Eddie Harrison

Profile: Nicolas Winding Refn

Born 1970 Copenhagen, Denmark Background After coming to prominence by re-sculpting his 1996 hit Pusher into an accomplished drug-trilogy, Danish writer/director Winding Refn’s controversial Bronson won him plaudits for coaxing a remarkable…

Valhalla Rising

(15) 92min Expectations have substantially cooled on Nicolas Winding Refn’s follow-up to last year’s brilliant Bronson, but those accustomed to his art-house sensibility/ visceral action fusions will find something original in Valhalla Rising. Refn’s…

The best things to do in Glasgow

Where to … … take a walk Dumbarton Road is Mecca for enthusiastic charity shoppers (tip: start off at the Salvation Army near Byres Road) – make a day of it by wandering round the junk and vintage shops of nearby Ruthven Lane first. (Kirstin…

A Boy Called Dad

(15) 79min April’s pre-blockbuster season is a traditional ‘dump slot’ for unanticipated UK films, and it’s a shame to see A Boy Called Dad given such unceremonious treatment, particularly as it showcases a strong performance from the perennially…

Dear John

(12A) 108min Director Lasse Hallström has made a virtue of crafting bestsellers into lushly produced, if sentimental movies including Chocolat, The Cider House Rules and The Shipping News. Adapting Dear John from the novel by The Notebook’s Nicholas…

Remember Me

(12A) 112min His role as the sulky Edward in the Twilight films helped make the vampire franchise a hit, but can a de-fanged Robert Pattinson make it as a star? The box-office belly flop suffered by Allen Coulter’s clunky, overwrought drama in…

Extract

(15) 94min After his considerable small screen success with Beavis and Butthead and King of the Hill, it was clear that Mike Judge’s brand of caustic humour would, one day, enable him to make a great big-screen comedy. Judge’s fans believe he’s…

Old Dogs

(PG) 88min Having earned his rubbish comedy spurs on Walt Becker’s biker comedy Wild Hogs, John Travolta returns on a fool’s errand to partner Robin Williams in the same director’s follow-up Old Dogs. Via a series of arch plot contrivances that…

The Spy Next Door

(PG) 94min Some years after Arnold Schwarzenegger in Kindergarten Cop and Vin Diesel in The Pacifier, Jackie Chan is the latest action star seeking to reinvent himself for a younger generation by portraying himself as a put-upon babysitter to bratty…

Perrier's Bounty

(15) 88min After an accidental shooting, charismatic Dublin gangster Michael McCrea (Cillian Murphy) goes on the run with his fey neighbour Brenda (Jodie Whittaker) and his coke-snorting, hypochondriac father Jim (Jim Broadbent). Together they have…

Hachi: A Dog's Story

(PG) 93min Lasse Hallstrom, director of My Life As A Dog, returns to his canine roots with Hachi: A Dog’s Story, an unashamedly sentimental version of the story most Scots would recognise as Greyfriars Bobby. The cited real-life inspiration for…

Case 39

The current vogue for demonic children flicks doesn’t excuse the unwarranted release of Christian Antibodies Alvart’s long-shelved horror film, in which Renee Zellweger plays Emily Jenkins, a social worker who adopts a malevolent girl with the ability…

Legion

(15) 100min From his ferret-carrying juggler in Inkheart to his deathly dull Charles Darwin in Creation, Paul Bettany’s weird and not-so-wonderful choice of roles hasn’t given him much of a chance to live up to the considerable acting promise he…

Capitalism: A Love Story

(12A) 102min Michael Moore’s credibility has taken something of a dint since the populist, glory days of Fahrenheit 9/11 and Sicko, but his new opus sees him going for broke by taking on the whole capitalist system. But without his old pal George…

From Paris With Love

(15) 92min Following on from his surprise action hit for Liam Neeson in Taken, Pierre Morel comes a cropper in his latest venture by teaming Jonathan Rhys Meyers and a shockingly bald John Travolta for the usual run-of-the-mill Parisian…

Solomon Kane

(15) 104min Based on a lesser-known character by Conan The Barbarian creator Robert E Howard, James Purefoy dons Solomon Kane’s Witchfinder General hat and sets out to bloodily revenge the murder of an innocent family who befriended him. Jason…

Freestyle

(12A) 85min Brit director Kolton Lee’s second feature, made under the auspices of Film London’s Microwave scheme, which also produced Shifty, stars Lucy Stanhope as Ondene, a young woman who falls for freestyle basketball player Leon Chambers (Arinze…

Battle For Terra 3D

(PG) 78min Having festered on the shelf since its April 2009 US release, Battle For Terra 3D arrives in our cinemas to cash in on the current wave of enthusiasm for three-dimensional cinema, and specifically Avatar, although Canadian director…

Ponyo (Gake No Ue No Ponyo)

(U) 101min An animated feature about a five-year-old boy who falls for a goldfish princess may not sound like a hot ticket, but the delightful content of Ponyo will be no surprise to anyone already in thrall to the Studio Ghibli brand. After Hayao…

Astro Boy

(PG) 93min A popular manga in Japan since 1952, and a cult TV show in the US since the early 1980s, Astro Boy makes a bid for worldwide domination in this flashy but flatly realised animation from director David Flushed Away Bowers. Freddie…

Hands up - A guide to the perfect heist

Planning one last big job? Then you may want to read Eddie Harrison’s handy guide to daylight robbery honed from hours of watching classic and not so classic heist movies. You in? Or out? OK so you want to pull off a heist? But unless you’re still…

Brothers

(15) 104min Susanne Bier and Anders Thomas Jensen’s 2004 Danish drama Brothers (Brødre) is given a prestige Hollywood makeover courtesy of writer David Troy Benioff and director Jim In America Sheridan. The result in an engrossing, if flawed drama…

The Boys Are Back

(12A) 103min Based on journalist Simon Carr’s memoir of bringing up his two boys in South Australia, The Boys Are Back is a small scale but quietly pleasing drama about the difficulties of parenthood. Executive producer Clive Owen cannily casts…

Ninja Assassin

(18) 98min ‘He doesn’t look like a ninja, he looks like he should be in a boy-band,’ comments a police investigator on first sighting of Ninja Assassin’s pyjama-clad killer Raizo, played by pop-star Rain. Given Rain’s pedigree as a crooner, it’s a…

All About Steve

(12A) 98min Sandra Bullock follows twin box-office strikes The Proposal and The Blind Side with supposedly kooky comedy All About Steve. Combining the male charms of The Hangover’s Bradley Cooper and Sideways star Thomas Hayden Church must have…