Reviews
Matt Wolf
The worlds of marital abuse and artistic fraud collide to eye-opening if also frustrating effect in Big Eyes, Tim Burton's film about the unmasking of an elaborate deception that ruptures a family along the way. The film has would-be Oscar contender written all over it, not least in pairing five-time nominee Amy Adams alongside two-time winner Christoph Waltz, but for all that fascinates about the real-life story on view, its walk to the podium is likely to remain as much a fantasy as the claims of the central character, Walter Keane, to having been a great artist. In fact, the Nebraska Read more ...
David Nice
Covent Garden’s masked balls circling around the New Year feature not the seasonal bourgeois Viennese couple and a bat-winged conspirator but a king, his best friend’s wife and – excessively so in this production – the grim reaper. Big voices are what’s needed if it’s Verdi rather than Johann Strauss II, and if we can’t have Jonas Kaufmann, who’s committed his energies to a lesser protagonist, Giordano’s Andrea Chénier, this coming January, then much-trumpeted Maltese tenor Joseph Calleja will have to do. Sadly conductor Daniel Oren is no substitute for Antonio Pappano, also Chénier-bound, Read more ...
Stuart Houghton
Telltale Games has pioneered the 'box set' model of gaming with their hit episodic adventures based in the Walking Dead universe as well as The Wolf Among Us, set in the modern fairytale world of the Fables comics. Telltale's long-awaited Game of Thrones licence has now launched on multiple platforms. Does their signature blend of multiple choices and moral dilemmas lend itself to George RR Martin's brutal fantasy world?The answer is a cautious yes. The typical Telltale title is an adventure based around well-drawn set pieces with your protagonist unfolding their story by solving puzzles, Read more ...
Lisa-Marie Ferla
Before the second series of The Fall began, I was watching Gillian Anderson being interviewed on This Morning. While the subject matter of the drama - a tense game of cat and mouse between Anderson’s DSI Stella Gibson and Jamie Dornan’s perverted serial killer - was never going to translate well to daytime telly, but I was still a little taken aback by Amanda Holden’s fawning over the apparent sexiness of Dornan’s character. In this feature-length finale, new detective on the block Tom Anderson (Colin Morgan) also attempted to pursue the idea that there was something alluring about the Read more ...
Helen K Parker
When I found out Jack King-Spooner was making another game, I didn’t know whether to be happy, or to be sick in my mouth a bit. His previous nuggets like Will You Ever Return and Sluggish Morss, have taught me to handle his small, subversive, artistically experimental and intimate ‘hand-made’ games with extreme care. You never quite know what JKS is going to show you (or rather force you to look at) and some things you just can’t un-see.The risk however, is always worth it, and with that ‘handle with care’ label stamped all over it comes Beeswing, the fourth addition to King-Spooner’s warped Read more ...
Veronica Lee
The audience for this show could probably be divided into to two camps: those who fondly remember watching Morecambe & Wise on ITV or the BBC, and those who weren't even born when Eric Morecambe died in 1984. The latter group may know the double act from repeats, of course (which remind us of how great they were and how many of their successors pale by comparison), but if they are new to Eric Morecambe and Ernie Wise, then Jonty Stephens and Ian Ashpitel's show is a good entry point. It helps to explain why in their heyday M&W were the most successful pairing in comedy, why stars Read more ...
Sam Marlowe
Drop-dead dames, a hard-bitten gumshoe, an ambitious writer and a sleazy movie mogul: this slick, sassy 1989 musical by Cy Coleman, David Zippel and Larry Gelbart serves up two parallel tales of Forties Tinseltown – and both of them are swell. Directing her first musical, Josie Rourke tackles this dazzling collision of noir thriller fantasy and garish Hollywood machinations with seductive brio. And her cast glide between the show’s twin dimensions with an elegance and wit worthy of stars of the classic silver screen.The set-up is ingenious. Stine (Hadley Fraser), a novelist, has been offered Read more ...
Katherine McLaughlin
“Comedy is all about timing” quips Lloyd Christmas at one point, something this sequel to the Farrelly Brothers' crass, gross-out comedy from 1994 very knowingly mocks. Those who hold a fondness for Lloyd and Harry’s shtick may be amused by the huge number of in-jokes and the silly slapstick, but overall this instalment is more filler than killer and relies way too heavily on nostalgia.As part of a huge prank to fool his best friend Harry (Jeff Daniels), Lloyd (Jim Carrey) has been pretending to be in a catatonic state for 20 years. That is, until Harry reveals he needs a kidney transplant to Read more ...
Heather Neill
For a Christmas-weary Brit who's already had it up to here with commercial bonhomie and festive schmaltz, there were going to be barriers to overcome. Here is an avowedly sweet American play – actually nine playlets – on the subject of love, set in snowy Maine, in a small town "that doesn't quite exist". In John Cariani's two-handers, lovers most often – although not quite always – overcomes disappointment, misunderstandings or awkwardness to reach mini-happy endings. The piece is phenomenally popular in the States, having replaced A Midsummer Night's Dream as first choice for high school Read more ...
Gary Raymond
There are moments in this collaboration between performer and theatre impresario Christopher Green and best-selling novelist Sarah Waters, where, rather like with a Stewart Lee stand-up routine, the audience has to make a conscious decision whether they are going to go all the way not so much with the idea presented, but with the mode of presentation. There are times in The Frozen Scream when it feels like the punchline is getting further away rather than closer.Part pastiche, part prank, part homage, part Kiss Me, Kate for the post-9/11 social scientist, The Frozen Scream is an adaptation of Read more ...
Jasper Rees
So now we know. Sort of. The missing clue was tweezered into view in time for the final episode of The Missing and the fate of little Olly Hughes has been revealed. Up to a point. To those reading this without having seen the dénouement, it gives only a little away to report that the plot involving the search for a ring of paedophiles has been a gigantic red herring. Probably.The Missing hasn’t been quite the water cooler event to match Broadchurch. But with skilful feints and shimmies it has kept any number of options open – and continues to do so – while simultaneously confirming one's Read more ...
Adam Sweeting
This newly-restored version of one of MGM's most hallowed musicals is making the seasonal rounds with a run at the BFI and selected cinemas around the country. Directed by Joseph L Mankiewicz in 1955, the piece drips with period charm, while its pairing of Marlon Brando and Frank Sinatra is still capable of generating a box office buzz 60 years later. But (I'll just whisper this) it may seem like a bit of a slog for modern audiences.It's not just the 150-minute duration that sometimes makes time feel like it's been nailed to the floorboards, or the jarring quaintness of the Damon Runyon- Read more ...