Film
Emma Dibdin
What, honestly, is left to say about The Artist? For better or worse, Michel Hazanavicius' warm, wry, subtly audacious love letter to silent cinema dominated conversation, headlines and awards ballots for a good three months, during which time everything from rapturous praise to derisory jibes were tossed at its unsuspecting, perfectly coiffed head.But the important point is this: to dismiss the film, as many did once the inevitable backlash began, as "a simple story, well told", or worse as "a simplistic and predictable story, competently told", is to ignore the wealth of wit, specificity Read more ...
emma.simmonds
“The angels' share” refers to the two percent of whisky that evaporates each year during its maturation process - which the romantically or religiously inclined would have us believe is siphoned off by cheeky celestial beings. With two Hollywood monoliths (Prometheus and Snow White and the Huntsman) slugging it out at the box office this week it seems unlikely that Ken Loach’s Glasgow-set latest - a tiny wee film by comparison - will be left with much more than the angels' share of business. However, this comedic and compassionate film – the winner of the Jury Prize at this year’s Cannes Film Read more ...
Jasper Rees
Apart from “I did not have sex with that woman” and maybe “It’s the economy, stupid”, Bill Clinton seems never to have said anything quite as memorable. Indeed, of all the phrases with his name attached, none is quoted quite so tremulously as Clinton's description of an event that takes place annually on the border between England and Wales as May makes way for June.Clinton’s “Woodstock of the mind” is actually a misnomer. The Hay Festival, which is celebrating its 25th birthday, is much closer to a Glastonbury of the mind. It occupies its place in the calendar with an ever greater sense of Read more ...
Jasper Rees
There’s no particular reason, beyond the herd instinct of producers, why films should enter the multiplex two by two. But such is the case with twin reimaginings of Snow White within a couple of months. First Mirror Mirror went all out for post-modern irony with Julia Roberts camping it up as the Wicked Queen. Now Snow White and the Huntsman imparts a heavy dose of post-feminist top spin with Charlize Theron vamping it up as the etc etc. The reboot is on the other foot.In both cases you have to ask who the films are aimed at, because it’s certainly not the same audience snared by the 1937 Read more ...