Why do audiences like to watch Tom Hanks suffer? Cast Away, Philadelphia, hell throw Forrest Gump in there, the man can play optimistic men broken and beaten down by life like no other. It comes as no surprise then that the man affectionately known as “America’s Dad” pulls it off again in Miguel Sapchnik’s Finch; the story of a man, his dog and his robot crossing a post-apocalyptic United States. It is only thanks to Hanks’ affability and some wonderful voice work from Caleb Landry Jones that Finch works as well as it does; an otherwise forgettable sci-fi adventure with more under the hood than meets the eye.
After a deadly solar flare has rendered the surface of Earth inhospitable, lone robotic engineer Finch (Hanks) roams the desert landscape by day – scavenging for what precious few supplies remain – and by night works on Jeff (Landry Jones), a robot designed to care for Finch’s dog Goodyear after he succumbs to the radiation-induced cancer ravaging his body. When an approaching superstorm threatens to wipe out the trio’s underground sanctuary, they set out for the (relative) safety of San Francisco, a cross-country journey that will test all of Finch’s will, patience and determination.
Apple TV+, 2021
Finch’s odd-couple road trip story is nothing we haven’t seen before, but Hanks’ presence goes a long way toward helping you look past the familiar and care for Finch and the outcome of his journey. Unlike those other roles, we find Hanks’ character post-trauma; a shell of a man whose only joy in this hellscape America comes from the companionship he feels for Goodyear. Jeff’s arrival signals a change in the status quo and the start of Finch having to come to terms with saying goodbye to his canine pal. As such there is a constant undercurrent of sadness that is balanced out by the ridiculous antics and childlike excitement of Jeff who – unlike other famous film robots – has quite the personality; approaching every new teaching and location with a sense of childlike wonder (think C3-P0 before R2-D2 made him a cynical asshole).
Landry Jones brings that personality to life wonderfully through lively, deeply emotive voice work that perfectly encapsulates the giddy highs of a child learning something new before the adult (Finch) scolds them for it. The effects help a great deal here; clearly Apple has spent a small fortune on ensuring that Jeff feels realistic and reacts to the world around him – slumping his shoulders in sadness and cocking his head in interest – in a way that feels both foreign and familiar; you are able to look past Jeff’s looks and see the touching father/son relationship at the film’s core. Finch might seem like quite the cruisy, conflict-less film but Sapochnik does a great job creating tension out of very little, crafting a wonderfully tense moment wrought from little more than a car driving behind Finch; normally fine, but potentially doom-bringing in this apocalypse.
Apple TV+, 2021
Finch accomplishes exactly what it sets out to do; presenting a touching story of a man, his robot and his dog bonding and learning some hard lessons about themselves and one another as they traverse an apocalyptic America. Sapochnik wisely never bites off more than he can chew (apart from a slightly bloated runtime), keeping the action contained and the stakes intimately low; one man gone in the apocalypse doesn’t mean much in the larger scheme of things but to Goodyear it means everything. Well played Hanks, you’ve done it again.
Apple TV+, 2021
Finch stars Tom Hanks & Caleb Landry Jones – Streaming on Apple TV+ now.
After crafting the biggest movie of all time you could be forgiven for resting on your laurels for a while. Not so for Joe and Anthony Russo – directors of monster Marvel hits Avengers: Infinity War and Endgame – who dove headfirst into an epic of a different sort with the Tom Holland starring Cherry. A sprawling, multiple year spanning odyssey of one man’s journey through a seemingly normal adolescence in Cleveland through to a PTSD-inducing stint in the army and a subsequent life of crime and crippling addiction, Cherry may be framed as a dissection of the opioid addiction crisis rampant in America, but it is as much a love story between two people who are simultaneously so right and so wrong for each other. The leading duo of Tom Holland and Ciara Bravo are phenomenal, but the Russo’s throw every cinematic trick in the book at their first post-MCU outing, constantly threatening to derail the whole thing with a jarring and bizarre mixture of film techniques.
A drifter by nature Cherry (Holland) moves about his life in Cleveland without direction, passing through a string of dead-end jobs and finding himself infatuated with college classmate Emily (Bravo). A casual dabbling in drugs is just a taste of what is to come as Emily and Cherry’s relationship begins to turn serious and a fight one night prompts a drastic reaction from both parties, with Emily threatening to head to Canada and Cherry enlisting in the US army. Inexplicably drawn back to one another, the couple stick together throughout Cherry’s two-year stint in the army, dragged through the worst of the worst as a combat medic and suffering from severe PTSD on his return to the States. A prescription of OxyContin to treat his illness serves as the entry point for Cherry’s addiction, abusing the painkiller and hooking Emily before the couple turn to a life of heroin abuse. The junkie lifestyle proves unsustainable for the young lovers however and, desperate to pay off their debt to dealer Pills and Coke (Jack Reynor), Cherry turns to a life of crime to sustain them, robbing banks at gunpoint to feed the vicious cycle as his guilty conscious begins to creep up and eat away at him.
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The relationship between Cherry and Emily is the centre of Cherry, the connective tissue that pulls you through the three distinct periods of this young man’s life. Those eras may fluctuate in quality and the style choices made by the Russos (we’ll get to those later) may draw your attention away at times but Holland and Bravo’s performances are simply phenomenal, fully investing you in this intense, toxic relationship between two people who could not be more wrong for each other but, like the drugs they inject by the boatload, can’t seem to kick. It’s easily Holland’s most ambitious performance to date, a far cry from the wholesome, boyish charm of Peter Parker and more akin to the darker side of his character in The Devil All the Time. Indeed it seems to have been a difficult role for the young actor – with multiple interviews covering the intense places he went to for the performance – but it pays off. The look of sheer terror in this young man’s eyes when his friend is blown apart in battle is harrowing to watch and the subsequent heart-shattering breakdown make you want to reach through the screen and give him a hug.
Spending the time to show a significant portion of Cherry’s military journey makes that eventual turn to drugs all the more debilitating for the audience. This kid has survived so much and come out on the other side but with a mental trauma that no one should ever experience, especially not a young 20-year-old in the prime of his life. His turn towards something that can numb his pain may be understandable to a degree but it is no less disheartening and watching the transformation of this wide-eyed, fresh-faced person with the world before him into a shell of a man, ravaged by drugs and mental disease is a hard thing to do, which is a testament to the strength of Holland’s performance. That performance doesn’t work nearly as well without the presence of Ciara Bravo’s Emily to balance it. In the younger years of their relationship, Emily makes some strong choices which ultimately impact the couple’s entire life, and Bravo wears the pain and stress of these decisions throughout the entire film; never forgiving herself for what she has caused Cherry and unable to bring herself to stop using the drugs that temporarily halt that pain. These two performances are so all encompassing that there is nary a supporting character in sight, with Jack Reynor’s clumsily named drug dealer and a handful of Cherry’s friends operating on the periphery, influencing the key couple’s relationship but never intruding on that bond. At the end of the day Cherry and Emily only have each other – and the Russo’s succeed in showing the strength of that love against all else.
AGBO, 2021
Where they go wild however is in the construction of the film. Seemingly free from any shackles imposed on them during their Marvel days in keeping a distinct, grounded visual style across multiple films and franchises, the brothers throw every trick in the book at the screen to spice up a grounded drama that really requires no fancy trickery that takes away from the performances. That’s what these tricks ultimately do, distracting from Holland and Bravo constantly with awkward, gaudy colour grading during scenes of drug abuse; flooding the screen with an ugly grey sheen and popping colour in as a representation of the trip or turning the whole screen red during somewhat pretentious title card scenes, indicating new chapters in Cherry’s story. Awkward voiceover and fourth wall breaks from Holland dilute the potency of the performances in scenes that require no explanation of what is going (again a hallmark of TheDevil All The Time) and perhaps the most jarring and unwarranted effect arrives during Cherry’s military experience: a complete aspect ratio change that reduces the widescreen format to a square box in the middle of the screen, a frankly bizarre choice that will have you checking your TV settings for an explanation. I questioned at times whether this over-stylisation of the film was an attempt at a Goodfellas-esque crime epic, but where that film glorified the violence and excess Cherry admonishes it, with all these awkwardly utilised techniques working against the very grounded story the Russo’s are trying to tell.
Cherry represents an awkward step away from the multi-billion dollar franchise that made the Russo brothers household names but a welcome willingness to keep working when they very well could have taken some much earned time off. While it may seem at times that the brothers are working against themselves, hampering the strength of their commentary on the opioid addiction crisis through over-the-top stylisation, the performances of Holland and Bravo and the central relationship between the pair win out, keeping you locked into a love story that is more interesting and emotionally engaging than the drug commentary. It isn’t the home run into prestige drama that many were expecting but it is an interesting change of pace for the Russo brothers, and an exciting prospect of what the future holds for these two incredibly talented filmmakers.
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Cherry stars Tom Holland, Ciara Bravo, Forrest Goodluck, Jeff Wahlberg, Michael Rispoli & Jack Reynor – Streaming on Apple TV+ now.
There’s a classic episode of The Simpsons where Homer is tasked with telling a few jokes at a birthday party, an opportunity he jumps at. When the party hits a snag and the announcement of a puppy’s death is made, Homer, still expected to perform, gamely hits the stage with a booming “ARE YOU READY TO LAUGH?”. He is met with a scathing response. “Be quiet, you awful man”. That’s kind of what it feels like watching Sofia Coppola’s latest dramedy On the Rocks, a film which takes one of the greatest comedians of all time in Bill Murray and completely wastes his talent, giving him constant streams of (admittedly excellent) heavy dramatic dialogue with barely a hint of his signature whimsy. This dramatic side of On the Rocks is top notch, with Oscar-worthy performances. However when your film is being sold as the breakout comedy of the year, audiences might expect, you know, a good joke or two, which On the Rocks sadly fails to muster.
Coppola’s exploration of the father-daughter bond is told through the eyes of Laura (Rashida Jones), a doting mother and writer in a creative rut, who feels like she is drifting from her husband Dean (Marlon Wayans) and begins to suspect he is having an affair with a co-worker. Naturally rattled and unsure how to handle the situation, Laura turns to her wealthy playboy father Felix (Bill Murray) for advice, a move which may result in more than Laura bargained for as Felix fills her head with all sorts of reasons that Dean is cheating, pulled from his own less than reputable experiences. What starts as a pursuit of Dean to catch him red handed gradually becomes a bonding experience for Laura and Felix, leading to a pursuit for answers to questions Laura has long buried as the father and daughter’s relationship fractured over the years.
Apple TV+, 2020
Right away the set-up is comedy gold. You have Bill Murray going to (what you would think would be) increasingly zany and wild lengths to catch Dean out. After all this is the man who repeated a certain Groundhog Day hundreds of times with some pretty whacky results. It becomes immediately apparent that Coppola is not concerned with this approach to the story and that is fine. She sets up the film erring on the dramatic side with a few chuckles from Murray as the relationship between Laura and Felix is established. All is well, the good jokes must be coming. Except they never really do as the film races through its brief 90 minute runtime. Nothing in On the Rocks is ever laugh out loud funny. The only scene that comes close involves Murray talking his way out of a speeding ticket, with hints and flashes of his signature style shining through before being quickly locked away just as he is about to be let completely off the chain.
No, this is not a film of wild adventures, this is a film of conversations. Murray and Jones in a restaurant discussing her childhood while he absentmindedly discusses his sexual conquests. Murray and Jones in a car discussing caviar and her sense of displacement in her world. Sadly the dialogue doesn’t crackle with intensity like say The Social Network does and the consistently heavy discussions begin to grate after a while. It’s not bad by any means but Coppola seems to think that simply having Murray in a scene will bring some levity to counterbalance the weight of the conversation and it does to a degree – Murray can’t help being naturally funny and charming even when he’s not trying – but it just isn’t enough to stay the monotony at points, despite the excellent performances.
Apple TV+, 2020
That is where On the Rocks makes up (mostly) for its shortcomings. It’s hard to excuse the lack of comedy when you are billing your film as a comedy but the dramatic performances that we get from Murray and especially Jones are astounding. This is hands down the best performance of Rashida Jones’ career, heartbreaking and raw in all the right ways, as she imbues her character with an empathy that immediately makes her relatable and an excellent heroine for the audience to root for. We have all been in tricky spots and creative ruts in life and her performance understands this on a deep level. We see the despondency and frustration in her eyes as she does the school run each morning, listening to the other mothers problems, never exposing that vulnerable side and talking about her own issues. It is only once she starts these adventures with Murray that she is truly able to express her concerns and worries about where her life is headed, slowly coming to realise that Felix might not be the best person to take relationship advice from but that he is a complicated and misunderstood man who deserves a second chance. It’s a truly next-level, understated performance from the actress that deserves at least an Oscar nomination.
Telling you to watch On the Rocks is a hard sell. I mean, how likely are most people to go and see a Bill Murray film in which he gives you nothing more than a quick chuckle? Oh did I mention there’s some heavy emotional drama to offset that lack of comedy? No, if there is anything to sway you into watching Sofia Coppola’s film it is the performances, which are exceptionally good (particularly Jones) and will likely find their way into awards contention come Oscar season. If you’re looking to sink a little further into that pandemic depression then give On the Rocks a go; otherwise maybe stick to something a little more optimistic and lighthearted in these troubling times? I hear the new Borat is good.
Apple TV+, 2020
On the Rocks stars Rashida Jones, Bill Murray & Marlon Wayans – Streaming on Apple TV+ now.
Tom Hanks is one of, if not the finest living actors today. The veteran actor, star of classics such as Forrest Gump and Saving Private Ryan, is also a huge box-office draw, headlining some of the most successful films of all time. As such, it will come as no surprise to anyone that Apple payed a pretty penny to get their hands on Hanks’ latest film Greyhound, a naval war film taking place during WWII that he both stars in and co-wrote. So did Apple’s investment pay off in terms of the quality of the film? It’s not as straightforward a question as it might seem. Greyhound is an engaging battle film with a typically excellent performance from Hanks which does a great job of building an atmosphere of tension and dread. It does however suffer from a distinct lack of characterisation of anyone other than Hanks and a story that is essentially several battle scenes stitched together over the course of one very long voyage between Britain and America. It is not a bad film by any stretch and I was fully engaged the whole time, but it isn’t the next huge classic war film that Apple was hoping for, and definitely is not the content that will draw large amounts of people to the service.
Greyhound follows U.S. Navy Captain Krause (Hanks) on his maiden voyage as commanding officer of the Greyhound destroyer, travelling across the North Atlantic in 1942 as an escort to merchant ships carrying troops and supplies for the war effort on the Front. Once the convoy enters the area of the Atlantic known as “The Black Pit”, their Air Force escort is forced to turn back and the Greyhound is thrown into a deadly game of cat and mouse with a number of German U-Boats stalking the depths. With 72 hours before they enter another patrolled stretch of sea, Commander Krause must rally the other naval ships and ensure as many merchant ships get through to the other side in one piece. It’s a barebones plot, to put it mildly, but director Aaron Schneider gets a surprising amount out of it, steadily building the tension as you anticipate the unseen U-Boat’s first strike, and never letting that go until the 72 hours are through once things kick off. It’s just the right length too, clocking in at a breezy 90 minutes without feeling rushed, letting you sit with the situation and feel the increasingly mounting pressure on the Captain for the full ride, only realising you were holding your breath once the credits roll.
Apple TV+, 2020
Hanks’ last few projects (The Post, Sully, Bridge of Spies) have seen him lean into his age in films I like to call “Dad movies”. You know the type: true stories that feature an older man in a position of great importance and leadership who use a lot of job specific words and make incredibly difficult, stressful decisions in order to save people or deliver an important message. Greyhound is the latest in this trend and its war-time setting thrusts it even deeper into that “Dad movie” category than those other titles I mentioned. Hanks clearly has a fondness for this time period and the script demonstrates his level of knowledge and understanding of the era, with a heavy use of military jargon and naval vernacular that can be a bit daunting for the casual viewer to grasp when you start. However it does an excellent job of really grounding you in the time period and immersing you in the situation, as the reliance on this technical vocabulary from the outset makes it even more noticeable when the situation becomes increasingly dire and people start slipping up and speaking out of turn and without the proper levels of hierarchy. It’s just another way that Hanks and Schneider build tension and make the film feel almost like horror along with Blake Neely’s great score and the terrifying threat of the constantly lurking enemy.
The issues start to show in Hanks’ script when you take a look at the characters in Greyhound. There’s really only one and that’s Hank’s Captain Krause. Again, he’s great in the role and really sells this man who trusts in his principles, God and his training to get the job done and is tested at every turn. There’s lots of subtle movements and facial expressions that convey the tiredness and the impact the lack of sleep is having on the Captain’s decisions and he is acutely aware that his every decision is taken with a grain of salt as he starts to become more erratic to combat the enemy. The problem is, Hanks is the only person that gets a story arc. Literally nobody else is given anything close to a normal supporting role except for Stephen Graham’s Lieutenant Cole, Krause’s right hand man and the only other actor who gets more than a few lines. Although his performance is solid, even Hanks’ character is severely underwritten as we only ever learn the basics about him. I’m not sure if that was Hanks’ intention, to have you learn what type of man this Commander is through his actions, but there just isn’t anything to him and the audience ends up rooting for him simply because he is Tom Hanks. There is an attempt to give the Commander something of a backstory with one flashback scene introducing his sweetheart back in America – played by the woefully underused Elisabeth Shue – but again, this doesn’t go anywhere and is just a bare minimum device to get you to care for this man, without success.
Apple TV+, 2020
Ultimately the lack of characterisation stops Greyhound from becoming anything more than a competently executed and well researched representation of one of the lesser known battles of World War II. It is certainly an engaging watch and the devices Schneider and Hanks employ keep you at a heightened level of stress only add to the experience, but at the end of the day when you don’t really care for the characters it’s hard for the film to have much emotional impact. Despite this, any time watching Tom Hanks on-screen is going to be a good time and I can confidently recommend Greyhound as a fun nautical action film. Just don’t expect to be blown away by the next great war picture – 1917 this is not.
Apple TV+, 2020
Grehound stars Tom Hanks, Stephen Graham & Elizabeth Shue – Available to stream on Apple TV+ now.
In today’s television landscape it seems like there is a new streaming service almost every other week. The rise of streaming titan Netflix has seen the emergence of several competitors, some more successful than others, including Amazon Prime, Disney+ and most recently, Apple TV+. The latter has been treading water for a few months now and with its initial lineup offering little hype for the service, consumers have been left wondering just when we’d see some more genuinely exciting, must-watch content. Well that wait is over with the release of Defending Jacob, Apple’s latest crime-drama limited series starring none other than Chris ‘Captain America’ Evans in a role far removed from his super-hero alter-ego. Whilst it may not be the must-see series that turns people onto the service, Defending Jabob is nevertheless an engaging, if familiar at times, legal procedural/murder mystery which is raised above other similar series by stellar performances from Evans, Michelle Dockery, Jaeden Martell and J.K Simmons.
Defending Jacob begins as former District Attorney Andy Barber (Chris Evans) takes the stand to be questioned at a trial. The circumstances of the trial are not clear to us but the series of questions asked of Barber serve as the impetus for flashbacks retelling the main series of events. The book on which Defending Jacob is based, written by William Landay, utilises legal transcripts as a framing device to take the reader back to this trial. It’s an inventive concept in the medium of a book but in terms of a crime-procedural television series, it unfortunately doesn’t come across this way and feels clichéd given this device’s prevalence in the genre. Within these flashbacks we focus on the murder of a young boy named Ben Rifkin (Liam Kilbreth), a classmate of Andy’s teenage son Jacob (Jaeden Martell). Initially in charge of investigating the case, Andy is unceremoniously removed when Jacob is accused of the murder and taken into custody. From here on out we follow the Barber family, including matriarch Laurie (Michelle Dockery), as they prepare for a trial to prove Jacob’s innocence, uncovering a web of secrets and lies that haunt the Barber name and which threaten to destroy the peaceful Massachusetts community of Newton and the show’s well meaning, seemingly ordinary family.
Apple TV+, 2020
Whilst the framing device of the trial might not be the most original, what differentiates Defending Jacob within the genre is the decision to focus not on the murder itself per se, but on the psychological aspect of committing a murder. How does one commit such a despicable act and do Andy and Laurie really believe that their son is capable of such a thing? It’s a fascinating route to go down and creator Mark Bomback and series director Morten Tyldum play with viewers’ expectations in giving you almost all the details of the case and the factors that are at play from the outset. The series doesn’t rely on cheap twists (for the most part) and instead presents a deep dive into each of the three members of the Barber family, making you question whether you really know any of them at all at one point or another. Evans and Dockery are fantastic (we’ll get to them later) but the central cog in the wheel here is Jacob himself, Jaeden Martell. He’s so perfect in the role as what some might consider the typical annoying teenager but he takes it a step further, switching gears constantly to make you feel for the terrified boy thrown in the deep end and facing life in prison but who also seems to be harbouring a darker side – just off-kilter and dark enough to give you serious doubts about his innocence. It’s a difficult juggling act to keep you so invested without making you feel he is completely innocent, completely guilty or so unlikeable that you don’t care anymore and the young actor pulls it off with a finesse that many veteran actors would be unable to achieve.
The series’ decision to let the story breathe and just sit with these characters for so much of the show might just be audiences’ biggest problem with it. While it allows for rich development of the characters, the series often introduces plot lines, seemingly to fill some of the air time, often leaving them unfinished and potentially leaving some viewers feeling cheated. The series doesn’t necessarily abandon these plot lines however, so much as it leaves them open-ended for interpretation. Take the characters of Ben’s parents for example: they have just lost their only son and are obviously struggling under the ridiculous weight of such a traumatic event. Tyldum and Bomback revisit these characters periodically throughout the show as an examination of how people cope with these situations and to illustrate the impact of the murder on the wider community outside of the Barber family. Other, less psychologically reflective storylines which are left unanswered can confuse and frustrate the audience, just as the characters in the series are confused and frustrated. This feels more like an intentional choice which works wonders to invest you and put you in the shoes of the characters, rather than to fill run time with unfinished storylines.
Apple TV+, 2020
Despite its weekly episodic role-out, Defending Jacob is very much suited to the binge-watching streaming era, and this is the way I would recommend you watch it. Continuous immersion in the story and characters only deepens your investment and for a show that wants to make you think and potentially reflect on your own life, the longer it can keep you thinking that way the more successful and impactful it is. Whilst the ending may be polarising to some (no spoilers) it is very much in line with what has come before and your satisfaction with it will likely be elevated if you have continuously lived with these characters and their struggles.
The other key element which elevates Defending Jacob from a mundane crime drama is the phenomenal cast, led by Evans, Dockery and Martell. Evans is amazing here, given the chance to do something wholly different to Captain America: a suburban father with a dark past who has buried feelings of guilt and anger deep within himself and finds himself flung into the spotlight, forced to reflect on his life; bringing long buried emotions to the surface. It’s a quiet measured role, with Evans taking the full span of the series to unfurl Andy’s motivations and worsening emotions as the screws tighten around the family. Whilst his chemistry with Dockery isn’t anything particularly special, he is clearly in command of his own character and through his facial expressions and carefully considered dialogue we feel for the Barber patriarch, who is either undergoing a particularly bad spell of luck or is receiving his just desserts, depending on which way you look at it.
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Dockery, similarly, is great; given more of a chance to show her character’s emotions outwardly, her response to certain secrets and revelations is truly heartbreaking and you feel that this is a woman in the terrible situation of having to confront the fact that she may not know who her son is; that he may be far more evil than she ever could have imagined given their seemingly enviable suburban life. Last but certainly not least is the great J.K. Simmons, who plays the small but integral role of Billy Barber, Andy’s incarcerated father whose involvement in the case is seemingly limited at first but comes to have more significance than expected. Simmons is outstanding as the slightly unhinged estranged grandfather to Jacob who has been absent his whole life. There is a sadness behind his eyes as his attempts to reconcile with Andy are batted away and Simmons displays an extraordinary ability to switch between that sadness and a blinding fury in the blink of an eye.
While it may not be enough on its own to entice you to subscribe to Apple TV+, Defending Jacob is nonetheless an outstanding slice of courtroom drama/crime procedural television which is given significant weight and purpose through outstanding performances from the entire cast, led by Chris Evans, and the director and creator’s willingness to deviate from the norm and explore an aspect of these stories that is often underdeveloped or forgotten about entirely. Despite some clichéd story beats which have become a staple of the genre and a lack of chemistry between Dockery and Evans, Defending Jacob is still an engrossing watch that will introduce you to a new side of Chris Evans, and if this is any indication of things to come, then the former star-spangled Avenger’s future looks bright.
Apple TV+, 2020
Defending Jacob stars Chris Evans, Michelle Dockery, Jaeden Martell, Cherry Jones, Pablo Schreiber, Betty Gabriel & J.K. Simmons – Streaming on Apple TV+ now.
