Category: Films
The Brutalist review – epic Adrien Brody postwar architectural drama stuns and electrifies
Brady Corbet’s amazing and engrossing epic The Brutalist is about the design of postwar America and what was mixed into its foundations at the building [more…]
Damaged review – Samuel L Jackson comes to Edinburgh in crime thriller
Here is what appears to be an authentic so-bad-it’s-good crime thriller, set on the mean streets of Edinburgh and starring the improbable trio of Gianni [more…]
Joker: Folie à Deux review – Joaquin Phoenix and Lady Gaga musical spirals out of tune
Five years ago, Todd Phillips released Joker, his much-acclaimed take on the DC Comics supervillain, with Joaquin Phoenix wearing the clown makeup as the crazy [more…]
What we do in the shadows: why film noir will never die
Film noir was first identified at a distance. In 1946, Italian-born French critic Nino Frank coined the term to describe a cycle of coolly cynical [more…]
‘We didn’t worry about a few dirty laughs!’ The Carry On women on playing nags, bra-burners and ‘crumpet’
I’m watching a clip from the 1969 film Carry on Camping with Valerie Leon. As in, I’m with Leon, in her house in west London, [more…]
Maldoror review – true-crime serial killer procedural induces stomach-turning horror
Fabrice Du Welz began the century as a master of Belgian gothic, riding the wave of Euro-extreme cinema. Calvaire, or The Ordeal, from 2005, was [more…]
Queer review – Daniel Craig is needy, horny and mesmeric in Guadagnino’s erotic drama
Queer is a story of lost love and last love and mad-about-the-boy obsession, featuring an excellent performance from Daniel Craig – needy, horny, moody, like [more…]
‘We never went down the Aardman route’: how the Brothers Quay rocked the animation world
The Brothers Quay, identical twins, make marvellous, mystifying films in which eerie stop-motion puppets outnumber the few live performers. These films might be set in [more…]
The Room Next Door review – Almodóvar spins a gorgeous, fragile tale of life and death
Pedro Almodóvar’s death-struck new melodrama – the great director’s 23rd feature but his first in the English language – is a hothouse Spanish shrub transplanted [more…]
Pedro Almodóvar: ‘There should be the possibility to have euthanasia all over the world’
The acclaimed Spanish director Pedro Almodóvar has called for euthanasia to be legalised worldwide. Almodóvar was speaking ahead of the world premiere of his first [more…]
