Paul Dale

Piranha 3D

16 Aug 2010

Alexandre Aja, the gifted French filmmaker who has so far had the cajones to tackle remakes of Wes Craven’s 1977 wilderness horror The Hills Have Eyes and feted J-horror Mirrors, finally tackles the big one – Joe Dante and John Sayles’ 1978 frat comedy…

The Edge of Love

19 Jun 2008

DRAMA (15) 110min Dylan Thomas, he of the milk wood, once remarked that: ‘When one burns one’s bridges, what a very nice fire it makes.’ The Edge of Love is the story of how the great Welsh poet burnt a very big bridge, one that connected him to an…

Apocalypto

(18) 138min

3 Jan 2007

Welcome to the jungle. A place where pierced savages josh and jest as they rip the flesh of a freshly speared boar. Life is simple, life is good, but trouble is hiding in the undergrowth and young family man Jaguar Paw (Rudy Youngblood) is about to go…

The best film websites

21 Jan 2010

If you work in an office and, like us, you love great movies you probably spend your lunch hour on any number of film-specific websites. So, after a totally unscientific survey of the cinema obsessives at The List, here’s our guide to what’s good and…

The Hot 100 2010 - Mark Millar, Kevin Bridges and Alasdair Gray take top 3 spots

Our annual chart of the people from Scotland being interesting, successful and creative

16 Dec 2010

The Hot 100 is a list of Scots who’ve made a sizeable creative splash in 2010. It includes musicians, artists, writers, actors, fashion designers, technological innovators, shop owners, festival directors, record label heads and one mad cyclist.

Stanley Kubrick & Rainer Werner Fassbinder

5 Mar 2009

This month two monsters of cinema meet in the central belt. As German auteur Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s takes over the Glasgow Film Theatre (courtesy of Goethe Institut) with a small selection of his better known films (Fear Eats the Soul, Effi Brest…

Hunger

Protest picture

30 Oct 2008

'Were you out last night my friend?' 'Is it that obvious?' I say pulling down a wrinkled lower eyelid to expose an eye as bloodshot as those of the two men opposite me. They are hot young actor Michael Fassbender - all fair brown hair, blue eyes, slight…

Jo Spence: Self Portraits

19 Jun 2008

PHOTOGRAPHY Gallery of Modern Art, Glasgow, until Sun 16 Nov Working class artist, photographer, Marxist, feminist, teacher and publisher Jo Spence was an extraordinary talent. Issue-based but always accessible, her work can be seen as the progenitor…

Alan Davie at 90 - A colourful history

24 Jun 2010

Celebrating his 90th birthday this year, cherished Scottish artist Alan Davie is being honoured by a series of exhibitions and events in his native Falkirk. Paul Dale speaks to him

Jules et Jim

3 Jul 2008

French New Wave filmmaker Francois Truffaut’s third film, made in 1962, was undoubtedly his masterpiece. Set in the 1910s and 20s it is the story of a freewheeling love triangle between alpha female Catherine (Jeanne Moreau), Austrian Jules (Oskar…

Document 9 film festival highlights

The documentary film fest celebrates a 'year of protest' theme

12 Oct 2011

Boasting one of their best film line ups in years, the Document 9 human rights festival takes the theme of protest as its mascot this year. The festival opens with Andrea Roggon's Soy Libre (I am Free) about life and hope in modern day Havana. The next…

David Fincher remakes The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

Here are five reasons to expect great things from the Fight Club and The Social Network director

3 Jan 2011

Fight Club and The Social Network director David Fincher returns with the American remake of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo at the end of 2011, starring Rooney Mara. Here are five reasons to expect great things 1: Daniel Craig With the new James…

Winter's Bone

7 Sep 2010

(15) 100min With its all too familiar theme of familial collapse and undercurrents of social disgrace and fear of the local customs, Debra Granik’s excellent second feature film could be a British colonial horror from a distant age, and in some ways…

Samuel Maoz' Lebanon and New York, I Love You among GFF first week highlights

Glasgow Film Festival blog

26 Feb 2010

Hello good people, Paul Gallagher has taken a well-earned rest from the film festival and I will be filling in for him for the next few days. I can’t promise to be as reasoned, intelligent or as enthusiastic as Paul -- being the embittered old hack I am…

The White Ribbon (Das Weiße Band)

4 Nov 2009

(15) 143min Writer/director Michael Haneke (The Piano Teacher, Hidden) mainlines the sentiments of fellow Austrians Alfred Adler (the psychiatrist who first formulated ideas of the inferiority complex) and novelist Marie Von Ebner-Eschenbach (who…

Profile - Riz Ahmed

16 Apr 2009

Born 1 December 1982 Background London Riz Ahmed graduated from Oxford with a degree in philosophy, politics and economics before training as an actor at the Central School of Speech and Drama. He came to prominence playing Shafiq Rasul, a member…

Films for Valentine’s Day

5 Feb 2009

If you want to go and see a film with your beloved this Valentine’s Day you can chose between Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger’s lovely 1945 Highland flit I Know Where I’m Going, a couple of Audrey Hepburn films (Funny Face and Sabrina) and four…

Lakeview Terrace

27 Nov 2008

THRILLER (15) 110min What could be safer than living next door to a cop? Well just about anything if that cop happens to be played by one of America’s leading black actors. Smug young marrieds Chris (Patrick Wilson) and Lisa (Kerry Washington) move…

The Qatsi trilogy at the 2011 Edinburgh International Festival

Godfrey Reggio's film trilogy with Philip Glass Ensemble live score is a masterpiece

15 Aug 2011

It’s been twenty-eight years since I saw Koyaanisqatsi, twenty-odd since I saw Powaqqatsi, and almost a decade since Naqoyqatsi. The first two I saw in empty art house cinemas on wet afternoons, I watched the third in a somnambulistic state from my sofa…

Elizabeth Blackadder

Brilliant retrospective of work by one of Scotland’s major artists

3 Aug 2011

Elizabeth Blackadder is a Dame, a Royal Academician and arguably Scotland’s most popular female painter and printmaker. A major retrospective of her work at Scotland’s biggest gallery space was only ever going to draw sighs of resignation from art snobs…

Takeshi Miike's 13 Assassins strikes a balance between measured character development and violent brutality

25 Apr 2011

(15) 126min Prolific to the point of insanity, unpredictable and blatantly controversial, Takeshi Miike is not your average Japanese filmmaker. His notorious body of work which includes loads of straight to video fare, the Dead or Alive trilogy, Ichi…

Step Up 3D

Other film releases, August 2010

3 Aug 2010

A group of underground street dancers from New York City team up with freshman Moose (Adam G Sevani) and find themselves pitted against the world’s best hip hop dancers in a life-changing showdown. Silly but euphoric and enjoyable street dance flick. If…

Magic Cinema: Croupier, Smokin’ Aces, House of Games and The Prestige

7 Jul 2010

It’s a kind of magic. The Edinburgh International Magic Festival and Filmhouse have joined forces to present a short season of classic magic movies. The strong, not too obvious quartet is Croupier, Smokin’ Aces, House of Games and The Prestige. Ticket…

The Railway Children screening to mark death of director Lionel Jeffries

31 Mar 2010

Fortieth anniversary screenings of this digitally restored print of Lionel Jeffries’ richly iconic 1970 family film starring Dinah Sheridan, Bernard Cribbins and a youthful Jenny Agutter. The film’s great and often (shamefully) overlooked writer…

A Day in the Death of Joe Egg

23 Aug 2009

(15) 104min (Sony DVD retail) Very welcome reissue of Peter Medak’s 1972 film adaptation of Peter Nichols’ hit West End play is a reminder that bad taste and suburban schadenfreude did not begin with Family Guy. Alan Bates and Janet Suzman are Bri…

The Creative World of Alan Davie

Remarkable mix of the dark and the sublime from much-loved Scottish artist

8 Aug 2009

Saxophonist and journeyman translucent Alan Davie is surely one of Scotland’s greatest living artists. At almost 90 years old it’s remarkable to think that this is the first exhibition of his work to embrace the breadth of his output in painting…

Antichrist

23 Jul 2009

Danish Dogme pack leader Lars Von Trier conjures up a slice of unbridled and unpleasant pantheistic horror that’s underlined by themes of grief and guilt. When middle class couple Charlotte Gainsbourg and Willem Dafoe’s son dies in a freak accident…

Mr Lautner Builds His Dream House

5 Mar 2009

With a new film and major exhibition celebrating his life and work, maverick architect John Lautner’s time may finally have come. Paul Dale looks back at the life of the man who shaped the look of US moviemaking’s hometown.

The Hot 100 2008

11 Dec 2008

It’s been a helluva year. 2008 has been a time of significant global change, socially, politically and culturally, with Scotland no exception. So here, for your delectation, is The List’s pick of the 100 people, places and things that rocked our world…

Salo

18 Sep 2008

DVD (18) 112min (BFI DVD retail) Pier Paolo Pasolini’s loose 1975 adaptation of the Marquis De Sade’s The 120 Days of Sodom gets an excellent two disc DVD (and Blu-ray) makeover with a ton of fantastic extras. Pasolini transposed De Sade’s tale…

The Banishment

4 Sep 2008

Fledgling master Russian filmmaker Andrei The Return Zvyagintsev’s flawed second feature is a nonetheless interesting fusion of British gangster flick Sexy Beast, Ingmar Bergman’s Persona and (thematically at least) Scenes from a Marriage as created by…

Foreskins Lament

21 Aug 2008

This dodgy production of New Zealand playwright Greg McGee's landmark 1980 play is played out in the locker room of a local rugby club changing room. A couple of really appalling performances and some less than inspired direction derail things. Still at…

Return of the Soul - The Nakbah Project

A secret persecution preserved in wax

14 Aug 2008

Scottish based painter, theatre designer and now multimedia artist Jane Frere revisits the Nakbah, the catastrophe that befell the Palestinian people in 1948 when the newly UN-sanctioned nation of Israel expropriated ‘lebensraum’ (living room) through…

Edinburgh International Film Festival - Jeanne Moreau

5 Jun 2008

Born between the wars to an English chorus girl mother and a French restaurateur father, Jeanne Moreau was born to play what feminist film critic Molly Haskell called ‘the glorious fantasy, appealing to both sexes, to men as eternal mistress, to women…

St Andrew's Day - The best film from Scotland

Our editors pick highlights from Scottish film through history

25 Nov 2011

Scotland shares Saint Andrew with areas of Russia, Romania, Greece and Malta, though this list is closed to the corruption of arthouse favourites like Theo Angelopoulos and Sergei Bondarchuk with their long names and even longer films. We’re assuming St…

Red, White and Blue

Grimly progressive horror/thriller strips away cliché that surrounds the genres

19 Sep 2011

(18) 103min Erica (Amanda Fuller) is not a good girl. She’s promiscuous but dispassionate, nihilistic but emotionless. The girl’s clearly got some issues. The only person who manages to make any kind of non-sexual connection is weirdy beardy Nate…

Precious Light - David Mach interview

Artist's first major Scottish exhibition in years at Edinburgh Art Festival 2011

6 Jul 2011

It’s just after 9am in Forest Hill in South London. The denizens of this leafy area have walked their children to school and boarded their commuter trains. In David Mach’s messy but unfussy two-floored studio, two handfuls of assistants and technicians…

Sex in art: Four examples of Scottish eroticism

The Wicker Man, Young Adam, Love Made Easy and The Quarrel of Oberon and Titania

1 Feb 2011

You can find good examples of Scottish eroticism without having to wallow through smut. The List picks four artworks that are worth seeking out for some homegrown, highbrow kicks

Edward Weston: Life Work and William Wegman: Family Combinations

A pair of fascinating photography exhibitions for the price of one

12 Aug 2010

These two fascinating exhibitions by two very different photographers challenge John Steinbeck’s belief that cameras should be disparaged because ‘they are so much more sure than I am about everything.’ Weston was the natural, a pioneer and a comrade…

Greenberg revealed at The List Surprise Movie at GFF

Glasgow Film Festival blog

28 Feb 2010

Hello. Don’t worry this is the last time you will have to read my witless meanderings, normal transmission with Sir Paul Gallagher will be resumed soon. So… The List Surprise Movie was…. (drum roll, drum roll) Greenberg. No it wasn’t Kick Ass or…

The Last Station

17 Feb 2010

(15) 112min It’s 1910 and the great Russian writer and aristocrat Leo Tolstoy (Christopher Plummer) has become a cult dissenting voice in Tsarist Russia. His writings and teachings on non violent resistance, state and property rights, chastity and…

Henri-Georges Clouzot's Inferno

4 Nov 2009

(15) 100min Movie history is littered with the foetus corpses of abandoned projects and unrealised masterworks from Francis Ford Coppola’s Megalopolis to Stanley Kubrick’s Napoleon, John Waters’ The Confederacy of Dunces and (arguably most tragic of…

Mesrine: Killer Instinct (l’Instinct de Mort)

30 Jul 2009

Tracing a line from Mesrine’s disillusioning military service during the Algerian war to the beginning of his notoriety in 1972 (when he graduated to murder), the first instalment of this epic crime tale is derivative, energetic and hugely…

The Clyde: Films of the River 1912–1971

11 Jun 2009

As a new exhibition celebrating the River Clyde, as seen through amateur and professional films opens, Paul Dale salutes Glasgow’s cine-camera chroniclers.

Francesca Woodman

28 May 2009

Francesca Woodman created a remarkable body of work in her short life (she committed suicide in 1981 at the age of 22), some of which can currently be seen at the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art’s Artist Rooms. This beautifully presented…

Christopher McDougall - Born to Run

30 Apr 2009

SOCIAL TRAVELOGUE In 2001, former war correspondent and much-injured running nut Christopher McDougall asked his doctor why his foot hurt so badly. The medic, an expert in sports medicine, informed McDougall that at over six foot tall, his body was…

Let The Right One In (Lat Den Ratte Komma In)

2 Apr 2009

DRAMA/HORROR Let the Right One In is a chilling Swedish coming-of-age story that breathes new life into a tired vampire genre marred by American high school teenagers and Christian lobbyist novelists (Stephanie Meyer, Anne Rice). It’s the early…

The Young Victoria

5 Mar 2009

ROMANCE/HISTORY Young Queen Victoria (Emily Blunt) kicks against the royal pricks but is tamed by a man whose name has become synonymous with penile piercing. Who would of thought it. Miserable old Queen Victoria was the proto feminist. As a young…

The Good The Bad The Weird

5 Feb 2009

WESTERN/ACTION Gifted South Korean filmmaker Kim Ji-woon takes on Sergio Leone’s greatest western and (unbelievably) emerges victorious. It’s the 1930s in the desert wilderness of Japanese colonised Chinese Manchuria and three treasure hunters are in…

Gonzo: The Life and Work of Hunter S Thompson

11 Dec 2008

(15) 119min Alex Gibney’s informative new documentary about the photojournalist and socio-political chronicler’s turbulent life and work obviously involved a lot of extra-curricular activity. Mapping Thompson’s trajectory from Twain and…