0:00:00 > 0:00:01withdrawal from the Australian Open, after Serena Williams announced she
0:00:01 > 0:00:04wouldn't be competing in Melbourne. That's all in FA Cup sports day at
0:00:04 > 0:00:086:30pm, but now it's time for The Film Review.
0:00:19 > 0:00:23Hello and welcome to The Film Review on BBC News.
0:00:23 > 0:00:33To take us through this week's cinema releases is Jason Solomons.
0:00:34 > 0:00:38What have you been watching?This week, we find out what happened when
0:00:38 > 0:00:42Christopher Plummer replaced Kevin Spacey as John Paul Getty. That
0:00:42 > 0:00:48isn't them, actually. That's the next film, Hostiles, with Christian
0:00:48 > 0:00:54Bale and Rosamund Pike, the ways of the west revived oral revised. We'll
0:00:54 > 0:01:00be looking at Ben Stiller as well, checking into a midlife crisis in
0:01:00 > 0:01:04Brad's Status, taking his son on a tour of college campuses and
0:01:04 > 0:01:08reminiscing about his own life and where it's all gone wrong for him.
0:01:08 > 0:01:15But let's start with All The Money In The World. I am reeling from the
0:01:15 > 0:01:19fact that Christopher Plummer is 88, because he looks astonishing.That
0:01:19 > 0:01:25is what you can do with all that money, a lot of CGI! John Paul
0:01:25 > 0:01:29Getty, who Spacey was playing, and the film has got rid of him and
0:01:29 > 0:01:32replaced him with Christopher plummy, the very feat that is what
0:01:32 > 0:01:40marks this note out a footnote in film history. Extraordinary from
0:01:40 > 0:01:43Ridley Scott to reshape his film around a new performance in
0:01:43 > 0:01:47Christopher Plummer. We watch the film now, especially in this
0:01:47 > 0:01:51climate, trying to see the join, to see if there was a ready break glow
0:01:51 > 0:01:55of CGI inserts from Christopher Plummer. Can we spot a bit Kevin
0:01:55 > 0:02:03Spacey, you can't, it's seamless, it's well done and Christopher
0:02:03 > 0:02:06Plummer is fabulous as John Paul Getty. I think they would have been
0:02:06 > 0:02:09a different... Ridley Scott talked about how Christopher Plummer is a
0:02:09 > 0:02:14twinkle in his eye, whereas Kevin Spacey had a more cold look, and
0:02:14 > 0:02:22that marks the film apart. We pity John Getty for being the richest man
0:02:22 > 0:02:24ever in the worldand his grandson is kidnapped, and that's the
0:02:24 > 0:02:32essence.It was a huge media case in the 1970s, it gripped the world, as
0:02:32 > 0:02:37John Paul Getty refused to pay the ransom, $17 million, which was quite
0:02:37 > 0:02:43a lot of money! The point was that it became this kind of case and he
0:02:43 > 0:02:49refused to budge and I think we are supposed to see John Paul Getty as a
0:02:49 > 0:02:51curmudgeon and Scrooge, but Christopher Plummer gives it a real
0:02:51 > 0:02:57edge. There is a fabulous speech about him not trusting people, only
0:02:57 > 0:03:00objects, of which he amasses a huge amount. They don't give him grief.
0:03:00 > 0:03:05But the rest of the film is going on, Michelle Williams Golden Globe
0:03:05 > 0:03:09nominated, and we will find out the results from LA on Monday for the B
0:03:09 > 0:03:12film has been nominated for I guess the feet of Scott getting it
0:03:12 > 0:03:19together. Christopher Plummer is nominated and Michelle Williams is
0:03:19 > 0:03:27nominated, and here she is wandering into the media storm.
0:03:27 > 0:03:29HUBBUB OF VOICES.
0:03:29 > 0:03:33My son, Paul, must be very frightened right now.
0:03:33 > 0:03:36I know I'm frightened for him.
0:03:36 > 0:03:39So, to the people who took him, I don't care
0:03:39 > 0:03:44why you did this, but I ask as a mother that you think of your own
0:03:44 > 0:03:47children or the child that you once were and set my boy free.
0:03:47 > 0:03:49Thank you.
0:03:49 > 0:03:51Her son's disappeared.
0:03:51 > 0:03:56A mother should cry for her son.
0:03:56 > 0:03:57Enough.
0:03:57 > 0:03:58Let the lady through.
0:03:58 > 0:03:59Let's go!
0:03:59 > 0:04:00HUBBUB OF VOICES.
0:04:00 > 0:04:01Miss Getty, I'm Corvo.
0:04:01 > 0:04:02I'm the lead investigator.
0:04:02 > 0:04:03Would you please follow us.
0:04:03 > 0:04:04Grazie.
0:04:04 > 0:04:05HUBBUB OF VOICES.
0:04:05 > 0:04:07Tell us more.
0:04:07 > 0:04:08You said you had the money.
0:04:08 > 0:04:14HUBBUB OF VOICES.
0:04:14 > 0:04:17I'm a big fan of Michelle Williams, and he sure spoken quite nicely
0:04:17 > 0:04:22about how she felt Ridley Scott was trying to really show this
0:04:22 > 0:04:24horrendous story of the kidnap of a child through the mother 's eyes.
0:04:24 > 0:04:31Does that come through western mock it does come through. -- does that
0:04:31 > 0:04:36come through? She reminded me of Catherine Hepburn with that accent.
0:04:36 > 0:04:42The story between Kevin Spacey and Christopher Plummer deflected a lot,
0:04:42 > 0:04:50and it's quite a hammy role, as John Paul Getty. And then you've got
0:04:50 > 0:04:55some, -- be son, played by Charlie Plummer, no relation, kidnapped and
0:04:55 > 0:05:03held hostage in Calabria by the Italian Mafia. So you never quite
0:05:03 > 0:05:07know what the centre of the story is. For me, it became about
0:05:07 > 0:05:11Christopher Plummer, and it kind of eclipses Michelle Williams, who is
0:05:11 > 0:05:16very good, and the film looks good in a classic Ridley Scott smooth the
0:05:16 > 0:05:19way. It didn't get to the of the matter. Your heart went out to what
0:05:19 > 0:05:24it must be like to being the richest man in the world. It's something
0:05:24 > 0:05:28I've been contemplating!
0:05:28 > 0:05:35Is the next film going to be brutal? I have heard lots about it but not
0:05:35 > 0:05:39seen it, Hostiles.There is room for one or two westerns per year now. It
0:05:39 > 0:05:45is to be what Hollywood and America was made on. But now Hostiles, I
0:05:45 > 0:05:50think we can tell there is irony in the title. It's what American army
0:05:50 > 0:05:54is called the Army, but American cowboys and soldiers used to call
0:05:54 > 0:05:56the Native Americans, Indians they were known as. We're not allowed to
0:05:56 > 0:06:03call them that now. When you have a film that revises that, what do you
0:06:03 > 0:06:07do about the brutality of the old west? This film opens with Rosamund
0:06:07 > 0:06:16Pike and her entire family wiped out by Comanche Indians, so you are
0:06:16 > 0:06:19already thinking, I don't see where the balance is with a new look at
0:06:19 > 0:06:24the west, where we expect white America to be slightly kind of
0:06:24 > 0:06:28apologetic for the way Native Americans were treated. This film
0:06:28 > 0:06:32doesn't do that, which is quite brave of it. Rest in bail is the
0:06:32 > 0:06:38Army man who has to escort a posse of Cheyenne Indians back to their
0:06:38 > 0:06:43natural homeland, and they come under attack from Comanche Indians.
0:06:43 > 0:06:46Nobody comes out of it particularly well. It is quite brutal and bleak.
0:06:46 > 0:06:50But I think that is what it was like. So that realism, that
0:06:50 > 0:06:54revisionism of what the Giroux is, going back to believe the kid, or
0:06:54 > 0:06:59dances with wolves with Kevin Costner. -- of what they hear row
0:06:59 > 0:07:05is.Quite tough to watch?Yes, and you don't get the payoff you usually
0:07:05 > 0:07:14do with a hero emerging.A bit more uplift in our third choice, I say
0:07:14 > 0:07:18with some hope?It's a comedy, but a maudlin one, about Ben Stiller
0:07:18 > 0:07:22experiencing a midlife crisis. I thought it was very funny, directed
0:07:22 > 0:07:29by Mike Whyte, who people might know as the director of School Of Rock
0:07:29 > 0:07:31for jet black. This is about Ben Stiller having to take his son,
0:07:31 > 0:07:37Troy, on a tour of colleges. Americans do this, flying off to see
0:07:37 > 0:07:50which colleges they want to get into, one of which is harboured --
0:07:50 > 0:07:53Harvard. It sparks reminiscences by Ben Stiller of his childhood chums
0:07:53 > 0:07:57and how much they have done better.
0:07:57 > 0:08:02I couldn't help but wonder, when was the last time Craig Fisher flew in
0:08:02 > 0:08:14economy? Probably not in decades. Yes, thank you.I know Jason
0:08:14 > 0:08:26Hadfield has his own private plane. Never has to fly commercial at all.
0:08:26 > 0:08:34Nick probably flies private, too. Must be nice to always have PCs part
0:08:34 > 0:08:47for you. -- the seas parting for you. Nothing out of reach,
0:08:47 > 0:08:50everything an option. It must be like a drug, all of this being
0:08:50 > 0:08:58important and special. Better than all the adventures, the exotic
0:08:58 > 0:09:04destinations.
0:09:04 > 0:09:14So does everybody leave the cinema feeling inadequate?A first world
0:09:14 > 0:09:20problems. The MPs his son and his friends, but then he goes, pull
0:09:20 > 0:09:24yourself together, you just live in Sacramento. It's about assessing
0:09:24 > 0:09:28those things, and I thought it was painfully smart and funny, well done
0:09:28 > 0:09:33and well performed by Ben Stiller, we think that they, the former doing
0:09:33 > 0:09:37his blue steel look, but he does this well and he gets good midlife
0:09:37 > 0:09:41crisis very well, but perhaps it's a bit close to home for me, not that
0:09:41 > 0:09:46my son is at college yet.
0:09:46 > 0:09:50Let's talk about something lovely.I think having to 2 is not just the
0:09:50 > 0:09:55best out but one of the best of last year. It is still doing great box
0:09:55 > 0:10:00office and I think he is adorable. -- Paddington 2. I have seen it
0:10:00 > 0:10:06twice. I will happily go again. If I was the richest man in the world,
0:10:06 > 0:10:11I'd go and see Paddington 2 everyday.For anybody who wants to
0:10:11 > 0:10:19stay in...I would get the DVD of Houthi, in east end set in melodrama
0:10:19 > 0:10:23starring bill nicely, a wonderful performance from Olivia Cooke, and
0:10:23 > 0:10:28it's about murders going on, a sort of Jack the Ripper style thriller
0:10:28 > 0:10:31set in the East End in all that time, all of the London fog and
0:10:31 > 0:10:34people going it's like Oliver creatures and coming out, but there
0:10:34 > 0:10:40was a grisly murder at the bottom of it, and it captures that Gothic
0:10:40 > 0:10:46horror very well. Interesting and well done.
0:10:46 > 0:10:49Award season is nearly upon us, so we'll be talking plenty in the
0:10:49 > 0:10:54coming weeks. Thank you very much for now, Jason Solomons. That is a
0:10:54 > 0:10:58taster on what is on offer this click -- this week.
0:10:58 > 0:11:02A quick reminder before we go that week.
0:11:02 > 0:11:05You'll find more film news and reviews from across the BBC
0:11:05 > 0:11:06online at bbc.co.uk/mark kermode.
0:11:06 > 0:11:09And you can find all our previous programmes on the BBC iPlayer.
0:11:09 > 0:11:10That's it for this week though.
0:11:10 > 0:11:11Thanks for watching.
0:11:11 > 0:11:13Goodbye.