Submarine - Review

The opportunities for British cinema goers to get genuinely excited about the offerings from our native land used to come fast and few, lately however we appear to have retreated into the realm of grainy low-budget affairs to great effect. By making our lack of funding and infrastructure a virtue rather than a burden we’ve begun to churn out some unexpected gems at a, still sluggish, but much better rate. Last year we had the comedy crowd pleaser from veteran Chris Morris (Four Lions) and this year another comedy veteran has stepped forward, Ayoade, with his low-key efforts to much acclaim at the Sundance film festival. Submarine follows the youthful exploits of self-obsessed Welsh teenager Oliver Tate (Roberts) whose melancholy demeanour sets him aside from the rest at school; we overhear his running monologue on his life, his love and his attempts to keep his dilapidating family together.

I’m not going to pretend that I haven’t noticed the almost cataclysmic buzz that’s surrounding the film right now, and why shouldn’t there be buzz? It’s not like Ayoade didn’t know what he was doing, the whole film plays directly into the hands of a very powerful, affluent and influential section of British society – us, students. There is nothing about this film that isn’t immediately of the time; a clever trick considering that the film is set, as Ayoade says, ‘vaguely in the past’. Most people theorise 80’s but Ayoade incorporates a myriad of timely styles in order to create the super-past. What’s so devilishly clever is that this super-past is in fact our own time to a lot of people. You just have to walk outside and you’ll see that long woollen coats with big toggles, low cut fringes, cardigans and general vintage have never been cooler. Yes, just so to get the most burning question out of the way, this film is in fact a hipsters wet-dream. In fact I’d actually be surprised if a hard-core hipster didn’t climax at least 3 times during the course of the entire film. It’s not just the clothing and the style however, original songs by Alex Turner should be sufficient to make any discerning student swoon with an over-load of ‘cool’. Not that Alex Turner is astoundingly hipster, if at all, but he’s British, a little mopey and he plays sad off-beat songs on a guitar – I’m sure any hipster could find something to like in that pile. Ayoade incorporates the use of various different cameras, old cameras to be exact (and there ain’t nothing quite as hipster as filming people in vaguely 60’s clothing with old cameras). As mentioned before Ayoade makes his lack of money a virtue with some tremendously charming low-budget special effects, most notably his version of ‘bullet time’ which usually requires million dollar 360 cameras to achieve but which Ayoade achieves by just making the actors stand perfectly still while he moves the camera around them. Where Ayoade’s style ceases to be endearing and starts to become a little problematic however is when you realise that you’ve seen all of this before, in fact you’ve been seeing it for quite a while. I’d be surprised if a student film-lover would be unaware of the work of Wes Anderson, and Ayoade is practically begging you to make comparisons. However, and very sadly, it doesn’t at all feel like Ayoade is challenging Anderson’s filmmaking, or even paying homage to it, he’s just point-blank ripping it off for his own benefit. That’s the saddest thing of all, the most original British film of the year couldn’t be any more derivative. The plot structure split into three acts, announced by large titles on the screen, reeks of Andersons (much copied) use of titling and subtitling as well as his use of chaptering throughout his films. Ayoade doesn’t stop there though, the dialogue, the dead-pan back and forth is so Anderson it hurts a little sometimes. The use of music, the snappy editing to odd, colourful objects dotted around the room. The unfortunate pain continues as it begins to become obvious that Ayoade didn’t stop with Anderson and moved on to the work of his, lesser known, contemporary/collaborator Noah Baumbach. Baumbach’s awkward family disputes are now legendary and the whole plot ends up feeling like Baumbach’s “The Squid and the Whale” set in, ironically, Wales.

Having said all this, I still loved the film. It didn’t make it easy for me, but somehow it felt genuine rather than pretentious. It felt skilled rather than amateur and I was impressed rather than disappointed. It may have just been sterling work of a young cast (especially the wonderful Yasmin Paige as Oliver Tate’s sadistic love interest), and the pangs of early youth and young love returning to me, but somehow it all seemed to work. The weakest part of the story, Tate’s mother (Hawkins) being seduced by a mullet-haired psychic (Considine), ends up still being something very special due to the work of the eternally watchable Considine and the commendable work of two British screen icons (the wonderfully airy Sally Hawkins and the unbeatably awkward and sullen Noah Taylor) as Tate’s parents. Most of all though it’s because at the heart of Submarine there beats an endearing love story that you genuinely want to succeed; and, everything considered, Ayoade does make some lovely little, genuine, homages to Truffaut with some terrific beach scenes. At very least, also, a friend and collaborator of both Anderson and Baumbach – a guy named Ben Stiller (heard of him?) – saw fit to add his name to the producing credits sheerly out of being so impressed. In the end, to return to my first point, you get so many truly great and original British films these days you don’t actually want to question the purity of one as good as this, because no matter where the influence came from Submarine still manages to feel fresh. Like with many things, a little unoriginality shouldn’t detract from Ayoade’s otherwise tremendous achievement.

8/10

Welsh Anderson