With its contemporary catchphrase title, Spoiler Alert sounds like it should be a snarky teen comedy. Instead, this romantic comedy/drama ,which is based on memoir of the same name by Michael Ausiello, is a sensitive, at times very moving but also tonally erratic film about the impermanence of life and the short time we have with one another. Jim Parsons,
Read moreExactly what writer/ director Damien Chazelle was trying to say with his latest film, Babylon, a wild sprawling, occasionally funny, often ridiculous, exhaustingly manic, yet emotionally hollow homage/satire/savaging of early Hollywood is not entirely clear. It’s as if he’s poured all his memories of film making and watching into a blender, mixed them with lurid fantasies of Hollywood’s debauched underbelly
Read moreThe Banshees Of Inisherin, the latest film from In Bruges and Three Billboards writer/director Martin McDonagh, is a beautifully shot, wonderfully acted, very quirky, if slightly uneven tragi-comedy that sits somewhere between folk tale, shaggy dog story and revenge fable. The leads from In Bruges, Colin Farrell and Brendan Gleeson, play two locals, Padraic and Colm, living on the fictional
Read moreArmageddon Time, which was the opening night feature at this year’s Jewish Film Festival, is a wonderfully poignant rites of passage drama based on the experiences of its writer/ director James Gray. (Michael) Banks Repeta plays a slightly fictionalised version of Gray named Paul Graff, a decent but precocious and trouble-prone 12-year-old living in Queens, New York in 1980. A
Read moreGiven its intriguing premise and the quality of production director Olivia Wilde brings to the film, it’s unfortunate that the ambitious psychological thriller Don’t Worry Darling doesn’t quite deliver on its promise as a mystery thriller or as social commentary. Set in the 1950’s, the film sees young married couple Alice (Florence Pugh) and Jack (Harry Styles) living in the
Read moreSome might have deduced from the movie poster – which features individual shots of the large, sharply dressed ensemble cast – that quirky murder mystery comedy, See How They Run is a homage to Agatha Christie’s whodunnits. This very likeable, if slightly tepid film is actually based around Christie’s phenomenally long-running play The Mousetrap. Set in London in 1953, the
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