The low budget British film Still Life is about as far as it is possible to get from the Hollywood blockbuster. Eddie Marsan plays John May, a quiet office worker for a local council in London. For 22 years he has been doing the unusual job of trying to trace relatives of people that die in the borough without any immediate family, and to make their funeral arrangements.
Maggie has travelled from the year 2054 back to today, and is emerging as a cult leader with a handful of followers. The viewer follows a couple, Peter and Lorna, who infiltrate the cult in the name of investigative journalism.
Game of Thrones’ Gethin Anthony plays the highly face-punchable William, an immature and selfish American travelling around Europe with his best friend Jeremy. Copenhagen isn’t on the itinerary by accident: William’s father, whom he feels some deeply unresolved emotions for, was born here.
Comparing this 1972 Russian classic to modern cinema, it is not an easy watch in that it is extremely slow… but stick with it, as that snail’s pace is an important part of the experience. It allows you to reflect on what is going on, because frankly – it doesn’t seem to make much sense for the first hour and a half or so.
Andrew Haigh’s low-budget film follows a week in the life of an elderly married couple Kate and Geoff (played by Charlotte Rampling and Tom Courtenay), who are about to celebrate their 45th wedding anniversary. They live a quiet life in rural Norfolk, with no children in their life but an Alsatian called Max and a few old friends.
The Rover takes place in the Australian outback, 10 years after ‘the collapse’. The normal rules of society have broken down, the law is no longer upheld, and individuals are beginning to come to terms with living in world where everyone seems to be free to be judge, jury and executioner if and when they feel like it. It sort of feels it may be taking place well after normal society collapsed, but still a while before it had become quite as bad as in the original Mad Max.
Director Andrew Nicoll once again teams up with Ethan Hawke, just like they did in the excellent Gattaca (1997). And like Gattaca, Good Kill raises questions about the impact of technology developments on society at large through focusing on individuals and their personal struggles. This time in the context of warfare.
The most expensive Chinese movie ever made, Dragon Blade cannot be accused of lacking ambition. The intent of the story is grand and some of the battle scenes are grander still.
I went into this movie with an open mind hoping for some spectacle as the scale has awe-inspiring potential. But blimey did they mess this up. The angle to the whole story is incredibly sappy… amplified by a painfully melodramatic score to ‘highlight’ all the emotional bonding that is going on when enemies become allies and Jackie Chan continues to fight for the common good…
The One I Love is billed as a ‘comedy’. But I think the real problem this directorial debut of Charlie McDowell (son of) has is that it isn’t quite sure what it is trying to be.
This is a movie definitely best watched with as little knowledge of the plot as possible, so I won’t explain much more than this: A couple is undergoing marriage counselling, and their counsellor sends them off to a private retreat that will work wonders.
Well. Another Liam Neeson Action Movie.
Liam Neeson’s acting is fine and so is Ed Harris’, but in the end there just isn’t anything special to this movie. I would write more if only I could remember anything about the plot.
Utterly forgettable. Only watch it if you are bored and can’t think of anything better to do.