Movie Review: Cassandra's Dream

Cassandra's Dream (2007) 

Directed by Woody Allen

Written by Woody Allen 

Starring Ewan McGregor, Colin Farrell, Hayley Atwell, Sally Hawkins, Tom Wilkinson 

Release Date January 18th, 2008 

Published May 22nd, 2008 

Someday this will be referred to as Woody Allen's London era. Whether this period of Allen's career will be remembered well is still in question. His Scoop was a cute, quick witted comedy that never caught on with audiences. His follow up, Match Point is a devastatingly smart thriller likely to be remembered by Allen fans as a masterpiece.

Now comes Cassandra's Dream another London set thriller that ups the ante on Match Point by going for big stars but comes up short on the smart thrills that made Match Point so brilliant.

Two brothers turn to crime to solve their financial problems only to find themselves not exactly adept. Ewan McGregor and Colin Farrell are Ian and Terry Blaine. Ian is a dreamer who aspires to high finance. For now he lives the life of a playboy without the actual means. Terry is more honest of his working class roots. He lives modestly with a longtime, loving girlfriend. His one indulgence is gambling and when we meet Terry he is on quite a hot streak. He eventually strikes it big at the card table to the tune of 30 grand.

Hot streaks however, never last. As Terry risks the 30 grand to get the money he needs to buy his girl a house he winds up 90 grand in the hole. Naturally, Terry turns to Ian for help. Ian for his part has fallen head over heels for a young actress named Angela (Hayley Atwell). What little money he has he hopes to use to keep Angela in the comfort she aspires to. Now however, he must help Terry. With their options limited the brothers turn to their uncle Howard (Tom Wilkinson) a highly successful businessman. Howard has one condition for a lone, the boys must murder a man who threatens to tear down Howard's multi-million dollar empire.

To say Howard is asking alot is an understatement and that is at the heart of the issues with Woody Allen's latest tale of chance, chaos and morality. Allen has always been fascinated with cause and effect and the idea that while one action may lead directly to another there is no such thing as fate. In the end, Allen's world view is that we are the arbiters of our fate and our consequences. That view certainly plays out in Cassandra's Dream where Terry and Ian are not forced to do anything but decide to do something and then decide their own punishment until the random nature of the world intervenes in all it's unintentional irony and strange ordinariness.

The last shot of the film with the world in order but an emotional shitstorm in the offing is a strong, almost devastating conclusion. Unfortunately, the central crime is so outlandish that you are unable to truly invest in it emotionally. Yes, Terry and Ian are both desperate but are they really so desperate to do what they do? I didn't buy it. I especially didn't buy Ferrell's Terry who turns ashamedly from an average guy into the worst type of Ferrell character, the weepy, whiny mess well displayed in Phone Booth, far less interesting in Alexander, The Recruit and now in Cassandra's Dream.

Ewan McGregor on the other hand is right at home as Ian. With charm that intimates a certain moral flexibility, McGregor's Ian is more suited to the central story than is the caricature that is Ferrell's Terry. It is Ian and his relationship with Amanda that brings home the central themes of the film, the randomness of life, the luck, the chance and the lack of any real grand design. Also, in Hayley Atwell's Amanda we get Allen at his self deprocating best. In the film's best scene, Allen goes meta and breaks down the very existence of her character in the film.

The failure of Cassandra's Dream is unfortunately Allen's inabilty to craft a solid thriller plot to tentpole his favored themes. The Allen intellect, his philosophy on life, death and movies is on well display but fail for not having a structure on which to hang them. Thus Cassandra's Dream is a film of ideas with no driving narrative force that could have, with a little more care, been a devastating dramatic piece ala his previous London set masterpiece Match Point. That film delivers the same themes with a thriller plot that is involving, shocking and purely Allen-esque in how it underlines its ideals.

Rent Match Point and Cassandra's Dream off your Netflix cue.

Movie Review: Christopher Robin

Christopher Robin (2018)

Directed by Marc Forster

Written by Alex Ross Perry, Tom McCarthy, Allison Schroeder

Starring Ewan McGregor, Hayley Atwell, Jim Cummings, Brad Garrett 

Release Date August 3rd, 2018 

Published August 2nd, 2018

Disney has had remarkable success taking their animated properties and repurposing them for live action films. And somehow, they’ve done this with no one accusing them of recycling or calling out the nakedly calculated marketing strategy that was the inception for each of these movies from Cinderella to Jungle Book to Beauty and the Beast and now to Christopher Robin, the live action take on Winnie the Pooh.

Much of the reason that we’ve given Disney a pass on such criticism is because the quality of this strip mining of our nostalgic memories of childhood have been so very good. Exceptional filmmakers such as Kenneth Branagh and Jon Favreau and now Marc Forster have turned this cynical nostalgic cash grab into something genuinely, lovingly artful. Marc Forster has even made, arguably, the most loving and artful of all of these cynical cash grabs.

Christopher Robin is the story of the young boy who found a door in a tree and bravely crossed it’s threshold into a world of wonder in the 100 Acre Woods. There he found magical creatures including a new best friend, Winnie the Pooh along with his pals, Piglet, Owl, Rabbit, Eeyore. Kanga and her son Roo, and the wonderful, bouncy backsided Tigger. Together they played and dreamed and had great adventures.

Years passed however and time came when Christopher Robin was forced to leave behind the 100 Acre Woods in favor of soggy old London and life in a boarding school. From there, Christopher would begin to forget his fuzzy former friends and start a real life. Grown up, and played by Ewan McGregor, Christopher met and fell in love with Evelyn (Hayley Atwell), they had a baby named Madeline (Bronte Carmichael) and he went to war.

Now home with his family, Christopher has begun to forget not just about the 100 Acre Woods but about fun in general. Christopher’s job at a luggage company consumes all his time and thoughts and even when he plans to spend a weekend away with his family, at his parents’ former cottage, he can’t get away from his work and the strain on his marriage is evident if only to us and to Evelyn.

Here’s where things take a turn. The scene shifts to Pooh Bear’s cottage. He’s just awoken and found that he has no hunny. He goes out seeking help from his friends and cannot find them. He finds the door in the tree where Christopher Robin always came from and decides to go through it into Christopher’s world. On the other side, Pooh emerges in London and finds Christopher anxiously hiding from a neighbor he doesn’t want to talk to.

Marc Forster is a filmmaker who knows a little something about gentle and pleasant kids stories. Forster’s Finding Neverland was an Academy Award nominee telling the story of J.M Barrie’s creation of Peter Pan. Christopher Robin feels a lot like that film with a similar whimsical, magical essence. Both Christopher Robin and Finding Neverland have an elegiac and plaintive pacing, an air of sadness slowly giving way to the joy of letting go. Forster worked with his Finding Neverland editor Matt Chesse on Christopher Robin and that may have contributed to the similarity in tone and pace.

What sets Christopher Robin apart is the screenplay which features work from three smoking hot properties. Indie darling Alex Ross Perry of Listen Up Phillip and Queen of Earth fame has a credit alongside Hidden Figures writer Allison Schroeder and Academy Award-winning Spotlight writer-director Tom McCarthy. Each contributes to the unique style of Christopher Robin’s story and the wonderful, whimsical way the characters interact.

Don’t misunderstand, these are still fully A.A Milne, by way of Disney, characters. Pooh still feels like Pooh, thanks to the legendary voice work of Jim Cummings and we still get to hear Tigger sing the Tigger song. But, the interaction between Christopher Robin and the rest of the world has a wit and liveliness to it that doesn’t distract from the classic source material. You can sense the respect that this creative team has for the source material, there is a loving care to the way Pooh and friends are presented, never with anything less than dignity; it's fun with a British sort of propriety.

Ewan McGregor is a wonderful Christopher Robin. I adored his stiffness early in the movie and the way his shoulders slowly go from up around his ears to fully at ease. He’s a man under desperate stress to do the right thing and he continually does the wrong thing until Pooh comes along and puts him straight. There is a lovely similarity to the recent Where the Wild Things Are when Christopher is in the 100 Acre Woods as an adult and realizes that he may, in fact, be the problem with his life and not everyone else.

McGregor is well matched with Hayley Atwell whose sympathetic care for her husband is only matched by her witty, self-protective, innate feminism. This is not a woman who will put up for very long with a man who doesn’t properly appreciate her, and especially her daughter, and you get that sense solely from Atwell’s manner and grace. She has a steely quality that easily gives way to softness and concern in the way only a great actress can show.

I have not even begun to praise the true star of the show, Winnie the Pooh. Earlier this year people were tripping over themselves to praise the over-hyped Paddington with his childish pratfalling and simplistic story. For me, Winnie the Pooh in Christopher Robin is my thesis statement on why Paddington doesn’t work. Pooh is charming in ways Paddington only hints at. He’s lovable in the ways that Paddington pretends towards. Most importantly, Pooh’s pratfalling antics and general mayhem are more well-explained and lovable than the destruction that Paddington wreaks upon his friends and family.

Christopher Robin is a lovely film, a gentle yet funny, sweet and harmless trifle that will make all audiences smile. Marc Forster is a director of immense talent and he brings that to bear in Christopher Robin with the lightest and most deft touch. The film is artful in how it is never flashy, you don’t feel as if you see Forster directing. The touch is light but effective, you sense how beautiful and well told the story is but it doesn’t feel as if you’re being steered and you sort of melt into the beauty and warmth of this story.

I feel as if, on a moral level, I should be upset about Disney strip mining my childhood for a quick buck. I feel like I should be annoyed that they aren’t developing original material and are instead basking in the dollars that existing products in shiny new packages can bring in. In the back of my mind, in fact, I am rebelling against these Disney products and their weaponized nostalgia. That said, up front and personal, Christopher Robin made my heart happy. The movie is completely adorable and a wonderful film for the whole family, proof that commerce and art can work together to create something beautiful.

Movie Review: Deception

Deception (2008) 

Directed by Marcel Langenegger 

Written by Mark Bombeck 

Starring Ewan McGregor, Hugh Jackman, Michelle Williams

Release Date April 25th, 2008 

Published April 26th, 2008

Jonathan (Ewan McGregor) is kind of a loser. Despite a high paying job as an accountant in New York City, Jonathan has no friends and no real life outside of his work. That changes when he is befriended by Wiley (Hugh Jackman) a charming, self effacing lawyer for one of Jonathan's client company's. Though they would seem to have nothing in common, Jonathan finds Wiley's friendly entreaties irresistible, probably because he has no friends to begin with. 

Wiley invites Jonathan out for a night on the town, loans him a 4000 dollar suit, and works on getting him laid. When Wiley heads out of town for a few weeks he 'accidentally' switches cellphones with Jonathan. From there Jonathan begins fielding Wiley's calls and finds himself initiated to 'the list' a group of high powered men and women who get together to engage in anonymous one night stands.

Through 'the list' Jonathan meets and falls in love with a woman (Michele Williams) whose name he does not know. Breaking the rules of 'the list' he tells her his name and asks to see her a second time on a real date. She agrees but when the date moves to a tiny hotel room Jonathan finds himself knocked unconscious and the girl gone missing. Now he must find the girl and discover just how much trouble his pal Wiley and this mysterious list have in store for him.

Sleazy and slow witted, Deception is an erotic thriller that is not all that erotic and far from thrilling. This is a movie that believes watching a bank transaction against a ticking clock is somehow exciting. As McGregor sits in front of a computer screen hyper music underscores quick cuts from his sweaty brow to a clock on the wall to the computer screen with a helpful icon that counts down how long the download is taking.

If that doesn't get your heart racing there is chemistry free romance between McGregor and Williams so uninspiring, it pales in comparison to the oddly homoerotic bonding between Jackman and McGregor. In a ballsier movie the romance would have been between Jackman and McGregor but this is not a really ballsy movie, just a really bad one.

Deception was released by Fox as a favor to star Hugh Jackman who produced the film under his Seed Productions banner. The film likely would have been direct to video after an international release if Fox were not counting on Jackman to push the fall epic Austrailia and next summer's blockbuster tent pole Wolverine. That may sound cynical but that's Hollywood horse trading for you. Also, how else could you explain how such a terrible film as Deception found its way to more than 2000 screens? 

Movie Review The Ghost Writer

The Ghost Writer (2010) 

Directed by Roman Polanski 

Written by Robert Harris, Roman Polanski 

Starring Ewan McGregor, Pierce Brosnan, Kim Cattrall, Olivia Williams, Tom Wilkinson, Timothy Hutton, Jon Bernthal 

Release Date March 3rd, 2010

Published March 9th, 2010 

Director Roman Polanski will be forever colored by the crime he committed that drove him out of America. His conviction on charges of statutory rape, he had sex with a 13 year old girl, will forever stain his reputation and whether he ever returns to America to face justice or remains in exile somewhere in Europe he will leave behind a tarnished legacy and a lifetime of movies that might have been.

Because of his crimes many people will forever avoid his movies as a form of protest. Those who make that choice will be the least for it as despite his crime Mr. Polanski remains a master behind the camera. The latest example of his genius is the political thriller The Ghost Writer starring Ewan McGregor and Pierce Brosnan.

Former British Prime Minister Adam Lang has one of the most anticipated memoirs in the publishing industry. His controversial time as Prime Minister, encompassing the height of the war on terror, his good looks and charm should lend itself to a terrific story and a grand slam bestseller.

Unfortunately, the book stinks and the Prime Minister's original ghost writer, a longtime aide, has died. The book is a shambles and a major fix is needed. Enter The Ghost played by Ewan McGregor, an author for hire who specializes in puffery and wordplay. He will sit with the PM and uncover some details that might turn the book into the bedside reader that publishers look for.

While things begin rather simply, the job of the ghost takes a sinister turn when the former PM is charged with war crimes and he is pressed by his bosses to control the story and keep it all for the book. What the ghost discovers is linked to the fate of the previous ghostwriter, the CIA and the PM's wife, played brilliantly by Olivia Williams.

The plot of The Ghost Writer is intricate and endlessly clever. Roman Polanski adapted it from the work of author Robert Harris who modeled the fictional story on real life British Prime Minister Tony Blair with whom Harris was once close. When Blair began working closely with President Bush, Harris turned and The Ghost Writer was born.

The veiled attack on Blair hovers over the thriller story of The Ghost Writer and the real life conceits serve as a sort of magic trick to distract audiences while Polanski and Ewan McGregor work the thriller aspect for smart, tense and even humorous scenes.

This is a master at work, intriguing us with asides while leaving us gasping with plotting, pace and dialogue. The Ghost Writer is relentless in its smooth pace and enthralling storytelling. McGregor is well matched to the role of the clueless ghost who comes in with no interest in politics and finds himself immediately out of his depth.

Olivia Williams is the standout of the superb cast. Playing the jaded, jilted politician's wife she begins a tense and sexy flirtation with the ghost all the while hiding secrets that nag at the back of your mind until their superb payoff. Pierce Brosnan hasn't been this good since his clever turn in 2005's The Matador. Brosnan combines Tony Blair's boyish energy and charm with an undercurrent of menace.

Kim Cattrall rounds out the cast as Brosnan's loyal aide and likely mistress. The relationship is left tantalizingly off-screen while she flirts with McGregor's Ghost in one of many smart, funny, sexy subplots that keep the audience off balance and searching for clues to the big bad behind all the trouble.

Murder, mystery, sex and politics what more could one ask for in a good thriller. With Roman Polanski behind the camera everything comes together under the eye of a master filmmaker who knows just what buttons to push to keep an audience engaged and grasping for the next clue, the next revelation and the final gut punch finish. Some will find the ending of The Ghost Writer unsatisfying. I feel it was the perfect finish and really the only way this story could end.

Put aside Roman Polanski's crime if you can and you will find The Ghost Writer to be a fantastic movie going experience. A brilliant thriller from a brilliant director who has maintained a mastery of filmmaking even as his personal life has been an absolute disaster.

Movie Review: Doctor Sleep

Doctor Sleep (2019) 

Directed by Mike Flanagan

Written by Mike Flanagan

Starring Ewan McGregor, Rebecca Ferguson, Kyliegh Curran, Cliff Curtis

Release Date November 8th, 2019 

Published November 7th, 2019 

Dan Torrance (Ewan McGregor) took years to recover from his father’s rampage at the Overlook Hotel. His mother died not long after his father attempted to murder them both and her death led to a spiral of self-destruction for her son. Dan fell hard into alcoholism in his attempt to quiet the voices in his head, the voices that he could hear any time via his ‘Shine,’ the psychic abilities that he discovered as a child at the Overlook and has run from ever since. 

Now, several years sober, Dan has found friend, Billy Freeman (Cliff Curtis), and a steady job as an orderly at a hospice in New Hampshire. Here, Dan’s Shine has a way of providing comfort to people when they need it the most, as they transition toward death. Dan becomes known at the hospice as Doctor Sleep as he shows up when it is time for the dying to enter their final sleep under his watchful and caring eye. 

Meanwhile, Dan is also allowing his Shine to reach out to a young girl named Abra (Kyliegh Curran), a fellow psychic, younger and more powerful than Dan. Their friendship is kind and Dan offers the kind of comfort, support and understanding that Abra’s parents cannot as they do not have her special ability. Abra fears her parents will not understand or worse, may fear her remarkable gifts. 

Abra’s powerful shine unfortunately catches the attention of Rose the Hat (Rebecca Ferguson). Rose leads a cabal of supernaturally powered villains who’ve discovered their own version of the fountain of youth, one that centers on people like Abra. The group is genuinely scary and the movie underlines how fearsome they are with visual flair. The ways in which we witness their evil are a little hard to watch as the terror of their victims has a visceral quality. 

Abra proves to be Rose The Hat’s white whale, a shine more powerful than even her own. The hunt for Abra, and Dan’s attempts to protect her and guide her,  make for a surface level take on the plot of Doctor Sleep. Thankfully, Doctor Sleep has a few surprises in store for those who give it a chance. This sequel to both Stephen King’s The Shining (novel) and Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining (Movie) looks like a debacle at first glance but turns out to be a brilliant gamble. 

Directed by Michael Flanagan, best known for such mainstream efforts as Oculus, Ouija: Origin of Evil and the Stephen King-Netflix adaptation, Gerald’s Game, Flanagan takes a big, bold step forward as a filmmaker in Doctor Sleep. Until now, Flanagan has been a rather mediocre horror director. Here, however, with Doctor Sleep, Flanagan arrives as a bold, risk taking filmmaker who is willing to bet big on a project that could have been his complete undoing. 

There is no margin of error in making Doctor Sleep. Flanagan was always going to be under intense scrutiny by intending to sequelize both the Stephen King and the Kubrick movie that King was not a fan of. That Flanagan brilliantly bridges the gap between King’s novel and Kubrick’s movie is one of the great strengths of Doctor Sleep. Even the author himself has acknowledged that Flanagan did the near impossible of pleasing the two masters of this sequel. 

Kyliegh Curran is a revelation as young Abra. A wonderful character, Curran infuses her with life, curiosity, humor and bravery. I loved how the movie allows Abra to be both youthful and naive and yet resourceful and more than capable of holding her own against Ferguson’s incredible villain performance. As a member of the Critics Choice Award voting mass, I can say for certain that I will be voting for Ms Curran in our Best Young Actor category. She’s just outstanding. 

Just about everything about Doctor Sleep is outstanding. Seeing the Overlook Hotel again, the remarkable recreation of the period detail of the overlook. Even the logic that help us arrive at the Overlook is solid and compelling. The script by director Mike Flanagan, quite smartly establishes Abra as every bit the equal in power and bravery as her adult co-stars. I especially enjoyed the earliest scenes between Curran and Rebecca Ferguson whose Rose the Hat is a terrific villain, especially when she underestimates our young heroine. 

Holding the whole movie together is Ewan McGregor as Danny. Though the when of the setting of Doctor Sleep is badly fudged so we don’t know how old McGregor is supposed to be, it turns out not to be an issue as McGregor melts into this performance. McGregor is a steady hand with strong instincts, the perfect leader for this movie. He has movie star good looks and charisma to draw in the mainstream and just the right amount of haunted conflict and a touch of madness needed for a great horror movie. 

I had low expectations for Doctor Sleep based on the fact of it being a sequel to a Stanley Kubrick movie without, obviously, Stanley Kubrick, as well as an underwhelming trailer. But, after seeing it, I am now a huge fan. The tone, the pace, the characters, the scares, they are all working in Doctor Sleep and I was excited and entertained throughout. This truly is the sequel to The Shining that I did not think was possible, an absolutely brilliant movie that lives up to the original book and movie in a big, big way. 

Movie Review: Changeling

Changeling (2008) 

Directed by Clint Eastwood

Written by J. Michael Straczynski 

Starring Angelina Jolie, John Malkovich, Michael Kelly, Jeffrey Donovan 

Release Date October 24th, 2008

Published October 23rd, 2008 

The title Changeling evokes images of little green aliens. I think director Clint Eastwood is going for alienation but the connection is missed until you actually see the movie. Despite the title Changeling, is really an affecting, thrilling drama featuring a performance by Angelina Jolie that is arguably an early lock for Oscar gold.

Christine Collins never usually worked on Saturdays but with a girl calling in sick and her replacement MIA, she would have to work this Saturday. It was to be the day she took her son Walter to see the new Charlie Chaplin movie. Instead, Christine had to leave her 9 year old little boy home alone. After missing her trolley and having to walk home, she arrived to find her son missing.

The police refused to take a report in the first 24 hours, assuming the kid would turn up. Walter would be missing for 5 months until a break in the case. A little boy found abandoned on DeKalb Illinois claims to be Walter. However, when mother and child are reunited Christine knows the boy is not her son. Bullied into posing for pictures and taking the child home by a PR obsessed detective (Jeffrey Donovan), Christine refuses to admit the child is hers.

Based on the true story of Christine Collins who in 1928 was the victim of a Los Angeles Police Department so desperate for good press coverage that they bullied and cajoled her into taking home a child that was not hers and went out of their way to convince her he was even as all evidence said no. Eventually, the cops tossed Collins in a sanitarium where she met other women who crossed the LAPD.

It's an exceptionally compelling story and in the hands of a master like Eastwood the plot is transcendent. There are several moments in Changeling that will absolutely take your breath away. Most movies can barely manage one breathtaking, edge of your seat moment, Eastwood has at least three. One is glimpsed in the trailer and nearly pulls an out of context tear.

Another is a perfectly thrown punch and still another is a classic courtroom scene that acts as a collective catharsis for nearly 2 solid hours of breath holding tension. There is no gotcha moment, no simple twists, no hand of god, just great actors with great material and a director who orchestrates it all to near perfection.

I cannot say enough about Angelina Jolie's transformative performance. Jolie takes everything audiences have known about her and turns them on it's ear. Aside from those legendary lips, in bright red here, Jolie plays totally against type as a meek, mousy single mom. Yes, she grows into a character we recognize as Angelina Jolie but early on as she effects the voice of a woman for whom speech is a desperate effort, you can't help but be blown away that you are watching the star of Wanted and Mr. and Mrs. Smith.

Even her characters in A Mighty Heart and her Oscar winning turn in Girl Interrupted do not compare to the highly original work Jolie delivers in Changeling.

The title sounds very Invasion of the Body Snatchers but the movie is truly a moving, often breathtaking drama. Far from one of Eastwood's masterpieces but still a work that shames most other directors. Changeling meanders from time to time and fudges some character motivations but with three scenes of truly devastating emotional power and an overall hypnotic air, there is far more to recommend Changeling than to nitpick.

Movie Review Following

Following (1998) 

Directed by Christopher Nolan

Written by Christopher Nolan 

Starring Jeremy Theobald, Alex Haw 

Release Date April 24th, 1998 

Published December 10th, 2001 

Christopher Nolan's Memento, starring Guy Pearce and Carrie Ann Moss, is a time-twisting, mind-bending, spellbinding ride of genre busting film history and by far the best film of 2001. Now, Nolan's first film, 1998's Following is available to American audiences and like Memento it's a trip. British actor Jeremy Theobold plays the unnamed lead, listed in the end credits as the young man, a writer who while struggling with writer's block begins an unusual search for inspiration.

The young man begins following random people on the street, just watching them go wherever they go shopping, for lunch, or home. At first it's a minor fascination but it soon grows to an uncontrollable obsession. The young man however is able to rationalize his actions with rules like never follow anyone more than once or never involve yourself in the subject's life. These rules are of course broken, and eventually he's not just breaking the rules, he's breaking into his subject's lives with help of one of his subjects named Cobb. Cobb caught the young man following him and invites him to follow even closer as Cobb breaks into homes not necessarily to rob them but more to paint himself a portrait of the people's lives.

Following, like Memento is not a slave to linear storytelling like most movies. Instead, the film flashes forward and backward and tells its story with little visual clues. Cuts and bruises of an unknown origin foreshadow a fight. Unknown until we are shown later in the film where they came from. To say anymore about the film's plot is to giveaway too much. Following is full of great surprises that should not and will not be ruined by this reviewer.

The performances by British actors Jeremy Theobold and Alex Haw are brilliant, with Haw especially effective as the sly charismatic thief whose justification for his breaking and entering are so enticing you might want to try it yourself. Following is a brilliant con game that you willingly fall for not because your stupid but because it's so enticing, you want to fall for it.

With Following and Memento, we can see the evolution of Christopher Nolan as an auteur who may be the next Scorsese or Coppola, a risky artist whose films can't be classified simply by genre. The kind of artistic filmmaker who respects his audience's intelligence and plays to it and that is all too rare in this day and age.