Film Review: Joe (2013)

According to Joe, the perpetually angry hero of David Gordon Green's film of the same name, restraint is the only thing keeping him alive. There's a certain wry humour in that statement, considering that these words are spoken by Nicholas Cage, an actor for whom the word seems so foreign it might as well be written in hieroglyphics, but there's also a great truth to it, both for the character and for the film that surrounds him. As played by Cage, Joe is a man who seems constantly on the verge of committing acts of terrible violence. He's introduced as the head of a crew responsible for poisoning trees so that they can be torn down and replaced, and he seems to be holding himself more or less together. Very quickly, though, it becomes apparent that his job and life are constructs designed to contain his propensity for self-destruction, which boils over in a handful of shocking, darkly comedic scenes that make good use of Cage's volatile physicality. He's not a consistently violent man, but Joe is definitely dangerous, and that sense that he could just flip out at any moment shadows him at every moment.

Film Review: Spring Breakers (2012)

One of the strengths of genre film making is that it provides ample opportunity for intelligent writers and directors to secret social, political and cultural commentary beneath the more visceral, lizard brain pleasures of horror, sex and violence. The appeal is easy to see: you can make an insightful, even subversive point without the audience feeling like they are being beaten over the head with an ideology, while still making a film which is actually fun to watch. It's a tricky bit of misdirection to master, but it's largely why the likes of Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Society and Shock Corridor remain so fascinating decades after they were initially released.