Film Reviews
Life of CrimeThursday, 04 September 2014
The task of adapting 1978 novel The Switch by Elmore Leonard - who sadly passed away last year - is given to relatively new director Daniel Schechter who brings together a superb ensemble cast, lush seventies set design and a gritty style. He mostly rises to the occasion thanks to confident camera work and an obvious rapport with his actors. Read more... |
Sex TapeWednesday, 03 September 2014
Slap and tickle and slapstick meet to varying degrees of not very funny in this comedy starring Cameron Diaz and Jason Segel as a married couple who attempt to spice up their love life with a home-made skin-flick. Extreme product placement, a lack of chemistry between the two leads and a tame script co-written by Segel and long-time writing partner Nicholas Stoller fails to deliver. Thankfully there are solid supporting turns from Rob Lowe and Jack Black. Read more... |
The GuestTuesday, 02 September 2014
Dan Stevens puts Downton behind him to become a CIA-built killing machine laying low in a New Mexico small town, in Adam Wingard’s bonkers new thriller. He looks all the better for it. Aristocratic English charm translates into Southern civility as his character David insinuates himself into a family grieving for a son he served with in Iraq. David’s just here to help. Read more... |
Before I Go To SleepMonday, 01 September 2014
Everyone loves a homegrown hero – and they don’t get more homegrown than Before I Go to Sleep, the thriller written and directed by Rowan Joffe, son of Roland Joffe, director of The Killing Fields and The Mission. Before I Go To Sleep is, arguably, one of the most anticipated British films of 2014. The script is based on the Faber Academy sensation of 2011, ex-audiologist S.J. Watson’s novel of the same name. Read more... |
Obvious ChildFriday, 29 August 2014
Opening as it does on a frank, witty and somewhat extended discussion of female discharge, Obvious Child lets you know from the outset that it is every bit as uninterested in making nice as its blunt lead character. Read more... |
Million Dollar ArmThursday, 28 August 2014
Disney's latest is a film which must have itself represented a hell of a pitch. Based on a true story, it's basically Slumdog Millionaire meets Jerry Maguire - two films that attracted ample awards-interest and that prompted cascades of cash, like crunchy autumn leaves to be raked up by the sackful. Read more... |
The Grand SeductionThursday, 28 August 2014
Taylor Kitsch’s doomed film career continues with this trite but good natured Canadian mash-up of Doc Hollywood and Waking Ned. Just like in major box office failure John Carter, Kitsch finds himself dumped in a foreign, mysterious land but the strange inhabitants are far more welcoming in the small harbour village of Tickle Head, where he could prove to be their saviour. Read more... |
Mystery RoadWednesday, 27 August 2014
Returning to the small town you grew up in after a spell in the big city can often be problematic. Old friends now think you’re a big shot. The familiar is seen in a new light, and not necessarily a good one. There’s a sense that the ties which have been slackened might be irrevocably sheared. In Mystery Road, Aaron Pedersen’s Jay Swan is a cop back in outback Queensland, in north-east Australia, after training. Now a detective, he quickly finds it’s sink or swim. Read more... |
Sin City: A Dame to Kill ForTuesday, 26 August 2014
There’s no rest for the wicked and corrupt in Frank Miller’s sequel to Sin City which sees him team up once again with Robert Rodriguez. A series of uninspired but visually alluring vignettes play out demanding you to question what came before and why such a foul follow-up has taken over nine years to come to fruition. Read more... |
If I StayMonday, 25 August 2014
Beethoven went deaf at 26, we're helpfully informed near the start of If I Stay in a bit of information that pales next to the tin ear on display in this late-summer romantic tragedy, which aims to position Chloë Grace Moretz as the next Shailene Woodley. (The actresses are all of five years apart, which constitutes a veritable lifetime in Hollywood). Read more... |
LucyFriday, 22 August 2014
Luc Besson has always venerated the ladies, preferably trousered types with lashings of spunk. You can tick them all off: Isabelle Adjani in Subway, the felon-assassin Nikita, precocious little Natalie Portman in Léon, bande-dessinée adventuress Adèle Blanc-Sec. Why, in The Lady he even offered a po-faced serenade to Aung San Suu Kyi. Not a lot of submissive mannikins in floaty floral-print cotton skirts in that lot. Read more... |
Into the StormThursday, 21 August 2014
One isn't long into the latest weather-related doomsday movie before a nagging question occurs: did the script for this late-summer image of elemental Armageddon at some point blow away? We all know that you don't go to these kissing cousins of Twister and the like expecting Chekhov or Mike Leigh. But Into the Storm is so peremptorily written that it's borderline hilarious. Read more... |
What IfWednesday, 20 August 2014
For an actor whose post-Potter CV has been so wide-ranging - an Irish cripple on stage one minute, a young widowed lawyer in a period horror film or the poet Allen Ginsberg the next - Daniel Radcliffe has developed a highly distinct acting style: self-effacing, somewhat shy, his head often downturned as if to deflect attention away from someone who, after all, was catapulted into stardom before he had even reached puberty. Read more... |
Two Days, One NightTuesday, 19 August 2014
The positioning of Oscar-winner Marion Cotillard (one of the few actresses to have confidently made that tricky transition from French darling to Hollywood leading lady) at the centre of the Dardennes' latest says less about the artistic integrity of the filmmakers - which remains beautifully intact - and more about the approach of the actress, who continues to do remarkable work in challenging fare despite her starry status. Read more... |
CharulataMonday, 18 August 2014
Calcutta director Satyajit Ray was a colossus of cinema whose work often bridged the gap between his native Indian – specifically, Bengali – culture and that of Europe. He wrote that his 1964 film Charulata (alternatively titled in English “The Lonely Wife”) was his favourite, saying “it was the one film I would make the same way if I had to do it again”. Read more... |
The RoverFriday, 15 August 2014
Mad Max script-doctored by Dostoyevsky: that’s how David Michod sees Australia after it all goes to hell. His first film, Animal Kingdom, rewired the gangster film as a suburban family horror story, sweaty with the threat and reality of violence. Michod’s debut as writer-director heads into the Outback, to make a post-apocalyptic road movie notable for steely reserve as much as swift, frequent mayhem. ... Read more... |
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