Tag: romance
Magic in the Moonlight
Saturday, August 30th, 2014 Film Reviews,Either the films are getting better or I’m becoming one of those critics who find redeeming features in unlikely places. Most reviewers seem to lose it after about 300 superhero flicks, when they finally begin to believe that someone in coloured leotards may have a rich inner life. My particular Waterloo might be Woody Allen. […]
Reaching for the Moon
Saturday, July 26th, 2014 Film Reviews,“The art of losing isn’t hard to master;” wrote Elizabeth Bishop, in One Art, the poem that gets most traction in Bruno Barreto’s bio pic, Reaching for the Moon. “so many things seem filled with the intent to be lost that their loss is no disaster.” It’s an obvious choice for a feature poem, as […]
The Lunchbox
Saturday, July 12th, 2014 Film Reviews,India is by far the world’s largest producer of feature films, but very few of them make their way into our cinemas. For westerners it seems surreal when a Bollywood drama suddenly erupts into an elaborate song and dance routine that would leave Busby Berkeley gasping. For Indian audiences the opposite applies. Without the songs […]
Grace of Monaco
Saturday, June 7th, 2014 Film Reviews,In every photograph, French director, Olivier Dahan, is shown wearing a hat. Sometimes it’s a beret, but more often a baggy, brimmed affair that makes him look like a fashion-conscious engine driver. Although I’m no style guru, it seems a rather silly affectation. In theory a director’s dress sense shouldn’t have any relevance to the […]
The Broken Circle Breakdown
Saturday, May 17th, 2014 Film Reviews,Belgians have a reputation for pursuing individualism to the point of eccentricity. The Broken Circle Breakdown will confirm that reputation, but the film has a lot more to offer than mere quirkiness. Viewers who enter the cinema in one piece may emerge trying to reassemble the fragments, having experienced alternating extremes of exhilaration and tragedy, […]
Only Lovers Left Alive
Saturday, April 26th, 2014 Film Reviews,Last time we saw Tilda Swinton on screen, in The Grand Budapest Hotel, she was playing a corpse. In Jim Jarmusch’s Only Lovers Left Alive, she is a vampire. This may be considered a form of progress. Since the days of Murnau’s Nosferatu (1922) and Dreyer’s Vampyr (1932) there have been thousands of vampire films […]
The Invisible Woman
Saturday, April 19th, 2014 Film Reviews,Charles Dickens (1812-70) was not only a literary giant, he was a celebrity whose every move was chronicled in the press. As a practising Christian and tenchant social critic Dickens had a reputation to uphold, but his temperament and energy lured him away from the path of convention. The Victorians were no more flawed than […]
Romeo and Juliet
Saturday, April 5th, 2014 Film Reviews,When an actor’s star is rising there is no point in pausing to ask whether they are actually right for a role. Douglas Booth may have been a bit too pretty and soft to play Noah’s son, Shem, but one could say the same about his portrayal of Romeo in Carlo Carlei’s new version of […]
Le Weekend
Saturday, March 1st, 2014 Film Reviews,To turn from Gloria to Le Weekend is to become conscious of the gulf that separates 58 from the mid-60s. Instead of the problems of being a single mature-age woman, we meet with the frustrations of a couple who have been yoked together for 30 years, to the point where they can hardly imagine themselves […]
Blue is the Warmest Colour
Saturday, February 15th, 2014 Film Reviews,Queen Victoria allegedly saw no reason for criminalising lesbianism because she couldn’t understand what such women actually did. Although this old story is almost certainly false, on the very slim chance there is anyone today feeling similarly bewildered, Blue is the Warmest Colour offers a most comprehensive demonstration. This film, which goes by the catchy […]