Rose Glass' directorial debut is an entertaining horror film but an oddly familiar one. It is distributed by A24 in the US, which is hardly surprising as it exhibits what has become the A24 horror aesthetic (think of films like The Witch, Hereditary and It Comes at Night): stylish visuals, uneasy camera work and an … Continue reading Saint Maud (Review)
Thanks to Curzon, Bong Joon-ho's debut feature film (first released in 2000) is now available to watch in the United Kingdom for the first time. Arriving hot on the heels of a deserved Oscar win for Parasite - and the re-issue of Memories of Murder (director Bong's first masterpiece) - British Bong completists have a … Continue reading Barking Dogs Never Bite (Review)
After years in developmental limbo, The New Mutants finally exists. However, this latest release in the increasingly troubled X-Men franchise exists in a deeply unengaging and often incomprehensible state. After an infamously difficult production cycle for this film, with frequent delays and reshoots, it's perhaps commendable that this film even exists at all - however, … Continue reading The New Mutants (Review)
Christopher Nolan's latest blockbuster comes with the promise of saving cinema: an unparalleled, thought provoking spectacle that will bring back the masses (safely, of course). Few films could bear this burden and, unfortunately, to repurpose a cliché actually used in Tenet (more on the clunky dialogue later) the film arrives not with a bang but … Continue reading Tenet (Review)
Though already an interesting filmmaker, Never Rarely Sometimes Always (NRSA) establishes Eliza Hittman as one of the most impressive writer/directors in the business, and as a unique voice making important films. On a narrative level, this is the tale of an under-18 girl from rural Pennsylvania (Autumn (Sidney Flanigan)) who, after an unexpected pregnancy, has … Continue reading Never Rarely Sometimes Always (Review)
Composer Jóhann Jóhannsson's debut - and sadly final - film is a fascinating thing. It exists on the installation art side of cinema and is composed of beautiful (primarily) black and white shots of abstract architecture (and other landscapes) that are accompanied by narration from Tilda Swinton. The footage is of real things but the … Continue reading Last and First Men (Review)
Off-putting name aside, Dogs Don't Wear Pants (DDWP) is a really impressive movie full of excellent decisions. It is a film of real style - and of some substance - that manages to cleverly negotiate disparate tones while always feeling cohesive. From the beginning, DDWP involves a number of tropes that are often off-putting, or … Continue reading Dogs Don’t Wear Pants (Review)
Naming a film about domestic life, in which a young couple 'move in' (more on that later) to a new home, after an observed enclosure gives you a strong indication of the ideas the film is going to push. Vivarium is a film that, ultimately, hides a very predictable and drawn out narrative behind a … Continue reading Vivarium (Review)
As a love letter to Eurovision in a Eurovisionless year, Fire Saga is a success. As a film, or as anything else - bar a vehicle for Dan Stevens to be mesmerising, it is a resounding failure. This overlong and deeply unfunny film has a number of fake Eurovision sequences that feel like real Eurovision … Continue reading Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga (Review)
Despite having a long history in both narrative and documentary cinema, in his later career Herzog has become more synonymous with the second. This is probably because, outside of some notable exceptions (some of which are debatable), Herzog's documentary output has been of a much higher quality than his narrative features for some time. Sadly, … Continue reading Family Romance, LLC (Review)
Assorted Opinions 