Latest – Page 636
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Reviews
Herbie: Fully Loaded
Dir: Angela Robinson. US.2005. 95mins.The latest in a gradualrecycling programme of Disney's back catalogue (after Flubber, The ParentTrap, Freaky Friday), Herbie: Fully Loaded is an effective familypicture which will be a big hit for the studio in the US - where it opens onJune 22 - and one likely to ...
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Reviews
Housewarming (Travaux, On Sait Quand Ca Commence')
Dir: BrigitteRouan. Fr-UK. 2005. 95mins.Actor turneddirector Brigitte Rouan turns in the French cinematic equivalent of the'chick-lit' novel in Housewarming, a breezily disposable comedy about anindependent professional woman whose life goes into a chaotic spin. Builtaround an elegant but rather stiff central performance by Carole Bouquet, thefilm is an unexpectedly fluffy ...
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Reviews
The Buried Forest (Umorgei)
Dir: Kohei Oguri. Japan.2005. 94mins.Stuck seductively in itsown dreamtime, Japanese arthouse director Kohei Oguri's Directors Fortnightcontender The Buried Forest is a slow waltz of stories and images thatonly reluctantly offers itself up to rational analysis. Set in a rural Japanesevillage that has an a historical, magical realist feel, this demanding ...
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Reviews
Bewitched
Dir: Nora Ephron. US.2005. 98 mins.Sony's eagerly awaited movie of the beloved 60s TV series Bewitched has to be one of the most featherweight summerblockbuster prospects in recent memory. Although it's stuffed with A-listtalent from stars Nicole Kidman and Will Ferrell down, co-writer and directorNora Ephron has delivered a romantic ...
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Reviews
Russian Dolls (Les Poupees Russes)
Dir/scr: Cedric Klapisch,Fr-UK. 2005. 125mins.We last saw Xavier(Romain Duris) five years ago at the end of L'Auberge Espagnole,literally running away from his new life as a civil servant. After the youthfulexuberance of his time in Barcelona chronicled in that film, who'd want tomeasure out their life with coffee spoons' Not ...
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Reviews
Adam's Apples (Adams Aebler)
Dir/scr:Anders Thomas Jensen. Den. 2005. 92mins.How do you persuade a neo-Nazi to bake an apple pie' Thisis the droll challenge that powers the third feature to be directed byubiquitous Danish screenwriter Anders Thomas Jensen.Adam'sApples isa curious genre mix, part black comedy, part serious good-and-evil moralitytale. Though it does not always ...
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Reviews
Crying Fist (Jumeoki Unda)
Dir: RyooSeung-wan. South Korea. 2005. 132mins.One of noless than six South Korean features to be invited to Cannes this year, FIPRESCIprize-winner Crying Fist is a better film than its generally downbeatreviews at home might suggest. The latest addition to the boxing genre, CryingFist is more conventional in one way than ...
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Reviews
Peekaboo! (Cache Cache)
Dir:Yves Caumon. Fr. 2005. 91mins.Amodern rural fable teetering halfway between country-house ghost story andslapstick silent comedy, Peekaboo is a lightweight but originaldivertissement that will amuse Gallic audiences without knocking them sideways.Playing entertainingly with the back-to-nature impulses, and phobias, of theurban bourgeoisie, the film is carried by the wordless central performance ...
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Reviews
The Adventures Of Sharkboy And Lavagirl In 3D
Dir. Robert Rodriguez.US. 2005. 94mins.A mildly engaging children's morality tale, RobertRodriguez's The Adventures Of Sharkboy And Lavagirl In 3D is the kind offilm that parents should be happy to let their kids see but which likely provetoo undemanding for anyone beyond its target age group.While the digital specialeffects are inventive ...
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Reviews
Event Horizon (L'Orizzonte Degli Eventi)
Dir:Daniele Vicari. Italy. 2005. 114mins.It's a nice idea for a film: take Italy's highest mountainoutside the Alps - the Gran Sasso - and come up with a storyline that links thehi-tech world below the mountain (which hosts the Gran Sasso National Laboratory,the world's largest underground laboratory for research into particle ...
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Reviews
Habana Blues
Dir:Benito Zambrano. Sp-Cuba-Fr. 2005. 110mins.Spanish director Benito Zambrano scored a surprise hit athome in 1999 with his first film, the intense mother-and-daughter drama Solas.Habana Blues is a very different product - a feelgood slice of raw Havanaenergy which uses its conventional but solid plot as a frame on which to ...
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Reviews
Invisible (Les Invisibles)
Dir: Thierry Jousse.France 2005. 85mins.Sound, vision and obsession mix to stylish, provocativeeffect in Invisible, the debut film from former Cahiers Du Cinema editorThierry Jousse. The latest in a long line of that magazine's critics to turn todirecting, stretching from the nouvelle vague generation to the likes ofOlivier Assayas and Pascal ...
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Reviews
Sangre
Dir/scr: Amat Escalante.Mexico-Fr 2005. 90mins.Life's existentialgrimness, Mexican style, is the subject of Sangre, a moody, taut,elliptical but ultimately rather frustrating debut by Amat Escalante. One man'squiet but troubled life caves in on him dramatically - yet somehowundramatically - in a story of finely-observed domestic and character detailthat will fascinate some ...
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Reviews
Alice
Dir/scr:Marco Martins. Port-Fr. 2005. 103mins.Anatmospheric, yearning study of loss by first-time Portuguese director MarcoMartins, Alice was one of the strongest films in this year's Quinzainesidebar at Cannes. Sombre and dark in theme and look, this unflinching look ata father's search for his missing three-year-old daughter is not aSaturday-night-at-the-multiplex experience, but ...
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Reviews
Bittersweet Life (Dal Kom Han In-Saeng)
Dir/scr:Kim Jee-woon South Korea. 2005. 115mins.An ultra-violent actionnoir by Korean director Kim Jee-woon, A Bittersweet Life is a stylishstory of a faithful underworld lieutentant who crosses his boss and ends upfighting for his life against his own gang. As in his previous genre outing,the dark psycho-horror yarn A Tale Of ...
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Reviews
Batman Begins
Dir:Christopher Nolan. US. 2005. 140 mins.LikeSam Raimi did with Spider-man,Christopher Nolan has gone back to the drawing board with the Batman characterin Batman Begins andemerged with an intensely dramatic, muscular action adventure picture whichshould be successful enough to kickstart the franchise for Warner Bros. Eradicatingany of the camp and tongue-in-cheek ...
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Reviews
Mr And Mrs Smith
Dir:Doug Liman. US. 2005. 120mins.Mr & Mrs Smith is a sleek, audacious mix ofromantic comedy, satire and action thriller boosted by the surging star powerof Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie. And making the most of that 'Brangelina'appeal - the couple's alleged off-screen affair is currently the talk of thetabloids - ...
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Reviews
The Sisterhood Of The Traveling Pants
Dir: Ken Kwapis. US.2005. 119mins.Based on a wildly popular young-adult novel about fourteen girlfriends and the pair of magical blue jeans they share over the summer,The Sisterhood Of The Travelling Pants is a coming-of-age dramatailor-made for fans of the books, which with its sequels has sold 3.5m-pluscopies in the US. ...
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Reviews
Cold Showers (Douches Froides)
Dir: Antony Cordier. Fr.2005. 100mins.The debut fiction feature from young French directorAntony Cordier, Cold Showers may not score heavily in terms of novelty:it is, after all, a small-town coming-of-age story trimmed with edgy teenagesex. Nevertheless, his rites-of-passage feature, which screened in Directors'Fortnight at Cannes, brings an unshowy, observation intelligence to ...
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Reviews
Cinema, Aspirins And Vultures (Cinema, Aspirinas E Urubus)
Dir:Marcelo Gomes. Braz. 2005. 99mins.Odd, really, that up to now, nobody has ever thought ofmaking a film about a travelling aspirin salesman in north-eastern Brazil inthe early 1940s. First-time director Marcelo Gomes has not only come up withthe definitive movie on the subject - he also provided us with one ...