This charming little movie doesn’t reinvent the wheel, but it does do three things. It makes the case that Haley Bennett is one of our most overlooked movie stars, it introduces Austrian actor Elyas M’Barek to English-speaking audiences, and it tells a serious story of unsupported female ambition with a …
Dominga Sotomayor is one of the biggest names of the new generation of the Chilean cinema. Alongside Pablo Larraín and Sebastian Lelio, her films achieved the international recognition and received attention for their boldness. Her debut feature, De Jueves a Domingo, premiered at the International Film Festival Rotterdam. Her most …
There are five reasons why Molly vs THE MACHINES should never have been made. It makes significant use of generative AI, from having AI voiceovers read the narration to AI images illustrating various points. This appears to have been done as a budget saving. Molly Russell, the 14-year-old named in …
“Cozy murder” is a thing because it’s an easy way for our society to reassure itself that justice will be done. What’s more, we all fear the reaper, and working out how to manage our inevitable end is one of the most important things we do, individually and collectively. This …
Welcome back to 1980s Rutshire where a small community of upper-class folk spend their lives sleeping with people who are not their wives, trying to steal the jobs of their romantic rivals and generally tear each other down. Based on characters created by the late Jilly Cooper, the gang are …
The first The Devil Wears Prada, based on a novel published in 2003, was released in 2006. It was the usual coming of age story in what remains a very unusual context for women: the world of work. An aspiring journalist named Andy (Anne Hathaway) became the second assistant to …
Earth has a problem: the light from the sun is fading thanks to an alien microorganism Ryland Grace has dubbed “Astrophage”. The world’s best scientists estimate that Earth has about 30 years before true devastation, but not all hope is lost. The world has come together to create a spaceship …
When the world is a smorgasbord of tastes and sensations you can’t blame someone for wanting to sample it all, but at a certain point you’ve got to admit you know what you prefer. The gimmick of the novel Allegro Pastell is a very good one: it’s the text and …
Documentary filmmaking also works as a personal chamber for filmmakers to pour their hearts into films. Throughout the diary or poetic non-fiction, the directors can discuss their personal lives, the formality of cinema, and themes they are passionate about. It is a chance to unveil themselves and the world surrounding …
The central couple at the heart of this complex Pakistani movie have known each other from around the village since childhood. They are thrown together because everyone else considers them damaged goods. The way they deal with their damage, separately and together, enables an unusual depiction of the power struggles …
After the movie is over but before the credits there is some explanatory text that makes Sukkwan Island aka My Father’s Island very difficult to review. For one thing, discussing them spoils the entire concept of the film. For another, it blurs the line between fiction and real life in …
Effi (Leisa Gwenllian) is a person and Blaenau Ffestiniog is the name of the village where she lives. In Welsh – everyone’s first language in this wonderful little film – the title therefore means “Effi from Blaenau.” (It’s pronounced Blay-nah.) It is an adaption of a one-woman play by Gary …
Who’d be young? With your whole life ahead of you and no sense of who you’re truly are, you live in anticipation of a brilliant future that will obviously come to pass somehow. On the other hand, who’d be old? Either you had your chance and it didn’t work out, …
Based on James McBride’s award-winning novel, the 2020 Showtime miniseries The Good Lord Bird takes an uproariously irreverent approach to some of the most tumultuous times in United States history – namely, militant abolitionist John Brown and his 1859 raid on the US military armoury at Harper’s Ferry, events that …
It has taken decades, but Patricia Cornwell’s iconic literary character, Dr. Kay Scarpetta, has finally been brought to life. Nicole Kidman takes on the role of the unrelenting chief medical examiner trying to prove that the case that made her career wasn’t based on misinformation. Scarpetta is more than your …
The first series in a name chronology series from super-producer Ryan Murphy follows the tragic romance of JFK’s son, John F Kennedy, and publicist Carolyn Bessette. Based on Elizabeth Beller’s book Once Upon a Time: The Captivating Life of Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy, the limited series charts the couple’s whirlwind romance, marriage …
This Chilean-Argentinian coproduction is a Chilean story but was filmed in Argentina for reasons its subject matter makes obvious. The military coup in Chile in 1973 that started with the murder of Salvador Allende brought about (speaking with understatement here) such a traumatic time to the nation that the after-effects …
Talk about melodrama! It is not so much that this adaption of Wuthering Heights goes to eleven, but that this version of Wuthering Heights starts at eleven and keeps going and going, and going, without losing its momentum for a moment. This over-the-top depiction of secret and dangerous passion makes …
2025 has been a strong year of Stephen King adaptations. These include It: Welcome to Derry, The Running Man, and The Life of Chuck. One of the darkest would have to go to the adaptation of his story The Long Walk directed by Francis Lawrence (The Hunger Games franchise). Set …
The representation of queerness in the past decade on TV has found itself on an uptick. Shows like Heartstopper, Queer Eye, Modern Family, and Schitt’s Creek have led the charge in normalising the existence of queer people on television, and therefore in life. Despite the challenges the queer characters face …