The inevitable challenge for any film sequel is to live up to the expectations raised by the original. When that sequel arrives many years after the first film, so that the original has come to be seen as a minor classic or at least a childhood favourite, the sequel’s task is that much tougher. This is one of the problems
Read moreBodies, Bodies, Bodies is an occasionally clever but mostly annoying, collision of whodunit thriller and millennial culture making it a cacophony of catchphrases and social media references occasionally interspersed by killings. The film employs the familiar set up of a group of friends – in this case mostly loud, obnoxious, twenty-something rich kids – converging on a sprawling mansion for
Read moreThe sensitive, charming but still gritty Irish film, The Quiet Girl (which is spoken almost entirely in Irish Gaelic) will no doubt prove to be a favourite for some filmgoers this year. It shows that a tearjerker can still be a credible and genuinely affecting drama. In her first film role, 12- year-old Catherine Clinch stars as Cait, the neglected
Read moreDespite being directed by the revered George Miller, containing some inspired and quite startling moments and starring two of Hollywood’s most respected actors, Tilda Swinton and Idris Elba, the oddball romantic fantasy and storytelling tribute, 3,000 Years Of Longing doesn’t entirely work. The title sounds like a Gabriel Garcia Marquez novel but George Miller and Augusta Gore wrote the film’s
Read moreThe ‘man versus nature’ horror/action film is one of the dodgier movie sub-genres. Casting an animal as a villain simply because it doesn’t welcome, or sees as food, a human who has intruded on its habitat is a little too human centric. Still, some films of this type have worked, the best example being Jaws because it reached beyond the
Read moreIranian comedy/ drama Hit the Road is a wonderfully poignant, funny, at times melancholic and unsettling film that at first seems like a familiar road trip film with echoes of Little Miss Sunshine but proves to be something more profound. The film introduces us to a distinct and very welcome new voice in writer/ director Panah Panahi, the son of
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