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Film and Reviews

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Cannes 2012: Amour

Cannes 2012: Amour

Deeply sad and affecting film from Michael Haneke, and winner of the 2012 Palme D’Or

(4 stars)28 May 2012

Unlike The White Ribbon (Michael Haneke’s Palme D’Or winning film from 2009), which stands out for its thematic and narrative complexities, Amour sees the Austrian director take a far simpler approach to filmmaking, with an intimate story of an elderly…

Cannes 2012: Holy Motors

Cannes 2012: Holy Motors

Hugely satisfying and inventive celebration of cinema from Leos Carax

(4 stars)28 May 2012

Monsieur Oscar (Denis Lavant) is picked up by his driver Celine (Edith Scob) for a day’s work - 9 appointments that will take him across Paris and into the paths of an array of characters. If that sounds vague, it’s deliberate - to say anymore would…

Men in Black 3

Men in Black 3

Silly, lightweight, completely unnecessary but surprisingly fun

(3 stars)25 May 2012

In these times of austerity Hollywood seems scared of originals ideas. Studios demand ‘brand recognition’ before they’ll stump up the multi-million dollar budgets blockbusters require. And they seem willing to latch onto almost any brand, from comics to…

Cannes 2012: On the Road

Cannes 2012: On the Road

Walter Salles’ adaptation of Jack Kerouac’s classic novel struggles to capture a sense of the times

(3 stars)25 May 2012

If, for two and a half hours, you can put aside the fact that Walter Salles’ (Central Station, The Motorcycle Diaries) latest work is an adaptation of one of the most famous, influential books in recent American history, you might just enjoy this…

Cannes 2012: The Paperboy

Cannes 2012: The Paperboy

Lee Daniels’ plot hole-ridden latest film is still a compelling, if occasionally ludicrous, ride

(3 stars)25 May 2012

Lee Daniels follows up his sleeper hit Precious with an enjoyably trashy, if often misguided, story based on the book by Pete Dexter. It’s 1969 and journalist Ward (Matthew McConaughey) returns to his hometown of Lately, Florida to investigate what…

Cannes 2012: Killing Them Softly

Cannes 2012: Killing Them Softly

Andrew Dominik’s stylish gangster film is visually impressive if occasionally lacking momentum

(3 stars)24 May 2012

Killing Them Softly, Andrew Dominik’s third film following Chopper and The Assassination of Jesse James By the Coward Robert Ford, is a bleakly humourous gangster flick with an underlying commentary on modern day moral bankruptcy. It begins with…

Cannes 2012: Trashed

Cannes 2012: Trashed

British documentary about waste pollution could have done with burrowing deeper

(2 stars)24 May 2012

Watching British documentary Trashed it’s curious to think who the filmmakers imagined their audience to be. Exploring the impact and problems of waste disposal, the film barely scrapes the surface of its subject matter, giving the air of a dry…

The Angels' Share - EMBARGO 22 MAY

The Angels' Share

Loach and Laverty's latest suffers from attempts to attract all-comers

(2 stars)23 May 2012

Here persists the noble quest of Ken Loach and screenwriter Paul Laverty to create accessible, populist films about the lives of the UK’s so-called underclass. Unfortunately, The Angels’ Share is straining so hard to be accessible and populist that it…

What To Expect When You’re Expecting

What To Expect When You’re Expecting

A witless and bland work based on the pregnancy self-help book

(2 stars)23 May 2012

‘You don’t know what love is until you’ve wiped someone’s ass,’ offers one of the many baby-boomers in Kirk (Waking Ned, Everybody’s Fine) Jones’ multi-stranded adaptation of the bestselling self-help book about the dos and don’ts of pregnancy.

She Monkeys

She Monkeys

Impressive coming-of-age drama with frank depiction of adolescent sexuality

(4 stars)23 May 2012

A courageous, periodically unsettling coming-of-age tale, She Monkeys is the arresting first feature from director Lisa Aschan. It’s a Swedish production which - in its frank approach to adolescent sexuality - bears comparison with Katell Quillévéré’s…

The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp

The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp

Crisp restoration of the 1940s satire by Powell and Pressburger

(5 stars)18 May 2012

Spry and delightful nearly 70 years on, The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp is one of many masterpieces from filmmaking virtuosos Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, collectively known as The Archers. Their fifth collaboration, from 1943, is an…

If I Want To Whistle, I Whistle

If I Want To Whistle, I Whistle

Drama depicting tensions of prison society from Romanian director

(3 stars)18 May 2012

18-year-old Silviu (George Pistereanu) has nine days left to serve of what has been an uneventful, well-behaved prison sentence. When an unexpected visit from his younger brother brings some unwelcome news, Silviu’s previously-held composure begins to…

The Source

The Source

A sincere story of the struggle for female emancipation in an African village

(3 stars)18 May 2012

You could easily dismiss The Source as a simplistic, sentimental fare but the latest film from director Radu Mihaileanu (The Concert, Live And Become etc.) is told with such warmth and sincerity that it is hard to resist. The struggle for female…

2 Days in New York

2 Days in New York

Modern screwball comedy from writer, director and actor Julie Delpy

(3 stars)18 May 2012

In the intermittently sparkling sequel to 2007’s 2 Days in Paris, writer-director-actor Julie Delpy once again turns her attention to family dysfunction. This time her alter-ego’s Parisian family are holidaying at her NY home, where they continue to…

Even The Rain

Even The Rain

Well-intentioned, if heavy-handed, political drama from writer Paul Laverty

(3 stars)18 May 2012

The sting of injustice and oppression echoes down the centuries in Even The Rain, an ambitious, well-intentioned political drama from writer Paul Laverty and his partner, director Iciar Bolain. Inspired by true events, the film is set in…

Moonrise Kingdom

Moonrise Kingdom

Wes Anderson's latest echoes his earlier triumphs, but breaks no new ground

(3 stars)17 May 2012

Wes Anderson’s seventh film feels like a Greatest Hits package. Which if you’re a Wes fan will make you very happy. Set on a New England island in the summer of 1965, the opening sequence of Moonrise Kingdom, with its incessant camera-pans around the…

Death Watch

Death Watch

Well-deserved re-issue of Bertrand Tavernier's prescient Glasgow-set sci-fi thriller

(4 stars)16 May 2012

Its plot is a credibility stretch even in these days of de rigueur media paranoia, and its relentlessly murky, moody tone might raise the odd giggle, but Tavernier’s long-neglected sci-fi curiosity is compelling nonetheless. Romy Schneider plays…

Polisse

Polisse

Sprawling French ensemble drama that veers between compelling and ridiculous

(3 stars)16 May 2012

This sprawling ensemble film, which tracks the harrowing daily routines of a Parisian Child Protection Unit, veers wildly between the compelling and the ridiculous. Scripted and directed by Maiwenn, with Emmaneulle Bercot acting as co-writer, it shifts…

Sing Your Song

Sing Your Song

A thorough account of the life of Harry Belafonte that occasionally lapses into hagiography

(4 stars)16 May 2012

This timely and thorough account of the extraordinary life of Harry Belafonte finds so much in its subject that it almost suffers by an over-abundance of material. A matinee idol whose benign appeal to white audiences masked fierce political…

The Turin Horse

The Turin Horse

Hard-going but profoundly rewarding piece of arthouse cinema from Bela Tarr

(4 stars)16 May 2012

This mournful fable isn’t exactly going to win a whole new crossover audience for Hungary’s master of arthouse tough love, Béla Tarr, but it’s a compelling, vividly realised addition to his unique oeuvre. As a father and daughter scrabble for a living…

The Dictator

The Dictator

Sacha Baron Cohen’s latest has moments of solid satire but still feels stale

(3 stars)11 May 2012

From the naked scrotum-in-the-face wrestling of Borat to the manifold outrages of Brüno, Sacha Baron Cohen is not a man overly acquainted with subtlety. His latest, The Dictator, drops the improvisational feel of those earlier films, but doesn’t lower…

A Fantastic Fear of Everything

A Fantastic Fear of Everything

Crispian Mills' directorial debut starts well but quickly loses pace

(3 stars)11 May 2012

A film by the former lead singer of Kula Shaker might not sound an appetising prospect. But before dismissing A Fantastic Fear of Everything, we should remember that Crispian Mills’ film pedigree is pretty spot-on. He is, after all, the son of Hayley…

Casa de mi Padre

Casa de mi Padre

Will Ferrell's Spanish-language comedy is at once unfunny and too silly to take seriously

(2 stars)11 May 2012

Funnyman Will Ferrell as a tough rancher in a violent Spanish-language Western? It could only be a joke, and that’s exactly what Case de mi Padre is, a ragged, silly spoof in the Airplane/Naked Gun mode. Unfortunately, as jokes go, it’s a not…

The Pact

The Pact

An unoriginal, low budget thriller that’s light on gore and stronger on tension

(3 stars)11 May 2012

The latest US horror/thriller to be granted a UK release has a slightly better pedigree than most: writer/director Nicholas McCarthy’s film was developed from his own short, which was shown last year at Sundance, quickly developed into this feature…

Ill Manors

Ill Manors

A jarring, grimy and a searing indictment of Broken Britain, from debut director Ben Drew aka Plan B

(4 stars)11 May 2012

To say Ill Manors doesn’t pull punches is like saying Mike Tyson hits quite hard. Raw, uncompromising and brutal, this urban tale of violence, prostitution and drugs smacks you round the face, then kicks you in the groin for good measure. It marks the…

Free Men

Free Men

A Prophet's Tahar Rahim stars in worthy but flawed WWII espionage drama

(3 stars)11 May 2012

Loosely based on real events, this espionage drama set during World War II focuses on the largely overlooked cooperation between Arabic immigrants and the French Resistance. Tahar Rahim (who shot to fame in A Prophet) plays a North African worker named…

The Innkeepers

The Innkeepers

A genuinely involving and disconcerting chiller that thankfully eschews any trendy post-modernism

(3 stars)11 May 2012

Having established his credentials as a serious genre fan with a spot-on homage to 80s horror movies in The House of the Devil, writer-director Ti West reaches even further back into the past with this slow-burning thriller. Like all good haunted house…

A Royal Affair

A Royal Affair

A skillfully delivered but coldly aloof period drama from the Swedish Dragon Tattoo team

(3 stars)11 May 2012

Reuniting the writing team behind the original Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, A Royal Affair is a welcome break from the current plethora of morbid Scandinavian thrillers; instead, Rasmus Heisterberg and Nikolaj Arcel have co-adapted an unfamiliar but…

Red Tails

Red Tails

George Lucas pet WWII project suffers from thin characterization, cliché and crude simplification

(2 stars)11 May 2012

Star Wars creator George Lucas used clips from his favourite aviation dramas to stand in for battle scenes in the original rough-cut of Star Wars, so it’s no surprise that several decades later, Lucas has invested some of his personal wealth in an…

Lawrence of Belgravia

Lawrence of Belgravia

Intimate and touching documentary about the eccentric Felt frontman

(4 stars)10 May 2012

Lawrence - surnameless former front man of the variably appreciated 80s-90s indie bands Felt and Denim, and current leader of the barely-appreciated-at-all Go Kart Mozart – is a bit like the picture in Jarvis Cocker’s attic, psychologically speaking.

How I Spent my Summer Vacation

How I Spent my Summer Vacation

Tightly directed action-comedy that even ardent Mel Gibson-haters will find difficult to dislike

(3 stars)10 May 2012

There are probably quite a few people – not least screenwriter Joe Eszterhaus, judging by his recently published missive – who would probably like to see Mel Gibson languishing in a filthy Mexican jail. But sadly for them, How I Spent My Summer Vacation…

Dark Shadows

Dark Shadows

A fun, if forgettable vampire movie, starring Johnny Depp, Eva Green and Michelle Pfeiffer

(3 stars)10 May 2012

Like a kid who turns up late to a Halloween party, Tim Burton arrives with his latest, vampire movie Dark Shadows. After Twilight, 30 Days of Night and Let The Right One In, not to mention TV’s True Blood…aren’t fangs, dusty coffins and dissolving in…

Beloved

Beloved

A sprawling, messy epic on unrequited love from French director Christophe Honoré

(3 stars)10 May 2012

Christophe Honoré's Love Songs (2007) established a talent for musical melodrama that eschewed all the traditional razzle-dazzle trappings of Hollywood. Characters break into song as they casually stroll down a city street and the often banal…

Le Quai des Brumes

Le Quai des Brumes

Marcel Carné’s 1938 romantic crime drama gets a well deserved restoration

(4 stars)4 May 2012

One of the definitive examples of the ‘poetic realism’ style of French cinema of the pre-war and wartime years, Marcel Carné’s 1938 romantic crime drama has been treated to a well-deserved state-of-the-art restoration. Thanks to the digital dust-off…

Juan Of The Dead

Juan Of The Dead

Cuban zombie comedy features cheerful mixture of political comment and splatter

(3 stars)4 May 2012

Another zombie film. Really? It sounds like the last thing anyone would want to encourage but Juan Of The Dead overcomes any zombie fatigue with a cheerfully anarchic mixture of splatter and political comment. If that just brought the early films of…

American Pie: Reunion

American Pie: Reunion

The cast regroup for a fourth time, and still manage to raise some laughs

(3 stars)4 May 2012

The cast of American Pie may have matured since we last saw them nine years ago at Jim and Michelle’s wedding but their antics remain juvenile for this latest slice of raunchy comedy - and for the most part that’s a good thing. Written and…

Hara-Kiri: Death of a Samurai

Hara-Kiri: Death of a Samurai

A quietly dignified film about 17th century honour and vengeance from Japanese director Takashi Miik

(3 stars)4 May 2012

The rigorously restrained Hara-Kiri: Death of a Samurai is prolific Japanese director Takashi Miike’s follow-up to the exhilarating 13 Assassins. A companion piece, rather than a direct descendant, it’s a story of 17th century honour and vengeance which…

Clone

Clone

Stilted science fiction psychodrama starring Matt Smith and Eva Green

(2 stars)4 May 2012

Originally entitled Womb, 2010 film Clone proves to be a painfully earnest slice of sci-fi psychodrama that attempts to meld burning questions of genetic ethics with the starkness of a Greek tragedy. The clipped, stilted script often appears to have…

Angèle and Tony

Angèle and Tony

Beguiling and slow-moving story charting unlikely romance in remote Normandy fishing village

(3 stars)4 May 2012

A beguiling and slow-moving story about an unlikely romance in a remote Normandy fishing village, director Alix Delaporte’s debut feature film certainly doesn’t force its way into audiences’ attentions. But for cinemagoers looking for some considered…

Two Years at Sea

Two Years at Sea

Meditative documentary about recluse Jake Williams, from British artist Ben Rivers

(4 stars)4 May 2012

Artist and filmmaker Ben Rivers’ debut feature film, Two Years At Sea is a handsome and meditative documentary about Jake Williams, a man living an isolated existence in northern Scotland. Shot on textured 16mm black and white film, Rivers captures…

Avengers Assemble

Avengers Assemble

Joss Whedon’s finely balanced superhero extravaganza is well worth the wait

(4 stars)27 Apr 2012

The main issue facing the making of a superhero ensemble piece is balance: with so many strong personalities on screen, how do you ensure each of them get their due? It’s a problem Joss Whedon has tackled effectively in Avengers Assemble, keeping…

Marley

Marley

A comprehensive documentary on the singer that would have benefitted from delving a little deeper

(3 stars)25 Apr 2012

(15) 145 mins Executive produced by Bob Marley’s son Ziggy and Island Records founder Chris Blackwell, Kevin Macdonald’s comprehensive, if overly reverential, documentary chronicles the life and times of the first musical superstar from the third world…

Safe

Safe

Guilty pleasure action flick starring Jason Statham

(3 stars)23 Apr 2012

(15) 94mins You have to admire Jason Statham. An actor that knows his limitations but plays to his strengths, while you’re unlikely to ever find him starring as Hamlet, it’s hardly surprising he’s ascended the ranks of Hollywood’s tough guys with…

Piggy

Piggy

Ultra-violent London-set thriller starring Martin Compston

(2 stars)23 Apr 2012

(18) 106mins Fight Club meets Death Wish in this ultra-violent vigilante movie, one so gratuitous it will turn even the strongest of stomachs. Set in a modern-day London where hoodies wielding knives seem to lurk on every street corner, Martin…

Revisiting: The Bad and the Beautiful

Revisiting: The Bad and the Beautiful

Vincente Minnelli’s classic Hollywood melodrama still shines on the big screen

(5 stars)23 Apr 2012

(PG) 118mins Vincente Minnelli’s momentous 1952 melodrama returns to the big screen and it’s as bewitching and stinging as ever. The Bad and the Beautiful is justifiably regarded as one of the finest films ever made about the filmmaking process…

Town of Runners

Town of Runners

Touching but hesitant documentary about an Ethiopian town's knack for producing athletes

(3 stars)23 Apr 2012

The tiny town of Bekoji in Ethiopia has produced an astonishing number of champion long-distance runners. Jerry Rothwell’s pretty and thoughtful documentary frustratingly resists analysing exactly why this is – we’re left to guess at a lucky combination…

Faust

Faust

Ill-defined version of story that emphasises the yuck factor

(3 stars)20 Apr 2012

Shot in grimy browns and greens, heavy with tangled-up multi-character physical movement and overlapping conversations, Sokurov’s take on the oft-interpreted Faust legend is no pretty pageant. From its opening shot, which closes in from a romantic…

Irvine Welsh’s Ecstasy

Irvine Welsh’s Ecstasy

An agonisingly watered-down imitation of Welsh's short story

(2 stars)19 Apr 2012

Nothing dates faster than drug culture, and writer-director Rob Heydon’s Irvine Welsh adaptation arrives nearly two decades after the era of the dedicated pill-popper. Taken from Welsh’s story 'The Undefeated', part of the 1996 compilation that provides…

Jeff, Who Lives at Home

Jeff, Who Lives at Home

The Duplass Brothers' slacker comedy bears too much resemblance to its underachieving protagonist

(3 stars)18 Apr 2012

(15) 83mins No one would have believed in the last years of the 20th century that of all the stars to emerge from Judd Apatow’s extraordinary talent nursery Freaks and Geeks, the household name would end up being Jason Segel. He’s not as gorgeous as…

Albert Nobbs

Albert Nobbs

Glenn Close's period drama passion project is a squandered opportunity of intriguing premise

(3 stars)18 Apr 2012

(15) 113mins Fifteen years in development, Rodrigo Garcia’s adaptation of George Moore’s short story The Singular Life of Albert Nobbs arrives on the back of two deserved Oscar nominations for stars Glenn Close and Janet McTeer. And while it’s just…

666: The Prophecy

666: The Prophecy

By-the-numbers horror from Darren Lynn Bousman, inspired by calendar numerology

(2 stars)18 Apr 2012

(15) 90mins The current public appetite for horror barely excuses the eventual, much delayed release of 666: The Prophecy, which was opportunistically released in the US in November last year on the date (and under the title) 11-11-11. The idea that…

North Sea Texas

North Sea Texas

Sensitive performances fail to make this predictable coming of age story engaging

(2 stars)18 Apr 2012

(15) 98 mins Given how difficult we’re lead to believe it is to get an independent film distributed in cinemas in the UK, you’d be forgiven for wondering why some of those that do reach our screens seem so familiar. North Sea Texas, the story of…

Outside Bet

Outside Bet

Low-budget British horse-racing comedy falls at the first hurdle

(1 star)18 Apr 2012

(12A) 101mins The cinematic equivalent of the clumps of horse dung that characters repeatedly step into for the cheapest of laughs, Outside Bet is strictly a non-runner in terms of light entertainment. In this painfully naïve British comedy, Bob…

The Raid

The Raid

A short, tough, pumped-up flick for die-hard action fans

(4 stars)17 Apr 2012

(18) 101min ‘1 ruthless crime lord. 20 elite cops. 80 floors of chaos.’ The advertising sets exactly the right proficient tone; crunching the numbers as well as bones, The Raid features a small group of policemen taking on a vertically stacked army of…

Damsels in Distress

Damsels in Distress

Whit Stillman's return to filmmaking features wordy, droll dialogue but often inept direction

(3 stars)17 Apr 2012

(15) 99min Following a 14-year break from filmmaking, American writer-director Whit Stillman returns to the big screen with another highly idiosyncratic comedy, one that audiences are likely to find either delightfully urbane or else utterly…

Monsieur Lazhar

Monsieur Lazhar

A classroom drama with unexpected charm, quiet dignity and emotional integrity

(4 stars)17 Apr 2012

(12A) 94min Inspirational schoolteachers have been a cinematic staple from Goodbye Mr. Chips to Laurent Cantet’s Cannes prize-winner The Class. Monsieur Lazhar successfully avoids treacly sentimental as it charts how a teacher and a group of…

The Monk

The Monk

Vincent Cassel stars in Dominik Moll's visually impressive but otherwise inert thriller

(3 stars)17 Apr 2012

(15) 101min It’s been seven years since Dominik Moll’s last film, but the talented filmmaker who made the blackly comic thrillers Harry, He’s Here to Help and Lemming, is back with his most ambitious film yet. Sadly, Moll’s adaptation of Matthew…

The Lucky One

The Lucky One

Unconvincing, one-dimensional drama starring Zac Efron and Taylor Schilling

(2 stars)17 Apr 2012

(12A) 101mins The latest adaptation of a Nicholas Sparks novel is as schmaltzy as ever but also hopelessly contrived and unconvincing. Stretching credibility from the start, Zac Efron stars as a US Marine who comes across a photo of an unknown blonde…

Silent House

Silent House

A ponderously slow psychological drama packaged as a horror film

(2 stars)17 Apr 2012

(18) 85min With Martha Marcy May Marlene, Elizabeth Olsen proved herself to be a young actress with great potential by persuasively playing a refugee haunted by her experiences with a murderous cult. Silent House features her in a disappointingly…

Being Elmo

Being Elmo

A revealing and heartfelt insight into the work of Kevin Clash, the man behind the puppet

(3 stars)17 Apr 2012

(tbc) 80min The recent Muppet movie and attendant hype has reaffirmed the peculiar genius of Jim Henson’s life’s work: that is to say, even when we can literally see the wires, even when we know we’re looking at manipulated felt and hearing actors…

All in Good Time

All in Good Time

Sweet-natured culture clash comedy starring Amara Karan and Meera Syal

(3 stars)17 Apr 2012

(12A) 93min Originally a 1965 play and subsequently a film by Irish writer Bill Naughton, this sweet-natured comedy became a theatre hit again in 2007 when East is East writer Ayub Khan-Din adapted it into a present-day British-Asian setting. The…

Goodbye First Love

Goodbye First Love

Intimate but unenlightening romance populated with unlikeable characters

(2 stars)17 Apr 2012

(15) 110mins It’s supposed to be unbearably boring hearing about other people’s dreams. But often that’s not nearly as bad as hearing about other people’s formative love affairs. Watching vain, drippy, lugubrious teenager Camille (Lola Créton) fall…

Cafe de Flore

Cafe de Flore

An objectionable, distasteful and ultimately pointless exercise in parallel plotting

(1 star)17 Apr 2012

(tbc) 120 min In crisply-shot present-day Montreal, celebrity DJ Antoine (Kevin Parent) has recently left his wife Carole (Hélène Florent) and set up a home with their two children and his new girlfriend, Rose (Evelyne Brochu). In dull and dingy Paris…

This is Not A Film

This is Not A Film

A snapshot into the life of embattled Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi

(4 stars)12 Apr 2012

(U) 75mins This is Not a Film shows us the world of acclaimed Iranian filmmaker Jafar Panahi - currently under house arrest in Tehran and facing a 6 year prison sentence and 20 year ban on filmmaking - all for planning to make a film that was deemed…

The Cold Light of Day

The Cold Light of Day

Clumsy, by-the-numbers action thriller starring Henry Cavill, Bruce Willis and Sigourney Weaver

(1 star)12 Apr 2012

(12A) 93min Wall Street trader Will Shaw (Henry Cavill) is taking a break from his Stateside business worries to visit his family in Spain, despite terse relations with his father (Bruce Willis). Unfortunately, he barely has time to sip a sangria…

Battleship

Battleship

Michael Bay-inspired blockbuster burdened by bog-standard plot and uneven tone

(2 stars)11 Apr 2012

(12A) 131mins Inspired by the Hasbro board-game, Battleship is part Michael Bay-inspired planet-trashing mayhem and part love letter to the US Navy, with whom director Peter Berg shares an intimate family history (his father was both a former Marine…

Bonsai

Bonsai

A likeable drama about past love and missed opportunities

(3 stars)10 Apr 2012

There’s much to like in this gentle drama about young love and missed opportunities but Chilean feature Bonsái feels a little too familiar to make a lasting impact. Julio (Diego Noguera) is an aspiring writer, working in a bookshop by day and…

Mirror Mirror

Mirror Mirror

Snarky re-telling of the Snow White myth, with the odd visual flourish

(2 stars)5 Apr 2012

Tarsem Singh is a frustrating director; he has a canny eye for striking imagery, but an uncanny knack for picking scripts with little or no charm (The Fall being his sole exception so far). So it was with J-Lo vehicle The Cell and Clash of the Titans…

Return

Return

A fine example of independent filmmaking, despite familiar subject matter

(3 stars)3 Apr 2012

American filmmaker Liza Johnson is by no means the first to take a crack at the ‘soldier comes home from war’ story, and she certainly won’t be the last, but Return is a worthwhile addition to the genre. It’s a focused, unshowy character study, light on…

StreetDance 2

StreetDance 2

A sequel of so-so dances, hackneyed plotting and wooden performances

(2 stars)2 Apr 2012

(PG) 85mins The ‘kids dancing their way out of the ghetto’ trope has been a staple of cinema since the 1950s but taking inspiration from recent US products like Step Up and Stomp the Yard, StreetDance 3D inexplicably became the UK’s most popular…

Act of Valour

Act of Valour

Impressive technique and verisimilitude delivered at the expense of plot and characterisation

(2 stars)2 Apr 2012

(15) 110min The on-screen pursuit of combat verisimilitude is the driving force behind Act of Valour, an anti-terrorist action flick which aims to make a virtue of casting real life Navy SEALs (United States Navy's Sea, Air, and Land Teams) as…

Wrath of the Titans

Wrath of the Titans

Sloppy sequel with poorly defined characters, starring Sam Worthington and Liam Neeson

(2 stars)2 Apr 2012

From its flimsy concept to its similarly sloppy use of post-conversion 3D, Wrath of the Titans is a sequel that fails to improve on the original in any way. Set 10 years after the events of Clash of the Titans, this pointless follow-up invents a…

The Pirates! In An Adventure With Scientists 3D

The Pirates! In An Adventure With Scientists 3D

An enjoyable, if occassionally laboured, family animation from Aardman

(3 stars)27 Mar 2012

(U) 88min Aardman's Pirates! In An Adventure With Scientists is the most ambitious undertaking yet from the Bristol-based clay-mation specialists but while often enjoyable it's not all plain sailing. The madcap story of a pirate captain, who…

Tiny Furniture

Tiny Furniture

Twentysomethings indie with charm and well-observed scenes

(3 stars)23 Mar 2012

(15) 99min If we believe what we are told in indie cinema (and why would we not?), you can’t move in the households of older affluent Americans for twentysomething offspring who’ve strayed back home to replay adolescent dramas and avoid the horror of…

Corpo Celeste

Corpo Celeste

Emotionally complex and gloomy study of adolescence and Catholicism

(3 stars)23 Mar 2012

(U) 100min Writer/director Alice Rohrwacher makes her feature debut with this diligent, emotionally complex study of an adolescent girl attempting to square physical dislocation with incipient sexual awakening and the concurrent rituals of her…

Babycall

Babycall

Noomi Rapace stars in creepy thriller that loses focus

(3 stars)23 Mar 2012

(15) 96min Swedish actress Noomi Rapace, whose fearless performance as Lisbeth Salander was the best thing about the original Millenium trilogy, gets a chance to stretch her acting muscles again in this creepy thriller. Rapace plays Anna, a young…

Delicacy

Delicacy

Opposites-attract, Audrey Tautou-starring romcom lacks momentum

(3 stars)23 Mar 2012

(12A) 104min Perhaps only in French cinema is the currency value of beauty so high that an entire film can be drawn out of the prospect of a not-that-good-looking man getting it on with Audrey Tautou. Even Hollywood would try to pretend that some…

The Hunger Games

The Hunger Games

Adaptation that successfully transcends its teen-fiction origins, with excellent cast and direction

(4 stars)21 Mar 2012

(12A) 142min A dystopian thriller with cross-generational appeal, The Hunger Games is an adaptation of the first novel in Suzanne Collins’ trilogy. From writer and director Gary Ross (Pleasantville) and co-written by Collins herself, it’s set in…

Into the Abyss: A Tale of Death, A Tale of Life

Into the Abyss: A Tale of Death, A Tale of Life

Werner Herzog documentary more than righteous polemic against capital punishment

(4 stars)19 Mar 2012

(12A) 107min In an interview to promote Into the Abyss, the German filmmaker Werner Herzog declares that, ‘it is absolutely clear that the crimes of the persons in my film are monstrous, but the perpetrators are not monsters’. Although Herzog himself…

This Must Be the Place

This Must Be the Place

Bracing aesthetic and gentle humanity despite risking absurdity at times

(4 stars)19 Mar 2012

(15) 119min There is a strong sense of the baroque running through the films of Paolo Sorrentino, not least his bravura portrait of former Italian Prime Minister Andreotti in Il Divo. His first English language venture This Must Be The Place neither…

Wild Bill

Wild Bill

Dexter Fletcher debut is a mature and funny comedy

(4 stars)19 Mar 2012

(15) 98min There are many aspects of Wild Bill that could cause a discerning cinemagoer to give it a wide berth – its lack of recognisable stars; its done-to-death London gangster milieu; its debuting writer/director Dexter Fletcher’s connections to…

The Cabin in the Woods

The Cabin in the Woods

Excellent horror has something in its box of tricks to scare everyone

(4 stars)19 Mar 2012

(15) 94min A film that’s almost impossible to talk about without ruining its multiple pleasures, The Cabin In The Woods is the most original horror movie of the year. Reverential to the genre, yet shaking it up simultaneously, it’s exactly what you’d…

Headhunters

Headhunters

Jo Nesbo adaptation is breathlessly, outrageously entertaining

(4 stars)19 Mar 2012

(15) 101min The twisty, tangled, page-turning bestsellers of Norwegian author Jo Nesbo seem tailor-made for the screen. The narratives move with all the momentum of a runaway train and there are enough flawed individuals and crumbling moral…

Le Havre

Le Havre

Aki Kaurismaki's French language debut is a grimly funny working class drama

(4 stars)19 Mar 2012

(PG) 93min Migrating south to shoot his latest feature in France seems to have lightened the mood of the Finnish filmmaker Aki Kaurismaki, whose brand of deadpan humour has previously proved to be the key in crafting a series of delightfully…

The Divide

The Divide

A nasty and nihilistic portrait of rapid decline of civilisation

(3 stars)19 Mar 2012

(18) 108mins Rarely will you see a film as nasty and nihilistic as Xavier Gens’ The Divide. The Frenchman scored a cult hit with 2007’s Frontier(s) before making his first foray into the studio system with the by numbers video game adaptation Hitman.

Iron Sky

Iron Sky

Finland's so-so sci-fi comedy could actually benefit from an American remake

(2 stars)19 Mar 2012

Six years in the making, Iron Sky arrives in a blaze of pre-release publicity. Finland’s first blockbuster, partly funded by fans, you certainly can’t quibble with its killer pitch: Nazis on the moon. It’s just a pity that director Timo Vuorensola’s…

Salmon Fishing in the Yemen

Salmon Fishing in the Yemen

Ewan McGregor and Emily Blunt quirky comedy romance is insubstantial muddle

(2 stars)19 Mar 2012

(12A) 107min This adaptation of Paul Torday’s 2007 novel is another to add to the list of ‘books that didn’t work as films’. The story of a nerdish Scottish fisheries expert (Ewan McGregor) and a sophisticated legal aide (Emily Blunt) selected by a…

21 Jump Street

21 Jump Street

Deceptively smart big screen revival of the once popular TV show, with Channing Tatum and Jonah Hill

(4 stars)12 Mar 2012

(15)109min Taken at face value, 21 Jump Street is another mis-matched buddy cop outing that mixes elements from the original television series, Superbad coming-of-age values and the gung-ho rhetoric of Michael Bay's action movies. But there's a…

Cleanskin

Cleanskin

A gratuitously violent Sean Bean action vehicle light on sociological insight

(2 stars)9 Mar 2012

'I love my country. I’ve killed for it and I’ll die for it', growls Ewan (Sean Bean), an ex-soldier turned secret service agent who is tasked with tracking down a cell of homegrown suicide bombers in this London-set thriller by British writer-director…

John Carter

John Carter

Visually impressive epic adventure suffers by prepping for sequels

(3 stars)8 Mar 2012

Edgar Rice Burroughs’ 1912 creation finally hits the screen after 79 years of development hell, with pre-production on an animated feature originally scheduled for 1931. Andrew Stanton, director of Pixar’s A Bug’s Life, Finding Nemo and WALL-E, has…

Wanderlust

Wanderlust

Charmless comedy painfully short on jokes, starring Paul Rudd and Jennifer Aniston

(1 star)7 Mar 2012

The actors in Judd Apatow’s Comedy Stable™ have an unfortunate habit of lulling you into a false sense of security. They’ll star in a string of likeable comedies that manage to poke fun at their subject matter (unplanned pregnancy, 40 year old virgins…

Project X

Project X

Major league mayhem with a dark, twisted edge

(3 stars)1 Mar 2012

(18) 88mins Animal House meets The Blair Witch Project, only this time the horror is very real in a movie that will undoubtedly give all parents nightmares. No, this is not a film about paranormal activity, but a high school party that gets…

This Means War

This Means War

Unsuccessful mash-up of the rom-com and spy action genres

(2 stars)1 Mar 2012

(12A) 97min McG attempts to satisfy both sexes in This Means War – a testosterone-driven action meets girl-pleasing rom-com, that ends up not being good in either genre, despite featuring two of the hottest young actors around (Tom Hardy and Chris…

Laura

Laura

Otto Preminger’s powerful, psycho-dramatic noir returns to the big screen

(5 stars)1 Mar 2012

(PG) 88min This, the first of a run of terrific film noirs that established and cemented Otto Preminger’s reputation as one of the greatest filmmakers to work in Hollywood during the post-war period, is, arguably, the European émigré’s very best.

Butcher Boy - Berkeley Suite, Glasgow, Fri 10 Feb, part of the Glasgow Short Film Festival

Butcher Boy - Berkeley Suite, Glasgow, Fri 10 Feb, part of the Glasgow Short Film Festival

Profound and nostalgic home movie soundtrack session

(3 stars)29 Feb 2012

The intimate basement bar that constitutes the Berkeley Suite, with its original 60s dancehall décor and faded ‘groovy’ vibes, mirrors the classy, nostalgic theme offered by this evening of film and music. Local eight-piece Butcher Boy frame a screen…

The Kid with a Bike

The Kid with a Bike

Naturalistic storytelling from the Dardenne brothers, starring Cecile de France and Thomas Doret

(5 stars)28 Feb 2012

(12A) 87min The Dardenne brothers’ latest film is one of their very best – the story of the relationship between a young boy Cyril (Thomas Doret), recently taken into foster care, and local hairdresser Samantha (Cecile de France). The two meet by…

Michael

Michael

Challenging and non-sensationalist portrayal of a paedophile

(4 stars)28 Feb 2012

(18) 96min Doubtless Austrian writer-director Markus Schleinzer, a former casting director for Michael Haneke, will be pilloried in some quarters for making a film which ‘humanizes’ its paedophile protagonist. Yet what makes this rigorously observed…

Bel Ami

Bel Ami

Pretty but shallow romantic period drama starring Robert Pattinson, Uma Thurman and Christina Ricci

(3 stars)28 Feb 2012

(15) 102min A young man gains social and financial advancement via his irresistibility to women, but has trouble securing professional credibility. And then he gets cast in a film called Bel Ami! Yes, it’s hard to imagine that Robert Pattinson…

Khodorkovsky

Khodorkovsky

Disjointed but nonetheless absorbing study of the Russian criminal oligarch

(3 stars)28 Feb 2012

(12) 112min A detailed and absorbing documentary on Russian oligarch Mikhail Khodorkovsky which looks at the rise and fall of the businessman amid the bigger picture of the country’s relationship with capitalism. Following a public conflict with…

In Darkness

In Darkness

Compelling WWII Jewish refugee tale has depth, wit and beauty

(4 stars)22 Feb 2012

(15) 145min Poland’s entry for the 2012 Academy Awards is a compelling tale, a technical tour-de-force and altogether an impressive showcase for the talents of a veteran director who recently helmed episodes of The Wire and The Killing (as well as…

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