Popular Reviews
House of Tolerance
A movie for every day of the year – a good one 11 February Cynthia Payne acquitted of running a brothel, 1987 On this day in 1987, 54-year-old Londoner Cynthia Payne was acquitted of being a madam and living off the immoral earnings of others. She’d been arrested before, in 1978, when her suburban sex parties for pensioners had attracted the attention of the newspapers, not least because she accepted Luncheon Vouchers as payment for activities including being spanked by young ladies. On the first occasion she’d been sentenced to 18 months in prison, reduced to six months on appeal, of which she served four. Payne’s notoriety stemmed in large part from her … Read more
The Parenting
Brian Cox apparently gets a bit sick of being asked in interviews about Succession and playing Logan Roy, which might explain his presence in The Parenting, a film unafraid to do jokes about projectile vomiting alongside a whole slew (spew?) of gags revived from the era of gross-out comedy. Look, this says, I’m an actor, now doing something completely different, alright, because that’s what acting is. Craig Johnson is the director and Kent Sublette the writer, but it’s the Farrelly or Wayans brothers who really preside over this movie – comedy done with a wink and a how-low-can-you-go chuckle. It’s a Meet the Parents set-up. Rohan (Nik Dodani) and Josh (Brandon Flynn) are … Read more
Evil Dead Rise
Who’s been watching The Exorcist? Writer/director Lee Cronin has, and Evil Dead Rise, the fifth instalment in the Evil Dead franchise, is thick with references to William Friedkin’s seminal 1973 horror movie. No bad thing in itself and just for fun Cronin chucks in an amusing reference to Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining at one point, just to keep things lively. Comedy has been part of the mix in the Evil Dead series, going back to halfway through the second instalment when director Sam Raimi suddenly pushed the ick factor so far beyond overload that it became funny. It seemed unintentional, a misjudgement, at first. But going repeatedly too far proved Raimi meant it … Read more
27 January 2014-01-27
Out in the UK this week Rush (StudioCanal, cert 15, Blu-ray/DVD/VOD) Recognising a good thing when he sees it, director Ron Howard sticks with Frost/Nixon writer Peter Morgan for this entirely satisfying, largely factual re-run of the rivalry between 1970s Formula 1 stars Niki Lauda and James Hunt. There’s tons to like in this film – Chris Hemsworth makes an excellent Hunt, and Daniel Brühl is actually an even better Lauda. But it’s Morgan’s screenplay which is the thing of wonder. Managing to tell the real story of the dramatic “couldn’t make it up” 1976 Formula 1 season and yet bouncing along simultaneously on the sort of good versus evil dynamic that Hollywood demands, … Read more
Sharp Stick
Like a lot of Lena Dunham’s work, Sharp Stick is a quirky dramedy set among the delusional and self-obsessed. With its strong autobiographical element it sits neatly alongside her early web series Delusional Downtown Divas (which kind of says it all), her breakthrough movie Tiny Furniture, and her TV show Girls. Dunham appears in it, and also produces, writes and directs, but it all hangs on one-time model and star of Netflix’s The Society Kristine Froseth, as a spectacularly naive woman who lives at home with her jaded mother and influencer sister and then gets into sex all of a sudden, aged 26, after seducing the father of the kid she babysits. Dunham … Read more
Nun of That
A film called Nun of That with the tagline “A blast for you and a blasphemy”? That’s two good reasons to watch right there. A third is that this is a funny (scrappy, admittedly) film wandering all over the dividing line between exploitation and satire. The action gets going in a strip club where a hitwoman disguised as a poledancing nun is shaking her ass at a roomful of appalled gangsters. These guys have all been raised as good Catholic boys and the sight of a gyrating bride of Christ is not helping the spaghetti and meatballs go down. Relief, of a sort, soon arrives, when the nun pulls out an automatic weapon … Read more
Trading Paint
John Travolta won a Worst Actor Razzie for his turns in Trading Paint (aka Burning Rubber) and The Fanatic (a joy for another day) so you might expect this film to be terrible and Travolta’s acting ditto. But acting awards good and bad often go to the undeserving, which is the case here. Travolta is not bad, nor is anyone in this film, nor is the film itself. It just doesn’t have much in the way of sizzle. It’s a drama about car racing so I’m probably contractually obliged to say “low octane” at some point. That was that point. Travolta plays Sam Munroe, a guy who runs a smalltime veteran race-car outfit. … Read more
Both Sides of the Blade
Revered arthouse director Claire Denis starts Both Sides of the Blade with an almost subliminal reference to Jaws. A couple wade into the sea. The soundtrack growls ominously. But only for maybe half a second. Then it pivots spectacularly into something gooey, gentle and romantic. We see the faces of the couple. It’s Juliette Binoche and Vincent Lindon, looking ecstatically happy. They stare fondly into each other’s eyes. They touch and caress each other. They laugh. Later, in their room, they make love. Still later, back at their apartment in Paris, their holiday over, the first thing they do is make love again. But that growl. Something is lurking. We learn what it … Read more
Perfect Sense
A movie for every day of the year – a good one 1 May England and Scotland become the United Kingdom, 1707 On this day in 1707, the countries of England and Scotland officially became united in “one kingdom by the name of Great Britain” (according to the Acts of Union). By “England”, the acts included the country of Wales, which had become absorbed legally into England by the Laws in Wales Acts of 1535 and 1542. Though in terms of monarchy, the English throne had been seized by a Welshman, when Henry Tudor (later Henry VII) defeated Richard III in battle in 1485. This Tudor line persisted in England until 1603, when … Read more
Magic Trip
A movie for every day of the year – a good one 29 January Mantra Rock Dance, 1967 On this day in 1967 one of the key events of the era of psychedelic rock, and the hippie era generally, took place. It was organised by the International Society for Krishna Consciousness, who saw it as an opportunity for their founder, AC Bhaktivedanta Swami, to speak to a broader public than normal. The reason why there would be a broader public was because of the other people taking part – the bands Grateful Dead and Big Brother and the Holding Company (lead singer: Janis Joplin), Moby Grape, beat poet Allen Ginsberg, LSD guru Timothy … Read more
Cornered
“This is the new Dick Powell,” the trailer insists. “Rougher. Tougher than in Murder, My Sweet.” Cornered is indeed the “new Dick Powell”. Audiences in the late 1930s and early 1940s knew him best as a crooner. But 1944’s Murder, My Sweet changed all that, when Powell became the first screen iteration of Philip Marlowe, Raymond Chandler’s dog-eared, quippy detective. In an adaptation of Farewell, My Lovely, Powell delivered Chandler’s dialogue with great style – “She was a charming middle-aged lady with a face like a bucket of mud. I gave her a drink. She was a gal who’d take a drink, if she had to knock you down to get the bottle.” … Read more
Red, White & Royal Blue
Hands across the sea – and down each other’s trousers – in Red, White & Royal Blue, a cute love story about the son of the US president falling for a British prince. It is the old Fred Astaire/Ginger Rogers tale of two people who really don’t get on, until they suddenly do. The snobbish, standoffish Prince Henry and the loud American Alex Claremont-Diaz, who are thrown together at one protocol-heavy event after another, where they regularly irritate the hell out of each other until things come spectacularly to a head at the wedding of the prince’s older brother, when the pair of them somehow end up under the wedding cake, covered in … Read more
