Day: June 1, 2014

2 June 2014-06-02

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Jared Leto and Matthew McConaughey in Dallas Buyers Club

Out in the UK This Week Dallas Buyers Club (E One, cert 15, Blu-ray/DVD) He literally rides bulls, the hero of this refreshingly unsentimental Aids drama – comedy? – about a rampantly heterosexual Texas guy who discovers he’s HIV+. That’ll be the meth and hookers parties we see him indulging in. The hero of this film is its script – a taut, tight example of economical writing that arrives in each scene as late as possible, tells us just enough of what we need to know, before moving on. There’s no backstories either – bane of so many films these days. So notice how many characters in this film, people with speaking roles and everything, … Read more

Rome, Open City

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Anna Magnani runs after her fiancee in Rome, Open City

A movie for every day of the year – a good one 2 June The sack of Rome, AD455 On this day in the 455th year of the Christian or Common Era, Rome was sacked. Actually, this is a touch ambiguous, because Rome had already been pillaged twice before, in 390BC by the Gauls fighting the Roman in the Battle of the Allia; and in AD410, in the attack of the Visigoths led by Alaric. In AD455 it was the Vandal king Genseric who marched on Rome, claiming a peace treaty between himself and Emperor Valentinian III had been violated when Emperor Petronius Maximus had usurped Valentinian and seized the throne. Out of … Read more