Film
What were they thinking? The Benefactor reviewed
The Benefactor is both a bad film and a thoroughly inexplicable one. It’s one of those what-were-they-thinking projects that wastes…
What is a serious film festival doing opening with Hail, Caesar!
What is a serious film festival doing opening with Ethan and Joel Coens’ turkey Hail, Caesar!? James Woodall reports from Berlin
Cinema needs films like Chronic – just not a lot of them
Scholarly filmgoers may recall a movement that sprouted from Danish soil called Dogme 95. It worked to a Spartan set…
What on earth was Ben Stiller thinking? Zoolander 2 reviewed
‘I’m pretty sure there’s a lot more to life than being really, really, ridiculously good-looking,’ said a pouty Derek Zoolander…
Watch it backwards – and then don’t stay for long: Dad’s Army reviewed
The TV sitcom Dad’s Army ran on the BBC from 1968 to 1977 (nine series, 80 episodes) with repeats still…
A worthy film that just doesn't fly: Spotlight reviewed
Like The Revenant and The Big Short, Spotlight is yet another Oscar contender ‘based on true events’ — although it…
I admired it - but also desperately wanted it to end: The Revenant reviewed
The Revenant is a survival-against-the-odds film that so puts Leonardo DiCaprio through it I bet he was thinking, ‘I wish…
Not as good as the book, but good enough: Room reviewed
This is the week of The Hateful Eight, the latest Quentin Tarantino film, but Tarantino being Tarantino, there were no…
Darth Vader is dirty and it’s not just me that thinks so
Star Wars taught Hollywood how to make children’s films for adults, says Tanya Gold
Why did a Russian ballet dancer throw acid in his boss’s face?
The 16th June 1961 and 17th January 2013 are two indelible dates in the annals of Russian ballet. Two events…
Grandma: a feminist comedy that punches magnificently above its weight
Apologies if you were expecting a review of Star Wars here, but Disney is not allowing critics access prior to…
Sunset Song is close to masterly
Lewis Grassic Gibbon’s Sunset Song is the best-remembered title of a short career. Born in 1901, he was dead by…
What’s it like to have a Nazi for a father?
This is a documentary in which three men travel across Europe together, but they’re not pleasurably interrailing, even though there…
How Technicolor conquered cinema
Peter Hoskin celebrates Technicolor’s 100th birthday
Was Steve Jobs really a genius?
Steve Jobs is a film about a man in whom I have little interest, but for 120 minutes I was…
How did this plotless goon-show wind up at the Royal Court?
One of the challenges of art is to know the difference between innovation and error. I wonder sometimes if the…
The couple behind the world’s most famous chair
Peter Mandelson, in his moment of pomp, had his portrait taken by Lord Snowdon. He is sitting on a fine…
I wept only with frustration: Spectre reviewed
Spectre is the 24th film in the Bond franchise, the fourth starring Daniel Craig, the second directed by Sam Mendes,…
Colm Toibin on priests, loss and the half-said thing
Jenny McCartney talks to unstoppable literary force Colm Tóibín about loss, priests and half-said things
Self-pitying, despairing, often delusional: the real Marlon Brando
Listen to Me Marlon is a documentary portrait of Marlon Brando that has him burbling into your ear for 102…
The Program could do with a good dose of performance-enhancing drugs
The Program, as directed by Stephen Frears, is a biopic of Lance Armstrong, the American cyclist and ‘sporting hero’ who…
What is it about Bill Viola’s films that reduce grown-ups to tears?
What is it about Bill Viola's films that reduce grown-ups to tears? William Cook dries his eyes and talks to the video artist about Zen, loss and nearly drowning
German refugees transformed British cultural life - but at a price
German-speaking refugees dragged British culture into the 20th century. But that didn’t go down well in Stepney or Stevenage, says William Cook
Horridly magnificent - but real problems occur when anyone opens their mouth: Macbeth reviewed
Who goes to big-screen Shakespeare? Not theatre-goers much, and with reason. Apart from the odd corker by Kurosawa, arguably Olivier…
Rainer Werner Fassbinder’s films verge on the incomprehensible — but that doesn’t stop him being a genius
London’s Goethe-Institut has a two-month season of films of Rainer Werner Fassbinder (whose 70th anniversary it’s celebrating), but only five…
