Is this CGI?

It seems like the sun is directly outside these windows, no matter what angle the camera is shooting at? And it kinda looks fake, but then most films do these days, due to excessive colour grading…

Anyway, this is a Walter Hill movie? I guess I bought it because it features Sigourney Weaver, because she often picks fun movies to be in.

Hm. I thought this was somebody else? But who am I thinking of? Oh!

Walter Hill, Michael Mann… same same…

Walter Hill produced Alien and stuff. Hm…

Oh!

OK, then I guess I do remember who Walter Hill is.

Was this a really low budget movie?

Yeah, I guess. I mean, not super duper low, but…

Is that Sigourney with a beard? Everything here looks so fake…

Perhaps we’re supposed to notice the fake beard and it’s a plot thing?

I guess it isn’t Sigourney after all? But she’s accused of heinous human experiments, so perhaps this guy is an experiment? So far I’m liking this movie, even if everything looks so odd.

The oddest thing about this doctor is that she applies mascara to her patients.

Housekeeping!

Oh, it wasn’t Sigourney, it was Michelle Rodriguez! Plot twist!

Oops, spoilers.

As revenges go, it seems pretty elaborate — Sigourney (mad doctor) made a hitman into Michelle Rodriguez as revenge for killing her brother or something. It seems like a pretty large expenditure… and is that really an effective revenge, anyway?

Hey! Is this like a send-up of a thriller? That makes more sense…

Yeah… they’re just having fun with clichés and an absurd plot? And it is indeed pretty entertaining.

It’s an odd movie. Sigourney Weaver has a tendency to pop up in these movies, but I wonder how this movie came to be. It’s a low budget oddball movie, and even from the script it must be obvious that it wouldn’t have much of a general appeal.

And indeed, few people liked this movie:

“The Assignment” is an embarrassment all around, a murky, regrettable piece of gutter cinema. Next year’s Razzie Awards race starts here.

But no — it’s to odd to land on the Razzie Awards, too.

I liked it! I thought it was interesting, and both Rodriguez and Weaver are great here. It needed a higher budget, because that awful fake beard (and other er fake bits) gave away the gag straight away. But I like that somebody would put in this much work on a doomed film.

The Assignment. Walter Hill. 2016. ⚃

This movie is a companion piece to Jane B. par Agnès V — Birkin talks about a script she’s for a short film she’s written, and Varda says that they should expand it into a full film. Et voila. But the kids in this movie are played by Birkin’s and Varda’s real children, and it’s filmed in Birkin’s house, so while this is a fictional narrative, it a bit blurry at the edges…

Birkin explained in the previous movie what this is about — Birkin’s character gets the hots for a 14 year old boy, and tragedy ensues. So it’s kinda creepy, but… having Varda’s child play the boy makes it even more creepy? I think?

I think that’s Birkin’s real parents?

And then the movie takes a really bizarre turn — Birkin’s character’s mother tells her to take the boy to a remote island!?

OK, perhaps this is supposed to be a fantasy sequence…

It’s a good movie… and Varda foregrounds all the problematic things about a story like this — she doesn’t try to make it reasonable. The performances are good, it looks great, but there’s still something not quite gripping about it all.

Kung-fu master!. Agnès Varda. 1988. ⚃

Hey! Jane Birkin is a great actor.

This is a weird movie, and I like it.

Does Jane Birkin have a Birkin bag!?

It’s a kind of documentary movie — it’s a portrait of Jane Birkin, but we get fictional interludes and stuff. It’s got a nice flow.

That’s a nice kitchen.

The movie is kinda entrancing, but some of the tableaux are pretty… lame. I mean, everything looks so great, but we get a lot of these mini-dramas that aren’t that interesting. Semi-improvised, perhaps?

It’s really good. It’s got a kind of stream of consciousness flow, and is edited together incredibly well.

Jane B. par Agnès V. Agnès Varda. 1988. ⚄