Venice 2016: Safari review
★★★☆☆ “The killing is only a small part,” says Gerald, one of the subjects of Ulrich Seidl’s new film Safari. By its conclusion you...
Film Reviews & More
Most Recent. In John Bleasdale.
17 March 2024
Film Review: Monster
★★★★☆ Having won the Jury Prize in 2013 for Like Father, Like Son and the Palme d’Or in 2018 with Shoplifters, Cannes favourite and Japanese director Hirokazu Kore-eda returns with Monster, a masterful work of intricate storytelling, complemented by a lovely score by the late Ryuichi Sakamoto.
17 March 2024
Film Review: The Zone of Interest
★★★★★ Theodor Adorno famously wrote that poetry was not possible after Auschwitz, but is cinema? Billy Wilder certainly thought so, getting footage from the camps as evidence as much as anything else. Steven Spielberg, Claude Lanzmann, Alain Resnais and Roberto Benigni have all with differing degrees of success tried their hands.
11 January 2024
Film Review: Poor Things
★★★★★ Greek weird wave director Yorgos Lanthimos (The Lobster, The Favourite) hits his stride with his strangest yet most deeply satisfying comedy fable yet, Poor Things. This exhilarating mix of Fanny Hill and Frankenstein is adapted by Tony McNamara from Alasdair Gray’s novel of the same name.
John Bleasdale
Venice 2016: Brimstone review
★★★☆☆ You have to admire the nerve of Dutch director Martin Koolhoven. The title card for his first English language effort reads ‘Martin Koolhoven’s...
Venice 2016: The Blind Christ review
★★★☆☆ “Let me tell you a story,” says Michael (Michael Silva), a spiritually inspired young man in the wastes of the Chilean desert. The...
Venice 2016: The Bleeder review
★★★☆☆ “I could’ve been a contender,” declares Marlon Brando’s brooding pugilist from On the Waterfront, and every actor these days seems to have a...
Venice 2016: American Anarchist review
★★☆☆☆ In a way the title of Charlie Siskel’s documentary American Anarchist is something of a misnomer. Anarchy as a political movement doesn’t get...
Venice 2016: The Age of Shadows review
★★★★☆ Korean director Kim Jee-woon is a prolific and accomplished generic gadfly with a western – The Good, The Bad and The Weird –...
Venice 2016: The War Show review
★★★☆☆ There are seven stages to grief, we’re told, from denial to acceptance. Andreas Dalsgaard and Obaidah Zytoon’s The War Show is structured with...
Venice 2016: The Beautiful Days of Aranjuez review
★★☆☆☆ You know when you buy a new camera, go into the garden to try it out and just snap things to see how...