• Pages

  • Site Sections

  • Tags

  • Archives

Zero Dark Thirty – Kathryn Bigelow. The assassination of a terrorist

Tweet    Zero Dark Thirty – Kathryn Bigelow Lincoln could be described as portraying the unprincipled pursuit of a principled objective, in conflict with the principled pursuit of an unprincipled end. It is a tragic lesson of history that when old men possessed of power talk with passion about principles – young people die. No […]

Lincoln – Steven Spielberg. The past is another place….

Tweet    Lincoln – Steven Spielberg “The past is another country. They do things differently there.” L P Hartley’s now almost proverbial opening lines of The Go-Between constantly resonated in the back of my mind throughout this powerful, accomplished, superbly acted film. With typical authority and characteristically meticulous attention to detail, Spielberg assembles to great […]

The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey – Peter Jackson Technical triumph Dismal Drama

Tweet    Technical Quality Dramatic Quality    The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey – Peter Jackson This visual realisation of a fantasy world of endlessly warring kingdoms is a technical tour-de-force: graphically state of the art with special effects to match. Simon Bright’s Art Direction aided by Andy McLaren and Ben Milson, together with Dan Hennah’s […]

Heads we win – tails you pay: Bankers’ motto

Tweet Inside Job – Charles Ferguson (Oscar 2011) Angry at Bankers? See this devastating, meticulously researched Oscar winner for best documentary feature 2011 and find out why you, we, are not angry enough. By a long chalk. ‘Heads we win – tails, you pay’ – the Bankers’ motto. Inside Job is no Michael Moore polemic. […]

Black is white: White is black: and then some

Tweet The Black Swan – Darren Aronovsky “And the Oscar for Original Music for 2011 goes to Black Swan and Pyotyr Illyitch Tchaikowski. Unfortunately Pyotyr can’t be with us tonight but he would like to thank His Imperial Majesty Tsar Aleksandr Aleksandrovich Romanov for his unfailing support and not forgetting his mum Alexandra Andreyevna and […]

Oscars 2009 – Nominations, Predictions, Choices and Comments

TweetOscars 2009 – Nominations Predictions, Choices and Comments London: 01.40 GMT – Just in under the wire before the announcements are made. I do this every year as a kind of personal aide-memoire. Historically I’ve been crap at prediction. And my personal preferences, though supported by arguments in reviews are always at root personal. So […]

Lord Of The Rings III – Return of the King – 9 hour trilogy ends with a fade on a door-knob

Tweet Lord Of The Rings – Return Of The King – Peter Jackson As the Laud of the Rings industry gears up for the Oscars, let’s get real. It will be a travesty if the Return of the King, the third and last in the Tolkein trilogy to be filmed, does not win a technical […]

Ray – in the land of the blues – this blind man was king

Tweet Ray – Director Taylor Hackforth London. Astoria Theatre, Finsbury Park. 1960. A young, white, Suffolk teenager sits, front row circle, with a 20 year-old ‘chaperoning’ mate, having somehow wangled a couple of tickets from the promoters of Ray Charles’s first ever London gig before they even went on sale. Two white sore thumbs in […]

Happy Feet – these penguinpromorphised penguins rock!

Tweet Happy Feet – George Miller Cosmically kitsch. And a pure delight. This absurd, irresistible mixture of genres, movies, performers and most of all, great foot-tapping music, like any good cocktail, delivers a terrific punch, even if at times it is a tad too sweet. It’s farcical, surreal, witty exuberance will make you laugh out […]

Juno – too cool for school, Hollywood cool

Tweet Juno – Jason Reitman Juno McGuff is up the duff. Dad, Mac MacGuff (J.K Simmons) and stepmom Bren McGuff (Allison Janney) are shocked but cool; as only parents in a cool Hollywood movie can be. At 16 Juno is already too cool for school. We know this because she rejects testosterone-driven jocks in favour […]