• Privacy policy
  • T&C’s
  • About Us
    • FAQ
    • Meet the Team
  • Contact us
TLE ONLINE SHOP!
  • TLE
  • News
  • Politics
  • Business
  • Sport
  • Opinion
  • Elevenses
  • Entertainment
    • All Entertainment
    • Film
    • Lifestyle
      • Horoscopes
    • Lottery Results
      • Lotto
      • Thunderball
      • Set For Life
      • EuroMillions
  • Food
    • All Food
    • Recipes
  • Property
  • Travel
  • Tech/Auto
  • JOBS
No Result
View All Result
The London Economic
SUPPORT THE LONDON ECONOMIC
NEWSLETTER
  • TLE
  • News
  • Politics
  • Business
  • Sport
  • Opinion
  • Elevenses
  • Entertainment
    • All Entertainment
    • Film
    • Lifestyle
      • Horoscopes
    • Lottery Results
      • Lotto
      • Thunderball
      • Set For Life
      • EuroMillions
  • Food
    • All Food
    • Recipes
  • Property
  • Travel
  • Tech/Auto
  • JOBS
No Result
View All Result
The London Economic
No Result
View All Result
Home Film

London Film Festival: Little Joe

★★★☆☆

Daniel Theophanous by Daniel Theophanous
2019-10-11 17:45
in Film, Film Reviews
FacebookTwitterLinkedinEmailWhatsapp

★★★☆☆

Emily Beecham’s Alice is a divorcee living with her young son Joe (Kit Connor). A botanist by trade, she a total workaholic. After slaving away for months in the lab along with her colleague Chris (Ben Whishaw) they successfully produce a plant species, a sterile spiky crimson flower designed to induce happiness.

Alice name the flower Little Joe after her son, smuggling home a sample for him to have. The plant starts to exhibit sinister intentions, almost otherworldly, possessing a psychotropic side-effect of purposefully altering the psychology of those who breathe in its pollen. Soon enough everyone in the lab, apart from Alice, has inhaled the pollen, including her son, and starts to behave in a curious manner.

Director Jessica Hausner may have taken her cues from horror classic Day of the Triffids, although Little Joe is nothing as outlandish as large plants determined to kill humankind.

Visually and narratively Little Joe can echo a Wes Anderson movie but given a clinical, Scandi-like minimalist twist as well as quasi-dystopian feel of Black Mirror episode. All references inferred by Hausner’s quirky if artistically pleasing directorial choices gel with the film’s unhurried pace, characters in a permanently perplexed state, their monochromatic wardrobe as well as the clean and orderly interior and exterior architectural settings.

The actors’ deliveries often appear stilted, which granted compliments the film’s subdued aesthetics, yet the lack of any dramatics doesn’t always work. Whishaw feels under used, his Chris is rather lifeless, almost unnoticeable

This being said, the performance by Kerry Fox as Bella is a film highlight; along with her shaggy dog, Fox’s confused hippy lab assistant is the only messy thing about the film. Beecham’s Alice is impeccably turned out in every scene, her character is always working with the confines of restraint. When she is the only one yet to inhale the pollen, finally getting on board with Bella’s conspiracy theory a little too late, her paranoia and subsequent reactions feel rather muted and expression-less, thus any modicum of suspense and drama is drained away, as events start to feel rather flat and monotone.

Little Joe is an acquired taste with its eccentric if sophisticated form, peculiar plot and intentionally wooden acting. It’s likely to appeal to certain audience who welcome the wacky and weird. Hausner’s stylish understated thriller is actually more of a accidental comedy at its heart, with strong social commentary of the world we live in, medicated into silence and subservience.

RelatedPosts

Final Thoughts on Cannes 2022

Cannes 2022 Review: Tori and Lokita

Cannes 2022 Review: Pacifiction

Cannes 2022 Review: Elvis

Subscribe to our Newsletter

View our  Privacy Policy and Terms & Conditions

Trending on TLE

  • All
  • trending
Abdollah

‘Rescue us’: Afghan teacher begs UK to help him escape Taliban

CHOMSKY: “If Corbyn had been elected, Britain would be pursuing a much more sane course”

What If We Got Rid Of Prisons?

More from TLE

Ministers should fund a national inquiry to look into remaining sexual assault allegations against former PM Sir Edward Heath, a police commissioner says

Nu Vending Opens Central London Showroom

Film Review: The Ballad of Buster Scruggs

Sex assaults on Tube ‘up by 42% in four years’ with almost 1/4 of attacks on one line

Scientists dispel smoking myth: quitting smoking actually helps lose weight

Crumbs! Watch woman take on Britain’s biggest sausage roll – THREE FEET of savoury snack so large it needs to be served on a FENCE POST

‘You’ve seen he gets kicked a lot’ – Giggs defends Manchester United winger

Energy supplier accidentally issues a £2 trillion compensation cheque to a customer

‘Worse than remaining’: Brexiteer takes Johnson’s Brexit deal to court

5 Tips Before You Hire a Car in England

JOBS

FIND MORE JOBS

About Us

TheLondonEconomic.com – Open, accessible and accountable news, sport, culture and lifestyle.

Read more

© 2019 thelondoneconomic.com - TLE, International House, 24 Holborn Viaduct, London EC1A 2BN. All Rights Reserved.




No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • News
  • Politics
  • Business
  • Sport
  • Entertainment
  • Lifestyle
  • Food
  • Travel
  • JOBS
  • More…
    • Elevenses
    • Opinion
    • Property
    • Tech & Auto
  • About Us
    • Meet the Team
    • Privacy policy
  • Contact us

© 2019 thelondoneconomic.com - TLE, International House, 24 Holborn Viaduct, London EC1A 2BN. All Rights Reserved.