Latest reviews – Page 478
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Reviews
Hukkle
Dir: Gyorgy Palfi.. Hungary. 2002. 75mins.An authentic one-off - think Microcosmos meets Twin Peaks - Hukkle starts out as a serene, naturalistic portrait of rural life. But it slowly morphs into something much more sinister, as apparently disconnected scenes gel into a murder investigation whose key events unfold in the ...
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Reviews
The Sea (Hafid)
Dir: Baltasar Kormakur. Iceland/France/Norway. 2002. 109minsThe wicked sense of humour that helped make his sprightly debut feature, Reykjavik 101, an off-the-wall delight is all but submerged in Baltasar Kormakur's follow-up, which offers an even bleaker portrait of Icelandic desperation and dysfunction. As a roiling family psychodrama, The Sea brings to ...
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Reviews
Evelyn
Dir: Bruce Beresford. US-Ire. 2002. 94 mins. Evelyn might well benefit from a worldwide roll-out in the wake of unlikely box office blockbuster My Big Fat Greek Wedding. It has the same softness of touch, dearth of dramatic conflict and ethnic cutesiness which is obviously proving reassuring and heartwarming to ...
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Reviews
Story Of A Kiss (Historia De Un Beso)
Dir: Jose Luis Garci. Spain. 2002. 105 mins.When a character, a novelist, in Jose Luis Garci's Story Of A Kiss (Historia De Un Beso) says of his art, 'I try to entertain and to move, never to persuade,' it could easily be Garci himself speaking. A romantic and meditative period ...
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Reviews
The Truth About Charlie
Dir: Jonathan Demme. US. 2002. 104minsIf Steven Soderbergh can gross $400m worldwide with a remake of Ocean's Eleven, then why can not Jonathan Demme do the same with a remake of Charade' The reason is simple: the first Ocean's Eleven is a movie which never inspired much love and Soderbergh ...
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Reviews
Darkness
Dir: Jaime Balaguero. Spain-US. 2002. 102 mins.Opening wide in Spain on Oct 11 following its world premiere at Sitges, Darkness has already broken local records for the year, with an opening weekend gross of $1.14m (E1.17m) from 275 copies. Pre-sales around the world - including to Miramax for English-language territories ...
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Reviews
28 Days Later
Dir: Danny Boyle. UK. 2002. 113minsWhen daily newspaper headlines are more frightening than anything fiction can devise, 28 Days Later may find that audiences prefer the comfort of frivolous escapism over an ambitious slice of end-of-the-world mayhem. A serious-minded, sloppily plotted homage to such 1970s fantasy genre giants ...
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Reviews
Fuehrer Ex
Dir: Winfried Bonengel. Germany. 2002. 106 mins.Winfried Bonengel has made neo-Nazis his speciality subject. The documentary Profession: Neo-Nazi (1993) was shown at 40 festivals around the world, while Fuehrer Ex , the book he wrote with former neo-Nazi militant Ingo Hasselbach, became a minor bestseller when it appeared in the ...
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Reviews
800 Bullets (800 Balas)
Dir: Alex De La Iglesia. 124mins. Spain.A spoof on the classic western, 800 Bullets (800 Balas) is one of the funniest, most original and stylistically adventurous pictures to emerge from Spain in recent memory. Perhaps heir to that other local master of invention, Pedro Almodovar, director Alex De La Iglesia's ...
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Reviews
Abandon
Dir: Stephen Gaghan. US. 2002. 99mins.The directorial debut of Oscar-winning Traffic screenwriter Stephen Gaghan, Abandon is not so much a teen thriller as a Bright Young Thing thriller - and like some of its Ivy League student characters it may be a bit too clever for its own good. US ...
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Reviews
Villa Des Roses
Director: Frank van Passel. Bel-UK-Neth-Lux. 2002. 119minsSelected as Best Feature at the recent Hollywood Film Festival and a triple nominee at the British Independent Film Awards (BIFA) later this month, Villa Des Roses is finally beginning to generate the kind of modest heat that could secure it a welcome in ...
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Reviews
The Intended
Dir: Kristian Levring. UK-Denmark. 2002. 110minsDanish expatriate Kristian Levring's follow-up to his Dogme-film The King Is Alive is a companion piece in every sense, visually, emotionally and thematically. Even if this sombre drama is more straightforward than its predecessor (it was shot using more conventional methods of film-making than the ...
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Reviews
The Nugget
Dir: Bill Bennett. Australia. 2002. 97mins.Although he is strictly one part of a sparky acting ensemble, Eric Bana shoulders the above-the-title promotional weight for The Nugget, a pleasantly folksy Australian comedy. After his huge arthouse success as Chopper, his macho lead in Black Hawk Down - and before his coming ...
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Reviews
City Of Ghosts
Dir: Matt Dillon. US. 2002. 116 minsA redundant throwback to the foreign climes, B-move thriller cliches of the 1950s, City Of Ghosts marks a competent but entirely conventional directorial debut from actor Matt Dillon. Fifty years ago, this might have served as a Robert Mitchum second feature with a sultry ...
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Reviews
White Oleander
Dir: Peter Kosminsky. US. 2002. 109 minsThe term 'chick-flick' has been rightfully criticised for denigrating women-orientated pictures since it implies an off-putting touchy-feeliness and some sugar-coated sentiment. But in the case of White Oleander, a florid melodrama about a teenage girl's journey of painful self-discovery as she is bounced from ...
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Reviews
Swept Away
Dir: Guy Ritchie. UK-US. 2002. 89mins.Even with husband Guy Ritchie writing and directing, Swept Away turns out to be another bewilderingly off-key movie vehicle for Madonna, a misconceived and unappealing romantic comedy - based on Lina Wertmuller's 1974 Italian film Travolti da un Insolito Destino nell'Azzurro Mare d'Agosto - that ...
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Reviews
The Ring
Dir: Gore Verbinski. US. 2002. 109 mins.DreamWorks looks set for a hefty hit with The Ring, a slick, dread-laden horror movie adapted from the 1998 Japanese smash of the same name which just about delivers the chills necessary to keep people talking about it and keep it in theatres for ...
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Reviews
The Magic Box (Sandouk Ajab)
Dir: Ridha Behi. Tunisia-France. 2002. 89mins.One of the few really pleasant surprises at this year's Venice Film Festival, The Magic Box is a small but likeable Tunisian drama that recycles the Nuovo Cinema Paradiso theme without appearing derivative. It was snapped up by Norway's BV International after its out-of-competition world ...
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Reviews
Bollywood / Hollywood
Dir: Deepa Mehta. Canada. 2002. 103mins.Canada-based Indian emigre Deepa Mehta lets her exuberant affection for her home country's film conventions run wild in Bollywood/Hollywood. A bloated comedy which awkwardly attempts a blend of the two cultures against a dreary Toronto setting, the film suffers in comparison to Mira Nair's 2001 ...