Subscribe
Home Blog Page 1170

The Runaways

Uncut
-
0

Quick to spot the potential of an all-girl metal combo, Hollywood hustler Kim Fowley nurtured The Runaways (average age 16). Taking their cues from Aerosmith and The Sweet, the five-piece injected glitter-glam with punk loco, typified by "Cherry Bomb" and "American Nights" from their '76 debut. By 77's Queens Of Noise, their loud'n'leery approach?led by Joan Jett and Cherie Currie?peaked into bratty brilliance, but was still largely dismissed Stateside. Faring better elsewhere, Live In Japan proved they could cut it in the flesh, but by that same year's Waitin' For The Night, both Currie and bassist Jackie Fox had quit. Ignored for years, they're recognised now as pivotal by rock chicks from Hole and L7 to The Donnas and Bikini Kill.

Quick to spot the potential of an all-girl metal combo, Hollywood hustler Kim Fowley nurtured The Runaways (average age 16). Taking their cues from Aerosmith and The Sweet, the five-piece injected glitter-glam with punk loco, typified by “Cherry Bomb” and “American Nights” from their ’76 debut. By 77’s Queens Of Noise, their loud’n’leery approach?led by Joan Jett and Cherie Currie?peaked into bratty brilliance, but was still largely dismissed Stateside. Faring better elsewhere, Live In Japan proved they could cut it in the flesh, but by that same year’s Waitin’ For The Night, both Currie and bassist Jackie Fox had quit. Ignored for years, they’re recognised now as pivotal by rock chicks from Hole and L7 to The Donnas and Bikini Kill.

Duke Ellington – New Orleans Suite

Uncut
-
0

The death, midway through the sessions, of legendary Ellington altoist Johnny Hodges (who wails his swan song here on "Blues For New Orleans") didn't halt this 1970 tribute to the Crescent City and its sons from being a highlight of Duke's sixth decade as a bandleader/composer. Harold Ashby (tenor) and Cootie Williams (trumpet) shine on "Thanks For The Beautiful Land Of The Delta" and "Portrait Of Louis Armstrong" respectively, while Bill Davis offers a successful organ vignette. Duke's writing was never indifferent but here he achieves something particularly fulsome, rich and swinging, even by his standards.

The death, midway through the sessions, of legendary Ellington altoist Johnny Hodges (who wails his swan song here on “Blues For New Orleans”) didn’t halt this 1970 tribute to the Crescent City and its sons from being a highlight of Duke’s sixth decade as a bandleader/composer. Harold Ashby (tenor) and Cootie Williams (trumpet) shine on “Thanks For The Beautiful Land Of The Delta” and “Portrait Of Louis Armstrong” respectively, while Bill Davis offers a successful organ vignette. Duke’s writing was never indifferent but here he achieves something particularly fulsome, rich and swinging, even by his standards.

Shack – The Fable Sessions

Uncut
-
0

Shack continue to strive for recognition beyond the converted, hence this glorified re-release of 1999's HMS Fable. This is a re-sequenced, remixed version of the original album with B-sides and outtakes from an era in which the fraternal Heads, Mick and John, came closer than ever to commercial success. But their aching psychedelia?think Love play Burt Bacharach, lyrics by Alan Bleasdale?failed to truly impact. The Fable Sessions eloquently poses the question once more: why?

Shack continue to strive for recognition beyond the converted, hence this glorified re-release of 1999’s HMS Fable. This is a re-sequenced, remixed version of the original album with B-sides and outtakes from an era in which the fraternal Heads, Mick and John, came closer than ever to commercial success. But their aching psychedelia?think Love play Burt Bacharach, lyrics by Alan Bleasdale?failed to truly impact. The Fable Sessions eloquently poses the question once more: why?

The Smithereens – Green Thoughts

Uncut
-
0
As the alt.rock scene began seeping overground in mid-'80s America, The Smithereens were almost alone in championing the beat-pop of The Kinks, Nick Lowe and Elvis Costello, and their crisp melodic punch seemed almost sedate alongside H...

As the alt.rock scene began seeping overground in mid-’80s America, The Smithereens were almost alone in championing the beat-pop of The Kinks, Nick Lowe and Elvis Costello, and their crisp melodic punch seemed almost sedate alongside H

Thelonious Monk – Criss Cross

Uncut
-
0

Today's avant-garde is tomorrow's mainstream?as was the case with Monk. When widespread success finally arrived, there was this nagging suspicion he didn't quite know how to deal with it. Columbia made much of his 'eccentricities'?the hats, etc?and the truly bizarre cover of Underground (1968) aimed him squarely at acid-rock fans into 'weird'. The acclaim may have been more, but it didn't herald a creative quantum leap. No abundance of fresh material or any noticeable new direction. Monk just carried on as before repeatedly picking over the innovative repertoire he'd previously created on Blue Note, Prestige and Riverside?always the first place to begin. But Monk wasn't the first to strip down and reconstruct his past work. Neither did he overly concern himself with recording technicalities. Often, the listener gets the feeling of eavesdropping on him working out ideas, mainly with his quartet. But for those prepared to forage, there can be moments of genuine revelation.

Today’s avant-garde is tomorrow’s mainstream?as was the case with Monk. When widespread success finally arrived, there was this nagging suspicion he didn’t quite know how to deal with it. Columbia made much of his ‘eccentricities’?the hats, etc?and the truly bizarre cover of Underground (1968) aimed him squarely at acid-rock fans into ‘weird’.

The acclaim may have been more, but it didn’t herald a creative quantum leap. No abundance of fresh material or any noticeable new direction. Monk just carried on as before repeatedly picking over the innovative repertoire he’d previously created on Blue Note, Prestige and Riverside?always the first place to begin.

But Monk wasn’t the first to strip down and reconstruct his past work. Neither did he overly concern himself with recording technicalities. Often, the listener gets the feeling of eavesdropping on him working out ideas, mainly with his quartet. But for those prepared to forage, there can be moments of genuine revelation.

Chop ‘Til You Drop

Uncut
-
0
DIRECTED BY Quentin Tarantino STARRING Uma Thurman, Lucy Liu, David Carradine, Vivica Fox, Darryl Hannah Opens October 10, Cert. 18, 120 mins Quentin Tarantino wrote the first pages of this insane film back in '94, straight after wrapping Pulp Fiction. In a nutshell, it's Fox Force Five?the TV pi...

DIRECTED BY Quentin Tarantino

STARRING Uma Thurman, Lucy Liu, David Carradine, Vivica Fox, Darryl Hannah

Opens October 10, Cert. 18, 120 mins

Quentin Tarantino wrote the first pages of this insane film back in ’94, straight after wrapping Pulp Fiction. In a nutshell, it’s Fox Force Five?the TV pilot briefly referred to by Uma Thurman’s character in that film?beefed up, stretched out and packed full of horribly bloody dismemberment. Early US viewers have been saying it’s the most violent film ever made. It’s not. But it comes close.

Tarantino hasn’t actually been working on this for nine years, of course. First came Jackie Brown, then a Lennon-style ‘lost weekend’. He was supposed to film his WWII flick Inglorious Bastards before this, but never got round to it. Even once he started Kill Bill, he put it on hold while Thurman had a baby. And, in June, Miramax cut the film in two at the last minute. So you come to this thinking he’s got something to hide. On the contrary, he’s got a lot to show off.

We open on a b/w, extreme close-up of Thurman’s gore-streaked face. It’s her wedding day, and here she is, lying on a church floor, surrounded by corpses. Her former boss, Bill (Carradine), has a gun to her head. “Bill, I’m pregnant,” she says. “It’s your baby.” He shoots her. Flash forward five years and Thurman’s ringing the doorbell of a suburban home. A woman (Fox) answers, their eyes meet, there’s a synth ‘sting’ and?whack! They launch into a bloody, glassware-smashing, furniture-breaking kung fu knife fight in the woman’s living room. Tarantino’s famous for his opening scenes, but this is so fast it snaps your head back.

If there’s one thing we could have guessed beforehand, it’s that Uma Thurman looks sexy with a blood-streaked sword in her hand. And this is very much her film. Referred to in the script only as “The Bride” (in a nod to Ronny Yu’s 1993 swordfest The Bride With White Hair), Thurman’s character is fresh out of a five-year coma and looking for revenge. It’s not clear why Bill tried to kill her, but she knows her former team-mates in the Deadly Viper Assassination Squad were involved. So she sets out to kill them, one by one, until she gets to Bill.

As far as plot goes, that’s it: feeble compared to the twist-filled storylines of Tarantino’s previous films. But his motivation here, from the 1960s Shaw Bros logo in the film’s opening credits onwards, is to accurately recreate the Asian “grindhouse” movies he loves?including their brutally linear, vengeance-themed plotlines.

For people who only know Tarantino from the much lighter, funkier Pulp Fiction, all this Asian stuff will be a mindfuck. Almost half the film’s spoken in Japanese, and a whole 10 minutes in the middle are animated by the producers of 1995 anim

Bad Boys II

Uncut
-
0

OPENS OCTOBER 3, CERT 15, 146 MINS Jive-talkin', gun-totin', Miami-destroyin' detectives Mike Lowrey and Marcus Burnett are back laying waste to the Sunshine State eight years after their first outing made superstars of Will Smith, Martin Lawrence and director Michael Bay. This time around, the threadbare plot involves our bickering heroes taking on ecstasy dealers, having fun with drug-laden cadavers, imperilling the lives of their loved ones and ultimately, erm, invading Cuba with a crack squad of US commandos. It's all riotous, overlong pyrotechnic fun, and a welcome back-to-basics step for Bay after the simplistic repackaging of US history that was Pearl Harbor. Unfortunately, by the time the hugely improbable climax rolls around, you just can't escape the feeling that, while Bay is the undisputed master of the epic action set-piece, he just can't bear to streamline his work. Bad Boys II undoubtedly provides plenty of easy laughs and cartoon violence but two-and-a-half hours is way too long for an action flick without a script.

OPENS OCTOBER 3, CERT 15, 146 MINS

Jive-talkin’, gun-totin’, Miami-destroyin’ detectives Mike Lowrey and Marcus Burnett are back laying waste to the Sunshine State eight years after their first outing made superstars of Will Smith, Martin Lawrence and director Michael Bay. This time around, the threadbare plot involves our bickering heroes taking on ecstasy dealers, having fun with drug-laden cadavers, imperilling the lives of their loved ones and ultimately, erm, invading Cuba with a crack squad of US commandos.

It’s all riotous, overlong pyrotechnic fun, and a welcome back-to-basics step for Bay after the simplistic repackaging of US history that was Pearl Harbor. Unfortunately, by the time the hugely improbable climax rolls around, you just can’t escape the feeling that, while Bay is the undisputed master of the epic action set-piece, he just can’t bear to streamline his work.

Bad Boys II undoubtedly provides plenty of easy laughs and cartoon violence but two-and-a-half hours is way too long for an action flick without a script.

Ten Minutes Older: The Trumpet

Uncut
-
0
OPENS OCTOBER 3, CERT 12, 88 MINS Jim Jarmusch recently told Uncut that when British producer Nick McClintock approached him for a 10-minute short on "something to do with the nature of time", he replied, "Vague enough? I like it." So, evidently, did names like Spike Lee, Wim Wenders, Aki Kaurismak...

OPENS OCTOBER 3, CERT 12, 88 MINS

Jim Jarmusch recently told Uncut that when British producer Nick McClintock approached him for a 10-minute short on “something to do with the nature of time”, he replied, “Vague enough? I like it.” So, evidently, did names like Spike Lee, Wim Wenders, Aki Kaurismaki, Werner Herzog and Chen Kaige, who feature here with wildly diverse offerings. There’ll be a second, from equally well-known directors, in December.

Kaurismaki kicks off with a deadpan tale of late-in-life love; Herzog hustles up a documentary on a rainforest tribe who first encountered ‘civilisation’ in 1981, with tragic repercussions. Jarmusch films an actress, Chlo

Spellbound

Uncut
-
0

OPENS OCTOBER 10, CERT U, 97 MINS If there is a crueller, more inhumane thing to do to a child than to enter them into America's National Spelling Bee competition, then making a film about their ordeal would probably be up there. Fortunately, Jeff Blitz and co-producer/sound recordist Sean Welch approached their subject with exactly the right tone. While no attempt is made to play down the inherent oddness of the kids who, out of the nine million contestants, make it to the final, they are treated with affection and dignity. The parents are a different matter, basking like sharks in reflected glory and pressuring their kids with the dead-eyed ambition of the worst kind of stage-mothers. The film-makers have been careful to recruit children from diverse backgrounds?this is, after all, a film about the American dream and the immigrant work ethic. As the competition heats up, and the subjects of the documentary are picked off one by one, failing to spell words like 'hellebore' and 'logorrhoea', the tension is almost unbearable. A fantastic little film.

OPENS OCTOBER 10, CERT U, 97 MINS

If there is a crueller, more inhumane thing to do to a child than to enter them into America’s National Spelling Bee competition, then making a film about their ordeal would probably be up there. Fortunately, Jeff Blitz and co-producer/sound recordist Sean Welch approached their subject with exactly the right tone. While no attempt is made to play down the inherent oddness of the kids who, out of the nine million contestants, make it to the final, they are treated with affection and dignity. The parents are a different matter, basking like sharks in reflected glory and pressuring their kids with the dead-eyed ambition of the worst kind of stage-mothers.

The film-makers have been careful to recruit children from diverse backgrounds?this is, after all, a film about the American dream and the immigrant work ethic. As the competition heats up, and the subjects of the documentary are picked off one by one, failing to spell words like ‘hellebore’ and ‘logorrhoea’, the tension is almost unbearable. A fantastic little film.

Barely Legal

Uncut
-
0
DIRECTED BY Joel Coen STARRING George Clooney, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Geoffrey Rush, Billy Bob Thornton Opens October 24, Cert 12A, 95 mins Back to score some of the winning chemistry that fuelled O Brother, Where Are Thou?, Clooney and the Coens once again draw on the golden-age screwball comedie...

DIRECTED BY Joel Coen

STARRING George Clooney, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Geoffrey Rush, Billy Bob Thornton

Opens October 24, Cert 12A, 95 mins

Back to score some of the winning chemistry that fuelled O Brother, Where Are Thou?, Clooney and the Coens once again draw on the golden-age screwball comedies of Preston Sturges and Frank Capra with Intolerable Cruelty. But the ghost of Billy Wilder hovers closer still in this cheerfully cynical, fast-talking farce.

Nodding to his O Brother… role, Clooney can barely contain his lip-smacking relish as Miles Massey, a preening legend of a Beverly Hills divorce lawyer with an unorthodox courtroom manner. Dissatisfied with his own evil genius for legal embezzlement, Massey sees possible salvation in the bodacious form of Marylin Rexroth, the ex-wife of one of his clients. Lustily embodied by Zeta-Jones with a Cristal-swigging swagger, Posh Spice hair and mid-Atlantic Welsh vowels wielded like pitchforks, Rexroth is a vampish serial divorc

Cabin Fever

Uncut
-
0
DIRECTED BY Eli Roth STARRING Jordan Ladd, Rider Strong, James DeBello, Cerina Vincent Opens October 10, Cert 15, 90 mins David Lynch prot...

DIRECTED BY Eli Roth

STARRING Jordan Ladd, Rider Strong, James DeBello, Cerina Vincent

Opens October 10, Cert 15, 90 mins

David Lynch prot

The League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen

Uncut
-
0

OPENS OCTOBER 17, CERT 12A, 110 MINS Comic fans are mauling this adaptation of Alan Moore and Kevin O'Neill's Victorian-literary superhero strip. Yes, the erudition of the original has been gutted and replaced by big punch-ups. But that works fine for a popcorn romp like this. Rather than try to turn the comic into a film, Blade director Stephen Norrington has let the film become a comic:big on visuals, short on plot. In a beautifully-rendered gas-lit London, the heroes of Victorian pulp fiction?Allan Quatermain (Sean Connery), Dorian Gray (Stuart Townsend), Dr Jekyll (Jason Flemyng), Captain Nemo, Mina Harker, the Invisible Man and Tom Sawyer?are gathered to combat a mysterious foe who's attempting to start a world war. True, the action leaps nonsensically from London, via Nemo's ship the Nautilus, to Venice and finally Mongolia, but it's no less fun than your average Bond film. In fact, this works well as a madcap, though muddled, 1860s take on the good old British spy flick.

OPENS OCTOBER 17, CERT 12A, 110 MINS

Comic fans are mauling this adaptation of Alan Moore and Kevin O’Neill’s Victorian-literary superhero strip. Yes, the erudition of the original has been gutted and replaced by big punch-ups. But that works fine for a popcorn romp like this. Rather than try to turn the comic into a film, Blade director Stephen Norrington has let the film become a comic:big on visuals, short on plot.

In a beautifully-rendered gas-lit London, the heroes of Victorian pulp fiction?Allan Quatermain (Sean Connery), Dorian Gray (Stuart Townsend), Dr Jekyll (Jason Flemyng), Captain Nemo, Mina Harker, the Invisible Man and Tom Sawyer?are gathered to combat a mysterious foe who’s attempting to start a world war. True, the action leaps nonsensically from London, via Nemo’s ship the Nautilus, to Venice and finally Mongolia, but it’s no less fun than your average Bond film. In fact, this works well as a madcap, though muddled, 1860s take on the good old British spy flick.

Bollywood Queen

Uncut
-
0

OPENS OCTOBER 17, CERT PG, 90 MINS Co-written by former NME editor and occasional Uncut contributor Neil Spencer, this stars James McAvoy (TV's State Of Play) as a lad up from the West Country to join his brother in the rag trade. There he runs into Geena, whose family run a rival garment factory. Head filled with notions of destiny and Bollywood romance, she falls for Jay, much to the disgust of her family, who attempt to coerce her into resuming her relationship with flash but dull Dilip. Intimations of Romeo And Juliet abound as Jay and Geena persist in seeing each other, breaking into song at moments of high emotion and drama, with events coming to a head at an Indian wedding. Though often nicely observed, Bollywood Queen is let down by flat acting and some stilted dialogue which gives it the feel of a mid-'80s EastEnders episode dealing with the Asian Question. But the musical interludes are a clever conceit and work surprisingly well. Tentative as it is, Bollywood Queen may be looked on as an early milestone in British-Asian cinema.

OPENS OCTOBER 17, CERT PG, 90 MINS

Co-written by former NME editor and occasional Uncut contributor Neil Spencer, this stars James McAvoy (TV’s State Of Play) as a lad up from the West Country to join his brother in the rag trade. There he runs into Geena, whose family run a rival garment factory. Head filled with notions of destiny and Bollywood romance, she falls for Jay, much to the disgust of her family, who attempt to coerce her into resuming her relationship with flash but dull Dilip. Intimations of Romeo And Juliet abound as Jay and Geena persist in seeing each other, breaking into song at moments of high emotion and drama, with events coming to a head at an Indian wedding.

Though often nicely observed, Bollywood Queen is let down by flat acting and some stilted dialogue which gives it the feel of a mid-’80s EastEnders episode dealing with the Asian Question. But the musical interludes are a clever conceit and work surprisingly well. Tentative as it is, Bollywood Queen may be looked on as an early milestone in British-Asian cinema.

In The Cut

Uncut
-
0
OPENS OCTOBER 31, CERT 18, 115 MINS The new campion is halfway between typical Campion and psycho-killer thriller. That's not a put-down:she finds a hypnotic, narcotic new space between genres, and relishes casting the female gaze on the usual New York mean street clich...

OPENS OCTOBER 31, CERT 18, 115 MINS

The new campion is halfway between typical Campion and psycho-killer thriller. That’s not a put-down:she finds a hypnotic, narcotic new space between genres, and relishes casting the female gaze on the usual New York mean street clich

XX – XY

Uncut
-
0
OPENS OCTOBER 24, CERT 15, 91 MINS A frank, impressive relationships drama, taking as its role models '70s titans like Carnal Knowledge, writer/director Austin Chick's debut was a jury favourite at Sundance. We'll hear more of him. Just as Neil Labute appears to have gone soft, Chick wants to probe...

OPENS OCTOBER 24, CERT 15, 91 MINS

A frank, impressive relationships drama, taking as its role models ’70s titans like Carnal Knowledge, writer/director Austin Chick’s debut was a jury favourite at Sundance. We’ll hear more of him. Just as Neil Labute appears to have gone soft, Chick wants to probe into the dark, mysterious crevasses of sex and love. A tremendous cast bravely take the journey with him.

In a Manhattan college in the early ’90s, bad boy Coles (Mark Ruffalo, also seen in this month’s In The Cut) meets Sam (Maya Stange) and Thea (Kathleen Robertson). They party, but a threesome proves awkward. Coles and Sam become a couple, but the reckless Thea, and young lust, upset the equation. We fast-forward a decade, and Coles is married, frustrated. Sam comes back into his life. Coles can’t help but want her: but is it her he craves, or what she symbolises to him?irresponsibility, freedom? His wife, no fool, is the story’s heroine.

As shorn of clich

Waiting For Happiness

Uncut
-
0

OPENS OCTOBER 24, CERT U, 95 MINS Waiting For Happiness is set in a coastal village in the west African state of Mauritania. Nothing much happens here. We're introduced to various characters, all of whom seem lost in thought, or lulled half to sleep by the sound of the nearby ocean. A teenage lad spends his day smoking cigarettes in his bedroom; an old handyman and his young apprentice take an eternity to change a lightbulb; a young woman recalls her French lover, who abandoned her years back. Slowly we realise the village is a final departure point for Africans hoping to emigrate illegally to Europe, most of its inhabitants biding time before making the dangerous crossing. And what begins as a curiously reticent study of village life turns into a subtle reflection on belonging and exile, underpinned by a dreamy melancholy. Short on dramatic incident, Waiting For Happiness frequently tests your patience, and the symbolism is often overbaked. But the performances keep things fresh, and the atmosphere is as vivid as a hot desert breeze. Slow but assured film-making.

OPENS OCTOBER 24, CERT U, 95 MINS

Waiting For Happiness is set in a coastal village in the west African state of Mauritania. Nothing much happens here. We’re introduced to various characters, all of whom seem lost in thought, or lulled half to sleep by the sound of the nearby ocean. A teenage lad spends his day smoking cigarettes in his bedroom; an old handyman and his young apprentice take an eternity to change a lightbulb; a young woman recalls her French lover, who abandoned her years back.

Slowly we realise the village is a final departure point for Africans hoping to emigrate illegally to Europe, most of its inhabitants biding time before making the dangerous crossing. And what begins as a curiously reticent study of village life turns into a subtle reflection on belonging and exile, underpinned by a dreamy melancholy.

Short on dramatic incident, Waiting For Happiness frequently tests your patience, and the symbolism is often overbaked. But the performances keep things fresh, and the atmosphere is as vivid as a hot desert breeze. Slow but assured film-making.

Bright Young Things

Uncut
-
0

OPENS OCTOBER 3, CERT 15, 104 MINS Set in a brilliantly vacuous world of cocaine-sniffing 'celebrities' sustained by a media that subsists on junk gossip, the contemporary relevance of writer/director Stephen Fry's Bright Young Things hits you squarely on the head like a carelessly-tossed champagne bottle. Based on Waugh's second novel, Fry's directorial debut follows a gaggle of idle rich gadabouts with a predilection for fast jazz, gramophone records and "naughty salt". At the centre of the whirl is writer Adam (Stephen Campbell Moore), a vapid cipher like all Waugh's main characters, haplessly trying to raise enough money to marry Nina (Emily Mortimer). Self-destruction and self-examination follow all this licentious hedonism but Fry handles the gear-shifts ably, while his ear for Waugh's brilliant dialogue is impeccable. Cameos from Simon Callow, Peter O'Toole and Dan Aykroyd (as a US newspaper mogul contemptuous of the chinless lackeys he employs) help make for a film that is at times fabulously funny and entertaining.

OPENS OCTOBER 3, CERT 15, 104 MINS

Set in a brilliantly vacuous world of cocaine-sniffing ‘celebrities’ sustained by a media that subsists on junk gossip, the contemporary relevance of writer/director Stephen Fry’s Bright Young Things hits you squarely on the head like a carelessly-tossed champagne bottle.

Based on Waugh’s second novel, Fry’s directorial debut follows a gaggle of idle rich gadabouts with a predilection for fast jazz, gramophone records and “naughty salt”. At the centre of the whirl is writer Adam (Stephen Campbell Moore), a vapid cipher like all Waugh’s main characters, haplessly trying to raise enough money to marry Nina (Emily Mortimer).

Self-destruction and self-examination follow all this licentious hedonism but Fry handles the gear-shifts ably, while his ear for Waugh’s brilliant dialogue is impeccable. Cameos from Simon Callow, Peter O’Toole and Dan Aykroyd (as a US newspaper mogul contemptuous of the chinless lackeys he employs) help make for a film that is at times fabulously funny and entertaining.

The Cremaster Cycle

Uncut
-
0
OPENS OCTOBER 17, CERT TBC, VARIOUS MINS Boldly straddling the chasm between obscure gallery installation and provocative arthouse epic, The Cremaster Cycle, made by Bj...

OPENS OCTOBER 17, CERT TBC, VARIOUS MINS

Boldly straddling the chasm between obscure gallery installation and provocative arthouse epic, The Cremaster Cycle, made by Bj

Time Of The Wolf

Uncut
-
0
OPENS OCTOBER 17, CERT 15, 113 MINS Austrian auteur Michael Haneke is known for broaching taboos and shattering barriers, but the only thing this indulgent bore will demolish is your patience. In successes like Funny Games and The Piano Teacher (Isabelle Huppert again stars here), he juggled narrat...

OPENS OCTOBER 17, CERT 15, 113 MINS

Austrian auteur Michael Haneke is known for broaching taboos and shattering barriers, but the only thing this indulgent bore will demolish is your patience. In successes like Funny Games and The Piano Teacher (Isabelle Huppert again stars here), he juggled narrative conventions, forcing us to question our tastes for cinematic sex and violence. Here he drowns us in his ‘visionary’ ego and asks if we can stay awake.

The premise is fascinating, the execution flat. The apocalypse has happened, and people scrap in the dark for food. Wanton violence abounds: in a startling opening, Huppert’s husband is killed by strangers. From then on, she struggles to protect her kids, looking for shelter and safety. The film’s shot in near darkness; you’re literally straining to see what’s going on. Not much is.

When she meets other survivors (B

Cuban Reels

Uncut
-
0

DIRECTED BY Oliver Stone STARRING Fidel Castro, Oliver Stone Opens October 10, Cert 15, 99 mins Perhaps it was inevitable that Oliver Stone would one day make a movie about Fidel Castro. The turbulence of 1960s America has been Stone's great theme, and America's obsession with the tiny communist state floating in its backyard is one of the key motifs of that era; Fidel himself has been a recurring phantom presence in Stone's work since his script for Scarface, and practically plays cameos in Salvador, Nixon, and, particularly, JFK. Stone's documentary, filmed with extraordinary access to Castro over three days in Havana in 2002, is his most controversial film since his dazzling dissection of the Kennedy assassination, and for similar reasons. Stone once said that, whether or not JFK uncovered 'the truth', he hoped it would come to be seen as an alternative myth to the official version presented by the Warren Commission. His portrait of Castro has been criticised as soft and one-sided, and it's true Stone is content to let Castro off surprisingly lightly over issues such as Cuba's civil rights record. But, at the very least, his film is of tremendous importance in directly challenging the caricature of Bearded Commie Monster propagated by the American establishment. For here, in this astonishingly intimate film?less documentary than document, recording a long, relaxed, frequently funny conversation between film-maker and subject?we have Castro as a man, a human being. The cameras seem captivated by the 76-year-old's soulful eyes, sculpted face and extraordinary poet's hands (not to mention iconic green battle fatigues and unexpected Nike trainers). Castro waxes lyrical on the revolution, Cuba's ongoing social experiment, and what will become of it after he is gone, as well as such disparate subjects as shaving, Viagra, guns, women and age. He even expresses his regret at never having seen Titanic on the big screen. With post-9/11 America entering a period Norman Mailer described as "pre-fascist", this flawed but fascinating work reasserts Stone's importance as Hollywood's most tenacious iconoclast. Paradoxically, however, the clearest indication of how valuable his film is might be that, at the time of writing, Comandante?originally commissioned by the HBO channel to be broadcast in May?has yet to be screened in the States.

DIRECTED BY Oliver Stone

STARRING Fidel Castro, Oliver Stone

Opens October 10, Cert 15, 99 mins

Perhaps it was inevitable that Oliver Stone would one day make a movie about Fidel Castro. The turbulence of 1960s America has been Stone’s great theme, and America’s obsession with the tiny communist state floating in its backyard is one of the key motifs of that era; Fidel himself has been a recurring phantom presence in Stone’s work since his script for Scarface, and practically plays cameos in Salvador, Nixon, and, particularly, JFK.

Stone’s documentary, filmed with extraordinary access to Castro over three days in Havana in 2002, is his most controversial film since his dazzling dissection of the Kennedy assassination, and for similar reasons. Stone once said that, whether or not JFK uncovered ‘the truth’, he hoped it would come to be seen as an alternative myth to the official version presented by the Warren Commission. His portrait of Castro has been criticised as soft and one-sided, and it’s true Stone is content to let Castro off surprisingly lightly over issues such as Cuba’s civil rights record. But, at the very least, his film is of tremendous importance in directly challenging the caricature of Bearded Commie Monster propagated by the American establishment.

For here, in this astonishingly intimate film?less documentary than document, recording a long, relaxed, frequently funny conversation between film-maker and subject?we have Castro as a man, a human being. The cameras seem captivated by the 76-year-old’s soulful eyes, sculpted face and extraordinary poet’s hands (not to mention iconic green battle fatigues and unexpected Nike trainers). Castro waxes lyrical on the revolution, Cuba’s ongoing social experiment, and what will become of it after he is gone, as well as such disparate subjects as shaving, Viagra, guns, women and age. He even expresses his regret at never having seen Titanic on the big screen.

With post-9/11 America entering a period Norman Mailer described as “pre-fascist”, this flawed but fascinating work reasserts Stone’s importance as Hollywood’s most tenacious iconoclast. Paradoxically, however, the clearest indication of how valuable his film is might be that, at the time of writing, Comandante?originally commissioned by the HBO channel to be broadcast in May?has yet to be screened in the States.

1...1,1691,1701,171...1,272Page 1,170 of 1,272

SHOP UNCUT