Review: Capsules: Attack the Block & Sarah’s Key

We are still playing catch-up here at Bucket Reviews, in the wake of Comic-Con, and this weekend’s two art-house releases are getting the capsule treatment as a result. It’s a bit strange to review an alien-invasion flick and a Holocaust drama on the same page, but here goes…

Attack the Block /

Like Romero on speed and hallucinogens, with alien invaders replacing the zombies, Joe Cornish’s debut feature is an adrenaline-fueled 90 minutes of action and social commentary. Despite its seriously loopy premise–the aliens descend on a rough-and-tumble South London apartment complex–the movie never feels overly flashy, thanks to an infectiously hip cast of teenage punks and practical creature effects that serve as a fitting tribute to science-fiction films of yore. This juxtaposition of new and old–the distinctly contemporary multi-ethnic urban landscape, captured through Cornish’s ode to the renegade sci-fi filmmaking style of the ‘60s and ‘70s (albeit considerably more frenetic)–is where the film finds its voice. For a new era, monsters return to their roots: as a mechanism by which audiences can explore sociocultural anxieties through farcical escapism. You don’t have to be British to enjoy most of what Cornish is going for, either — there is plenty of general commentary on what it means to be a young person at a time when, despite the promulgation of technology, generational rifts within communities are still rampant. But in addition to the substance, of course, comes a wealth of style, with numerous action set-pieces that will have viewers on the edge of their seats and wowed by Cornish’s visual command. Fans of executive producer Edgar Wright will also be overjoyed to see Nick Frost pop up in a small role as the complex’s resident drug dealer whose “weed room” proves an ideal hideout from the aliens. While it may not be as revolutionary as an early Romero picture, Attack the Block captures the legendary filmmaker’s trademark balance of brains and braun better than he himself has in decades.

* * *

Attack the Block (2011, UK). Produced by James Biddle, Jenny Borgars, Will Clarke, Matthew Justice, Lucy Pardee, Nira Park, Tessa Ross, James Wilson, and Edgar Wright. Directed and written for the screen by Joe Cornish. Starring John Boyega, Nick Frost, Jodie Whittaker, Luke Treadaway, Adam Leese, Joey Ansah, Flaminia Cinque, and Chris Wilson. Distributed by Screen Gems. Rated R, with a running time of 88 minutes.

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Sarah’s Key /

Those who found 2008’s The Boy with the Striped Pajamas offensive in the way that it made a melodrama out of child deaths in the Holocaust need not consider seeing Sarah’s Key, for it plays much the same manipulative tune. While Sarah’s historically liberal depiction of Nazi-inflicted brutality may not anger certain viewers in the way that Pajamas’ did because it was at least inspired by a true story, the film once again raises the question: Can we reduce the Holocaust to a Lifetime drama? Granted, the performances of Sarah’s Key are far better than those that would grace the weepy women’s network — Mélusine Mayance is gut-wrenching as the eponymous young girl, delivering one of the best child performances in years, and the always reliable Kristin Scott Thomas brings quiet gravitas to the role of a journalist investigating Sarah’s story decades later. But even though the actors imbue their characters with humanity, they are still puppets of co-writer/director Gilles Paquet-Brenner’s manipulative syntax, which seldom allows the viewer to experience real emotion because it always dictates how they should feel. This is the undoing of the film and provides the answer to the aforementioned question: Unless a drama gives us real insight into what it was like to live in Nazi Europe (as many straight dramas like The Pianist and Schindler’s List have), there is no reason to watch it instead of a documentary on the subject. That Sarah’s Key seemingly puts narrative digestibility before said insight is, at the very least, crass.

* * *

Sarah’s Key (2011, France). Produced by Stéphane Marsil and Gaetan Rousseau. Directed by Gilles Paquet-Brenner. Written for the screen by Serge Joncour and Gilles Paquet-Brenner, based on the novel by Tatiana De Rosnay. Starring Kristin Scott Thomas, Mélusine Mayance, Niels Arestrup, Frédéric Pierrot, Michel Duchaussoy, and Dominique Frot. Distributed by The Weinstein Company. Rated PG-13, with a running time of 111 minutes.