Film Review of the Week

Action

Ant-Man And The Wasp: Quantumania (12A)

Review: High expectations and rational thought are seldom the best of friends. After the battle cries and expertly choreographed death rattles of phase three of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, resolving the Thanos character arc that took root in the end credits of 2012’s Marvel Avengers Assemble, phase four of the MCU was always going to be an anti-climax. The resulting tumble through a spectacularly realised multiverse after the Blip felt disjointed and lacked a clear narrative through line to hint how ripples from each superpowered action might overlap and build into a tidal wave of unstoppable dramatic momentum.

There were undeniable highlights: Simu Liu’s spectacular mastery of the 10 rings, the eagerly anticipated spandex tag team of Spider-Man: No Way Home, and an elegiac farewell to Chadwick Boseman from the grief-stricken nation of Wakanda. However, every triumph in phase four felt neatly self-contained. Ant-Man And The Wasp: Quantumania forcefully and noisily kickstarts phase five by introducing a multifaceted villain to rival Thanos, whose insidious presence has existed in a world within a world beneath our own universe for many years.

This genocidal time traveller – whose name isn’t uttered on screen for the best part of an hour – is embodied with palpable menace by Jonathan Majors, casting a long shadow over every frame including two teases buried in the end credits that expand the unstoppable threat beyond wise-cracking Scott Lang (Paul Rudd) and his clan. Screenwriter Jeff Loveness adopts a Greatest Hits Of Marvel approach to storytelling in his gung-ho gallivant, echoing tender exchanges, droll comic relief and rallying cries from earlier films without losing sight of the emotional bonds between a supersized family powered by Pym particles.

Scott (Rudd) and Hope Van Dyne (Evangeline Lilly) aka Ant-Man and Wasp are sucked into the Quantum Realm by a “sub-atomic Hubble telescope” designed by Scott’s spunky 18-year-old daughter Cassie (Kathryn Newton). The teenager and Hope’s parents Hank (Michael Douglas) and Janet (Michelle Pfeiffer) are also wrenched from our reality into a fantastical hidden universe where drinking viscous red goo allows spies to speak the same language, buildings move on giant legs and Kang the Conqueror (Majors) patiently awaits the return of a duplicitous old friend. Battle lines are drawn and Scott, Hope and the gang align with ballsy freedom fighter Jentorra (Katy O’Brian), telepath Quaz (William Jackson Harper) and an orifice-obsessed entity named Veb (David Dastmalchian).

Anchored by Rudd’s goofy and optimistic intergalactic hero (“It’s a pretty good world. I’m glad we saved it!”), Ant-Man And The Wasp: Quantumania shoehorns copious backstory and world-building into two frenetic hours laden with digital effects. Pfeiffer merrily scene-steals, spearheading a menagerie of determined, proactive female characters who proclaim, “just because it’s not happening to you doesn’t mean it’s not happening”. Returning director Peyton Reed sustains the irreverence of previous instalments with a bonkers call back to a character from the first Ant-Man who has definitely let power go to their head.

Animation

Marcel The Shell With Shoes On (PG)

Review: Expanded from a series of stop-motion animated short films, Marcel The Shell With Shoes On is the glorious, life-affirming odyssey of a one-inch-tall, googly-eyed talking shell voiced to perfection by Jenny Slate. Not since Forrest Gump has an unlikely big screen hero plied unabashed sweetness and childlike naivete to such winning effect, whether it be commenting on his perpetually sunny disposition (“Guess why I smile a lot… ’cause it’s worth it”) or correctly identifying a cleaning lady as “the harbinger of the vacuum”.

A script co-written by director Dean Fleischer Camp, Slate and Nick Paley elicits endless empathetic awwws and guffaws, shifting perspective on the modern world to Marcel’s uncynical vantage point as he races around the living room inside a tennis ball. A faux documentary format allows the eponymous casing to narrate thoughts and emotions directly to camera without irony or the intrusion of self-criticism. “Sometimes people say that my head is too big for my body,” matter-of-factly chirrups Marcel, “and then I say, ‘Compared to what?’” We would all do well to embrace Marcel’s uncluttered, self-affirming philosophy.

He lives with his grandmother Nana Connie (voiced by Isabella Rossellini) and their pet lint Alan in a house that has been vacant since previous owners Mark (Thomas Mann) and Larissa (Rosa Salazar) vociferously parted company. The uncertain fate of Marcel’s shell family, including parents Mario (Andy Richter) and Catherine (Sarah Thyre), is a source of unspoken anguish. Connie is in the early stages of dementia so Marcel cares for her while she nurtures vegetables in the garden and talks to insects. “Don’t use me as an excuse not to live,” she implores Marcel.

Every week, they settle down to watch the TV news magazine programme 60 Minutes and their favourite presenter, Lesley Stahl (playing herself). Filmmaker Dean (Fleischer Camp) rents Marcel’s house and becomes fascinated by day-to-day activities of his tiny housemate. He begins filming Marcel for a documentary. “It’s a movie but nobody has any lines and nobody even knows what it is while they’re making it,” the titular shell sweetly explains to Nana Connie. When Dean uploads footage to the internet, Marcel leverages his newfound fame to learn the truth about his family’s disappearance.

Marcel The Shell With Shoes On beautifully distils the circle of life into 90 minutes with an abundance of warming sentiment and sincerity. The stop-motion wizardry is impeccable and Marcel is an effortlessly expressive protagonist, shedding a pool of tears that drips onto the floor or poetically verbalising the void left by missing kin: “A space in my heart gets louder and bigger every day”. Fleischer seamlessly interacts with his diminutive co-star, catalysing an irresistible double-act that proves the only size that truly matters is the full capacity of a beating heart.

Drama

The Son (15)

Review: Divorced parents are ill-prepared to navigate their teenage son’s mental health crisis in Florian Zeller’s emotionally wrought drama, adapted by the director and Christopher Hampton from Zeller’s 2018 stage play. The co-screenwriters received golden Oscar statuettes in 2021 for their elegant adaptation of Zeller’s play The Father, in which Anthony Hopkins delivers a mesmerising performance as a discombobulated 80-something grappling with dementia. The Welsh actor chews scenery in The Son, portraying an aging political beast with strong ties to the White House, who doesn’t flinch at the prospect of taking on the role of a monster in the eyes of his 50-year-old son.

Hugh Jackman plays the aggrieved scion, delivering one of his most finely calibrated performances as an absent parent, who never had an encouraging, positive role model as a template for fatherhood. Sins of the past are revisited on subsequent generations in Zeller and Hampton’s script, which is handcuffed to its stage origins as a series of heated conversations in living rooms and offices to attribute blame and suffering. A third act sleight of hand, which might succeed at a distance in a theatre, rings hollow under the scrutiny of a camera in close-up.

High-flying New York lawyer Peter Miller (Jackman) and younger wife Beth (Vanessa Kirby) are raising their baby son Theo as he contemplates a consultancy role in the political campaign of senator Brian Hammer. The opportunity would necessitate regular visits to Washington DC and entangle Peter in the weeds of Capitol Hill. His ex-wife Kate (Laura Dern) gate-crashes domestic bliss with unsettling news: their 17-year-old son Nicholas (Zen McGrath) has been playing truant from school for a month. The boy refuses to engage with his mother and important national curriculum tests are looming.

Peter initiates a stilted conversation with his son and eventually allows Nicholas to move in with him, Beth and baby Theo, in the hope that a change of scenery will lift the teenager’s spirits. Nicholas continues to suffer, largely in silence, unable to articulate the darkness that threatens to consume him. An impotent and confused Peter seeks answers and an apology from his 80-something workaholic father Anthony (Hopkins), who has scant interest in salving deep psychological scars of an unhappy childhood. “It’s pathetic watching a man of fifty chained to the teenager he once was,” snarls Anthony. “Get over it!”

The Son tackles thorny and uncomfortable issues with a heightened sense of urgency almost three years after the first Covid lockdown. An ensemble cast led by Jackman emerges from the wringer with tears and bruises but characters’ reactions don’t always ring true. A pivotal scene in a hospital room, debating Nicholas’ acute depression with a doctor (Hugh Quarshie), is particularly manipulative, neatly setting up an inevitable final hammer blow.