Comedy and Tom Dawson

The Adopted

Quirky, saccharine directorial debut from French actress Melanie Laurent

24 Jan 2012

(15) 100 mins Still only 28-years-old, French actress and musician Melanie Laurent makes her directorial debut with this offbeat family tale, which owes more to her recent performances in US indie Beginners and the sentimental melodrama The Concert…

Little White Lies (Les Petits Mouchoirs)

Overlong comedy-drama starring Marion Cotillard, Francois Cluzet and Benoit Magimel

18 Mar 2011

(15) 154min Following the international success of his innocent-man-on-the-run thriller Tell No One, French actor/director Guillaume Canet returns with this sprawling ensemble drama, which concerns a group of friends in their 30s and 40s. One of…

Unmade Beds

4 Dec 2009

Written and directed by Argentinean filmmaker Alexis Dos Santos, Unmade Beds unfolds against the backdrop of the East End of London’s modern day bohemian scene. It’s a world of rent-free accommodation in generously equipped warehouse squats, regular…

Rumba

23 Jul 2009

Written and directed by the triumvirate of Dominique Abel, Fiona Gordon and Bruno Romy, Rumba is a deadpan Belgian tragi-comedy, in which the clowning of the characters goes hand-in-hand with a series of disastrous setbacks in their lives. Happily…

Brüno

9 Jul 2009

Poor Brüno! The 19-year-old presenter with the really hot body from Austrian TV fashion show Funkyzeitung has been ‘schwarzlisted’ following an unfortunate incident involving his all-Velcro suit at a Milan catwalk event. Leaving behind his pygmy Asian…

Looking for Eric

11 Jun 2009

COMEDY/DRAMA Could Ken Loach finally be mellowing in his eighth decade? For years the socialist director has been British cinema’s most consistently political filmmaker, illuminating how the dreams of his working class characters are inevitably…

Let's Talk About the Rain (Parlez-moi de la pluie)

30 Oct 2008

In an interview to promote their 2004 feature Look at Me, the French actors/filmmakers Agnès Jaoui and Jean-Pierre Bacri felt that they couldn't pitch their films at Hollywood meetings, and their latest collaboration Let's Talk About the Rain again…

Mes amis, mes amours

3 Jul 2008

Mes Amis, Mes Amours resembles a Gallic version of a Richard Curtis movie, set in an affluent, quarter of London and peopled by French expats: it’s less a romantic comedy than a sentimental fantasy of city living among an ultra-friendly community of…

California Dreamin’ (Endless)

22 May 2008

DRAMA/COMEDY (15) 154min Tragically Cristian Nemescu, the 27 year-old writer-director of California Dreamin’ died in a car crash whilst working on the post-production of this richly ambitious film (together with his sound designer Andrei Toncu), hence…

Smart People

8 May 2008

COMEDY DRAMA (15) 94min Another week and another dysfunctional American family comedy. Scripted by novelist Mark Poirier and directed by newcomer Noam Murro, Smart People examines the improbable rejuvenation of widowed, middle-aged English professor…

Three and Out

24 Apr 2008

COMEDY (15) 106min Heard the one about the suicidal 50-something Irishman Tommy (Colm Meaney) and the London tube driver and aspiring novelist Paul (Mackenzie Crook), who needs somebody to throw themselves under his train in order to collect a…

You, the Living

27 Mar 2008

COMEDY/DRAMA (15) 93min In an unnamed Nordic city a moustachioed tuba-player starts talking about savings and pensions, while making love to his wife who is wearing a military helmet. A dog is dragged along a pavement, attached to the walker of its…

I Do

1 Nov 2007

ROMANTIC COMEDY (PG) 90min Meet Louis Costa (Alain Chabat from The Science of Sleep). He’s a 40-something Parisian perfumier, happily content with his bachelor existence. Yet, the women in his family – specifically domineering mother Genevieve…

The Band's Visit

1 Nov 2007

COMEDY/DRAMA (12A) 87min The band in question is the Alexandria Ceremonial Police group, which has come to Israel to perform at the opening of an Arab cultural centre in Petach Tivka, north-east of Tel Aviv. Unfortunately for them there’s no one to…

My Best Friend (Mon Meilleur Ami)

7 May 2007

The French director Patrice Leconte seems drawn to unusual pairings: think of Juliette Binoche’s governor’s wife and Emir Kusturica’s condemned prisoner in The Widow of Saint Pierre; Jean Rochefort’s retired teacher and Johnny Hallyday’s bank-robber in…

Orchestra Seats

12 Feb 2007

‘A comedy about people who are suffering’, is how director and co-writer Danièle Thompson describes Orchestra Seats. In fact, this predictable slice of middlebrow entertainment resembles a Gallic Love Actually. Set in and around Paris’ prestigious…