Glen Powell

Anyone But You

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Glen Powell and Sydney Sweeney get up close

Since Reality Sydney Sweeney has nothing left to prove. A standout performance that didn’t rely on her usual standout performers, it was sober and pitiless and one of the best films of 2023. And now? Anyone But You, the sort of thing you might have thought she’d have left behind, a boy meets girl, loses girl, etc romcom with the 90s in its rearview, with sexy jokes, some whoops-nudity, side characters who are funny and/or supportive confidants, plus parents who push too hard or are gross-out buffoons, all the trappings really. It’s a strange Frankenstein creation welding together bits from two Australian directors. From PJ Hogan the vibe and drive of Muriel’s Wedding … Read more

Twisters

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Kate in shades sits on the roof of a chaser truck

No one was exactly clamouring for it but Twisters, the imaginatively titled sequel to Twister, turned out alright in the end anyway. The original, complete with flying cow, came out in 1996, 24 years ago. At that point the director of this sequel, Lee Isaac Chung, was a fresh faced 18 years old, star Glen Powell was eight and co-star Daisy Edgar-Jones was minus two. To the film’s credit it leaves Twister where it was, not referring back to it at all, and with no cameos to remind us when Helen Hunt and Bill Paxton were the plucky duo chasing tornadoes around the mid-West and trying to heal a broken relationship as they … Read more

Devotion

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Jonathan Majors as Jesse Brown

Three stories fight for space in Devotion. Most obviously the Korean War, which turns up so infrequently it’s almost as if film-makers have taken a vow of silence on the subject (Robert Altman’s Mash, while set in the Korean War, was really about Vietnam – and it was 50 years ago). Second up, the trials and tribulations of a black naval flyer in a largely white American fighting force after the Second World War. And third, a story of platonic love between two men. It’s a true story, about white preppy academy guy Lieutenant Tom Hudner (Glen Powell, who’s also the producer) and black up-by-his-bootstraps Ensign Jesse Brown (Jonathan Majors, so hissably good … Read more