Mark Kermode

For all its apparent structural complexities, The Father is not quite as mysterious as its creators would have us believe.

The theatrical origins of Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom weigh heavy on this film, directed with a stagey air by Tony award winner George C Wolfe.

As is customary, absurdist humour, global history and abject horror sit side by side, all equally weighted and witnessed.

Perhaps that is this frothy film’s strength: cherrypicking multiplex-friendly elements from a complex and still largely unknown life in a manner that leaves the audience wanting to know much more.

Where Spielberg and screenwriter Tony Kushner’s version comes into its own is in the moments where it dares to find its own distinct voice – nowhere more so than in placing Somewhere in the hands of Rita Moreno.

If you’re looking for a film that explains where the Spielbergian tropes you know and love came from, then The Fabelmans is for you.

Whatever its inconsistencies, The Lost King is an underdog story that proves a perfect vehicle for Hawkins’s reliably winning screen presence.

One for the buffs. [17 Feb 2008, p.3]

Time and again, scenes of back-breaking struggle end with the screen fading to black, as if the film itself is simply too tired to go on or hanging its head in empathetic shame.

While the changing moods of BlacKkKlansman seemed bold and audacious, the warring elements of Da 5 Bloods appear bolted together rather than alchemically mixed.

While the Norns-of-fate narrative may contrive several reversals of fortune and sympathy, there’s little of the genuinely uncanny weirdness that made Eggers’s first two features such a treat. What madness lies herein is not of the north-northwest variety but more in keeping with the bonkers blockbuster spectacle of Darren Aronofsky’s Noah.

The result is an A-list B-movie that juggles moments of breath-taking visual splendour with much on-the-nose speechifying about sins of the fathers and eternal isolation, spiced up with some action-packed silliness that entirely undercuts its more po-faced pretensions.

What we have instead is a succession of variously successful vignettes, only some of which hit that sweet spot between horror and humour, as we watch Arnaud’s life collapse around him.

None of which is to say that Good Luck to You, Leo Grande isn’t admirably subversive and enjoyably whimsical fare.

The film too often seems to be heading somewhere extraordinary, only to disappear into an ambitious conceptual hole that, while occasionally startling, is ultimately less than the sum of its parts.

As for Baker and regular co-writer Chris Bergoch, they refrain from judging their characters, observing the world from Mikey’s maniacally self-serving point of view even as comedy turns to queasiness and worse.

Fans will doubtless be dazzled by its meticulous imitation-of-life-in-miniature visual aesthetic, yet I swithered between whimsical amusement, mild curiosity and outright irritation.

This is a playfully sensuous affair that wonders what happens to slow-burn intimacy when mediated by the urgency of the online world.

There’s an inherent irony in any drama that places her centre stage. Yet at a time when news itself is under fire, with journalists demeaned and attacked by despots bent on obliterating the very concept of truth, perhaps Colvin’s story is more relevant than ever.

While The Duke is never quite as surprising as the case that inspired it, it nonetheless retains a much-needed astringent streak.

While the result may occasionally get bogged down by dramatic contrivance, it’s generally buoyed up by a pair of likably bickering performances from the two leads.

While the film may be flawed by some dramatic missteps, it remains buoyed by the surefootedness of Polster’s performance, which is engaging, believable, and wholly sympathetic.

In a film defined by understatement, it’s the little details that matter.

Watching this sporadically sparkling yet weirdly saggy “cover version” of Argento’s biggest international hit, I couldn’t help wishing that someone had been there with the scissors to trim the film of its indulgences – not the violence, but the verbosity.

This is Day’s show all the way, and her performance remains the film’s strongest suit.

In the lead role, Anya Taylor-Joy creates an admirably spiky character who is less likable than some of her screen predecessors, and all the better for it.

It’s a collection of grimly satirical snapshots, fitting together like the misshapen pieces of a Chinese puzzle ball to create a dyspeptic, dystopian portrait of our past, present and future.

The result is a nicely nasty tragicomedy, a rollercoaster ride that swaps real moral dilemmas for something more disposably entertaining, picking you up, spinning you around and then spitting you out with a neat sucker-punch ending that leaves you feeling entertained, if a little bit empty.