Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015) review
**** Director: Joss Whedon Duration: 141 minutes (US) Shrouded in secrecy and keenly anticipated in a manner that could only be described as fervent, Age of Ultron bears the fruits … Continue reading
Fast & Furious 7 (2015) review
Mission Improbable? It doesn’t take Ed Miliband in a leadership debate to give a ‘hell yeah’ to that question. Fast & Furious 7’s not just Ludicris, but ridiculous too. ***1/2 … Continue reading
Michael Winterbottom talks to Greg Wetherall about Amanda Knox and the Kercher family’s response to his latest
Normally when you are making a film no one hears about it, but we had quite a lot of publicity about us making it beforehand, so even in Italy where we were filming, it was always written up as an ‘Amanda Knox film’, or are we saying ‘this’ about the Italian justice system? Are we saying ‘this’ about Amanda Knox? In the end, now that it is finished, it’s like, ‘look at it’.
Interview: Discussing ‘Appropriate Behaviour’ with writer/director/star Desiree Akhavan
“The very core of these messages are sexist. But I get it. It’s a machine. We’re trying to make it palatable to an audience that isn’t used to women being … Continue reading
Virgin Mountain (2015) – Berlin Film Festival 2015
Director: Dagur Kari Duration: 94 minutes (Iceland/Denmark) **** Considerably overweight and out of love. Cruelly bullied by the brutes in the work place and showing signs of arrested development at … Continue reading
Knight of Cups (2015) – Berlin Film Festival 2015
Director: Terrence Malick Duration: 118 minutes (US) ** ‘Wake up’. ‘WAKE UP!’ It’s not often that a recurring line spoken about the human consciousness is equally appropriate as a shallow … Continue reading
Robocop (2014)
**** Director: Jose Padilha Duration: 118 minutes (US) Set in 2028, one of the first things that may strike you about the future is the seeming longstanding embargo on the … Continue reading
The Square (2013)
**** Director: Jehane Noujaim Duration: 108 minutes (Egypt/USA) Oscar shortlisted documentary on the uprising in Egypt; a revolution that gave a gravitas to social networking, whilst simultaneously evidencing history in … Continue reading
All Is Lost (2013)
***** Directed: J.C. Chandor Duration: 106 minutes (US) Alone, adrift and in dire need of salvation. This is not a presumptuous and damning indictment on any reader of this piece, … Continue reading
Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues (2013)
*** Directed: Adam McKay Duration: 119 minutes (US) Comedy films, especially modern comedy films, face the eternal dilemma; how to stretch an exciting premise and/or characters into a feature length … Continue reading
The Hobbit: The Desolation Of Smaug (2013)
**** Director: Peter Jackson Duration: 161 minutes (US/New Zealand) To those who are excited and invested in the series, it is time to dust down any anticipation. The wait is … Continue reading
Homefront (2013)
*** Directed: Gary Fleder Duration: 100 minutes (US) Our hero, Jason Statham, is a normal man (albeit an ex-DEA agent) just trying to get through his day. Having moved out … Continue reading
Carrie (2013)
** Directed: Kimberly Peirce Duration: 100 minutes (US) What a Carrie-On Remakes, remakes, remakes. Is there a reason for them to exist other than to enable cash registers to sing … Continue reading
Gone With The Wind (1939)
***** Dir: David O’Selznick Duration: 233 minutes (US) Gone With The Wind (1939) is a film easily defined by statistics. It is oft-quoted that if box office receipts were adjusted … Continue reading
Seduced and Abandoned (2013)
**** Directed: James Toback Duration: 98 minutes You may have heard about the 99%. Well, in Seduced & Abandoned, Toback and Baldwin (he of James and he of Alec) offer … Continue reading
Captain Phillips (2013)
**** Dir: Paul Greengrass Duration: 134 minutes (US) It is 2009 and an American cargo ship is heading through international waters. Plain sailing? Not quite. This is a ship that … Continue reading
Interview: The Wicker Man Director On His Final Cut, Cursed Remakes And Not Wanting To Be Typecast
It is 40 years since the Wicker Man first bore its indelible image of a giant burning human-shaped casket onto the retinas of cinema-goers. Now, in a new restoration and … Continue reading
Rush (2013)
**** Dir: Ron Howard Duration: 123 minutes (USA/Germany/UK) A retelling of a famously bitter and volatile rivalry. Has Ron Howard evaded caricature in this high-octane biopic of sorts? Niki Lauda … Continue reading
Museum Hours (2012)
**** Dir: Jem Cohen Duration: 106 minutes (2012) (Austria/US) A leisurely film that pores through the relationship between art and life may not sound like the easiest sell. However, for … Continue reading
Monsters University (2013)
***** Directed: Dan Scanlon Duration: 110 minutes (2013) (US) Pixar bring back Mike and Sulley for a journey retracing their college days. It is a trick that enables pratfalls, truculence … Continue reading
Gimme The Loot (2012)
**** Dir: Adam Leon Duration: 79 minutes (2012) (US) Escapades a-plenty in this refreshing shaggy dog tale and debut from Adam Leon. Could the mainstream studios wake up for a … Continue reading
Sundance London: A Diary – Days 3 and 4
Seeing as Sundance is about to fade into a fond memory, it makes sense to distil the second half of the festival into one single entry. I am sure I … Continue reading
Trance (2013)
**** Danny the Champion of the World? Olympic opening ceremony hero returns with pulsating thriller to rock your socks off and dazzle your senses. Dir: Danny Boyle Duration: 101 mins … Continue reading
Robot & Frank (2012)
*** Dir: Jake Schreier Duration: 130 mins (2012) The shape of things to come? Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid for the new millennia? A meditation on old age, dependency and … Continue reading
Broken (2012)
**** Dir: Rufus Norris Duration: 90mins (2012) How much misery can one audience take? This belligerently sombre drama will depress even the most hardened Eastenders fans. Be prepared. A simple … Continue reading
The Digest. Short Review: Zero Dark Thirty (2012)
**** Dir: Kathryn Bigelow Dur: 157 mins (US) (2012) Tracking the 10 year hunt for the poster boy and figurehead of Al Queda, Osama Bin Laden. As the dust settles on … Continue reading
Django Unchained (2012)
*** Dir: Quentin Tarantino Dur: 154 mins (US) When the lights are burning bright and you think they are stars – turns out it is merely electricity lighting up the … Continue reading
Life of Pi (2012)
**** Dir: Ang Lee Duration: 127 minutes (US) (2012) Life of (the) Pi(ous); adaptation of the ‘unfilmable’ book. Can visual ingenuity mould an engaging tale? Or is this merely a … Continue reading
Review: Jack Reacher (2012)
**** Dir: Christopher McQuarrie Duration: 130 mins (US) (2012) Reach(er) for the stars? Tom Cruise stretches diminutive frame to fill the shoes of a modern literary action giant. Does he … Continue reading
Review: The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey (2012)
**** Dir: Peter Jackson Duration: 159 mins (US) Carry On Camping. The epic 1st part of this new Tolkien trilogy. Seeing as Peter Jackson is ‘doing a Lucas’, is this his Phantom … Continue reading
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