I have recently taken up reading more. It takes me away from scrolling on my phone, and to be honest, it has made me feel a whole lot better about myself. One of the books I read was George Orwell’s immortal Animal Farm. Written in 1945, it was an allegory of Stalinism set on a…
Tag: drama
The Invite
One of the favourite approaches to filmmaking of late is making the audience feel uncomfortable. The Drama is a perfect example, as we watched a couple heading to the altar, but a secret spins their world around. You find yourself hiding in your hands as you watch things spiral out of control. Now we have…
The Odyssey
It used to be the case that a film star’s name attached to a project would open a movie, making it a guaranteed box-office winner. Occasionally, a director would have that same effect. Christopher Nolan has become one of those directors. His films tend to open big. Not saying that they aren’t always great. For…
Disclosure Day
Steven Spielberg is, without a doubt, one of the greatest filmmakers of all time. His CV is littered with great movies, and he’s been at the top of his game ever since his debut feature, Duel, back in 1971. What gets people excited is his sci-fi films, after such monster smashes as Close Encounters of…
Tuner
It’s not that often you see a film like Tuner. A cross-genre drama that is part romance, part heist movie, with more than a whiff of 70s paranoia thriller about it. It takes a simple yet effective premise and allows both the scenario and the character development to flesh out. At the same time, it…
Backrooms
It’s not often that a major film studio would hand over a $10 million movie to a 19-year-old director fresh out of high school. Yet that is exactly what A24 have done with Backrooms, based on a YouTube series by director Kane Parsons. It seems to have paid off, as this intriguing, often uncomfortable cross-genre…
The Christophers
Given that director Steven Soderbergh announced his retirement from filmmaking in 2013, he has not worked since. In the past year, he has made four films: the creepy horror Presence, the underrated and underseen Black Bag, and, still to come, a documentary, John Lennon: The Last Interview. His latest, The Christophers, is probably his quietest…
The Devil Wears Prada 2
Some films don’t have sequels for a reason. The original works as a standalone, and it doesn’t need another film. In most cases, the sequel brings nothing to the table and thus causes a small backlash to the film that first captured everyone’s imagination. I can safely say that The Devil Wears Prada, a mid-budget…
Michael
There have been many biopics about musicians over the years. Some have worked, others haven’t. The likes of Rocketman, the story of Elton John, worked because, although it was part fantasy, it wasn’t afraid to go to the darker places in John’s life. The same can be said of Better Man, the Robbie Williams story,…
California Schemin’
James McAvoy has established himself as a reliable actor, whose credits have included The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe, Atonement and Split. Now he’s taking on his next challenge, behind the camera as director of California Schemin’, based on the incredible true story of how two Dundee lads took on the record industry. Based…
The Drama
Could film-makers please stop making anxiety-ridden, packed movies, as my nerves cannot cope anymore. With films like Marty Supreme and If I Had Legs I’d Kick You out in the world, I often leave the cinema frazzled. Now we can add The Drama to the collection. It was certainly the worst of the group, starting…
The Magic Faraway Tree
Can we say all hail, Simon Farnaby? The performer and writer who started life in Horrible Histories and went on to co-write the BBC comedy Ghosts has taken the family film and breathed no life into it. Having co-written Paddington 2 and Wonka, he has now taken a beloved series of books by Enid Blyton,…
Stu Loves Film 