invested in their plight, or the outcome of each scenario.  The characters never felt like true characters, instead remaining thin representations of a stereotype.  Consequently, the hard-hitting moments never quite land the way they ought to.

There is some strong acting, but generally the emotions are downplayed which gives the play a wash of sameness to it.  However, the cast are not to blame here.  The script simply needs more work.

I just got a bit bored, really.

The scenes would have been helped by an increase in pace.  Things felt slow and time dragged.  The director missed several opportunities to inject a fresh energy.  Even the interludes between scenes were unnecessarily sluggish.  Disappointing.

See this play if you have patience, or a drug that messes with your perception of time.

We're the Millers film review

We're the Millers tries its best to shock with its off-beat morality and frequent vulgarity.  But it takes more than it used to to shock an audience and this does not quite cut it.  It's a funny film, but too often it resorts to base humour and smut.  It's one thing to incorporate adult themes in ones humour, but it is another to make these themes the punchline.  There was a disappointing lack of wit or surprise and this is what ultimately lets down an otherwise strong film.

The story is interesting enough, but it falls into every cliche it could until it ends up just too predictable.

The most enjoyable aspect of the film is the chemistry between Jason Sudeikis and Jennifer Aniston.  They work well together and I hope to see them together with a more developed script next time.

See this film for something colourful and light, or if you're a grubby teenaged boy.

The Way, Way Back film review

The more things change, the more they stay the same?  One of the most appealing elements of this film is that it seems to take place in a more innocent time.  It is 1983 and it is always sunny.  Children can spend all day playing and return home only for meals, they can jump from bridges into rivers, they enjoy the outdoors.  But then, the occasionally product placed igadget determines that it is 2013.  So why the time travel 30 years into the past?  I'm not sure, but it's sweet.  Like Candyland.

And such is the tone of the film in general: sweet, for sweetness' sake.  The story is nothing new: boy dislikes Mom's boyfriend, boy seeks a place to call his own, boy finds male role model and the place he belongs and gets his first kiss.  The summer he came of age.  And eventually Mom sees that boyfriend is a jerk.

It's sweet, lighthearted and gets a few good laughs.  I enjoyed it, but couldn't help feel that I was watching someone's therapy session.  I felt like perhaps the writer was rewriting his adolescence and romanticising it. It is one way of owning it, but that is not the same as writing a beguiling screenplay.  The main fault is that it takes for granted that we are onside with the protagonist.  For me, that allegiance was not fully earned.  Had it been fully earned, the rest of the film would likely have been a lot more satisfying.

See this if you are fond of the '80s and fancy a trip down memory lane.

The Heretic theatre review

The Heretic is a play of two halves.  Act I introduces the viewer to the title character, a controversial scientist, in her natural habitat; her office within the walls of a highly respected university.  Here, she is confident and assertive and in control...until she's not.  Act II shows her at home, where she is less in control, and the play shifts focus to the private lives of her and her daughter.  I thoroughly enjoyed the first act, mostly for the expert comic timing of Jennifer Ward-Lealand and Stelios Yiakmis.  I laughed a lot.  The second act, though, shifted ground too much to carry on what the first act established.

At interval I asked myself what might happen next.  I found it impossible to know.  I found no unresolved questions from the first half that I cared to have answered.  The private lives of the characters were simply not interesting enough to keep my interest, and the professional issues that had arisen had found a resolve of sorts.  And so, in Act II the sub-plot about her daughter takes the focus.  Act II is funny and fast-paced and watchable, but it lacks the originality that made Act I so interesting.

What I enjoyed about Act I is that the subject matter was topical, thought-provoking and shown in a new light.  About time there was a comedy about climate change.  The dialogue is funny, and the tone is set for a comedy of words and ideas, suitable for the academic setting.  When the setting changes, so too does the tone, and it felt like quite a different play.

See this play if you need a happy ending.  Leave at half time if you don't.

Like There's No Tomorrow theatre review

This is a play and it is so many plays and it is performance art and it is awesome!  From the moment I entered The Basement, I was greeted by friendly young things looking for a good time.  I was soon taken under the wing of a popular girl dressed as an ancient Mayan, and she convinced me to take my pants off on the dance floor...maybe that's giving too much away, but the great thing about this work of art is that everyone will have a unique experience.  That was mine, and it almost certainly won't be yours.

The premise is a simple one; a shock death has occurred at a local high school and tonight the friends and peers of the deceased are partying at the "cancelled" afterball.  The Basement provides the venue of a megaparty, utilising every part of the grounds to create a tour of the many sub-parties, and the audience are absorbed as fellow revelers - sometimes part of the action, sometimes flies on the wall but never far from the high dramas of youth gone wild.

I enjoyed myself like I was at a party, so infectious was the energy of the young cast.  I was reminded how fun it was to be a teenager.  Wow.  I never used to buy into that "high school is the best years of your life" stuff, but this show has made me analyse that anew.

Basically, the experience is like no other, and I loved how the many stories interweave and are each given their moment in the spotlight.  But even as a straight play, this would be a strong piece!  The story is truly moving and a little disturbing.  It is so true to life that I recognised many of my schoolmates in the characters drawn for us.  While the acting is mixed, there are some very powerful performances here and overall it bodes well for the future of theatre in Auckland.

See this for an all-consuming experience that will rejuvenate you if you let it.  Just wow.

Mood Indigo film review

No one creates dreamlike worlds quite like Michel Gondry.  The world inhabited in Mood Indigo is cartoon-like and defies many of the physical laws that govern and shape the environment we know.  He uses a variety of methods to achieve this, seamlessly incorporating projections, stop-motion, and a range of tricky special effects I can't name.  But despite this healthy dose of the surreal, the viewer immediately accepts this charming world's unfamiliar qualities.  Much of this effect can be credited to the actors, who take everything in their stride and are kind enough to invite us to follow.  Also, the physical environment in Mood Indigo is used to reflect its characters emotions/health.  In this sense, there is some logic to their world - but it is a dream-logic.

Similarly, the photography of the film reflects the story and transitions from bright-carefree-happy to bleak-struggle-hardship.  The film is at all times beautiful, and it handles this transition well, but ultimately it is this unusual structure that proves to be the film's greatest obstacle.  When a film tells a story of people making it through hard times to reach the good on the other side, the audience is uplifted.  This film does the opposite.  To what effect?  It is sad.  The charming protagonists meet their fate with considerable grace, which provides a sense of hope.  There is an underlying message that love is enough, and that one can choose to meet the hardest of circumstances with dignity.  But mostly, it is sad.  The predominant theme is rather bleak: life is fragile and one random event can be enough to turn our fortunes, perhaps none of us are as far from destitution as we like to believe.  This may be true, but it is not a message most of us like to hear.  And so I think this film will struggle to reach a wide audience.

See this film for a visually beautiful experience.  The story has many charms, but is ultimately more depressing than uplifting.  As far as tragedies go, this is a pretty happy one.