London Film Festival
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BFI London Film Festival 2012: ‘Rust and Bone’ review
★★★★☆ After premiering at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, Jacques Audiard’s elegant yet muscular Rust and Bone (2012) was met with assorted feelings, with the film’s heightened melodrama and contrasting aesthetics appearing somewhat jarring in comparison with the director’s previous work. Thankfully away form the harsh judicious glare of the Croisette, Audiard’s latest study of…
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BFI London Film Festival 2012: ‘Francine’ review
★★★★☆ Starring Academy Award-winning actress Melissa Leo, Brian M. Cassidy and Melanie Shatzky’s Francine (2012) is a surprisingly provocative piece of stripped-down social realism that’s subtle approach belies its powerful core themes. After serving time in prison for an undisclosed crime, Francine (Leo) begins to rebuild her life in a small American town. Her new…
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BFI London Film Festival 2012: ‘Memories Look at Me’ review
★★★☆☆ Unsurprisingly, given its title, the past plays a major role in the debut feature film of Song Fang, best known as the nanny in Hou Hsiao-Hsien’s Flight of the Red Balloon (2007). Gentle, pleasant, and seemingly autobiographical, Memories Look at Me (2012) is an exploration of life, the passing of time, and fatality. To…
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BFI London Film Festival 2012: ‘Clip’ review
★★★☆☆ With several awards scooped on its festival travels thus far – including a Tiger Award in Rotterdam – and having being banned in Russia, Serbian drama Clip (Klip, 2012) now arrives at the London Film Festival. The feature debut, both as writer and director, of actress Maja Milŏs, the film is a gritty and…
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BFI London Film Festival 2012: ‘Antiviral’ review
★★★☆☆ Brandon Cronenberg displays the creative genes he was born to engage with Antiviral (2012), a fittingly abstract body horror that whilst clearly influenced by his father’s distinctive style, ultimately culminates in an impressive debut. Syd March (Caleb Landry Jones) is an employee at the Lucas Clinic, where celebrity viruses are sold to ‘true connoisseurs’.…
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BFI London Film Festival 2012: ‘Beyond the Hills’ review
★★★★☆ Fresh from the Palme d’Or success of the undeniably bleak and dour 4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days (2007), Romanian director Cristian Mungiu returns to the fray once again with Beyond the Hills (2012), a balanced and observant examination of religion, love and freedom – and perhaps the most thought-provoking and profound film to…
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BFI London Film Festival 2012: ‘Beasts of the Southern Wild’ review
★★★★☆ A big-screen adaptation of Lucy Alibar’s play Juicy and Delicious, Benh Zeitlin’s Beasts of the Southern Wild (2012) is a picturesque coming of age tale imbued with an aura of magical realism and an underlying cultural message about our fluctuating global environment. Precocious six-year-old Hush Puppy (Quvenzhane Wallis) lives with her father Wink (Bwight…
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BFI London Film Festival 2012: ‘Here and There’ review
★★☆☆☆ Nobody would question the fact that Antonio Mendez Esperanza’s Here and There (Aquí y Allá, 2012) raises some extremely important and relevant points about the challenges faced by Latin American migrant workers. Yet, even the most ardent fans of slow cinema may well find Esperanza’s film a chore. The narrative follows protagonist Pedro, who…
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BFI London Film Festival 2012: ‘Just the Wind’ review
★★★★☆ Hungarian director Benedek Fliegauf’s bleak and brutally affecting Eastern block drama Just the Wind (Csak a szél, 2011) was one of the very best films screened at this year’s Berlin Film Festival, rightfully finding itself in the running for the top Golden Bear award. Fliegauf’s latest may still be looking to secure UK distribution, but…
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BFI London Film Festival 2012: ‘Spike Island’ review
★★☆☆☆ The 90s were great, weren’t they? You had Oasis, Blur, Pulp, and of course The Stone Roses, who are given near mythical status in Mat Whitecross’ love letter to band frontman Ian Brown, in Spike Island (2012). A group of lads from Manchester spend their days rehearsing together in their unsigned band, covering their…