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The Holdovers. (15.)
Directed by Alexander Payne Starring Paul Giamatti, Dominic Sessa, Da’Vine Joy Randolph, Carrie Preston and Tate Donovan. In cinemas. 133 mins. Just in time for your post-Blue Monday 2024 January slump, comes 2023’s best Christmas movie. It does what most Christmas movies do – deliver solace and joy to characters who are in difficult, painful situations, but does it with a great deal more restraint and class than is usual, and with an almost fetishistic reverence for 70’s movie trappings. Scala!!! (18.)
Directed by Jane Giles and Ali Catterall Featuring Adam Buxton, Ralph Brown, Mark Moore, Kim Newman, Stewart Lee, John Waters, Ben Wheatley and Barry Adamson. 96 mins. “Scala!!! Or The Incredibly Strange Rise and Fall of the World’s Wildest Cinema and How it Influenced a Mixed-up Generation of Weirdos and Misfits,” to give its full title. For those of you who are not weirdos or misfits and may just be feeling left out by that subtitle, The Scala was a cult repertory cinema that ran from the early 80s to the early 90s, up there in the badlands of Kings Cross. It showed a wide range of classic, cult and exploitation films, a different double or triple bill every day, plus a five-film all-nighter on Saturday. This history of its existence as told by the people who were there, is an exaggerated, hyperbolic, distorted, highly partial account that is absolutely accurate and captures its unique ambience perfectly. The Boy and the Heron. (15.)
Directed by Hayao Miyazaki. Starring Soma Santomi, Masaki Suda, Aimyon. Japanese subtitled version/ Robert Pattinson, Christian Bale and Gemma Chan. Dubbed English version. In cinemas Boxing Day. 124 mins. For those parents who find Wonka a touch gaudy, the other big festive family treat is the (probably) last film by master Japanese animator Hayao Miyazaki, director of My Neighbour Totoro, Spirited Away. Or maybe not, the BBFC has decided to slap a child unfriendly and unprecedented 12A certificate on the latest Studio Ghibli film for "moderate threat, bloody images, brief self-harm." Crazy. The brief self-harm is the young protagonist hitting himself in the head with a stone and bloody images are the blood that it produces. I don't know, but I suspect your under-12s will be able to take it. Godzilla Minus One. (12A.)
Directed by Takashi Yamazaki Starring Ryunosuke Kamiki, Minami Hamabe, Yuki Yamada. In Japanese with subtitles. 124 mins. In the quarter of a century that Godzilla has been a pan-Pacific movie commodity, it’s noticeable that while the Hollywood efforts have had marked prosaic, quite plodding titles – Godzilla, another Godzilla, Godzilla: King Of Monsters, Godzilla vs Kong and the forthcoming Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire - the Japanese entries have tended to go for inscrutable, head-scratching monikers. Shin Godzilla in 2016 was a confusing choice, the result of them sticking with the Japanese title where Shin can mean New, True or God. A recent Netflix anime has the name Godzilla Singular Point. This latest big-screen instalment has you waiting for the maths sequence. It’s an odd way of scoring the movie because by many metrics this is one of the very best of the 38 Godzilla movies. If this is Minus One, most of the American films would be in the negative twenties. Napoleon. (15.)
Directed by Sir Ridley Scott. Starring Joaquin Phoenix, Vanessa Kirby, Tahar Rahim, Ben Miles, Paul Rhys and Rupert Everett. In cinemas. 157 mins. Looking back, it's a terrible oversight that we never got a Carry On Napoleon: Sid James chasing Barbara Windsor around stately homes cackling, "Yes, tonight Jospehine," Kenneth Williams providing boner part innuendos. Ah, it'd have been brilliant. Instead, we now have Sir Ridley Scott's Napoleon, which to some degree fills the gap. The Marvels. (12A.)
Directed by Nia DaCosta Starring Brie Larson, Iman Vellani, Teyonah Parris, Zawe Ashton, Park Seo-joon and Samuel L. Jackson. 105 mins Do you remember a time when Brie Larson’s Captain Marvel was supposed to be a really big deal? In the post-credits scene of Avengers: Infinity War, Nick Fury's final action before turning into ash was to summon her to come rescue the universe. The Captain Marvel movie that followed was a comparatively modest affair, a 90s period piece, but sprightly and entertaining and it made over a billion dollars worldwide, putting it in the top ten Marvel films. But when, four years after Endgame, she finally gets to have a sequel she finds she has to share the story with Monica Rambeau (Parris) and a Ms Marvel (Iman Vellani) two figures from Marvel’s TV arm. She's the most powerful superhero in the universe, but now she's appearing in a film that sounds like a Motown-era group of backing singers. She' doesn’t even get Diana Ross billing. I was never a particularly big fan of Larson’s interpretation but surely she at least deserves Captain Marvel and the Marvellettes? Dream Scenario. (15.)
Directed by Kristoffer Borgli Starring Nicolas Cage, Julianne Nicholson, Michael Cera, Dylan Baker, Dylan Gelula and Tim Meadows. 100 mins. For about a half hour Dream Scenario is as good as its title. Nicolas Cage plays college professor Paul Matthews, a desperate mediocrity, who starts appearing randomly in numerous people’s dreams. While the dreamer goes through some kind of traumatic situation, Cage passes through or just stands and observes. After some early mystification, Cage begins to grow into his newfound celebrity though obviously, eventually, events take a turn for the worse when Cage stops being a passive figure in their dreams. The Great Escaper. (12A.)
Directed by Oliver Parker Starring Michael Caine, Glenda Jackson, John Standing, Danielle Vitalis and Will Fletcher. In cinemas. 96 mins. Ah, the old people, the movies love the old people, always off on one of their wacky adventures, those reckless and crazy one-last-hurrah-before-they-die jaunts. Here’s another one, Bernard Jordan (Caine), a 90-year-old WWII veteran who sparks a police manhunt when he escapes from his Hove care home to attend the 70th anniversary of D-Day in France. Except to its great credit, Parker’s based on a true story film isn’t a typical twee little British movie about the elderly. They are motivated by our inability to face up to the prospect of ageing. This is the reality of getting old and it isn’t pretty but there is dignity to it. A Haunting In Venice (12A.)
Directed by Kenneth Branagh. Starring Kenneth Branagh, Kelly Reilly, Michelle Yeoh, Tina Fey, Jamie Dornan and Camille Cottin. 103 mins. Right now, no self-respecting London bus can leave the depot without an advert for A Haunting In Venice draped across one of its flanks. After a terrible summer, Disney is desperately throwing the marketing budget at the third Branatha Christie movie. Logic would suggest that it is entirely redundant to employ Kenneth Branagh to direct and star in an Agatha Christie murder mystery, or indeed any kind of whodunnit: if Branagh is starring and directing it’s always going to be him wot dunnit. It’ll be Colonel Branagh in the conservatory with a Gal Gadot; Reverend Branagh in the library with a Russell Brand; Professor Branagh in the CGI pyramid with the Frenchnsaunder. Sound of Freedom. (15.)
Directed by Alejandro Monteverde Starring Jim Caviezel, Bill Camp, Cristal Aparicio, Lucas Avila and Mira Sorvino. 131 mins. Freedom used to be just another word for nothing left to lose, but inspired by the Braveheart promise that THEY will never take our freedom, Freedom has become the 21st-century crack. We’re hooked on the stuff. The cravings are so intense, so all-consuming that once you get a taste for it Freedom takes over lives, leaves people gibbering wreck unable to function rationally or distinguish fact from fiction. Freedom is tearing families asunder, ripping society apart. The noise of the Sound of Freedom is tedious culture war babble but is this 5-year-old low-budget Mexican film really an entry-level drug or a just a well-intentioned piece pointing a spotlight at an under-explored social evil? Breaking the Waves. (18.)
Directed by Lars Von Trier. 1996. Starring Emily Watson, Stellan Skarsgard, Katrin Cartlidge, Jean-Marc Barr and Adrian Rawlins. Back in cinemas. 159 mins. Ah, the lord loves a Trier and few directors have been quite so trying as Lars Von, the Dirty Dane who has forged a unique identity that is equal parts Ingmar Bergman and Jeremy Beadle, occasionally in a dirty Mac. Love him or hate him - both are equally valid positions, but only if you don’t stick rigidly to it - there really is nobody quite like him. To celebrate the four decades of his career (and to promote their Von Trier box set that is coming out in the autumn), Curzon Artificial Eye are putting a selection of his films back in cinemas throughout August in a season they are calling Enduring Provocations. A nice title, because though his work has often seemed to be faddy, superficial and even childish, it has endured and so has he. With Michael Haneke seemingly decided to hang up the boots with which he has been giving a kicking to all our hopes, desires and delusions of culture, LVT looks like the last European auteur standing. Mission Impossible Dead Reckoning Part One. (12A.)
Directed by Christopher McQuarrie Starring Tom Cruise, Hayley Atwell, Rebecca Ferguson, Vanessa Kirby, Ving Rhames, Simon Pegg, Pom Klementieff and Esai Morales. In cinemas Monday, July 10th. 163 mins. Mission Imp 6.5 is, the first of a two-part finale bringing the curtain down on a series with entries in each of the last four decades. The first four each had a different director and a different style until with the fourth one, the Brad Bird directed Ghost Protocol, it found a format it felt comfortable with and could rely on. The films have been better for it but are largely indistinguishable: was that the one where he hangs from the plane at the start or climbs up the Burj Khalifa? I don’t think though that anybody is going to forget which one Dead Reckoning is: it’s the one which runs rings around Indiana Jones. Indiana Jones and the Dial of Destiny. (12A.)
Directed by James Mangold. Starring Harrison Ford, Phoebe Waller-Bridge, Mads Mikkelsen, Boyd Holbrook, Antonio Banderas, and Toby Jones. 154 mins. The fifth big-screen Indy adventure has at least one thing going for it that none of the others did - zero expectations. Indiana Jones and The Crystal Crock Of Shit put paid to that. And there are a few other enthusiasm curbers: no Spielberg and Lucas; Harrison Ford is over 80; the lukewarm reception to its Cannes premiere in May; the bloated running time. (When in March, John Wick 4 came in at nearly three hours it seemed some crazy reckless dare; now two and half hours has become the minimum for a summer blockbusters.) So realistically, just about the best we could hope for from Indy 5 is alright, and alright is just about what we get. The Flash. (15.)
Directed by Andy Muschiette Starring Ezra Miller, Michael Keaton, Ben Affleck, Sasha Calle, Maribel Verdu, Ron Livingston and Michael Shannon. 144 mins. In cinemas. Flash, a ha, another sap in the multiverse. Early on Barry Allen aka The Flash, complains that he is the "janitor of the Justice League," which I'd say is fundamentally true. Being the hero whose superpower is running very fast is always a shit detail in any ensemble movie, primarily because since the Christopher Reeve Superman the cinema has failed to find a credible way to visualise it. Perversely, the solution here involves a great deal of slow motion. Even so, Ezra Miller’s incarnation of the sparky runner had probably been the stand-out of the Justice League films so a solo movie was required – just at the exact time its star was demonstrating that any relationship to the rails would mostly involve coming off. Fast X. (12A.)
Directed by Louis Leterrier Starring Vin Diesel, Michelle Rodriguez, Charlize Theron, Tyrese Gibson, John Cena and Jason Momoa. 141 mins. All good things must come to an end, and so must Fast and Furious, that melting pot encapsulation of the American Dream – the right to bear arms, drive ultra-high emission vehicles, drink cold beers at sizzling BBQs, praise God, put the needs of your immediate family over everything else and, above all, to employ excessive hardware in ill-conceived overseas escapades and then take a moral high ground to justify it when the plan goes awry. The Guardians of The Galaxy. Vol 3. (15.)
Directed by James Gunn. Starring Chris Pratt, Zoe Saldana, Dave Bautista, Karen Gillan, Pom Klemintieff, Chukwudi Iwuji, Vin Diesel (voice), Bradley Cooper (voice), Sylvester Stallone, Elizabeth Debicki and Will Poulter. In cinemas. 150 mins. Saving the day; it's what these Guardians do. But as they and director James Gunn come to the end of their three-film story arc, they find themselves facing their greatest challenge - trying to make comic book movies exciting again. Since Avengers Endgame, the Marvel Cinematic Sprawl has struggled to engage audiences. Endgame was such a perfect resolution to a decade and a half of filmmaking that really nothing more needed to be said. Subsequent instalments have felt like desperate milking, stragglers trying to cadge a few last drinks after all the interesting party guests have gone. Or, if you prefer, Fantastic Beasts that are pathetically aware they are a poor substitute for Harry Potter. With Thanos gone, Marvel’s efforts to interest us in their giant, 3 phase Multiverse scheme have mostly just convinced audiences that, in a universe of infinite versions of the Earth, they are stuck on the one that doesn't have any good superhero movies anymore. Raging Bull. (15.)
Directed by Martin Scorsese. 1980. Starring Robert DeNiro, Joe Pesci, Cathy Moriarty, Nicholas Colasanto and Frank Vincent. In cinemas from April 14th. Black and white. 129 mins. Back in the eighties and nineties, Raging Bull was seen as Scorsese and DeNiro’s masterpiece. De Niro's performance as boxer Jake La Motta and the gaining of 60 pounds to play him in fat retirement was the ultimate piece of method acting conviction while Scorsese’s visual barrage of photographers’ flash bulbs, rapid editing mixed with judiciously applied slow motion and zappy camera moves was filmmaking at an intensity that had rarely been seen before. Now though it definitely ranks below Taxi Driver and Goodfellas, and quite possibly Mean Streets and King of Comedy. Time doesn’t deal out an even hand but, even so, seeing it again on the big screen, it’s a bit of a shock to discover just how diminished it looks, even in a lovely new Scorsese-approved 4K restoration print. Dungeons and Dragons. (12A.)
Directed by John Francis Daley and Jonathan Goldstein Starring Chris Pine, Michelle Rodriguez, Regé-Jean Page, Justice Smith, Sophia Lillis and Hugh Grant. In cinemas March 31st. 134 mins. There's only really one thing wrong with the film adaptation of the durable role-play board game Dungeons and Dragons – it’s a film version of Dungeons and Dragons. D&D has been around since the 70s and is presumably still being played but in all that time its image with the wider, reality-focused general public has remained that of being something a bit sad and the preserve of nerds. This tries to shake away those tainted associations with a zippy, lighthearted adventure romp but whatever they do it can’t escape the feeling that a film version of Dungeons and Dragons, filled with dungeons and dragons and sorcerers and sword fighting is really just a Minipops version of Game of Thrones. John Wick: Chapter 4. (15.)
Directed by Chad Stahelski Starring Keanu Reeves, Donnie Yen, Bill Skarsgård, Laurence Fishburne, Shamier Anderson and Ian McShane. 169 mins. John Wick 3 John Wick 2 John Wick 169 minutes? Why? Why? Why? The glory of the John Wick ascendency from over achieving has-been comeback vehicle to one of the most elegant and inventive action film series ever to come out of Hollywood was in how all the gradually accumulating baggage - bigger name co-stars, larger budgets, post-colon titles like Parabellum, the whole High Table mythology - never once slowed it down. Three hours and a globetrotting plot (wherever it goes – Berlin, Osaka, Paris, New York – the weather’s always overcast and misty) is a lot to take on though. But John Wick is gonna carry that weight. Infinity Pool. (18.)
Directed by Brandon Cronenberg. Starring Alexander Skarsgård, Mia Goth, Cleopatra Coleman, Jalil Jespert, Amanda Brugel and John Ralston. In cinemas. 118 mins. Brandon's latest takes you to Infinity Pool and beyond; way, way beyond. Cronenberg Jr is not a man to let an 18 certificate go to waste and this dyspeptic black comic horror about idle rich debauchery in a walled Eastern European holiday resort supplies an all-you-can-take offering of sex and violence. Having previously given us celebrity disease mules (Antiviral) and body squatting assassins (Possessor), now he addresses one of the great modern terrors – is it safe to befriend that couple you met on holiday? Ant-man and The Wasp: Quantumania. (12A.)
Directed by Peyton Reed. Starring Paul Rudd, Evangeline Lilly, Jonathan Majors, Kathryn Newton, Michelle Pfeiffer, Bill Murray and Michael Douglas. 125 mins Well, a Quantumania is something I guess but sounds a bit too Ken Russell for my tastes. Overall I think I'd have preferred a Quantumphenia: lots of little Mods on little scooters plummeting down into the cracks in the Brighton pavement while squealing, "What's normal then?" To be honest, as far as an Ant-man film goes, anything other than quantum would be good. |
Dumb Money. (15.)
Directed by Craig Gillespie Starring Paul Dano, Pete Davidson, Shailene Woodley, Nick Offerman, Vincent D’Onofrio, Sebastian Stan, America Ferrera and Seth Rogen. 104 mins. The smart money was always on Dumb Money, Hollywood's take on the GameShop short squeeze, being a poor man’s Big Short. During the second year of the pandemic, the tale of thousands of small investors clubbing together to thwart Wall Street Hedge Fund types' attempts to short the computer game chain GameShop, was a rare shaft of light, a moment to cheer. All the more special because it seemed to be a rare thing that both left and right supported. That Hollywood would feel the need to cast their mould over it was inevitable. The question was what shape they would impose on it. Kick Out! The Newtown Neurotics Story.
Directed by Luke Baker. Starring Steve Drewett, Simon Lomond, Billy Bragg, Atilla The Stockbroker and Steve Lamacq. 85 mins. TThe Newtown Neurotics – I once didn't see them in concert. It was some kind of Labour party event in St Leonards, part village fete, part benefit gig. The year was probably 1986, as the cover of the latest issue of Class War, the anarcho-syndacalist equivalent of Viz, was a picture of the wedding of Fergie and Prince Andrew above the headline Better Dead Than Wed, which in those days was still quite a controversial viewpoint. The event was a bit of a shambles and was descending into factional bickering even before a drunk wandered towards the stage and upended his beer over support act Atilla The Stockbroker. Atilla, always a top turn and total trooper, quipped, "Nice pint," and carried on regardless. After him the three-man punk ensemble Newtown Neurotics stumbled onto stage, started their first song at which point the sound deck, or something else electrical, blew and they then stomped off, never to return. All not very punk in my opinion. The Idiots. (18.)
Directed by Lars Von Trier. 1996. Starring Bodil Jorgensen, Jens Albinus, Anne Louise Hassing, Troels Lyby, Nikolaj Lie Kaas, Henrik Prip, Luis Mesonero and Louise Mieritz. In cinemas August 18th as part of Curzon’s Von Trier retrospective Enduring Provocations season. 110 mins. It’s a tough call, but The Idiots, Idioterne, is arguably Von Trier’s most contentious, most offensive, most hated movie. But, I’m here to tell you, it’s a little sweetie. Idioterne is about a counterculture group devoted to “spazzing;” acting as if they have mental or psychological disabilities to make people feel awkward and release their inner idiot. It’s LVT’s first (and only) contribution to the wave of films made according to his Dogme 95 manifesto, a vow of chastity that had directors commit to 10 rules including only using handheld cameras, not making sets, no props, no music, only using sound recorded on location. So Idioterne is a cheap-looking movie built around the old playground taunt of “Urh, mongy." Really, what's to like? Actually, a lot. Idioterne is genuinely funny and, by LVT standards, sincere, maybe even moving. Elemental. (PG.)
Directed by Peter Sohn. Featuring Leah Lewis, Mamoudou Athie, Ronnie Del Carmen, Wendi McLendon-Covey and Catherine O’Hara. 109 mins. Elements; you’re expecting four but Pixar are only really doing two in this story of young love set in Element City. Earth and Wind exist largely in the background, as clouds and lumps of land. The focus is on fire and water, a Romeo and Juliet tale of forbidden love between Ember (Lewis), the daughter of immigrant parents and Wade (Athie) a water being from a well-off family. It’s a perfect expression of opposite attracts: she’s fiery with a short temper; he’s a total drip. Asteroid City. (12A)
Directed by Wes Anderson. Starring Jason Schwartzman, Scarlett Johansson, Tom Hanks, Bryan Cranston, Jeffrey Wright and Steve Carell. In cinemas June 23rd. In the fragmented and divided bubbleverse of the 21st century, where niche shall speak bull to niche, perhaps the only sane option left is to just try and be discerning in your choice of bubble. Since the mid-90s, writer-director Wes Anderson has been carefully, meticulously, painstakingly, constructing cinema’s most desirable bubble. Le Mepris. (15.)
Directed by Jean-Luc Godard. 1963. Starring Brigitte Bardot, Michel Piccoli, Jack Palance, Giorgia Moll and Fritz Lang. Mostly subtitled. Back in cinemas now. 103 mins After the opening credits, the film starts with a long hard look at Brigitte Bardot's bum and then moves on to Jack Palance's face. From there it continues along the downward trajectory it has set for itself. The title translates as Contempt, and this film about filmmaking is absolutely full of it. It is though one of the most acclaimed Godard films, which is to say that it is one of the Godard films that a relatively large number of people can sit through and very probably enjoy. Spider-man: Across The Spider-verse.
Directed by Joaquim Dos Santos, Kemp Powers and Justin K. Thompson. Starring Shameik Moore, Hailee Steinfeld, Oscar Isaacs, Jake Johnson, Issa Rae, Daniel Kaluuya and Jason Schwartzman. In cinemas now. 140 mins. At the start of Woody Allen’s 1980 film Stardust Memories, there is a scene of the star sitting on a train carriage, in black and white, full of miserable, ugly, depressed people. Looking out of the window he sees another adjacent carriage full of happy, young, sexy people enjoying a party. Sharon Stone blows him a kiss. She's unknown and in black and white but offers a much more alluring prospect. Woody argues with the conductor that he's on the wrong train, does all he can to get off his carriage but has no joy. In 1980, this was just another one of Woody's Bergman homages, a spin on the opening of The Silence. Now I think it expresses our obsession with multiverses, that burning sense of injustice felt at knowing that you are stuck in the worst of all possible universes. Beau is Afraid. (15.)
Directed by Ari Aster. Starring Joaquin Phoenix, Patti Lupone, Amy Ryan, Nathan Lane, Parker Posey and Denis Menochet. In cinemas May 19th. 179 mins. Hollywood is, and always was, an open all-hours meat grinder luring in talented individuals and then systematically smashing the vision and wonder out of them, flattening out their aspirations before then setting them to work on the shop floor, cracking the whip over the seegeeye merchants. And the really heartbreaking thing is that in most cases, it is for their own good. Renfield. (15.)
Directed by Chris Mckay. Starring Nicholas Hoult, Nicolas Cage, Awkwafina, Ben Schwarz and Shohreh Aghdashloo. In cinemas. 93 mins. If you’re turning out yet another incarnation of Dracula, the most filmed fictional character ever, common decency suggests you at least come up with some kind of novel, new angle. This blood-drenched action/ horror/ comedy set in present-day New Orleans focuses on his familiar, Renfield (Hoult) and explores his master/ slave relationship with the dark lord, (Cage, obviously) through the contemporary prism of toxic codependency. Renfield attends group therapy sessions trying to talk through his inability to break free of his abusive partner. Or perhaps the novel angle is to make a film where Cage is the most stable and predictable element. © 1998 Universal Studios. All Rights Reserved. The Big Lebowski. (18.)* Directed by Joel Coen. 1997. Starring Jeff Bridges, John Goodman, Julianne Moore, Steve Buscemi, David Huddleston, Philip Seymour Hoffman and Sam Elliott. In cinemas March 31st. 112 mins. What kept people going to the cinema during the pandemic was old films. When the big studios were holding back their big releases, the urge to attend these arenas of communal diversion proved greater than the paucity of new product that was being offered. Post-covid, Spider-man/ Top Gun and Avatar may have “saved Hollywood’s ass” but those only come along every six months and in between them, old films that have been helping cinemas tick over. Companies like Glasgow-based Park Circus are still doing a steady business reissuing classics, probably because these releases fill the space where all the mid-budget, streamer-dumped films used to be. Subject. (15.)
Directed by Jennifer Tiexiera and Camilla Hall. Featuring Margaret Ratliff, Arthur Agee, Mukunda Angulo, Jesse Friedman, Michael Peterson, Elaine Friedman, Bing Liu and Susanne Reisenblichler. 93 mins. Documentary filmmakers are the lowest of the low; smarmy, ingratiating mugwumps who suck the life out of whatever host they attach themselves to while highmindedly proclaiming to be, “telling their story.” Documentaries are thriving at the moment – in cinemas they seem to be taking the slots vacated by actual films – and Subject is about the effects of being featured in a successful doc. The Son. (15.)
Directed by Florian Zeller Starring Hugh Jackman, Zen McGrath, Laura Dern, Vanessa Kirby and Anthony Hopkins. In Cinemas. 123 mins. First, there was The Father, now there is The Son and perhaps French playwright turned film director Zeller has an old play he can dust down and call Holy Ghost to complete a trilogy on family misery. The hideous force behind his writing is the insistence that family unhappiness is unavoidable; that however good your intentions are, it's all going to end horribly. There’s a cruelty to that which might cause you to come to despise him. Women Talking. (15.)
Directed by Sarah Polley. Starring Rooney Mara, Claire Foy, Jessie Buckley, Judith Ivey, Ben Whishaw and Frances McDormand. In Cinemas. 104 mins. Let’s be honest, Women Talking is a title to turn most men’s blood cold and set their ears to in1/ out1 mode. But when it comes to the cinema it’s the Talking rather than the group doing it that’s the issue. There have been some fine People Talking films, but I think we are right to be wary of any movie that imposes such restrictions on itself. Still, we must respect a movie that is true to its title – this is an hour and three-quarters of discussion, debate, recrimination and reconciliation. In a barn. Knock At The Cabin. (15.)
Directed by M. Night Shyamalan Starring Dave Bautista, Jonathan Groff, Ben Aldridge, Nikki Amuka-Bird, Abby Quinn, Kristen Cui and Rupert Grint. In cinemas. 100 mins. The film career of M. Night Shyamalan, (The Sixth Sense, Split) has been a series of twists, turns and rug pulls but Knock on the Cabin may mark his most audacious trick yet – a socially progressive, fundamentalist Christian tract. Rashomon. (15.)
Directed by Akira Kurosawa. 1950. Starring Toshiro Mifune, Machiko Kyo, Takashi Shimura, Masayuki Mori, Minoru Chiaki, and Kichijiro Ueda. Japanese with subtitles. 88 mins. Now that Greenaway’s had his turn, the BFI is devoting two months to a Kurosawa season: all those marvellous Samurai movies, the premake of The Magnificent Seven, the premake of the Bill Nighy cancer film. And, of course, Rashomon, the one that was his international breakthrough and the title of which (only Fellini has as many films that kept their native language title for their international release) has become shorthand for any narrative that is told from multiple subjective perspectives. Bardo: False Chronicle of a Handful of Truths (15.)
Directed by Alejandro G. Iñárritu Starring Daniel Giménez Cacho, Griselda Siciliani, Ximena Lamadrid and Iker Sanchez Solano. Streaming on Netflix. 160 mins. You’re one of the world’s most acclaimed film directors and won back-to-back Oscars for your last two films (Birdman, The Revenant.) How do you follow that? Obviously, stick it to a gullible streaming service (in this case Netflix; other streaming rubes are available) by getting them to fund your overlong, subtitled, self-indulgent, semi-autobiographical, no-star cast, black comedy riff on 8½ in which you get to realise all those great ideas for stunning visual set pieces that you couldn't find a place for in your other films. And then, just to go that extra mile into obscurity, you laden it with one of the most audience-repelling titles imaginable. Lynch/ Oz. (15.)
Directed by Alexandre O. Philippe. Featuring Amy Nicholson, Rodney Ascher, John Waters, Karyn Kusama, Justin Benson, Aaron Moorhead and David Lowery. 109 mins. A strapping teenager with taped-down breasts dressed up like a little girl being taken into the woods by some strange men to see something magical – it’s no wonder a mainstream family film as bizarre as The Wizard of Oz is a major influence for David Lynch. Philippe’s speciality has been films about films: 78/52, a study of the shower scene in Psycho and Memory: The Origins of Alien which attempted to assess the disparate cultural influences on Ridley Scott’s horror classic. Here, seven unseen writers and filmmakers present six analyses (Benson and Moorhead are a directorial team) of how Lynch’s art has been influenced by the 1939 classic. These are illustrated by a barrage of clips, often in split screen with a Wiz scene contrasted with a Lynch one. Pinocchio. (PG.)
Directed by Guillermo Del Toro and Mark Gustafson. Starring Gregory Mann, David Bradley, Ewan McGregor, Ron Perlman, Cate Blanchett, Tilda Swinton, John Torturro, Finn Wolfhard and Christoph Waltz. In selected cinemas 25th November, streaming on Netflix on December 9th. 114 mins. The film industry is one big game of keeping up with the Joneses. They’ve got a Cinematic Universe, so you’ve got to have one. They’ve started a streaming service, so you start one. They make a Pinocchio, you make a Pinocchio. Weird: The Al Yankovic Story.
Directed by Eric Appel. Starring Daniel Radcliffe, Evan Rachel Wood, Toby Huss, Julianne Nicholson and Rainn Wilson. 108 mins. Streaming now on the Raku channel. At last, Daniel Radcliffe has found the role he was born to play: American musical parodist Al Yankovic. (Note, Yankovic singular, not Yankovics plural: four decades been getting that wrong.) It seems to me the purveyor of witty ditties, even those as acclaimed as Tom Lehrer or Victoria Wood or Bill Bailey, occupy a particularly wretched rung on the showbiz ladder. Weird Wal Wankovic (singular), primarily known in this country for his 80s Michael Jackson send-up Eat It, is basically the US equivalent of the Barron Knights. All Quiet on the Western Front. (15.)
Directed by Edward Berger Starring Felix Kammerer, Albrecht Schuch, Aaron Hilmer, Edin Hasanovic, Moritz Klaus and Daniel Brühl. In German and French with subtitles. Selected cinemas. Streaming on Netflix from 28th October. 147 mins. Some people want to fill the world with anti-war films, and what’s wrong with that, I’d like to know, because here we go again. The 1930 Oscar-winning Hollywood adaptation of Erich Maria Remarque’s 1928 novel about the futility of trench warfare in WWI, essentially set the format for the anti-war movie. Berger’s film, the first of the three film versions to be in German adds a lot more to it than just subtitles; it’s a spectacular compendium of the last quarter century of war-is-hell movies, everything since Saving Private Ryan raised the bar. It even incorporates Roger Deakins's masterful rotating shadow shots from 1917. Avatar: The Way of Water. (12A.)
Directed by James Cameron. Starring Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldaña, Sigourney Weaver, Kate Winslet, CCH Pounder, Stephen Lang, Jermaine Clement and Edie Falco. In cinemas. 192 mins. Like the Qatar World Cup, an Avatar sequel was something that nobody much wanted but now that it’s here there’s an obligation felt to get a bit excited about it. I’m sure that when Disney bought out Twentieth Century Fox they must have baulked just a bit at taking on the reported $1 billion wrapped up in James Cameron’s four new instalments of the Avatar saga. 3 seems to be more or less done and will arrive this time next year regardless; how far they are into 4&5 is unclear but their completion depends on how this goes. Jeanne Dielman, 23, Quai Des Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles.
Directed by Chantal Akerman. Starring Delphine Seyrig, Jan Decorte, Henry Storck, Jacques Doniol-Valcroze and Yves Bical. Streaming on the BFI Player subscription. Subtitled. 202 mins. It takes a special kind of idiot to be a film critic or academic and when they get together under the Sight and Sound Asleep big top once a decade for their poll of the greatest films ever made, they always conjure up a special kind of idiocy. Last time they had the world rolling around in laughter with their verdict that Hitchcock’s Vertigo was the best film ever. This time though they’ve surpassed that by alighting on a three and half hour Belgium film that nobody’s heard of, in which nothing happens; a film so obscure that it doesn’t seem to have ever gotten a formal release in this country nor exist on an original film print anymore, surviving only in disc form. I don’t think you have to be Michael Gove to have your back put out by the verdict of these “experts.” |