Incoming: Demolition
Davis (Jake Gyllenhaal), a successful investment banker, struggles after losing his wife in a tragic car crash. Despite pressure from his father in law Phil (Chris Cooper) to pull it together, Davis continues to unravel. What starts as a complaint letter to a vending machine company turns into a series of letters revealing startling personal …
Film Review: A Flickering Truth
War is always costly and the human toll is normally devastating to those countries, communities and groups involved. However, the cultural cost of conflicts is less widely reported. Terror groups, primarily daesh, al-Qaeda and Shabbab, have shown their appetite for destroying historical sites of importance and attempting to annihilate anything which doesn’t correspond to their …
Incoming: Son of Saul
Winner of the Best Foreign Language Film Oscar and Golden Globe, Son of Saul is Hungarian director László Nemes’ blistering debut feature, a courageous and unflinching reimagining of the Holocaust drama. Saul Ausländer is a member of the Sonderkommando, the Jewish prisoners forced to assist in the machinery of the Nazi concentration camps. While at …
Film Festival Preview: Derby Film Festival 2016
2016 is the third year of Derby Film Festival in its current guise. After successfully building on the impressive iD Fest and incorporating Fantastiq Film Festival into the programme, it’s a high quality and very welcoming affair which goes from strength to strenght. This year it has expanded even more – More previews, more top …
DVD Review: Mysterious Object at Noon
Apichatpong Weerasethakul is easily the most renowned director working today in Thailand’s independent cinema. Operating outside of the studio system, he’s achieved his greatest successes with Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives and Tropical Malady. However, his first feature was the little known Mysterious Object at Noon. An experimental documentary, he employs the …
Incoming: Arabian Nights: The Desolate One
The latest from Miguel Gomes (Tabu, Our Beloved Month of August) Arabian Nights (As mil e uma noites) is probably this year’s most ambitious cinematic undertaking, and the most talked about film experience of the last Cannes Film Festival. Arabian Nights uses the framing device from the original Arabian Nights of the beautiful young Scheherazade …
DVD Review: The Zero Boys
The ’80s was the decade where action films first came to the fore. Whilst Jackie Chan and Bruce Lee may have pioneered the first Asian invasion of martial arts films, it was the likes of Sly Stallone, Arnie and Chuck Norris who made the genre big business in America. Whilst The Zero Boys may be …
DVD Review: The Ninth Configuration
A quick look at William Blatty’s writing credits will give you an idea of what to expect from his first film, The Ninth Configuration. Blatty is best known for his screenplay of The Exorcist which he adapted from his novel of the same name (he also directed The Exorcist III). Again, for The Ninth Gate, …
Incoming: Bastille Day
Michael Mason is an American pickpocket living in Paris who finds himself hunted by the CIA when he steals a bag that contains more than just a wallet. Sean Briar, the field agent on the case, soon realizes that Michael is just a pawn in a much bigger game and is also his best asset …
Film Review: Kicking-Off
football fans are a peculiar lot and being rational doesn’t really go hand in hand with supporting a club. The anger, the humiliation, the indignity, the depression; anyone supporting one of the many inconsistently underperforming football clubs knows them well. Losses can be attributed to myriad factors, but it’s often forgetting to wear your lucky …