Latest reviews – Page 483
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Reviews
Halloween: Resurrection
Dir: Rick Rosenthal. US. 2002. 89minsNumber eight in the series of Halloween horror movies is so bad it could be Scary Movie 3. It's so bad, in fact, that there might be a big enough teen audience looking for cheap thrills and unintentional laughs as to make it a hit. ...
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Reviews
Euro Pudding (L'Auberge Espagnole)
Dir. Cedric Klapisch. France-Spain. 115mins.The latest ensemble piece by French director Cedric Klapisch possesses as much promise as his 1996 breakthrough number, When The Cat's Away. Warmly received in France, where it is playing on 398 screens and has registered 1.2m admissions ($6.24m) after three weeks, this featherweight comedy explores, ...
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Reviews
Reign Of Fire
Dir: Rob Bowman. US/UK/Ireland. 2002. 101mins.Despite the obvious expense lavished on the CGI-created dragons, the enjoyment of Reign Of Fire comes from its cheesy heroic values and cheerfully hammy performances by super-muscly actors Christian Bale and Matthew McConaughey. More reminiscent of old-style Ray Harryhausen movies than the post-apocalyptic epics like ...
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Reviews
The Bourne Identity
Dir: Doug Liman. US. 2002. 118 mins.One of Robert Ludlum's best-selling Cold War spy novels gets a refreshingly edgy cinema update in The Bourne Identity, an international thriller that, under the guidance of indie director Doug Liman, spins out its Hollywood genre conventions with continental flair. The film opened strongly ...
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Reviews
The Seagull's Laughter (Mavahlatur)
Dir. Agust Gudmunsson. Iceland 2001. 104 mins.The new offering from veteran Icelandic director Agust Gudmunsson initially posits itself as a post-war coming-of-age social satire. Yet this acerbic comedy soon offers up several lively portraits of women looking to assert themselves in a world very much controlled by men. Based on ...
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Reviews
Focus
Dir. Neal Slavin. US 2001 104 minutes.Based on Pulitzer Prize-wining playwright Arthur Miller's 1945 novel, Focus offers a timely, yet heavy-handed look at the paranoia, fear, and ignorance that fuels religious and racial intolerance. In light of the tragic events of September 11th and the subsequent attacks ...
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Reviews
Devdas
Dir: Sanjay Leela Bhansali. India. 2002. 181minsDevdas is a bloated banquet with minimal nutrition for the grey cells, but a few spicy morsels to tease the taste buds along the way. Expectations are riding high for the $10 million production, which opens worldwide with around 1,000 prints today (July 12) ...
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Reviews
Nowhere In Africa (Nirgendwo In Afrika)
Dir. Caroline Link. Germany. 2001. 134mins.A sprawling epic about a Jewish family sheltering in Africa just before World War Two, Nowhere In Africa is a natural crowd pleaser that has already stormed to success in Germany. Adapted from Stefanie Zweig's best-selling autobiography, the film, which is now playing on 224 ...
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Reviews
Champion
Dir: Kwak Kyung-taek. Korea. 2002. 117minsLike its hero, Kim Deuk-gu, who tried to become Korea's first boxing world supremo, Champion gives a very worthy account of itself, but ultimately fails to deliver a knock-out punch. With sumptuous looks and a determinedly physical central performance by Friend star Yoo Oh-sun, the ...
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Reviews
Year Of The Devil (Rok d'Abla)
Dir. Petr Zelenka. Czech Republic. 88mins.The opening film at this year's Karlovy Vary festival was another musical -mockumentary by Petr Zelenka, who has already scored in this genre on home ground, both with a television series (Padlock 1982-2007) and the 1996 feature Happy End (Mnaga). Inspired by a concert by ...
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Reviews
Cuckoo (Kokoshka)
Dir: Alexander Rogozhkin. Russia. 2002. 100 min.Awarded best director and best actor (Ville Haapasalo) at last week's Moscow Film Festival, where it proved an audience favourite, Alexander Rogozhkin's new film is another of his contemporary metaphors that deals with war and peace, man's instinct for survival and his need to ...
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Reviews
Chicken Heart
Dir: Hiroshi Shimizu. Japan. 2002. 105 mins.Hiroshi Shimizu is a Takashi Kitano protege, having worked as an assistant director on several of his films, including Hana-Bi, Kikujiro and Brother. At the same time he has also received backing for his first two features from Kitano's production company, Office Kitano. Shimizu's ...
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Reviews
Apartment 5C
Dir: Raphael Nadjari. US/Fr/Israel. 2002. 93 mins. Two qualities distinguish this grungy, ultra-low-budget New York production: John Surman's gorgeously moody saxophone jazz score and the fact that the film, set during last year's cold, grey Thanksgiving celebrations, was apparently one of the first shot to be in the city after ...
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Reviews
Bridget
Dir: Amos Kollek. Fr-US. 2001. 90mins.Amos Kollek is one of the great wonders of the film festival world. Each new film seems virtually guaranteed of a slot on the A-list (the last two, Queenie In Love and Fast Food, Fast Women, both premiered in Cannes), yet none has broken though ...
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Reviews
17 Fois Cecile Cassard
Dir: Christophe Honore. France. 2002. 105mins. A patchily promising first feature from writer turned director Christophe Honore, 17 Fois Cecile Cassard charts a woman's agonising struggle to rebuild her life after the devastating death of her husband. Told in 17 snapshots of moments that define her journey from abject misery ...
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Reviews
The Abduction Club
Dir: Stefan Schwartz. Ire-UK. 2001. 96mins. Based on an amusing plot premise - "the 18th century's answer to Dateline" - The Abduction Club avoids the music-vid gimmickry of previous attempts to bring the costume romp to the youth market such as Jake Scott's Plunkett And Macleane. The gentle tone of ...
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Reviews
Lilo & Stitch
Dirs: Chris Sanders, Dean DeBlois. US. 2002. 85mins.Lilo & Stitch may not push the animation envelope much, but with its modestly scaled story and retro cartooning techniques, this endearing ugly duckling tale could still give Disney its biggest traditionally animated summer hit in years. The film's $35.3m opening weekend US ...
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Reviews
Fate (Yazgi)
Dir. Zeki Demirkubuz. Turkey. 2001. 115mins.The first of three Tales Of Darkness features by Zeki Demirkubuz, Turkey's most promising new film-maker, this free adaptation of Albert Camus' novel The Stranger is bound to attract plenty of festival activity. The best indication of the film's nature and eventual future comes with ...
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Reviews
El Bonaerense
Dir: Pablo Trapero. Argentina 2002. 92mins. The Buenos Aires police department comes under wry satirical scrutiny in the second feature by the director of the highly-acclaimed Mondo Grua (Crane World). The business of crime-fighting has rarely looked so farcically disreputable outside the Police Academy series, but the humour here is ...
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Reviews
Happy Times (Xingfu Shiguang)
Dir: Zhang Yimou. China-US. 2000. 96minsThe first film from Edward R Pressman and Terrence Malick's Sunflower Productions, Zhang Yimou 's Happy Times is a Chaplinesque sentimental comedy which has its moments of greatness. Even during the more pedestrian scenes, it is difficult not to be warmed by this winning tale ...