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IN CINEMAS/ Streaming Now
Violent Night. (15.)
Directed by Tommy Wirkola Starring David Harbour, John Leguizamo, Alex Hassell, Alexis Louder, Leah Brady, Cam Gigandet and Beverly D'Angelo. In cinemas. 112 mins. Violent night, holy night, all is crass, all is dark. For eleven months of the year, that’s the title of a straightastreaming action movie but at this most wonderful time of the year, it becomes something rather smart and enticing. Just like the music biz, in the movies one Christmas hit and you're made for life. Elf, Wonderful Life, Muppet's Christmas Carol, etc are hardy perennials, steady and reliable earning streams for their respective Noddies and Mariahs. With its Father-Christmas-as-an-action-hero set-up, Violent Night's bid to join them is both calculated and demented. 
Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery. (12A.)
Directed by Rian Johnson. Starring Daniel Craig, Edward Norton, Kate Hudson, Janelle Monae, Leslie Odom Jr, Dave Bautista and Kathryn Hahn. In cinemas now, streaming on Netflix from December 23rd.139 mins After the “mixed” reaction to his Last Jedi effectively scuppered both Disney concluding trilogy and the chances of making his own three-film Star Wars spin-off, writer/ director Johnson really needed a great, original idea to get his career back on track. What he came up with was an Agatha Christie-style country house murder mystery with his take on Hercule Poirot, Benoit Blanc (Craig); possibly the lamest idea possible. Another whodunnit; just what the world was crying out for. 
Triangle of Sadness. (15.)
Directed by Ruben Ostlund. Starring Harris Dickinson, Charlbi Dean, Zlatko Buric, Dolly De Leon, Vicki Berlin and Woody Harrelson. In cinemas or streaming at Curzon Home Cinema. 149 mins. Of all the many qualities the Swedish director Ostlund (Force Majeure, The Square) possesses, the one that I treasure most is that he does a terribly good post-screening Q&A. Trust me, that’s very rare. Every other director or producer or star waffles on about influences and themes and the film’s importance; Ostlund just enthuses about interesting stuff he's read online or seen on Youtube. His inspiration is not other films, but life. With Ostlund, you can take his Triangle of Sadness because you know it won't be an Oblong of Obtuseness or a Parallegram of Pomposity. 
Doctor Who Am I. (12A.)
Directed by Matthew Jacobs and Vanessa Yuille. Featuring Matthew Jacobs, Paul McGann, and Daphne Ashbrook. In cinemas 80 mins. In the nineties, screenwriter Matthew Jacobs outraged British Doctor Who fans by writing the ghastly American TV movie which had a new Doctor (McGann) kissing a girl (Ashbrook) and being revealed to be half-human. Now he comes dangerously close to outraging their American counterparts with this documentary about him tentatively trying to embrace the world of fan conventions. Though the narrative calls for him to humbly engage with a group of people who mostly hated his work, Jacobs’ keen ego nearly sabotages the project. He finds it difficult to disguise his sense of superiority to these cosplaying fanatics with their portable, self-assembly Tardises (or is it Tardi?) and hero worship of anybody even remotely connected with this sixties British kids' show. Even him. 
The Banshees of Inisherin. (15.)
Directed by Martin McDonagh Starring Colin Farrell, Brendan Gleeson, Kerry Condon, Barry Keoghan, Pat Shorrt and Gary Lydon. In cinemas. 109 mins. McDonagh's fourth feature reunites him with the stars of his first, In Bruges, Farrell and Gleeson. It's a good deal they've got going. His scripts give them some of the best roles of their careers; their majestic performances get the maximum out of often magnificent dialogue and go a long way towards disguising how contrived and superficial his dark tragi-comedies are. Though many of his plays are set there, this is his first Irish film. On the remote west coast island of Inedsherrin, one friend, Gleeson, tells the other friend, Farrell, that he doesn't want to be his friend anymore and takes ever more drastic steps to enforce this separation. 
The Lost King. (12A.)
Directed by Stephen Frears. Starring Sally Hawkins, Steve Coogan, Harry Lloyd, Mark Addy, Mark Ingleby, Amanda Abbington and James Fleet. In cinemas 108 mins. Ah, the English; we've so obsessed with class even corpses have a pecking order. Richard III has been dead for five centuries with no known burial ground but, because he was the last of Plantagenets, people wouldn't let him lie. This latest from Steve Coogan and Henry Normal’s Baby Cow Productions is the story of office worker turned amateur historian, Philippa Langley (Hawkins.) It was her research into the issue that led to the king's remains being dug up in a Leicester car park 10 years ago. 
Moonage Daydream. (15.)
Directed by Brett Morgan. Starring David Bowie. In Imax cinemas September 16th, other cinemas September 23rd. 135 mins. I’ve used this line before, but one of David Bowie's great gifts was spotting trends before anyone else, a facility best expressed in his taking his leave of us in January 2016. He was already a revered and beloved figure but in the six and a half years since Bowie, that gender-bending cross-dressing cut-up interpretive dance mime avant-garde poseur, has become a totem of remembrance for better, happier times. I think that there is a huge demand for a big, extravagant celebration of his life and music. This is not that film. 
Crimes of the Future. (18.)
Directed by David Cronenberg. Starring Viggo Mortensen, Lea Seydoux, Kristen Stewart, Scott Speedman, Welket Bungue and Don McKellar. 107 mins. The crimes are future but the perpetrator is historical. Cronenberg will be 80 next birthday and has given this the same title as his first full(ish) length feature. The first Crimes of the Future was filmed during summer recess at Toronto university and concerned itself with demented dermatologists and plague-spreading cosmetics; the second with insurrectional evolution. 
Where Is Anne Frank. (PG.)
Directed by Ari Folman. Featuring Ruby Stokes, Emily Carey, Michael Maloney, Sebastian Croft, Skye Bennett and Ari Folman. In cinemas or on demand. 99 mins. When I was a much younger man, I returned home one day to see that The Great Escape was on telly. Not that again, I thought until after a couple of minutes I realised that I had never actually seen The Great Escape; such is its cultural ubiquity that not only did I believe that I had, but so many times as to be bored of it. Similarly, I've never read word of Charles Dickens and, though everybody says how enjoyable it is, I probably never will. This brings us to this revisiting of The Diary of Anne Frank, a book which everybody knows whether they have read it or not. Ari Folman’s animation tries to shake the innocent scribblings of a teenage girl free of the monument that has encased it. 
Bullet Train (15.)
Directed by David Leitch Starring Brad Pitt, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Joey King, Brian Tyree Henry, Andrew Koji and Hiroyuki Sanda. In cinemas. 126 mins. It all seems very simple. Put a bunch of assassins on an overnight train from Tokyo to Kyoto, each with different missions and objectives that are all interconnected. But this bloody exercise in murder, mayhem, deception and decapitation on an orient express is complicated and confused by the fact that though they are all on the same journey, most of them are taking different routes. 
Nightclubbing.
Directed by Danny Garcia Featuring Alice Cooper, Jayne Country, Alan Vega, Billy Idol, Peter Crowley and Elliot Murphy. 85 mins. NY, punk rock, that’ll be CBGB’s then? Ah, but according to the opening titles, “the story of Punk Rock in New York is mainly the story of two clubs.” This is the story of the other one: Max’s Kansas City, a downtown Manhattan landmark from the mid-sixties to the start of the eighties. Its story is that of Andy and Lou and David and Iggy and Malcolm and Sid and Nancy and Debbie and Patti and Johnny, Joey, Dee Dee. Sadly, their contributions to this documentary are on scratchy, grainy VHS recordings of their performances. Those appearing to chat about the old days are a less celebrated selection: there are no Talking Heads among the talking heads. 
Kurt Vonnegut: Unstuck in Time. (15.)
Directed by Robert B. Weide and Don Argott Featuring Kurt Vonnegut, Robert B. Weide, David L. Ulin, Edie Vonnegut and Mark Vonnegut. 127 mins. The opening line of Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse Five (which comes at the start of chapter 2; it’s that kind of book) tells us, “Billy Pilgrim has become unstuck in time.” Big deal: in time we all come unstuck. When it came out in 1969, Vonnegut’s comic, time travelling, science fiction account of the firebombing of Dresden propelled him into the frontline of American authors, a position he retained for around a decade or two. I wouldn’t like to suggest that Slaughterhouse Five and Breakfast of Champions and the rest had gone the way of Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, but I was kind of under the impression that he'd gradually floated clear of critical acclaim and reader popularity and that he’d become associated with a certain period. Which suggests that this biodoc has itself come adrift from its proper place in time. 
Thor Love and Thunder. (12A.)
Directed by Taika Waititi Starring Chris Hemsworth, Natalie Portman, Christian Bale, Tessa Thompson, Russell Crowe and Taika Waititi. In cinemas. 119 mins. This makes it four for Thor, edging him ahead of the three big-screen instalments for Iron Man and Captain America. It’s quite an achievement for the unfancied lad from Asgard, overcoming an initial two films that were poor to middling. Thor four gets off on the right foot by indulging in a simple courtesy that has become increasingly rare in TV and movies: the recap. Through his comic onscreen persona of rock creature Korg, co-writer/ director Waititi recounts Thor’s various previous adventures and mishaps in his own films and The Avengers. It's a nice consideration for the more casual viewer who hasn't fanatically rewatched every film and followed all the spin-offs on Disney+. But as this new film gets underway you may find yourself coming to an uncomfortable conclusion: Thor has become a bit of a wally over the years. Thor four is thoroughly flawed for sure. |
Lynch/ Oz. (15.)
Directed by Alexandre O. Philippe. Featuring Amy Nicholson, Rodney Ascher, John Waters, Karyn Kusama, Justin Benson, Aaron Moorhead and David Lowery. 109 mins. A strapping teenager with taped-down breasts dressed up like a little girl being taken into the woods by some strange men to see something magical – it’s no wonder a mainstream family film as bizarre as The Wizard of Oz is a major influence for David Lynch. Philippe’s speciality has been films about films: 78/52, a study of the shower scene in Psycho and Memory: The Origins of Alien which attempted to assess the disparate cultural influences on Ridley Scott’s horror classic. Here, seven unseen writers and filmmakers present six analyses (Benson and Moorhead are a directorial team) of how Lynch’s art has been influenced by the 1939 classic. These are illustrated by a barrage of clips, often in split screen with a Wiz scene contrasted with a Lynch one. 
Three Minutes: A Lengthening. (12A.)
Directed by Bianca Stigter Featuring Helena Bonham Carter, Glenn Kurtz, Moszek Tuchendler. Partly subtitled. In Cinemas or Curzon Home Cinema. 69 minutes. The three minutes (and 53 seconds) are a home movie of the Jewish inhabitants of a Polish village near the Ukrainian border shot in 1938 by visiting American businessman, David Kurtz, who was making a tour of Europe with his wife and three friends. On Thurs 4th August, Kurtz rented a black Sedan and drove out to Nasielsk, the place where Kurtz's family had emigrated from in the previous century when he was just 4 years old. Here he shoots Kodachrome footage, some in black and white, some colour, of around 150 of its population; mostly just them staring into the lens. Less than a hundred of Nasielsk’s 4,000 Jewish inhabitants would survive the Holocaust. 
Pinocchio. (PG.)
Directed by Guillermo Del Toro and Mark Gustafson. Starring Gregory Mann, David Bradley, Ewan McGregor, Ron Perlman, Cate Blanchett, Tilda Swinton, John Torturro, Finn Wolfhard and Christoph Waltz. In selected cinemas 25th November, streaming on Netflix on December 9th. 114 mins. The film industry is one big game of keeping up with the Joneses. They’ve got a Cinematic Universe, so you’ve got to have one. They’ve started a streaming service, so you start one. They make a Pinocchio, you make a Pinocchio. 
Weird: The Al Yankovic Story.
Directed by Eric Appel. Starring Daniel Radcliffe, Evan Rachel Wood, Toby Huss, Julianne Nicholson and Rainn Wilson. 108 mins. Streaming now on the Raku channel. At last, Daniel Radcliffe has found the role he was born to play: American musical parodist Al Yankovic. (Note, Yankovic singular, not Yankovics plural: four decades been getting that wrong.) It seems to me the purveyor of witty ditties, even those as acclaimed as Tom Lehrer or Victoria Wood or Bill Bailey, occupy a particularly wretched rung on the showbiz ladder. Weird Wal Wankovic (singular), primarily known in this country for his 80s Michael Jackson send-up Eat It, is basically the US equivalent of the Barron Knights. 
All Quiet on the Western Front. (15.)
Directed by Edward Berger Starring Felix Kammerer, Albrecht Schuch, Aaron Hilmer, Edin Hasanovic, Moritz Klaus and Daniel Brühl. In German and French with subtitles. Selected cinemas. Streaming on Netflix from 28th October. 147 mins. Some people want to fill the world with anti-war films, and what’s wrong with that, I’d like to know, because here we go again. The 1930 Oscar-winning Hollywood adaptation of Erich Maria Remarque’s 1928 novel about the futility of trench warfare in WWI, essentially set the format for the anti-war movie. Berger’s film, the first of the three film versions to be in German adds a lot more to it than just subtitles; it’s a spectacular compendium of the last quarter century of war-is-hell movies, everything since Saving Private Ryan raised the bar. It even incorporates Roger Deakins's masterful rotating shadow shots from 1917. 
Emily. (12A.)
Directed by Frances O'Connor Starring Emma Mackey, Oliver Jackson-Cohen, Alexandra Dowling, Fionn Whitehead, Adrian Dunbar and Gemma Jones. In cinemas. 130 mins. That’s Emily as in Bronte, so a great deal of the two hours, ten minutes is spent out on wild and windy moors. Or in this case, wet and rainy; very wet and rainy. I know it's England; I know it's Yorkshire, in the Pennines, but even so, nobody can leave the house in this film without the heavens opening. Usually accompanied by claps of thunder, if you please. This is the most onscreen precipitation since Blade Runner. 
Amsterdam. (15.)
Directed by David O. Russell Starring Christian Bale, Margot Robbie, John David Washington, Anya Taylor-Joy, Remi Malek and Robert De Niro. In cinemas. 134 mins There are a lot of familiar faces in this new Amsterdam, it can become a bit much. The cast for this may not count as particularly starstudded when compared to say The Towering Inferno or A Bridge Too Far but they were epic disaster/ war movies, not some knotty, off-beat period mystery comedy. Yet to the above named you can add Chris Rock, Andrea Riseborough, Zoe Saldana, Michael Shannon, Mike Myers, Matthias Schoenaerts, Alessandro Nivola, Timothy Olyphant and Taylor Swift. 
Clerks III. (15.)
Directed by Kevin Smith. Starring Brian Halloran, Jeff Anderson, Trevor Fehrman, Jason Mewes, Jennifer Schwalbach, Kevin Smith and Rosario Dawson. 100 mins. Nearly 30 years on from the success of the original DIY, micro-budget, black and white, comedy Clerks, Kevin Smith drops in on Dante (Halloran) and Randall (Anderson) and the rest of the original cast to see how their getting on working at the same convenience store they’ve been stuck in for most of the last three decades. Turns out, not so well. After surviving a heart attack, Randall forces them both to reevaluate their priorities and what they have done with their lives. 
The Forgiven. (15.)
Directed by John Michael McDonagh Starring Ralph Fiennes, Jessica Chastain, Matt Smith, Caleb Landry Jones, Said Taghmaoui and Christopher Abbott. 117 mins. Confession. I watched this under a marvellous McDonagh misapprehension, thinking it was the work of the younger brother and playwright (actual name, Martin,) who made In Bruges and Three Billboards, rather than the preferred older brother, JMM, who made The Guard and Calvary. Martin rankles with me because I'm still wondering how I was hoodwinked into writing a 5-star review for Three Billboards. JMM though had enough credit in the ledger from those first two films that forgiveness is not remotely an issue, even though his previous film War On Everyone, a nihilistic buddy cop film parody, was atrocious. This remains the case even after his latest failed effort, a kind of Tui package holiday version of The Sheltering Sky. 
She-Hulk: Attorney At Law.
Directed by Kat Coiro. Starring Tatiana Maslany, Ginger Gonzalo, Mark Ruffalo, Tim Roth, Benedict Wong, and Jameela Jamil. First season streaming now on Disney + Do you remember the time when Marvel was still one of the things you looked forward to, when their films stuck such a fantastic balance between send-up and sincerity that they could make almost anyone a superhero fan? Yes, I really miss that. And it wasn’t even that long ago; definitely much more recent than the end of the Pixar era. I wouldn’t want to pinpoint exactly when they started to slide and what caused it but it most definitely coincided with the point when they started spewing out new product every other ****ing month. The Disney approach to dealing with cash cows is to milk them dry in the quickest time possible, as if there was some big prize for finishing first. Thank goodness they don’t do fossil fuels; we’d already be relying on campfires and animal furs to get us through winter. 
Fire of Love. (PG.)
Directed by Sara Dosa Featuring Katia and Maurice Krafft. Narration by Miranda July. 93 mins. This chilling tale of a deadly obsession is entirely charming and magical. Pity about the terrible title though Volcanologists In Love or Lava Will Tear Us Apart wouldn’t have been any better. Born twenty miles apart in Alsace, Maurice and Katia Krafft were brought together by late 60s French radicalism but, despairing of the chances of real political change, they bonded over a passion for volcanoes. A fierce Life Wish and desire to live with unremitting intensity committed them to a Russian roulette lifestyle: for two decades they flew around the world to chronicle, study and film the latest eruptions until they were caught out by the Mount Unzen eruption in Japan and were killed instantly. 
Paris, Texas. (12.)
Directed by Wim Wenders. 1983. Starring Harry Dean Stanton, Hunter Carson, Nastassja Kinski, Aurore Clement and Dean Stockwell. In cinemas or Curzon Home video, concluding Curzon’s Wim Wender’s season. 139 mins. Ah, Paris Texas. Ry Cooder’s slide guitar. Harry Dean Stanton marching purposefully across the desert between the buttes in his raggedy suit and baseball cap. Nastassja Kinski looking back over the shoulder of her pink angora sweater. Aurore Clement saying, “Unteau.” The dark stormy sky seen through the windscreen as the wipers repel the rain and a car pulls off into a motel. The man ranting on a bridge above a multilane LA freeway. The Ry Cooder music again. Few films have been quite so effective in burning a series of timeless images and sounds into the memory of their viewers; or in getting them to forget that what’s between them is maybe not so great. 
Brian and Charles. (PG.)
Directed by Jim Archer. Starring David Earl, Chris Hayward, Louise Brealey, Jamie Michie and Nina Sosanya. In cinemas. 90 mins. The poster for this tale about a lonely handyman living in a cottage in a remote Welsh valley who invents a robot companion, threatens some kind of British comedy nightmare mishmash. Bearded, unkempt and in a scruffy jumper, Brian (Earl) looks like Jim Royle. Charles (Hayward) resembles an oversized ventriloquist doll: specifically Lord Charles, who in the 70s was a big TV act on the arm of Ray Alan. The background wallpaper suggests a Mike Leigh film. But from the moment Brian looks into the camera and starts telling us about his dark times you know that it is going to be much, much worse: it’s yet another mockumentary. 
Wings Of Desire. (12A.)
Directed by Wim Wenders. 1987 Starring Bruno Ganz, Solveig Dommartin, Otto Sander, Curt Bois and Peter Falk. Subtitled. Black and white/ colour. Back in cinemas as part of a Wender’s retrospective at Curzon cinemas. 127 mins It's not unusual for foreign-language films to use their original title in English-speaking markets – Rashomon, La Dolce Vita, Hana Bi – if the translation doesn't excite. Der Himmel Uber Berlin doesn’t quite roll off the tongue but surely something better than the unforgivably wishy-washy Wings of Desire could be used as the title for Wender’s greatest film: Wings Over Berlin, perhaps? |
