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King Kong – the eyes have it

Tweet King Kong – Peter Jackson (BBC Prize Review) The eyes have it. Of all the multi-million $ visual illusions created for King Kong, the most critical to the film are the prehistoric, 25 foot Gorilla’s eyes. However breathtaking the CGI generated action sequences, and they are superbly filmed and edited – it is the […]

A Scanner Darkly – Linklater on the years AD – After Dick

Tweet A Scanner Darkly – Richard Linklater (BBC Prize Review with philosophical coda) Consciousness is the last mystery. It is the holy grail of brain scientists and K2 to philosophers. If consciousness is the substance of this mystery, personal identity is its form. The conceptual, even spiritual, genesis of Philip K Dick’s book upon which […]

A Good Year – BBC prize, a charmless offensive

Tweet A Good Year – Ridley Scott (BBC Prize Review) Russell Crowe doesn’t do charm. It was perverse therefore for Ridley Scott to cast him in a film based upon Peter Mayle’s book of the same name. The book at best was a light, slight, quizzical account of the travails of a dropped out advertising […]

What The Bleep Do We Know? – wind-up a scientist

Tweet What The Bleep Do We Know? – Directors: Arntz, Chasse, Vincente. (BBC Prize Review) Wind up a scientist – praise this movie! One distinguished writer on science has used terms like ‘atrocious, ‘junk’ and offers the view that if you know anything about science you will be violently ill after seeing it.’ Now you […]

Babel – simply a masterpiece

Tweet Babel – Alejandro Gonzalez Inárritu (BBC Prize Review) Simply a masterpiece: of conception and writing, direction, performance and technical accomplishment integrating the whole. If not already, Inárritu will be one of the great directors. This is a work of consummate warmth and humanity – beyond language, beyond religion, beyond politics. In a world bedevilled […]

Saraband – Bergman’s existential farewell. Deeply moving

Tweet Saraband – Ingmar Bergman (BBC Prize Review) Saraband is like a cup of very hot, black, excellent tea on a bitter Winter’s day. Not everyone’s brew. A drink that must be sipped, taking in its satisfying heat little by little. No sweetness here, just a few hints of tenderness and compassion like single grains […]

Vers Le Sud (Heading South) – sexual colonialism

Tweet Vers Le Sud (Heading South) – Laurent Cantet (BBC Prize Review) Is sex the paradigm human experience? A pool of thought for ever poisoned by Freud. Presidents, kings and queens, tycoons and politicians – all seem willing to risk everything for it. It sells everything from spanners to hot dogs; politicians to flatulence pills. […]