Tag: drama
Russian Resurrection Film Festival 2017
Friday, October 27th, 2017 Film Reviews,Why Russian Resurrection Film Festival? Is it a reference to Tolstoy’s famous novel, or to the revival of the Russian film industry in the post-Soviet era? A bit of both, I imagine, as the 14th RRFF is preocuppied with history and the literary classics. This year’s festival features a retrospective of films by Andrei Konchalovsky […]
Thor: Ragnarok & The Snowman
Friday, October 20th, 2017 Film Reviews,At the beginning of this week I was looking forward to The Snowman, based on a gripping crime novel by Norway’s Jo Nesbø. I had fewer expectations for another Scandinavian saga – Thor:Ragnarok, the third installment of the popular Marvel superhero franchise. By the end of the week my expectations had been trashed so effectively […]
Blade Runner 2049
Friday, October 13th, 2017 Film Reviews,Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner (1982) is the epitome of a cult classic. It didn’t set the box office on fire at first appearance, but with every year its grimy vision of the future reappears in one film after another. If Scott had kept possession of the original sets he could be running a useful little […]
The Final Portrait
Friday, October 6th, 2017 Film Reviews,In Paris in 2006 I dined with James Lord in the restaurant of L’Hotel in rue des Beaux Arts. It’s the hotel in which Oscar Wilde had expired in an upstairs room, losing his final battle with the wallpaper. Many years after Wilde’s departure, Lord established himself in an exquisite apartment on the other side […]
Battle of the Sexes
Saturday, September 30th, 2017 Film Reviews,It’s strange to watch Battle of the Sexes from an Australian perspective, remembering how we barracked for Margaret Court in her rivalry with America’s Billie Jean King. Forty years on, Margaret Court looks like the most dreadful sourpuss – an outspoken homophobe, and allegedly an apologist for Apartheid. Billie Jean King has taken a very […]
Mother!
Thursday, September 21st, 2017 Film Reviews,For want of a better term one would have to call Darren Aronofsky’s bizarre, polarising Mother! a ‘horror movie’, but he has really invented a new kind of film that offers several strong lines of interpretation under the umbrella of a grandiose cosmic vision. Most horror flicks have a pretty basic structure: those who offend […]
Victoria and Abdul
Friday, September 15th, 2017 Film Reviews,One marvels at the undying appeal of Queen Victoria for latter-day filmmakers. Along with two features: John Madden’s Mrs. Brown (1997) and Jean-Marc Vallée’s The Young Victoria (2009), there are dozens of movies in which the Dear Old Queen makes an appearance. She’s usually portrayed as a stern but lovable grand dame who strikes an […]
The Dinner
Friday, September 8th, 2017 Film Reviews,After watching Steve Coogan send up his own dramatic aspirations in The Trip to Spain, it requires a conscious readjustment to accept the tortured, bipolar character we meet in The Dinner. To play history teacher, Paul Lohman, Coogan not only has to find an American accent, he has to exude bitterness and self-pity in every […]
Maudie
Friday, September 1st, 2017 Film Reviews,In every bio pic one can’t help wondering what the subjects of the film actually looked like. Unless it’s a movie about another movie star it’s unusual for the lead actors to closely resemble the people they’re playing. In the case of Maudie it seems that director, Aisling Walsh, was never interested in getting leads […]
The King's Choice
Friday, August 25th, 2017 Film Reviews,Scandinavian history may not be a pressing concern for most Australians, but we can all recognise the importance of political courage – if only by its absence in Canberra. The King’s Choice deals with the dilemma that beset King Haakan VII of Norway when his country was invaded by the Germans in April 1940. Erik […]