Wednesday 21 July 2010

Critical Week: Knight and dogs

The studio took its time showing the Cruise-Diaz reunion romp Knight and Day, and you couldn't really blame them after the thumping it took by American critics. Yes, it's startlingly lazy filmmaking, but it's also rather undemanding good fun. It also fares well compared to this week's other Hollywood offering, Cats & Dogs: The Revenge of Kitty Galore, a rather frantic sequel to the sleeper hit from, erm, 2001.

Much more interesting were Mike Leigh's London drama Another Year, featuring ace performances from Jim Broadbent and Ruth Sheen and a barnstorming one from Lesley Manville, and Bong Joon-ho's gorgeously directed Mother, a very dark look at maternal love. In addition, Guiseppe Tornatore gave us another golden-hued epic paean to his childhood, and then some, with Baaria; Super Furry Animal Gruff Rhys' quirkily surreal Separado! takes us on a search for a distant relative in Argentina; and the British crime drama Bonded by Blood retells a familiar true story for at least the third time (and it's not the charm).

On the other hand, Juliette Binoche's Cannes-winning Certified Copy failed to materialise due to problems with the digital projection, so I'll have to catch up with that next week. I'm also catching up with Nicolas Cage in The Sorcerer's Apprentice, the dance sequel Step Up 3D, the British drama The Arbor, and horror films from Canada (Joe Dante's The Hole in 3D) and Britain (F).

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