Film, Issue 578

Hitlist - The best film & dvd releases

19 Jun 2007

The Golden Door Dreamy and surreal tale of Europe to US immigration in the early part of the 20th century starring Charlotte Gainsbourg. See interview and Also Released . Cameo, Edinburgh from Fri 29 Jun. Jan Svankmajer A dizzying selection of films…

Shakalaka Boom Boom

DVD

19 Jun 2007

MUSICAL/DRAMA Suneel Darshan’s Bollywood remake of Milos Forman’s Amadeus modernises the story in a transatlantic setting, where naturally gifted but arrogant young upstart Reggi (Upen Patel) challenges experienced champion of Indian pap/pop AJ…

The Beast Must Die

DVD

19 Jun 2007

HORROR Made in 1974, this British monster movie produced by Hammer-alike outfit Amicus attempted to bridge the transatlantic divide by capitalising on the post-Shaft blaxploitation craze and casting handsome African-American actor Calvin Lockhart in…

The Rise and Rise of Michael Rimmer

19 Jun 2007

COMEDY Written by Peter Cook, John Cleese and Graham Chapman, this 1970 political satire was panned on release, yet now looks startlingly prophetic. Cook was never more charismatic than as the mysterious Michael Rimmer, arriving unannounced at the…

DVD - Round-up

19 Jun 2007

‘Spring being a tough act to follow, God created June.’ The great American writer, actor and boxing analyst Al Bernstein wrote that. But then he also said, ‘A fool and his money get a lot of publicity’ so perhaps we shouldn’t pay too much attention to…

Also Released

19 Jun 2007

Hostel: Part II (18) 93min (3 Stars) Further exercises in extreme horror from Tarantino acolyte Eli Roth (Cabin Fever, Hostel). This time three young Americans studying in Rome set off for a weekend trip with a beautiful model from one of their art…

Film Books Round-up

19 Jun 2007

In Talking Movies (Wallflower, 4 Stars) Jason Wood interviews more than 30 contemporary filmmakers including Carlos Reygadas, Richard Linklater, Atom Egoyan, Lucrecia Martel, Elia Suleiman and Nuri Bilge Ceylan. Wood’s project is wonderfully…

Shutter

19 Jun 2007

HORROR In lieu of a forthcoming US remake, this half arsed 2004 Thai ghost story is getting an overdue and limited release. Driving home after getting drunk with a few of his old friends, photographer Tun (Ananda Everingham) and his girlfriend…

The Flying Scotsman

19 Jun 2007

BIOPIC Riding your bike fast doesn’t make you a hero, but Graeme Obree’s well-documented battles with the external and internal pressures of professional cycling put him firmly in the Lance Armstrong class. As depicted in Douglas Mackinnon’s…

La Vie en Rose

19 Jun 2007

BIOPIC French singer Edith Piaf’s real life was the stuff of turbulent melodrama: she was abandoned by her mother and spent some of her impoverished childhood in a brothel, and she was discovered singing on the streets by an impresario, whom she was…

Paris, Je T'Aime

19 Jun 2007

SHORT FILM ANTHOLOGY For this portmanteau work, 21 directors from around the world have contributed five-minute shorts, which are set in 18 of Paris’ administrative districts. The project was intended as a cinematic valentine to the French capital…

Bollywood round-up

19 Jun 2007

In director R Balki’s Cheeni Kum (PG) 139min (3 Stars) 64-year-old temperamental London chef Bhuddadev (Amitabh Bachchan) falls for 34-year old modern Indian sophisticate Nina (Tabu). Comedy and drama arise from the age difference. Initial comparisons…

Lucky You

19 Jun 2007

COMEDY/DRAMA From The Cincinnati Kid to Casino Royale, a game of cards with heavy emotional stakes can make for high tension cinema, but auteur Curtis Hanson (LA Confidential, The Wonder Boys, 8 Mile, In Her Shoes) loads the decks far too heavily in…

Captivity

19 Jun 2007

THRILLER Since she stopped watching the clock as Kim Bauer in 24, Elisha Cuthbert has been typecast on the silver screen as the archetypal damsel in distress. In Captivity she plays the kind of girl that, if she weren’t already famous, would be…

Charlotte Gainsbourg

19 Jun 2007

Charlotte Gainsbourg is alluring. Tall and lithe with dark long hair dropping past her visage she’s far from a classic beauty. What she does have is a sense of mystery, and it’s this quality that Italian filmmaker Emanuelle Crialese makes use of in The…

Moloch

DVD

19 Jun 2007

Where his mentor Andrei Tarkovsky would often take the ordinary and turn it into the extraordinary, filmmaker Aleksandr Sokurov frequently works a partial reverse. In his trilogy of ‘dictator’ films, Tauras (about Lenin), The Sun (about Hirohito) as…

Comics - NEVERWHERE (DVD)

18 Jun 2007

FANTASY Elephant and Castle, Knightsbridge and The Angel, Islington: to non-Londoners and small children alike the names of the city’s landmarks conjure a sense of the bizarre which Neil Gaiman, much-loved writer of novels, comics, films and…

Comics - HELLBOY ANIMATED: BLOOD AND IRON (DVD)

18 Jun 2007

HORROR/SUPERHERO The newest animated feature based on Mike Mignola’s hugely enjoyable demon ghost hunter graphic novels is somewhat hampered by the fact that it is based on what is arguably the weakest of the first six source novels. This is the one…