Film, DVD, Issue 603

Neil Astley & Pamela Robertson-Pearce - In Person: 30 Poets

POETRY DVD/BOOK (Bloodaxe) Tucked inside the book of the same name comes a smart pair of DVDs which platform the depth and range which poetry publisher Bloodaxe have been offering us for three decades. In Person is a celebration of the intimacy that…

Strays

ROMANCE/DRAMA (15) 79mins (Revolver) Although a big name now, Vin Diesel couldn’t get work before this film was nominated for a Grand Jury Prize in Sundance back in 1997. Written, directed and produced by the man of muscle himself, this is half…

A Walk with Love and Death

ROMANCE/DRAMA (15) 90min (BFI) Made immediately after his boisterous Scottish historical romp Sinful Davey, this long lost, now cult, 1969 film was a much more personal project for the great John Huston. Based on Dutch writer Hans Koningsberger’s…

Bandit Queen

DRAMA (18) 115min (Metrodome) Made in 1994 Shekhar Kapur’s (Elizabeth) brutal retelling of the true story of Phoolan Devi, India’s only modern day female outlaw is still a compellingly tough watch. Jailed in 1983 and released in the year Bandit…

Jade Warrior

MYTH/ROMANCE (12) 100min (Yume) This potentially fascinating attempt to combine two mythologies: ancient Chinese martial arts with Finnish legend, The Kalevala is, as the blurb tell us, ‘the first ever Finnish martial arts film’. May it also be the…

Cluny Brown

SATIRE (PG) 100min (BFI) Ernst Lubitsch’s famous lightness of touch is all over the final film completed by the master of sophisticated wit and classy style. Having skewered American society with a series of punchy Hollywood romantic comedies such as…