★★★★☆ The Rolling Stones – messianic anti-moss-gatherers or piratical pariahs – how best should they be remembered? American director Brett Morgen (highly regarded for his 2002 cult hit The Kid Stays in the Picture) tackles this historical quandary head-on with […]
★★★★☆ It seems almost impossible to talk about Julian Jarrold’s BBC/HBO drama The Girl (2012) without mentioning Sacha Gervasi’s Hitchcock (2012) – starring Anthony Hopkins as the ‘Master of Suspense’ – in the same breath. Whilst comparisons will undoubtedly be […]
★★☆☆☆ An apparent sequel to Tobe Hooper’s notorious (and masterful) 1974 cult classic The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, Texas Chainsaw 3D (2013) starts promisingly but soon becomes yet another sub-standard American gorefest, with little or no real body. Directed by […]
London’s finest short film festival, the LSFF, returns once again this year for its 10th incarnation (4-13 January), a decade on from its inaugural outing back in 2003. Widely recognised as the UK’s premiere showcase for short form fanatics – […]
★★★★★ Roman Polanski’s Oscar-winning Chinatown (1974), starring Jack Nicholson and Faye Dunaway, took the film noir in a whole new direction, subverting the American Dream into a bleak portrait of corporate America. Jack J. Gittes (Nicholson) is a PI brought […]
★★★★☆ The world-renowned Don McCullin spent over three decades of his illustrious career on the frontline of human conflict. From 1969 to 1984, he was the celebrated photographer for The Sunday Times, where he covered an assortment of wars, a […]
★★★★★ Re-released as part of the Roman Polanski retrospective at BFI Southbank in London, Repulsion (1965) ranks among the director’s best work. It’s an expertly crafted masterpiece, finding a genuine sense of horror in the domestic and the mundane. Time has […]
★★★★☆ Quartet (2012), the first turn at directing by Hollywood icon Dustin Hoffman, is a film which requires little effort – either from those taking part or from the viewer. That’s not intended to be derogatory, indeed quite the opposite, […]
★★★★☆ Five years after making a powerful impression with terrifying ghost story The Orphanage (2007), Spanish writer and director Juan Antonio Bayona turns his attention to the tsunami that wreaked havoc on thousands of unsuspecting victims on December 26, 2004. […]
★★★★☆ Due in no small part to the delayed UK theatrical release of Hadewijch (2009), Hors Satan (Outside Satan, 2011) is the second Bruno Dumont film to hit these shores within the last twelve months – no bad thing, of […]
★★☆☆☆ Dark Nature (2009), the directorial feature debut from BAFTA-winning writer Marc de Launay, promises much but ultimately fails to deliver on its lofty ambitions. This Scottish slash fest – starring a cast of virtual unknowns including Len McCaffer, Imogen […]
★★☆☆☆ Just when you thought the cockney gangster genre was brown bread and buried in concrete, Frank Harper’s St. Georges Day (2012) comes floating down the Thames carrying a cast of familiar London heavies, armed to the teeth with dodgy […]
Happy New Year and welcome to 2013 one and all! The last twelve months truly offered something for all cinematic tastes, with barn-storming Hollywood blockbusters such as Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight Rises, Joss Whedon’s Avengers Assemble and Sam Mendes’ […]
