Paul Gallagher
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What Maisie Knew
19 Jun 2013
Well-crafted drama starring Julianne Moore showing divorce from a child's point of view
In an upmarket Manhattan apartment, rock singer Susanna (Julianne Moore) and her art dealer partner Beale (Steve Coogan) are having an explosive argument. The camera quickly moves to an adjacent room, where the couple’s infant daughter Maisie (Onata…
Leonardo DiCaprio: An appreciation - The Great Gatsby, unknowability and ultimate fractured hero
22 Apr 2013
DiCaprio and Baz Luhrmann work together again 17 years after Romeo + Juliet
At the beginning of this year Leonardo DiCaprio said that he was planning to take a ‘long, long break from acting’. He appears to be sticking with that plan. Following the The Great Gatsby, released in May, we’ll see him at the end of 2013 in The Wolf…
Wolf Children
6 Feb 2013
Expert storytelling from Anime director Mamoru Hosoda
Although this Japanese animated film tells a story about people who can turn into wolves, it would be a mistake to assume that it is just for kids. Directed and co-written by The Girl Who Leapt Through Time’s Mamoru Hosoda, Wolf Children is a complex…
The Knot
4 Oct 2012
Distasteful wedding comedy written by and starring Noel Clarke with Matthew McNulty
Noel Clarke emerged during the last decade as a British actor and filmmaker with distinct promise, but in recent years his prolific output has fallen far short of that potential. This wedding comedy, starring and co-written by Clarke, is surely his…
I’m So Excited
18 Apr 2013
Pedro Almodóvar returns to the brassy style of his earlier films
The new comedy from beloved Spanish auteur Pedro Almodóvar begins with a message assuring us that the film ‘is fiction and fantasy, and has no connection to reality’; a provocation to assume the opposite is true if ever there was one. But while there…
Iain Banks - The Quarry
6 Jun 2013
Iain Banks' final book skillfully portrays our increasingly digital world with famous black humour
Brought forward for publication following Iain Banks’ announcement three months ago that he is ‘officially Very Poorly’ with terminal cancer, The Quarry initially seems a uniquely difficult read. The fact that one of its main characters is in the final…
Star Trek Into Darkness
9 May 2013
Solid sci-fi story in the vein of JJ Abrams' first Star Trek film
With his brilliant restart to the Star Trek series in 2009, director JJ Abrams delivered an origin story that was both respectful to the series’ history while unafraid to take its well-known characters in new and surprising directions. Added to this…
Vinyl
19 Feb 2013
Clunky Welsh comedy starring Keith Allen and Phil Daniels as ageing punk rockers
This clunky punk rock comedy from Welsh filmmaker Sara Sugarman has its heart in the right place, but despite a decent ‘inspired by real events’ premise and some solid performances, it’s crippled by a half-baked script and a reliance upon…
Maniac
13 Mar 2013
Gratuitous slasher remake with a lead performance by Elijah Wood
This slasher remake takes the concept of William Lustig’s controversial 1980 original, focusing on Frank, a loner sociopath who brutally murders beautiful women, and increases the repellent-factor by virtue of a much higher gore budget and a decision to…
Good Vibrations
8 Mar 2013
Inspiring biopic of Belfast punk record label owner Terri Hooley
In 1970s Belfast, as sectarian conflict escalated into terrorism and murder, Terri Hooley decided to open a record shop on the battle-scarred high street. 'One love' was his declaration, and Good Vibrations was the name of the store. The store birthed a…
White Elephant
22 Feb 2013
Contemplative Argentinian drama about a team of Catholic priests working in Buenos Aires' slums
In this unique and impressive drama Argentinian filmmaker Pablo Trapero (Carancho) invites us into the lives of a team of dedicated Catholic priests, led by Father Julian (Ricardo Darin), who work with and live amongst gang members, drug addicts and…
Arbitrage
13 Feb 2013
Tightly-structured thriller set in finance world starring Richard Gere and Susan Sarandon
Set in the world of high-flying money-makers, mergers and acquisitions, this tightly-structured thriller, whose title refers to a strategic financial process, begins with a series of jargon-filled conversations that will leave all but the most…
Ballroom Dancer
22 Jan 2013
Downbeat documentary about former World Latin American Dance Champion Slavik Kryklyvyy
This sombre and self-important documentary, about former World Latin American Dance Champion Slavik Kryklyvyy’s attempt to regain his position after a decade out of the spotlight, aims to show the tough, serious and painful flipside to what happens on…
Popshot: an illustrated magazine of new writing
17 Apr 2013
Issue #9 contains pieces by Michael Hitchins and Fabian Acker
With crisp presentation, simple text layouts, full-page illustrations and plenty of white space, PIssue #9 contains pieces by Michael Hitchins and Fabian Ackeropshot – an illustrated magazine of new writing - makes simplicity a virtue, letting the…
Thursday Till Sunday
28 Mar 2013
A beautifully-crafted but directionless Chilean drama about marital strife
This South American drama depicts a four-day cross-country car journey taken by a family, for reasons kept intentionally vague, from the perspective of 12-year old Lucia (newcomer Santi Ahumada), travelling with her parents and little brother Manuel.
5 highlights from the Glasgow Youth Film Festival
23 Jan 2013
Wreck-It Ralph and Studio Ghibli's Wolf Children form part of Glasgow Film Festival's youth strand
1. Girl Walk // All Day An outdoor, interactive screening of this New York-set dance film, a hit at last year’s South by South West Festival. It follows three dancers performing across the city to the sounds of DJ Girl Talk’s album All Day. (River Clyde…
Up There
19 Nov 2012
Zam Salim's Scottish BAFTA-winning dark comedy is a simple, solid idea that’s stretched too thin
This dark comedy from debut British filmmaker Zam Salim has a promising concept but nowhere interesting to go with it. The story takes place in an imagined afterlife, another plane of existence in our own world where dead souls must pass the time, able…
Five reasons to head to the Southside Film Festival
17 May 2013
The Glasgow film fest does a great line in Scottish films and site-specific screenings
You can discover forgotten former cinemas Glasgow’s Southside may be lacking in cinemas today but that hasn’t always been the case. Take a meander around the area’s architecturally-diverse former picturehouses on a walking tour with the knowledgeable…
The Edinburgh Literary Pub Tour
10 May 2013
Witty duets guide you through the city's literary history
This entertaining mash-up of pub crawl and street theatre uses conflict to bring its subject alive, with great results. Hosted by two characters (one a bohemian who believes Edinburgh’s famous writers were formed from the city’s squalor, the other an…
Chimpanzee
30 Apr 2013
Disney's latest nature documentary will keep young animal enthusiasts happy
This kid-friendly documentary has all the elements you would expect given its Disneynature origins: excellent production values (many of the crew are veterans of the BBC’s natural history documentaries), slick filmmaking and a generally wholesome…
Dead Man Down
30 Apr 2013
Overlong and silly crime drama starring Colin Farrell and Noomi Rapace
This convoluted thriller's nondescript title is a pointer to its flaws: unfocused and overlong, its swill of criminal characters and sub-plots feel like an unfinished work-in-progress, thrown together and stamped with a generic title whose meaning is…
The Gatekeepers
22 Feb 2013
Oscar-nominated documentary about the heads of internal Israeli intelligence agency Shin Bet
Shin Bet is the name of Israel's internal anti-terrorist intelligence agency, the identities of its personnel are all top-secret, with the exception of the man in charge. In this remarkable, vital documentary Israeli director Dror Moreh interviews the…
C Robert Cargill - Dreams and Shadows
22 Feb 2013
A twisted mix of Grimm horror, fairy folklore and clichéd dialogue from the screenwriter and critic
Opening with a chapter in which a sweetly romantic couple are brutally disposed of mere pages after their introduction, this is a dark fairy tale in the truest sense of the word, and distinctly not for kids. But prod beneath its blackly imaginative…
The We and the I
19 Feb 2013
Michel Gondry shows his imagination is alive and well in his latest drama
French director Michel Gondry (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind) gives the single-location movie a funky twist with this authentically over-the-top slice of Bronx life, following the long, loud journey of a local New York bus, loaded with high…
First Position
29 Jan 2013
Compelling documentary following 6 young ballet dancers competing for the Youth America Grand Prix
The Youth America Grand Prix is one of the most prestigious young people’s ballet contests in the world, and this compelling documentary follows six of the dedicated hopefuls taking part, each from very different backgrounds but all sharing the same…
