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Film Reviews 2013

Given that it's now April - maybe time for a 2013 thread on films to watch and avoidBecause I was in cruel, husband-baiting mode, I took him along to A Late Quartet....though I knew - cos he said so - that he'd hate it. And it was pretty bad with a dreadful clunky script and (according to him) some wholly implausible violin playing. And a revolting sub-plot with a frisson of peadophilia.But Christopher Walken was ace. And it had Wallace Shawm and Mahder Jaffrey in bit parts.Shame that Philip Seymour Hoffman - whom I generally really like - was rather weak. And then we came home and watched teh latest Jonathan Creek episode which was diabolically bad and made the Quartet seem just mildly unfortunate. Ho hum

Sara Nathan ● 4910d141 Comments

I agree that Jonathan Creek went very weird over Easter. Probably best not to try to revive these much-loved shows.A Late Quartet has been getting very good reviews; nothing less than four-star that I've seen.

Susan Kelly ● 4909d

I know - both Jonathan Creek and Late Quartet got good reviews in today's Observer. But there you go, they are wrong!

Sara Nathan ● 4909d

I've often found Francois Ozon's films dull and pretentious but this is an absolute gem.Set in small-town France, it features a middle-aged, middle-class couple, a French teacher and the manager of an art gallery, who initially come across as smug. But as the husband becomes obsessed with a 16-year-old pupil who shows signs of promise as a writer of fiction and the wife is faced with the loss of her gallery, you quickly realise that they are a sad and disappointed pair.This is original, fresh and funny. On at the Waterman's until the 21st.

Susan Kelly ● 4904d

This is a short (75 minutes) oddity in which real-life criminals in a maximum-security prison in Italy, mostly Mafiosi serving long sentences, put on a production of Julius Caesar. It was different but perhaps not as compelling as it might have been.

Susan Kelly ● 4902d

Have to agree with Sara that this is a bit of a stinker; you'd need an awful lot more interest in the politics of string quartets than I can muster to enjoy it.The main problem is that three members of the quartet are so childishly self-involved that it's impossible to care what happens to them.Have to take issue with you on the 'paedophilia', Sara. The couple have been married 25 years and married because she was pregnant, making the daughter 24 and hardly a child.New York looks nice in the snow, though.

Susan Kelly ● 4897d

Susan,  I saw this having read your comments and enjoyed it until the end, I didn't like the ending at all and thought it unrealistic.  Love Kristen Scott Thomas though although she was a tad wasted here.

Emilia Fitzpatrick ● 4897d

Oh? The ending worked fine for me.If only we could make films like this in the UK, with or without KST.Welcome to the forum, BTW, Emilia.

Susan Kelly ● 4897d

This Danish film is a delight. You could call it a romcom but that wouldn't really do it justice. It's streets ahead of the average romcom and the characterisation is needle sharp.Danish couple Astrid and Patrick are to marry in the Bay of Naples after a whirlwind romance. Flying in are his widowed English father, a workaholic being stalked by his bitch of a sister-in-law who thinks she should have been his first choice all along; Astrid's mother, who is recovering from cancer; and her father who was caught in bed with 'Tilde from accounts' and seems to think it's perfectly fine to bring her along to the wedding.I don't want to give the plot away so let's just say that things do not go according to plan.

Susan Kelly ● 4890d

Tomorrow night I hope.Mark Kermode was waxing lyrical on 5Live today.

Sara Nathan ● 4890d

On at the Watermans until May 5th.http://watermans.ticketsolve.com/shows/873492532/events

Susan Kelly ● 4890d

Saw it tonight and really enjoyed it. Just a rom com in beautiful surroundings (and definite shades of Mamma Mia - think goodness Pierce Brosnan didn't have to sing this time!)but I thought a clever script and the woman and her family beautifully played.

Sara Nathan ● 4889d

And so nice that the women didn't all have to be dazzlingly beautiful the way they would be in an American or British film.

Susan Kelly ● 4888d

But noticeably he was playing his real age - around 60 and she is 41 playing 50ish - less than 15 years older than girl playing the daughter.Still not right!

Sara Nathan ● 4888d

This is the most miserable film with a ghastly sense of foreboding happening over the whole thing - except you know something unspeakable has happened from about two minutes in.The actress is brilliant, the kids cute (which doesn't help)but it goes on a long time and is surprisingly unmoving.Not sure really who would enjoy it - just grateful I didn't take husband.

Sara Nathan ● 4882d

It's hard to understand why anyone thought it worthwhile to make a film out of this novel by Patrick White. Despite a starry cast of Charlotte Rampling, Geoffrey Rush and Judy Davies, the characters are all so unpleasant that it's impossible to care what happens to them.It's 1972 and unloved children Basil and Dorothy return from Europe to the mansion in Sydney where their posh, rich, cold mother is dying to make sure they get their inheritance.

Susan Kelly ● 4869d

This film is too much! It's too long and too big. And the music is ghastly.But - apart from the framing story - it's quite faithful to the book and I thought the key casting rather good. Carey Mulligan as the empty-headed, avaricious and careless Daisy was, I thought, just right and Leonardo Di Caprio was what my image of Gatsby is.The problem is that they are all so ghastly, it's a tad difficult to care. But that's true of the book too.I think it's been rather unfairly panned: without the framing story and with therefore 30 fewer minutes, it would be rather a good movie.

Sara Nathan ● 4867d

I thought the music was clever, and almost the best thing about it! Apart from Carey Mulligan (who is brilliant in everything I've seen her in), and I thought Tobey Maguire did well in a thankless, unshowy role.  I would recommend seeing it in 3D though. I saw it in 2D because of a friend who can't bear 3d, but I think it's so visually OTT the extra dimension would be worth paying for.

Olga Sidoryk ● 4864d

A nostalgia fest for being an activist student near Paris in 1971 - after the evenements presumably referred to in the French title.I found it rather annoying - all these immensely privileged and indulged kids spouting revolution before learning how to get high.It's very episodic - picaresque almost. Some laughs, very little engagement. And seemed very much longer than it was.

Sara Nathan ● 4852d

Also saw this yesterday and decided in the end that I liked it after wavering all the way through. It starts slowly, is definitely too long, a bit humourless (apart from the dinosaurs and Nazis (no, really)) and the kids ARE annoying with their half-baked, second-hand ideas but, in the end, it's the story of how Gilles (the director's alter ego) will never get over his first love.

Susan Kelly ● 4852d

Hailed as a French take on Mad Men crossed with Amelie (or was it the Artist?) I didn't enjoy this as much as I thought I would. It's a rather self-conscious romcom set in 1950s small-town France and involving an awful lot of typing.The opening credits are fantastic and the music wonderful throughout. But I thought it arc, mannered with a rather leaden script and 21st century consciousness (and an eye to the American market)... though the female lead was good. Husband, on the other hand, thought it delightful froth with a believable, damaged hero and a sweet storyline. Yer pays yer money...

Sara Nathan ● 4850d

I agree with your better half and enjoyed this, though the Artist/Mad Men strapline has to be one of the worst ever. The hero's 'damage' was very human and understandable.Too long, of course, but I think that about 90% of the films I see.

Susan Kelly ● 4848d

I saw it last night and it was about half an hour too long IMHO. I did enjoy it though and the clothes etc looked right for the time (1971). Took me right back to that time!

Chris Hurley ● 4848d

Can't wait.Suitable for post-Proustian book-club don't you think?

Sara Nathan ● 4848d

I adore French films and couldn't wait to see Populaire, I also have a not so secret crush on Romain Duris. It was enjoyable enough, made me smile a lot, but not a patch on Priceless or Heartbreaker. Brilliant soundtrack though.

Apple Leiper ● 4848d

I saw it last week. Fun performances from Matt Damon and Michael Douglas.

Phaddaeng Thumraksa ● 4848d

Yes, I'm really looking forward to Liberace.

Susan Kelly ● 4847d

The two stars of this are absolutely fantastic: Matt Damonas the toy ou and Michael Douglas as the superstar. And the makeup is incredible. The music and design work excellentlyAll in all - apart from the unwatchable plastic surgery sequences  - it's an excellent watch. What a pity it will get no - much deserved - awards in the US because Hollywood wouldn't fund it so its HBO and for telly only there - which is frankly an indictment of the studio system. Shame on them

Sara Nathan ● 4846d

The Big WeddingThought this was poor given the big names in the cast - Robert De Niro, Susan Sarondan, Diane Keaton

Sally Rivlin ● 4845d

It had such execrable reviews, we didn't bother. thanks Sally for confirming!

Sara Nathan ● 4845d

on the site of Ballet Rambert with five screens and a couple of bars.Only downside is that it doesn't open till late 2014/early 2015 and I can't wait that long.In other cinema news: Vue has been bought by some Canadian fund. Who knew that Vue Westfield was one of the three most profitable cinemas in the UK?I went for the first time on Sunday and was pleasantly surprised: barely more than the Vue at Park Royal and much cleaner, more comfortable, better loos etc. Only downside: paying for parking.

Sara Nathan ● 4844d

Park Royal Vue's only real selling point is the acres of free parking.

Susan Kelly ● 4844d

Too right - it's certainly not the repertoire, the cleanliness, the loos, the refreshments or the clientele.Doesn't leave much!

Sara Nathan ● 4844d

They are, however, showing the live broadcast of The Audience on Thursday evening. We've booked, but it looks as if we're pretty much the only ones, which makes me fear that they'll be left off the list for future such events, forcing me to make the long trek to Shepherd's Bush.

Susan Kelly ● 4844d

I don't mind the Vue. I love that I can park free outside (great when you leave and can be in your car and home within 10mins). I never eat or drink in a cinema so that's not a problem. In fact I hate people munching on nachos or popcorn  nearby. I use the loo before I go so have never used the one there. I love the leather seats and dolby sound system.

Phaddaeng Thumraksa ● 4844d

Joss Whedon filmed this black and white version at his own house with a bunch of friends in a couple of days and for almost no money. It's a triumph, with the lightness of touch that Whedon brought to his finest creation: Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

Susan Kelly ● 4834d

I found this slightly disconcerting as there's such a disconnect between Liberace's flamboyant lifestyle, with its whites and golds and feathers, and the blackness of his heart.Great to see two A-list actors acting so thoroughly against type and they both gave it their all. Douglas, in particular, is superb.I agree with Sara that the plastic surgery footage is wince-making.

Susan Kelly ● 4828d

This Saudi film is a delight and an almost full auditorium at the Watermans gave it a round of applause at the end.Wadjda, who must be about 13, is a mischievous, rebellious child who kicks against the rules of her society and school -- literally, as she wears trainers under her veil rather than the orthodox black shoes prescribed.She lives with her mother; her father is coming under pressure from his family to take a second wife, one who will give him a son. Meanwhile, Wadjda has set her heart on getting a bike and if that means playing the goody-two-shoes and winning the school's cash prize for best recital of large chunks of the Koran, then so be it.

Susan Kelly ● 4789d

This slight film is a big disappointment. It concerns a 18-year-old English girl, a talented pianist, who goes to spend the academic year with a New England family. The 40-something husband wanted to be a professional musician and finds it hard to accept his fate as a teacher at the local high school. The two are attracted to each other and start to make plans to run away together.It's hard to care about the characters. The sound quality is poor, meaning that you often can't catch what people are saying and if you do, you mostly wish you hadn't as the dialogue is so banal. I very much got the impression that it had been largely improvised.Go and see Wadjda instead!

Susan Kelly ● 4786d

This slight New York film ought to be irritating but somehow contrives to be utterly charming. Frances is a scatty 27-year-old who longs to be a professional dancer and the narrative follows her through a few months when she falls out with her best friend before reconciling.There are shades of Woody Allen here, and of Lena Dunham's Girls, tiny bit of Phoebe from Friends; at the same time, it's fresh and original.Is no one else going to the cinema at the moment?

Susan Kelly ● 4781d

Not in film-going mode at the moment - but I really want to see this

Sara Nathan ● 4780d

You should probably hurry then as it's not the sort of film that hangs about. Showing at the Waterman's tonight and tomorrow.

Susan Kelly ● 4780d

This delightful film updates Henry James's novel to the 21st century, where Maisie lives with her parents in a swanky apartment in New York. The relationship is falling horribly to pieces, though, and each selfish, irresponsible parent (cringe-makingly played by Julianne Moore and Steve Coogan) claims to want custody of Maisie while not really caring anything about her or noticing how unhappy she is. Soon, two step-parents are added to the mix, just to make poor Maisie's life more complicated.

Susan Kelly ● 4751d

Woody Allen's latest is not what you would expect from his oevre. It's a bittersweet story of adopted sisters pretty much down on their luck. The acting, primarily by Cate Blanchett and Sally Hawkins (from Happy go Lucky)is very good and Cate portrays the egotistical eponymous monster at the heart of the film really beautifully. We enjoyed it.And it's set largely in San Fransisco...

Sara Nathan ● 4751d

Do you really enjoy Formula 1? Do you like bio-pics? Do you think Peter Morgan one of the century's finest screen and playwriters?Unfortunately, to enjoy this flick, you really have to tick all the above boxes and the first is infinitely the most critical. And I don't. Not even a bit. though sort of yes to two and certainly yes to three.So this is about the rivalry between James Hunt and Niki Lauda. Which remains pretty inexplicable except by saying "chalk and cheese" - which is a bit obvious.Far too many cars doing really boring things. And anyhow, Senna was better.But the Q & A with Peter Morgan was good - which is why we went.

Sara Nathan ● 4751d

This film's been getting saturation advertising and the more I have to sit through the trailer, the less I want to see it. Yes only to Peter Morgan.

Susan Kelly ● 4750d

I saw About Time last week (I needed a light feel good film) and enjoyed it,  actually more so that I was expecting. The main chap in it (sorry do not know his name) was excellent and  Rachel McAdams good as ever.  Light film about the men being able to travel back in time and tinker with their life,  very funny in parts and confess did get a bit teary at one part - is it age I seem to weep at the slightest provocation these days!  Lindsey Duncan and Bill Nighy excellent.The sister was irritating though,  why does Richard Curtis always have a "kooky" sister knocking around.

Emilia Fitzpatrick ● 4750d

Ooops forgot to change the heading in my last post.

Emilia Fitzpatrick ● 4750d

The critics hate Richard Curtis but I'm looking forward to seeing About Time at the Waterman's later this month.

Susan Kelly ● 4750d

I hope you enjoy it Susan,  I liked it much more than Notting Hill,  but not quite as good as Four Weddings!

Emilia Fitzpatrick ● 4750d

Funnily enough, I wasn't wild about Four Weddings on first seeing it the day it opened here, but I seem to enjoy it more every time it's on TV.

Susan Kelly ● 4750d

So this is billed as a comedy - which it just isn't at all - though there are a few laughs. Actually, though more tragic, it was quite Blue Jasmine-esque in its flawed and troubled characters. These focus (sort of) round a creative writing group in Tiberius - which is depicted as a bit of a hole of a town in Northern Israel which would like to like Sefad (very old,beautiful,cool but ever so Godly)As long as you don't approach it thinking you are going to have a jolly time, it's really rather good though there is really too much tragedy for one family or group to cope with. No cast or crew you will have heard of though features the Gashishim - who were apparently a cult, Goons-like, comedy trio in the 60s with a turn for Python-esque - but probably untranslatable - catch-phrases. No, I had never heard of them either.

Sara Nathan ● 4750d

Saw it this week at Watermans and loved it (but hated the parents!)

Chris Hurley ● 4750d

This is a fresh and original American inde about Carol, a 31-year-old dialect coach who wants to be a voiceover artist like her dad, if only it weren't such a male-dominated profession. The film opens with her widowed father moving his 30-year-old girlfriend in and telling Carol it's time she moved out and stood on her own two feet, which has slight echoes of the first episode of Girls. I guess this really is the generation that doesn't want to (or can't) grow up. Soon the two are competing to do a voiceover for a hilariously terrible film that begins In A World ...Echoes of Frances Ha in that, like Greta Gerwig, Lake Bell both wrote and stars in this film, and she even directs it as well. That can make for self-indulgence but Bell keeps it tight.Favourite bit, when she bumps into another young woman in the street and gives her her card saying, 'You sound like a squeaky toy'.

Susan Kelly ● 4749d

Oh, dear. This long Italian film got glowing reviews when it came out a couple of weeks ago, but I can't remember when I last saw anything so pretentious. There were moments when it looked as if it was about to take off and become something watchable, but it never reached escape velocity. We left after an hour, and we weren't the first to throw in the towel!

Susan Kelly ● 4744d

1943, the French Pyrenees: an elderly sculptor and his wife take in a young Catalan girl, Merce, letting her sleep in his studio in the hills and be his life model in exchange for food and money. The hills are busy with Maquis activity at night and Merce escorts fugitives across the border into Spain, causing the old man to grumble about the scars on scratches on her body. As the tide of war turns against Germany, their quiet life is coming to an end.Odd, monochrome, I found it compelling.

Susan Kelly ● 4741d

Crikey Susan! That's not like youIt must have been appalling.The last one I left before the end was the Hobbit

Sara Nathan ● 4741d

I think that's the first one I've walked out of in about 5 years. Life's just too short!

Susan Kelly ● 4741d

Caught two foreign language films in one day recently and would definitely recommend each."Amour" is French movie by Michael Hanneke (director of "Hidden" & "The White Ribbon") so very slow action and long static shots with story of couple in early 70s where wife's health and mobility deteriorates as she suffers strokes. Stated like that sounds tedious and boring but the strength of the two leads (Jean Louis Trintignant and Emmanuelle Riva) who were well known French cinema actors in 60s onwards are mesmerising.At other extreme is "The Hunt" a Danish movie about claimed child abuse and the effect on a small community of close friends. Brilliant for the first half it fades slightly in the second half I felt but overall is still a powerful and simply made film on a sensitive issue even in politically correct Denmark.Proof that keeping away from Hollywood pap (dreading seeing the latest opuses on F1 in "Rush" and the bio film of Steve Jobs) has its hidden rewards.

Joe Conneely ● 4740d

Both very good films, though I think you'll have to catch them on DVD now.

Susan Kelly ● 4740d

This felt half-baked, like a first draft, not funny enough. The high spot is Tom Hollander as a grumpy playwright; he steals every scene he's in.

Susan Kelly ● 4736d

I'm sure this is on your must-see list, Sara (kidding!): plenty of violence, sex and swearing.I loved this film. Rarely have ninety minutes flown by so swiftly. It's an 18 certificate and not for sensitive souls. James McAvoy is so awesome as DS Bruce Robertson of the Edinburgh police -- bloated, red-eyed and looking about 50 -- that he makes the man -- a violent, alcoholic, womanising, racist, sexist homophobe, teetering on the brink of total madness -- pitiable rather than loathsome. Can he find redemption with the sweet young widow whose husband he tried to save when he succumbed to a typically premature Scottish heart-attack? You can probably guess.The film is very funny, very stylish and perfectly structured.

Susan Kelly ● 4729d

I found this film very worthy (code for dull). It never catches light, flickering briefly when the hate mail starts to pour in following publication of Arendt's coverage of the Eichmann trial in Jerusalem in 1961. She was accused at the time of being all intellect and no feeling and that's a large part of the problem: it's hard to like the character or care about her.The sense of the era didn't seem quite right, either, despite the fact that almost everyone chain smokes (some of the actors looking as if it's the first time they've held a fag). I guess we've been spoiled by Mad Men.

Susan Kelly ● 4727d

I totally agree: two fantastic films. The Hunt maybe the best I have watched this year.

Manuela Mancini ● 4726d

This is scripted by Hanif Kureishi. set in Paris and starring Jim Broadbent, Lindsay Duncan and Jeff Goldblum, so the portents are good.I really liked this rather poignant tale of a couple visiting Paris to mark their 30th wedding anniversary and to find out if there is anything left of the marriage now the children have gone.I was with her all the way  on almost everything (which I think my husband found rather depressing)We did agree that Jim Broadbent has been playing men in their mid-sixties for so long, it's rather a relief he iis one.I liked it as much as Blue Jasmine - and it has a similar elegeic air - Malcolm preferred the Woody Allen. There's a tour de force set of speeches at a dinner party near the end - even if you think it a tad slow before, that'll  get you going.

Sara Nathan ● 4720d

Hope this is not taking the thread off only major cinema releases but currently attending this Festival as part of my studies. Saw two good documentaries last week which I suspect will go straight to DVD (but you can still catch at the Festival) and both sadly about men who had died recently. The first "Gore Vidal; The United Staes of Amnesia" is a real laugh from beginning to end on one of the funniest and highly acidic wit liberal commentators and writers on US politics as well as several political US historic novels especially. Great use of historic TV documentary footage as well as coverage of his last three years to death, plus comments off close friends including Christopher Hitchens who pre-deceased him.The second "The Sarnos: a life in dirty movies" is about the much lesser known Joe Sarno who was the leading auteur of US soft porn in the late 50s. '60s and early '70s, earning the title "the Ingmar Bergman of pornography' if that doesn't sound a contradiction in terms, because of their different treatment of women! His low budget films were all blockbusters on 42nd Street in NY the main market for showing these at the time but inevitably he did not get to share in the results. He refused to embrace hard core porn movies and so pretty well disappeared from making film in the late 70s until he was "found" in 2009 for a BFI Retrospective in 2009 and Sweden where he had made films in the 70s. Based on that outline  the film would seem dire but what it neatly does after setting out the history of what he did (including interviews with John Waters and others) is document the relationship with his wife Peggy who appeared in an early film for him and later married him despite an 18 year age gap and her rich family being against her choice. One of those documentary movies that just blossoms on screen before your eyes in a way that fiction features can not achieve and again Joe sadly died at 88 years as the film was being completed. Hopefully both will get released onto DVD and be shown on TV at some point soon.

Joe Conneely ● 4720d

This new Jim Jarmusch film was the best of the three I saw today and a pleasant surprise given I find a lot of his films variable and over reliant on a few good performances. A take on the vampire movie genre it has no special effects, so will be a disappointment to horror film fans. The pace is very slow but the continual dry and deadpan humour from a script with endless music and literary references is what makes it so enjoyable. The story is of a reignited love affair between two vampires played out in the old city in Tangiers and modern day run down Detroit. Tilda Swinton who with her natural skin and hair tone looks made for the part couples with Tom Hiddleton ("Thor" films and "War Horse") as a wasted rock musician with many shades of "Performance" in a lot of the Detroit scenes. They play the laconic and wasted undead lovers with great controlled emotion, other vampires appearing being John Hurt as a 400 years old Christopher Marlowe (yes its that type of film!) and a troublesome sister to Swinton appearance by Mia Wasikowska (looking a lot healthier that the last time I saw her in "Jane Eyre").At two hours its pace and lack of action may well defeat many - the five film students sitting behind me at the showing slept for most of it!

Joe Conneely ● 4719d

If you saw and enjoyed the Iranian film "A separation" by Asghar Farhadi then you will appreciate his latest about a French wife Berenice Bejo (the female star of "The Artist" looking decidedly plain and stressed out this time around) who wants to shed her separated Iranian husband (Ali Mosaffa, the husband from "A separation") and wed her new French boyfriend who she is pregnant by. To tell any more would be to reveal a well plotted film.The script is excellently written, like an onion where new facts to the relationship are stripped away and revealed as the adults and three children involved start to argue and conflict with each other, aided by strong performances all around including the children. Easily the best film seen today but an honourable mention is due to "Parkland". With the 50th anniversary of the JFK assassination approaching, the film returns to events in Dallas over those key days in 1963 but instead of the main events it focusses on what happened to the minor characters caught up in events. These include the medical team at Parkland the Dallas Hospital, who treated both JFK and then Lee Harvey Oswald; Abraham Zapruder who captured the key event on his mini movie camera; Oswald's brother who worked and lived in Dallas at the time and his crazy mother; and, FBI agent James Hosty who had evidence about Oswald which was politically fatal to the FBI's reputation. A very low key and understated film, it deserves to do a lot better than it probably will if ever released generally.

Joe Conneely ● 4718d

My goodness I disliked this film. It felt like a middle-aged male director's fantasy about what beautiful 17 year old minxes get up to. Practically pornographic - just lacking organs really.The best bit is the whole one minute thirty seconds that Charlotte Rampling is on screen but, goodness, it's a long time coming - rather like the old men.Just grateful didn't take husband.

Sara Nathan ● 4718d

Was lucky enough to see premiere review this morning. Based on book of a true story (which I have not read) this is The Magdalene Laundries 50 years on.Judi Dench as the Irish mother seeking her illegitimate son in the face of indifference by the convent where her son was born fifty years ago and taken from her, is definitely what makes the film worth seeing. Put in contact with a recently sacked Labour political adviser played by Steve Coogan, he finally accepts to help her track down her son in return for a "human interest story" to be written to earn money.I am not a great lover of Coogan's style and here as producer and co-script writer as well as co-star his influence is inevitable. He brings the right level of cynical self interest and arrogance to his role and the real pleasure in the film is the continual face offs between a worldly wise and pragmatic Dench with a conspiring and arrogant Coogan. I must admit while well written, I felt the script at times was playing too much for jokes.Director Stephen ("The Queen") Frears shows again his forte is to make great cinema off the human interest in real events. Special thanks also to BBC Films who with Lottery Money got this excellent film made.

Joe Conneely ● 4717d

Last posting from this event!  "Locke" was definitely the most innovative film I saw at this festival and the good news is it is a British Independent feature. At 85 minutes it is a film of a man driving from Birmingham to London in his BMW 4x4. Apparently shot in 8 days we only see the one actor (Tom Hardy as Ivan Locke of the title) and the film has only one location (the BMW) as it travels down the motorways, all other characters being only heard as voices on his car phone. Over the course of the journey we see how the life (wife, family and job) of a very focussed man falls apart. Great cinematography and beautifully edited (given only one location), to reveal any more would be to ruin viewing of the film but catch it if you get a chance - very memorable.

Joe Conneely ● 4716d

I really want to see this one - may even buy a ticket - rare at this time of year.

Sara Nathan ● 4716d

I really enjoyed this - the story of the making of Mary Poppins as a film musical and PL Travers two week visit to Hollywood before she signed away the rights.Good script and compelling performances from Emma Thompson as the redoubtable - and incredibly rude - PL Travers and Tom Hanks as the rather smoothed over Walt Disney.Paul Giametti as her driver is also ace.You get lots of the soundtrack too.The premise is that both Travers and Disney had traumatised childhhods - though hers is explored as his is not.Can't quite see why the Standard gave it a measly 3 stars as it is both funny and moving (I wept a bit)

Sara Nathan ● 4712d

Daisy (brilliantly played by Irish actress Saoirse Ronan) is a 16-year-old American, angry and unhappy. Sent to spend the summer with her English cousins, who lead an Enid-Blyton-style existence in a big house in the country, she starts to unbend and fall for her cousin Edmund (something which I suspect American audiences find transgressive in a way we Brits do not).Then a nuclear bomb goes off in London and the country descends into chaos as the army fights a (losing) guerilla war against the terrorists. Daisy, Edmund et al are evacuated to work camps. Determined to escape and make their way home, they face a post-apocalyptic nightmare on the way and not all of them will make it.I thoroughly enjoyed this, although the ending may be a little too optimistic in the circumstances.

Susan Kelly ● 4707d

Maybe I was just in the wrong mood but this film didn't do it for me at all. How could you be with the wife all the way, Sara? I thought she was vile -- the sort of woman who makes a career out of belittling her husband, which then makes him look unattractively weak. I couldn't find any sympathy for them at all.Great performances, sure, and Nick's speech at the pompous dinner party was a classic, but I don't think I would recommend it. It leaves too sour a taste.

Susan Kelly ● 4706d

Oh, if only the film had been invisible as well. What a turkey. And you know, from the first shot of the sky lowering to a wide beach - where inevitably a figure in a black crinoline will soon walk - that it's going to be ghastly. But by then it is too late and you are wedged in the longest two hours of cinema in the recent past.Shame because this is based on the excellent Claire tomalin biography of Dicken's mistress, Nelly tiernan and stars Ralph Fiennes and Kristin Scott Thomas among many others. And lots and lots of frocks.But the problem is that it is also directed by Ralph Fiennes and, honestly, he should stick to acting. Also a leaden script by Abi Morgan and some wholly inappropriate music didn't help. A cliche of a period piece which reeked of amateurism somehow.I don't usually bang on at such length...but if you go after this, don't say you weren't warned.

Sara Nathan ● 4697d

What a difference a day makes.Philomena is also based on a book, funded by the BBC and BFI, starring heavyweight British actors (I assume no objection to describing Judi Dench thus?)But this one was directed by Stephen Frears. Maybe he could coach and mentor Ralph Fiennes.This was refreshingly unsentimental - given the subject matter about an Irish woman who has her illegitimate child removed by the evil nuns and sold abroad. Definitely shades of the Magdalene sisters which deals in a fictional version of the same story.But Philomena is real so is Martin Sixsmith (I know that because we held the same scholarship and I used to get sent his BBC paycheck for some reason)Anyhow, Judi Dench is so moving and Steve Coogan as Sixsmith is so brilliant, that it all works. Good script (which Coogan co-wrote)and music too.And really examines some dilemmas over faith, sexuality and acceptance.

Sara Nathan ● 4695d

You might be misled by the title into thinking this is a children's film. Nothing could be further from the truth. Nor is it a comedy. We're in Yorkshire but not the God's Own Country of Hovis ads, rather the scrap yards and dismal council estates of Bradford. Arbor and Swifty are two adolescent boys excluded from school who spend their days stealing scrap metal and selling it to a dealer, the oddly and inaptly named Kitten, to give money to their useless parents. Arbor lives with his Mum and half brother and the brother is a drug addict who steals Arbor's Ritalin; that's the sort of thing these boys have to contend with so what hope is there for them?Swifty has a natural affinity with horses and is soon helping Kitten with his prize trotting pony. Maybe redemption lies there? But when Arbor starts stealing scrap from Kitten to sell to other dealers, he sets in train a series of events that ends in tragedy.I feared at first that this might be too depressing, too Ken Loach, but the superb naturalism of the young stars and the exquisite cinematography -- never have electricity pylons, cooling towers and sink estates looked so beautiful -- that it turned out to be a real joy.

Susan Kelly ● 4692d

I enjoyed Philomena well enough and the performances are, as you say, terrific, but I found the woman herself deeply tiresome and marvelled at Sixsmith's patience with her.As he says at one point, 'This is what a lifetime of Reader's Digest, the Daily Mail and romantic fiction does to the human brain'.

Susan Kelly ● 4691d

And jolly good for him as a snotty metropolitan elitist to have to deal with it for once!

Sara Nathan ● 4691d

Well Coogan did admit in the interviews included in "The Look of Love" DVD (where he played Paul Raymond), that he was attracted to playing characters who were not very likeable persons. I though his character in "Philomena" epitomised the type of washed up political class snob who having been sacrificed to protect someone else was then forced to take on the human interest story the film is about, simply to make some money, and had his eyes opened in the process.

Joe Conneely ● 4691d

He certainly seemed to have gained something from the process, especially as he's shown as depressed at the start of the film. 'Your stool is outstanding'. Brilliant!

Susan Kelly ● 4691d

This is a delightful road movie about why one shouldn't ever decide to a)live in America or b)grow old.It combines laugh out loud funny with some real poignancy.And because it's in black and white, the whole mid west looks like something left over from the Grapes of Wrath. The casting is amazing - though no-one I've ever heard of - and even the music is good. I really enjoyed it. Oh yes - and it features the single best use of the f-word I have ever heard.There's always a theme to the BAFTA tips. I'm wondering if growing old is this year's.

Sara Nathan ● 4691d

Saw the trailer for it today before Philomena. It looked interesting.

Susan Kelly ● 4691d

Given this is a film about dying of Aids, it's not going to be much fun. It's based on a real life story of a singularly unpleasant but conveniently heterosexual chap who bonks everything that moves at rodeos around Texas in the 80s (possibly excluding the bulls, but its not clear)and ends up with AIDS.Not one to take this lying down, he starts to import vitamins, interferon or anything else he can find to extend his life. He sets up a club of other AIDS sufferers and, in the course of this stops being red-neck white trash and becomes almost decent and radically less homo-phobic.Can't say I enjoyed it much.

Sara Nathan ● 4682d

That's another two hours of my life that I will never see again. So far (even including The Invisible Woman) the turkey of the season.It is full of gratuitous sex n violence. Starts with fellatio and goes downhill (is that possible?) Almost wholly incomprehensible as to motive or the "how", the plot seems an excuse for the aforementioned  s'n'v and is not saved by the pseudo-intellectual sprinkling of guff. Quoting Keats while on the run just doesn't do it for me. Nor from the stunned silence in the viewing theatre followed by whispered abuse (darling, it really isn't done to publicly undermine another artiste's oevre at these things) was the rest of the audience convinced. Actually I only lasted till the end to see if one of husband's pupils, who'd spent a couple of days playing the violin for some arty scene, had made the cut. Luckily she hadn't so one reputation saved. But those of Brad Pitt, Michael Fassbinder, Penelope Cruz, Javier Bardem and Cameron Diaz will hardly have been enhanced.

Sara Nathan ● 4681d

Rather an old fashioned film this - rather better than the book from what I can recall (almost sure I never finished it). Stars Kate Winslet as troubled young woman - sort of twenty years on from Revolutionary Road - living with son, who gets persuaded to take in a fugitive on the run. (Josh Brolin) It's a little predictable but a good watch with an OK script and rather good music.Only about six billion times better than The Counsellor - so above average.

Sara Nathan ● 4677d

Any film starring Geoffrey Rush is off to a good start and both he and Emily Watson are fabulous in this. And the design is brilliant. And it's very moving and not at all crass...though a voice over by death is never going to be laugh a minute.Honestly, it's just one ghastly disaster after another in small town Germany, maybe Stuttgart during World War 2.I thought I had read it but hadn't - it reminded me thematically a bit of Hans Falluda's Alone in Berlin  - or filmically - the Reader.Worth seeing but take tissues.

Sara Nathan ● 4673d

The history of American black emancipation from the 1920s on through the eyes of a chap who was butler in the White House for over 20 years.A tour de force from Forest Whittaker who is in practically every shot. Ably supported by Oprah Winfrey and with some seriously starry bit players including  Robin Williams as Eisenhower, John Cusack as Tricky Dicky and Alan Hickman and Jane Fonda as the Reagans (rather stunning actually) It can't be true - and apparently quite largely isn't - but it is rather moving. And for such an American film (leaving aside the odd British thesp)interesting that all the music was recorded in London. OK, a fairly arcane fact...(Which reminds me, John Williams wrote the fine music for the Book Thief - I forgot to mention it)

Sara Nathan ● 4673d

This had really quite bad reviews so expectations were pretty low - but actually I rather enjoyed it. Benedict Cumberbatch was compelling as Julian Assange, and the wikileaks story (even told from the point of view of his trusted aide who eventually decamps) is good stuff for film. The digital effects were brilliant - well, they have to be - there's not a lot of moving footage in computer hackery. Lots of great support from Daniel Bruhl, Laura Linney, Stanley Tucci (tiny roles) Dan Stephens - Matthew to Downton fans. I wonder if Alan Rusbridger was flattered at being played by Peter Capaldi (Malcolm aka Dr Who)

Sara Nathan ● 4664d

I'm not a fan of Sofia Coppola and loathed Lost in Translation (unlike everyone else)This had a really poor trail but the film itself was so much better than I expected. It's about a group of vacuous LA teens who get kicks from robbing A-listers such as Paris Hilton when the stars are out partying. It's about emptyness, fame, consumerism, peer-pressure, parenting etc but is also rather a good watch with some memorable sequences. Emma Watson - Hermione all grown up and thin - stars, most of the rest are unknown to me.

Sara Nathan ● 4664d

The big lesson from this season is to avoid movies where actors direct themselves. qv the Invisible Woman where Ralph Fiennes is the perpetrator. Here it's Ben Stiller. And if those aren't fateful words,I don't know what are.Half the fun of going to these screenings is in NOT doing much research beforehand - so you come to it as a tabula rasa. Which can be good. Alternatively, it means you see things really best avoided. And this one is number 3 on this year's wall of shame so far.The first making of this tale - which I am ashamed not to have seen - starred Danny Kaye and was exceptional. Maybe the second lesson is don't go to remakes.I think the plot is supposed to be: really boring man has incredible fantasy life in which he achieves madly. In this version he ends up in Iceland, Greenland, Afghanistan and loses the need to fantasise and gets the girl. Which can't be right. A few laughs and loads of racial and national cliches. Best avoided. Unless you really like Ben Stiller of course - he's in nearly every frame.

Sara Nathan ● 4664d

You may remember the stage play - it was on at the National Theatre - and a huge success, not so long ago.From what I remember, this barely opens it out at all - a few vistas over hot, flat Oklahoma, some cars coming and going. But the powerful set pieces remain the core. And why not? If you have actors like Meryl Streep and Julia Roberts prepared to look old and buffeted by the mid-west, you don't need a whole lot else (though Ewan McGregor and Benedict Cumberbatch - is he in EVERYTHING this year?- don't hurt. It's about the ghastly women in a dysfunctional family tearing each other and themselves apart. Only the Indian, OK native American, servant comes out of it with any credit. Well worth seeing, though long with few laughs. Bet the female leads get nominated all over the place.

Sara Nathan ● 4662d

A most interesting film. It struck me as a metaphor for the terminal decline of America. A large sum of money that doesn't really exist but all the fat, stupid people are convinced that it does: isn't that what caused the financial crisis?

Susan Kelly ● 4661d

1943: Allen Ginsberg leaves his home in New Jersey and his paranoid-schizophrenic mother to go to Columbia. At first he's a hard-working and diligent student but soon he becomes infatuated with beautiful fellow student Lucien Carr, and he's not the only one. Lucien has a circle of gay admirers whom -- unstable and manipulative as he is -- he does not hesitate to exploit. One man in particular, David, has followed him around the country to this -- his third college.As Lucien and Allen carry out the rebellions which look so quaint to our 21st-century eyes, at a time when students were minors and treated as such and wore collar and tie to lectures, they are headed towards tragedy as David becomes ever more possessive. Bizarrely, US law at that time allowed a heterosexual man in receipt of unwanted advances from a 'known homosexual' to use that as a plea of self-defence or justification. Ah, the good old days.The film got bad reviews and perhaps doesn't quite pull it off, but comes close. Shots of the main characters walking backwards to prove ... nope, no idea ... don't work at all and it plods in places, but generally, it was well worth seeing.

Susan Kelly ● 4659d

I think you are right - one of the most thought-provoking of the year...also on the decline of the family.It would cure you instantly of unthinking approval of the US wouldn't it?

Sara Nathan ● 4658d

I don't know much about lesbian love-making but this all looks terribly hard work and it goes on for so long. Actually seems like for ever when you are sitting in a cinema in Wimbledon with about four other heterosexual couples in their fifties and above who audibly sigh at each groan of pleasure (if that's what it was)Apparently the young actresses felt totally exploited by the directors insistence that they do this interminable love-making over and over again. I see their point. Actually you could see their points, crevasses and everything in between. DON'T TAKE YOUR MOTHER (OR DAUGHTER)The other small concern is that this movie lasts very nearly three hours, the sex is about ten minutes. It's almost all in close up - not just the sex. And it comprises girl meets girl, they fall in love. It doesn't end happily. Um. that's it.And Arsenal were playing that night - husband must love me as much as he says he does to sit through this instead.

Sara Nathan ● 4658d

My husband rather enjoyed it. I didn't bother. I gather that Lars Von Trier has made a FOUR-hour hard-core porn movie. I won't be bothering with that either!

Susan Kelly ● 4658d

The landscapes in Nebraska looked not so much post-industrial as post-civilisation, as if there had been an apocalypse.

Susan Kelly ● 4658d

In an orthodox Jewish family Shira, at 18, is ready for matrimony and her parents have their eye on a rather dull young man. But then the sudden death of her sister Esther, leaving a new-born baby son, postpones any talk of weddings and when the son-in-law begins to speak of marrying a Belgian widow and moving himself and his son abroad, Shira's mother cannot face the loss of her grandson and suggests Shira as a second wife for him.These should be good ingredients for drama, but the film seems wilfully undramatic -- even anti-dramatic. Too many scenes consist of people sitting round talking. I began to lose interest in Shira's dilemma, especially as she is not being forced, or even pressured into the marriage, the difficult decision being wholly hers.The film has been likened to the works of Jane Austen. The only parallel I see is that women who fail to find a husband in these communities are failures, people of no account in the world. Moreover, no respectable woman in Jane Austen's day would have contemplated marrying her brother-in-law, such unions being frowned upon and of dubious legality.Also, Jane Austen has a sense of humour.

Susan Kelly ● 4657d

Oh dear - and Mark Kermode loved it - which is why we are going tomorrow night...

Sara Nathan ● 4657d

Not saying it's a bad film, just too understated for my taste.

Susan Kelly ● 4657d

Understated is fine by me!I loved this film: the idea, the script, the performances. Even this year's obsession with shooting everything in close-up is fine when claustrophobia, the weight of family expectation and a wholly confined life are what it's all about.The action (if that's the word) is set in Jerusalem- probably. But you would never know it. Virtually all of it is set indoors in the cramped homes and study rooms of the Hassidic community there - where doors have to slide because there is never space to open them.It is a slight story of what happens when the older sister, in a close-knit, ultra-orthodox, family dies. It is wordy, it is probably over-sympathetic to Hassidic men: the Rebbe is a mensch, our heroine's father a gent and the hero (if you remove the fur hat and side-curls) would be frankly a hunk.But just give thanks for a beautifully acted, U-rated, (thanks be - no lesbian sex!)  91 minute film which actually explores duty, family and what marriage is about in a thoughtful and, I thought, charming way.Sorry, Susan, we will have to agree to differ on this one.

Sara Nathan ● 4655d

No problem. I believe it was Tel Aviv but, as you say, there was no way of telling given the almost 100% indoor sets.

Susan Kelly ● 4655d

The big Haredi communities are pretty much all in Jerusalem - Tel Aviv's almost wholly secular. (to the extent that husband's Arabist, peace-niky, agnostic relatives there won't even visit Jerusalem) What made you think that?

Sara Nathan ● 4655d

The New York Times says Tel Aviv, the Washington Post Jerusalem...The director, an orthodox ba'al teshuva woman herself, lives in Tel Aviv.All more and more surprising.

Sara Nathan ● 4655d

What made me think it was Tel Aviv is that that's what it said in the reviews I saw.

Susan Kelly ● 4655d

Star-studded but puerile.I gave it about 45 minutes. Seemed ample

Sara Nathan ● 4645d

This rather affecting Chilean film is a study in the loneliness and resilience of a woman alone in middle age and coming to terms with it.Rather good and understated

Sara Nathan ● 4645d

Based on real events and with the silver linings play book team, this is rather a good watch - tho a bit long.Particularly good female leads in Amy Adams and  Jennifer .... No it's gone - the one who is in everything -- Laurence??

Sara Nathan ● 4645d

Jennifer Lawrence, star of The Hunger Games and size-zero refusenik. Hurrah!

Susan Kelly ● 4644d

I so loved this - a musical set in Edinburgh about squaddies returning from Afghanistan. A juke box musical (aka mx mamma Mia apparently) using the music of the proclaimedFab performances, great music. Yum!

Sara Nathan ● 4644d

A twofer this one - up for best film not in the English Language AND best British film...which is quite good going and I have never seen before.It's very miserable about a family from the sticks who are forced to become economic migrants into the city when rice prices fall. things get very, very, bad, then a little better when the dad finds work. But you just know it's not going to end well.There's a surprising and gripping twist...

Sara Nathan ● 4643d

I disagree -  I really enjoyed Blue/Warmest, finding it a compelling and intense portrait of a relationship in flux and eventually decline. Great to see two strong female leads with men as bit parts for a change. Don't give it a miss thinking it's no more than girl/girl porn - it's far from this, and although I admit I wasn't convinced at the outset about the full-on stuff, at the end of the three hours (which I think it needed to be to explore the relationship in detail and allow the narrative to build) I felt it was integral to the intensity of the portrayal. Well deserved top prize at Cannes in my view (and that of many others).  - although agree that there must remain unease over the reported relationship between actors and director.

Cathy Johns ● 4643d

"Vue Westfield was one of the three most profitable cinemas in the UK?" I would take that with a generous pinch of salt, assuming you are talking of Westfield W12 rather than the one in Stratford, where who knows .... If it makes more money than most, it would be on food sales outside. I've often seen many many empty seats. Frankly I don#t believe this is one of the 3 or even 30 most profitable cinem's in the UK. If you attached a supermarket to a cinema, would the profits of the former make the latter a profitable cinema?

Dan Filson ● 4642d

The latest Disney classic animation - based on the Snow Queen. We watched with three generations of adults and all loved it: so beautiful; rather moving; OK music and very funny in parts. Also a clever twist and a modern ending in some ways.Genuine must-see family film

Sara Nathan ● 4642d

I may have spent altogether too long at the Organ Inn Folk club as a teenager, because I could sing along with a ridiculous number of the folk songs in this flick about a rather horrible singer trying to make it in New York in 1961. Honestly, he has no redeeming features - apart from an affection for ginger cats.It's Coen Bros so beautifully shot, fabulously lit and with a road movie element.OK, but not great

Sara Nathan ● 4642d

I think I saw at least the first of this trilogy - made over 18 years ago, by the same team.They are now a couple with pretty twin daughters, but he is torn apart by custody traumas over his son.They talk A LOT, they walk a bit, they talk again. That's it.Quite liked him, couldn't stand her...starring Ethan Hawke and Julie Selpy as before.Not very long but lasted a lifetime.

Sara Nathan ● 4642d

About a lonely geek, who does lonely geeky things with Scarlett Johansens voice. Vaguely Percy and little funDidn't finish it

Sara Nathan ● 4640d

I rather  enjoyed this tale of two 14 year olds helping a fugitive  while considering love, girls and relationships. Great  location so. The Mississippi or somewhere like. The star of Dallas Buyers Club - matthew mc something is a convincing  lead

Sara Nathan ● 4640d

Not an award winner but if you like the premise, it's quite fun. And the insider radio jokes are hoot if you are a radio groupie. But a bit laboured  as a plot. Quite a few laughs though

Sara Nathan ● 4640d

Saw this months after Susan and loved it - so interesting about girls and women in Saudi society - quite subversive too - I was amazed to see it was shot in Riyadh. that must have taken nerve.The acting is rather affecting as is the story of a stroppy teen who decides to learn Koranic recitation in order to win the prize money to buy a (forbidden to girls) bike.

Sara Nathan ● 4639d

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2302869/Saudi-Arabia-lifts-ban-women-riding-motorbikes-bicycles.htmlGood work, Wadjda!

Susan Kelly ● 4638d

I really enjoyed this too. Many critics complained that the flashbacks to Travers' childhood in Australia slowed it down but I felt they were necessary to break up what would otherwise have been a long series of scenes in which Walt and his staff made suggestions and Travers said No in as rude a way as she possibly could.Emma Thompson was obviously having a whale of a time as the world's grumpiest woman.'You're the only American I've ever met that I like, Ralph.''May I ask why?''No.'

Susan Kelly ● 4638d

The Hobbit 2 - overdone 3D rubbish. Too long and too much action. About as subtle as "shut up". Tolkien would not be impressed

Steven Diver ● 4634d

Was it worse than Hobbit 1? I only lasted 90 minutes in that - seemed ample at the time. And am only going to try number two if it is nominated for something serious.Was watching Sherlock episode two when they both had postits on their foreheads during the stag night and thought Dr Watson's should really have been the Hobbit - not Madonna. Sherlock wouldn't have heard of either and it would have been funnier.

Sara Nathan ● 4634d

Hobbit - 3D snazzy angles. Yawn.I haven't watched the second sherlock yet - something for tomorrow evening :-)

Steven Diver ● 4634d

Now really do have to see 12 years a slave, Mandela, wolf of wall street and captain Phillips - oh an despicable me 2 and monsters university. All well and good.But my heart sinks at the prospect of Gravity.

Sara Nathan ● 4633d

Some film mogul somewhere must have seen Leonardo di Caprio playing Jay Gatsby and decided to go a bit further. the real-life "wolf" makes the Great Gatsby seem a real charmer.Actually I didn't realise until the end of this very, very long movie, that it was based on a true story: we watched it as a fable of our times till the credits rolled.It's the story of a greed-is-good broker with no redeeming features and his rags/riches/rags/presumably riches odyssey, surrounded by lots of other scummy people. Joanna Lumley has a tiny part. Directed by Scorcese.

Sara Nathan ● 4632d

Reformed villain in the title role so much less fun.Features Russell Brand's voice as the wicked scientist.I know lots of people think it as good as the first one. It just isn't.

Sara Nathan ● 4632d

Having posted this last night, I heard the star himself on the Today programme drawing parallels between Gatsby and the Wolf...

Sara Nathan ● 4631d

My daughter tells me this movie has 546 uses of the f-word. She saw it in Abu Dhabi where it was 45 minutes shorter due to censorship - though te most stringent cuts can't have excised all of them. Amazon it made sense at all!

Sara Nathan ● 4628d

This is the most astonishing film and could well win both best documentary and best foreign film at the Baftas.The film-maker, an American, British Danish chap called Joshua Oppenheimer - whose presence is palpable throughout the film - spent years finding those who committed the massacre of about a million people in Indonesia in 1965/6 and winning their confidence. Then he persuaded them to re-enact their brutal killings of "communists".... Some of these men begin to realise the enormity of what they have done 45 years ago. Others still revel in it. Almost telling was the footage of contemporary Indonesian TV which still spouts the same propaganda that enabled these gangsters to murder in the 60s and protects them now.It was gob-smacking stuff that you wouldn't have believed as fiction. Just stunning.

Sara Nathan ● 4623d

This is so not my sort of film: based on the true story of the hijacking of an American cargo ship by Somali pirates in 2009.Tom Hanks is stupendous as the eponymous hero - can't understand the lack of Oscar nomination. And the previously unknown (cos he had never acted before) Barkhad Ali as the Somali leader.It is really gripping and I suppose a thriller. But it does feel quite real. The Somalis are excellent, as is the music.

Sara Nathan ● 4623d

Not Ali but Abdi is the name of the Somali... discovered while working as a chauffeur apparently..

Sara Nathan ● 4623d

Even less my sort of film than  Captain Phillips and wholly exhausting to watch.But Mark Kermode is right to say it's the best use of  3 D yet...it's stunning to look at and to listen to.The special effects are staggering - and done by frame store in Soho. As the whole thing is special effects, this makes it, weirdly, a contender for best British film - which is odd given plot and stars wholly American. The music was done here too.Didn't exactly enjoy it but is a triumph of film- making.

Sara Nathan ● 4620d

This is beautifully shot and played and very informative and rather shocking. Nothing like as violent as Django Unchained thank goodness.But curiously unmoving altogether. Michael Fassbinder as the rather psychopathic second owner of our hero, Solomon,(after a rather gentlemanly DBenedict Cumberbatch) rather steals the show. Mute suffering just doesnt come over so well.Of course one should see it and mass American guilt will probably get it loads of Oscars. I would have thought it might do rather less well here....though several British actors and of course a British director and some local musical involvement.Would rather like to read the book though.

Sara Nathan ● 4619d

Yes some shocking, almost unwatchable scenes. But a brilliant film with great performances and beautifully filmed, as you would expect as Steve McQueen is an artist. BTW an interesting interview with him a few weeks ago in the Guardian http://www.theguardian.com/film/2014/jan/04/steve-mcqueen-my-painful-childhood-shame revealed he went to school in Ealing (Drayton Manor I believe) and was subjected to institutional racism while he was there, as later admitted by the new head of the school when he returned for a prize giving.

Chris Hurley ● 4618d

I had expected to find this rather a chore: bio-pics covering a whole life - and in this case, by no means a short one, very seldom work well and are often frighteningly long. But this was much better - though still immensely long.I found it more moving than 12 years a slave though with the same core story of the white man's brutality to the black one in his power.And it wasn't wholly hagiographic either - Mandela, and of course Winnie, were portrayed as humanly flawed. the SOuth African landscape and people were deployed to great effect but the real star was Idris Elba - and a Brit at that! Naomie Harris (OK another Brit) pretty ace as Winnie

Sara Nathan ● 4618d

What a self-indulgent, pretentious piece of pretty claptrap! I cannot understand how this got nominated for best film not in the English Language alongside some really worthwhile movies.While film is of course about the visuals - that's not all it's about and this isn't about anything except (maybe) the decadence of haute-bourgoise Roma.Just not worth your - or my time.It goes on for nearly three hours too - apparently. I didn't last.

Sara Nathan ● 4616d

This gritty British film is based on an Oscar Wilde short story which I am ashamed to say, I haven't read (or possibly, haven't remembered at all) It's about a couple of hopeless schoolboys from ghastly families who want to make quick - and not necessarily legal - money from dealing in scrap. Slightly  redeemingly, at least partly to help their put-upon and oppressed mothers. they fall into very bad company and you just know that it's not going to end well. It doesn't.Good cast - the two boys are little toe-rags - convincing ones though. Distractingly one of them has parents acted by a combination of the drunk in Rev and the ghastly O'Brien in Downton. It's searing and all that, but worth watching. Lacks laughs (understatement)

Sara Nathan ● 4616d

Too long, as you say, and too slow. It's not The Sting. Enjoyed the 70s costumes and interiors though.

Susan Kelly ● 4609d