Film Reviews

Trance

Emma Simmonds Monday, 25 March 2013

Pulsating and cinematically proud with an opulent urban palette, Trance positively storms onto the screen. Fast becoming a national treasure (if he hasn't broken through that particular ceiling yet) Danny Boyle is also one of the few directors with the visual chutzpah to make a film this bombastically exciting set in the UK.

Compliance

Emma Dibdin Friday, 22 March 2013

When Craig Zobel’s true-life thriller Compliance played at Sundance, it was met equally with critical praise and audience outrage. There were walk-outs, complaints, shouting matches. At the London Film Festival last year, reaction was similarly polarized – one indignant viewer attempted to lead a mass walkout, rising from his seat during a particularly troubling scene with the rallying call of “Okay everybody, I think it’s time to go now!”

Jack the Giant Slayer

Nick Hasted Thursday, 21 March 2013

This is a fairy tale which may send children to sleep before the good bits, then wake them up screaming at the first glimpse of loping, bestial giants.

Neighbouring Sounds

Demetrios Matheou Thursday, 21 March 2013

With the customarily narrow perspective that informs much film distribution in the UK, we might be forgiven for assuming there is just one subject in Brazilian cinema: crime; in particular, the drug-related gang wars in the favelas. We certainly haven’t seen much to suggest otherwise, since City of God.

Post Tenebras Lux

Emma Simmonds Monday, 18 March 2013

In Post Tenebras Lux (light after darkness, in Latin) Mexican writer-director Carlos Reygadas casts a spell which transforms the ordinary into the extraordinary. The human condition is eye-poppingly explored in this ambitious, sometimes puzzling work of visual poetry, buoyed by the innocence of children and mired in the contrasting anxieties of their parents. Whether it's sexual neurosis, the natural world, or kids at play it's all too beautiful.

The Incredible Burt Wonderstone

Veronica Lee Friday, 15 March 2013

Anyone who has ever sat through a Las Vegas show – whether in the Nevada desert city or on tour – will instantly recognise the cheesy, overblown nonsense being lampooned throughout this movie. Whether they'll find it as funny is another matter.

The Spirit of '45

Graham Fuller Thursday, 14 March 2013

Ken Loach’s first solo documentary since The Flickering Flame, The Spirit of ‘45 is an indispensable agitprop movie that might have been subtitled Days of Hope, after Loach and Jim Allen’s 1975 drama serial about the political struggle of a socialist family between the Great War and the General Strike.

The Paperboy

Emma Simmonds Wednesday, 13 March 2013

You wait years for another interesting Nicole Kidman film and then two come along at once. Two weeks ago it was the elegantly malevolent Stoker and now here's sweaty, shameless noir The Paperboy. It's a film that takes Zac Efron's squeaky clean reputation and quite literally pisses all over it.

Shell

Kieron Tyler Tuesday, 12 March 2013

As a finely drawn portrayal of loneliness and solitude encouraged by bottled-up emotions, Shell would be noteworthy enough. But it also contains two scenes – father and daughter interactions - that are deeply uncomfortable viewing. First-time feature director Scott Graham’s encapsulation of the life of 17-year old Shell and her father Pete’s life at an isolated Scots garage isn’t going to be quickly forgotten.

Beyond the Hills

Tom Birchenough Monday, 11 March 2013

The Romanian New Wave continues producing cinema with a visceral power that’s hard to match anywhere in Europe, though to say it was alive and well would hit the wrong note, given the bleakness of the world it goes on depicting.

Oz The Great and Powerful

Emma Simmonds Friday, 08 March 2013

It’s no exaggeration to say that The Wizard of Oz has a special place in the hearts of millions. For many, their last trip over the rainbow will have been watching its 1985 sequel Return to Oz, a commercial flop berated at the time for a too tenebrous tone. Yet Return to Oz was the stuff of numerous childhood nightmares, and so it's gone on to achieve cult status.

Side Effects

Adam Sweeting Thursday, 07 March 2013

Stephen Soderbergh would have us believe that this might be his last movie, which is difficult to believe. But if so, he's bowing out with one his sharpest, most devious and most watchable pictures, in which a shrewdly-chosen cast does full justice to a screenplay over which Scott Z Burns has pored painstakingly for more than a decade.

Broken

Matt Wolf Wednesday, 06 March 2013

"I'm so worn out with it," a character remarks in a different context well into Rufus Norris's film Broken, to which one is tempted to respond, "Ain't that the truth!" A dissection of so-called "broken Britain" in all its jagged disarray, stage director Norris's debut film wants to be excoriating but is instead mainly exhausting and feels infinitely longer than its briefish running time.

The Guilt Trip

Veronica Lee Tuesday, 05 March 2013

Of all the pairings you might have thought would star in a cross-generational road movie, I suspect Seth Rogen and Barbra Streisand would be the last names you would have put together, despite their undoubted comedic talents.

Robot & Frank

Emma Dibdin Monday, 04 March 2013

We've hardly gone wanting for big-screen robots of late – Michael Fassbender's inpenetrable cyborg was the best thing in Ridley Scott's overly ponderous Prometheus last year, while many have argued that Pixar reached its pinnacle with disarming robot-rom WALL-E in 2008.

Stoker

Emma Simmonds Friday, 01 March 2013

It's about time the world got to know South Korean director Park Chan-wook. His "vengeance" trilogy (and its middle segment Oldboy in particular) made an indelible impression on many but Stoker, Park's frighteningly meticulous English-language debut starring Nicole Kidman, Mia Wasikowska and Matthew Goode, will considerably broaden his reach.