Patrick Gamble
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Film Review: ‘The Raid’
★★★☆☆ Director Gareth Evans’ flexes his action movie muscles with The Raid (2012), a no-holds barred, testosterone charged, Indonesian martial arts film that whilst rich in conflict and visual panache masks an immaterial script and any semblance of plot. In a Jakarta apartment, rookie cop Rama (Iko Uwais) prepares himself for an impending operation with…
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DVD Review: ‘Crime or Punishment?!?’
★★★☆☆ You’d be forgiven for interpreting the title of Keralino Sandorovich’s latest film, Crime or Punishment?!? (2011) as a mistranslated contemporary adaptation of Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s novel about the moral consequences of murder on the human soul. However, whilst Sandorovich’s film is an archetypal example of the quirky comedic output we’ve grown to expect from Japan,…
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Film Review: ‘Mitsuko Delivers’
★★★☆☆ Yûya Ishii’s Mitsuko Delivers (2011) tells the story of a young single woman in the ninth month of her pregnancy who relinquishes her fate to the wind, drifting through life like a wayward cloud. Starring Riisa Naka, Aoi Nakamura and Ryo Ishibashi, Ishii’s latest feature is a quintessential slice of contemporary Japanese cinema with…
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Film Review: ‘Beloved’
★★☆☆☆ Prolific French director Christophe Honoré reunites with composer Alex Beaupain for yet another post-modern musical drama, Beloved (Les Bien-Aimés, 2011). Boasting an all-star French cast including Catherine Deneuve, Ludivine Sagnier, Chiara Mastroianni and Louis Garrel, as well as outsourcing talent from abroad (Czech director Milos Forman, American Paul Schneider), Honoré’s latest fails to live…
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Film Review: ‘Jeff, Who Lives at Home’
★★★★☆ From the successful directing partnership of brothers Mark and Jay Duplass comes Jeff, Who Lives at Home (2011), a naturalistic examination of brotherly love told through the fractured relationship of two wayward siblings played by Jason Segel and Ed Helms. Jeff (Segel) is thirty and currently living in his mother’s (Susan Sarandon) basement. He…
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Cannes 2012: Jeff Nichols’ ‘Mud’ preview
This year’s 65th Cannes Film Festival boasts an unusually strong American presence within its competition strand, including Jeff Nichols’ highly anticipated new film Mud (2012). Despite only previously having directed two features, Nichols has rapidly built a name for himself after his stunning 2007 debut Shotgun Stories wooed critics at the Sundance Film Festival and…
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Film Review: ‘Angel & Tony’
★★★☆☆ When it comes to portraying unconventional relationships, French cinema has the market well and truly cornered. Whether it’s the ill-fitting match up of a repugnant older man with his young trophy wife or its splendidly nonchalant approach to threesomes, French cinema seems to have no shame when it comes to passions of the flesh.…
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Film Review: ‘Goodbye First Love’
★★★★☆ Following the critical success of her sophomore feature Father of my Children (Le père de mes enfants, 2009), French director Mia Hansen-Løve returns with the incredibly mature and nuanced Goodbye First Love (2011) – a loosely autobiographical examination of the complex emotions that accompany the blossoming romance between young lovers Camille (Lola Créton) and…
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Sundance 2012: Safety Not Guaranteed review
★★★★☆ American director Colin Trevorrow’s Safety Not Guaranteed (2012) is just the type of sweet-natured, low budget indie comedy (with an all-important intelligent heart) that has slowly become synonymous with the world-renowned Sundance Film Festival. Starring rising star Aubrey Plaza, Jake M. Johnson and US mumblecore actor/director Mark Duplass, Safety Not Guaranteed is a pitch…
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Sundance 2012: Filly Brown review
★★☆☆☆ From directors Yousser Delara and Michael D. Olmos comes Filly Brown (2012), a fictional tale of a promising Latino rapper trying to make it big in LA despite numerous domestic and professional obstacles. Starring Gina Rodriguez, Chrissie Fit and Lou ‘Diamond’ Phillips, this hip hop-infused drama sadly struggles to find its voice amongst its…