Archive for the ‘tragedy’ Category

‘I swear, if you existed, I’d divorce you!’

I was lucky enough, during my university days, to have the chance to act in my class’s adaptation of Edward Albee’s theatrical journey into the heart of emotional and marital anguish; I played George (Richard Burton in the film), the long-suffering husband of Martha (Elizabeth Taylor), who’s the daughter of the president of the American university where George works as an assistant history professor.

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See worthy, but not a classic

Well I remember my intitial reaction to James Cameron’s sweep-all-before-it 11 Oscar winner in 1998 – my film critic career was still in its infancy then and, like seemingly most of the civilized world (it was the most succesful film ever until Cameron’s Avatar (2009)) overtook it recently, though thankfully not with Academy Awards), I was blown away by the scale, sweep and power of a film that, as far as I knew, was an accurate account of the sinking of HMS Titanic, a story of human folly and arrogance, and the thousands of souls who paid the ultimate price.

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The drugs don’t work

I am almost afraid to review this movie. Director Darren Aranofsky (Pi (1998), The Wrestler (2008)), working with Hubert Selby Jr., adapts Selby Jr.’s own novel into one of the most nightmarish descents into personal hell ever committed to film.

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Watch and learn

The full and rather clumsy title of Lee Daniels’ movie is Precious: Based on the Novel Push by Sapphire. Quite why Sapphire is name-checked, I have no idea, unless it was a contractual obligation. Rather like all the tunes in the charts where we get Boring Song by Nobody-I-Know featuring Some-Other-Nobody. It’s just irritating. This, however, is the one single fault I can find with this quite astonishing piece of cinema.

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Kane scrutiny: Still able?

An attempt to stand on the shoulders of giants – a look at Orson Welles’s Citizen Kane (1941), which is enjoying a return to UK cinemas.

Here there be tygers – how to proceed with a ‘review’ of a film that has topped critics’ Top Ten lists virtually since its release, thus making a serious play for the honour of ‘Best Film Ever’?

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An offer you still can’t refuse…

It’s ‘re-release city’ in the UK at the moment – Francis Ford Coppola’s seminal The Godfather (1972), an adaptation of Mario Puzo’s novel, has also returned to big screens in recent weeks.

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The nature of evil

It’s rare, for me, to find a film that very nearly defies my capacity to describe it – and that’s not meant to be a self-aggrandising statement on my skills as a film reviewer, even if it sounds like it.

I have loved film since I was very small, and feel very lucky to have the opportunity to write about it for a living, which is why I hope you will believe me when I say that, should you take the risk (and believe me, that’s what it is) of seeing Lars von Trier’s Antichrist (2009) for yourself, as opposed to merely reading hyperbolic reviews such as this one, you will leave safe in the knowledge that you will NEVER see its like again.

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Secrets and lies

In what was, quite remarkably, German writer-director Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck’s first feature, we are taken inside the dark heart of East Germany in the mid-1980s. Communism still rules with an iron grip, the fall of the Berlin Wall is five years away, and Hauptmann Gerd Wiesler (Ulrich Mühe) is a high-flying member of the Stasi, the secret police agency of the former German Democratic Republic.

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‘I’ve been twelve for a very long time’

‘Will you be my girlfriend?’
‘Oskar, I’m not a girl.’

Vampires – they just won’t stay dead, will they? Please forgive the clumsy segue, and allow me to tell you why Tomas Alfredson’s Låt den rätte komma in (Let The Right One In) (2008) (which lifted the Golden Raven at this year’s BIFFF) is perhaps the finest film ever made about the undead.

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The eye of childhood

Following on from my thoughts on this year’s remake of The Last House on the Left (1972), namely that even a very-well made film of its kind (brutal rape followed by brutal revenge) asks certain questions of viewers as to what exactly they are seeking in terms of entertainment, I believe that a similar enquiry should always be levelled at any film that makes The Shoah (Holocaust) its central theme.

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