Edinburgh
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Edinburgh 2017: London Symphony review
★★★★☆ Honouring and recognising the city of London through the power of images set to a beautifully orchestrated score, London Symphony – the crowdfunded documentary film from critic and filmmaker Alex Barrett – is an ode to a bustling, diverse and ever-changing capital.It’s a move to recapture the symphony films of the 1920s, when such…
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Edinburgh 2017: Where is Kyra? review
★★★☆☆ Michelle Pfeiffer delivers one of her best performance in years in Where is Kyra?, director Andrew Dosunmu’s follow-up to Mother of George. It’s a dark, often suffocating character study that revels in misery, barely a hint of levity in sight as a woman spirals into desperation.Pfeiffer plays Kyra, who lives in a pokey flat…
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Edinburgh 2017: Killing Ground review
★★★☆☆ Damien Power’s feature debut Killing Ground adopts an interesting non-linear structure that nicely builds tension to tell a story that’s otherwise unremarkable. However smart it is in its plotting, the film ultimately succumbs to needlessly over-the-top violence.Ian (Ian Meadows) and Sam (Harriet Dyer), a couple whose back story is never really revealed, travel to…
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Edinburgh 2017: That Good Night review
★★☆☆☆ Esteemed British actor John Hurt sadly passed away earlier this year at the age of 77, with one of his final roles being in Eric Styles’ That Good Night, which receives its World Premiere at the Edinburgh International Film Festival this week.That Good Night is an adaptation of a successful stage play, with Hurt…
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Edinburgh 2017: Tom of Finland review
★★★★☆ This biopic of celebrated gay icon Touko Valio Laaksonen (known to many as Tom of Finland, played by Pekka Strang) is smartly made by Finnish director Dome Karukoski, whose feature treads on the heels of a well-received documentary released in 1991.The film spans numerous years of Touko’s life, from his time serving as a…
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Edinburgh 2017: Goodbye Berlin review
★★★☆☆ Adapted from the best-selling novel Why We Took the Car, Goodbye Berlin is a quirky German coming-of-age comedy that’s funny if a bit formulaic. Maik (Tristan Gobel) is a disconnected teen; his mother is an alcoholic, his father isn’t interested and he has no friends.Maik is smitten with classmate Tatjani (Aniya Wendel), but she…
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Edinburgh 2017: God’s Own Country review
★★★★☆ Francis Lee’s God’s Own Country, a poignant gay romance about self-discovery in rural West Yorkshire, has been labelled a Brokeback Mountain on the Dales. It’s an understandable analogy, but it does understate the brilliance of Lee’s vivid depiction of love, lust and lambing.Johnny Saxby (Josh O’Connor) is left to manage the Saxby & Sons…
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Edinburgh 2017: Programme highlights
Doors to the Edinburgh International Film Festival reopened tonight with the UK premiere of acclaimed coming-of-age drama God’s Own Country. The festival, now in its 71st year, closes with the World premiere of unofficial Morrissey biopic England Is Mine.Films set to screen in the city include Final Portrait, directed by Stanley Tucci and starring Geoffrey…
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Edinburgh 2016: Ithaca review
★☆☆☆☆ Don’t shoot the messenger. But the word on the wire at the Edinburgh Film Festival, where Meg Ryan’s Ithaca is making its UK premiere, doesn’t bode well for the actor’s directorial debut. Set in the titular city post-Pearl Harbour, it’s the story of a teenage boy who delivers telegrams to the townspeople during America’s…
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Edinburgh 2016: Little Men review
★★★★★ Theo Taplitz and Michael Barbieri are future stars. The titular protagonists of Ira Sachs’ Little Men give extraordinarily mature performances that belie their tender age. They feature in a perceptive, affecting family drama that channels the director’s characteristically graceful, understated and emotionally enrapturing style through a subtly crafted story of class and gentrification in…