On the Road: Comfort movies

One of the hazards of being a film critic is the airline entertainment system: scrolling through the hundreds of movies that are on offer looking for something that (1) I haven't seen before and (2) want to watch. Occasionally something that fits this criteria pops up but, on my recent flight to California to spend some time with my family, there wasn't anything. In these cases I tend to turn to favourite comedies or musicals that will amiably pass the time. On this flight, the 1999 classic Galaxy Quest did just the trick. I hadn't seen it in years, and I'd forgotten how great the cast is: including Sigourney Weaver, Alan Rickman, Tim Allen, Sam Rockwell, Tony Shalhoub and Daryl Mitchell (above). This isn't a film you ever get tired of revisiting. I also revisited the 2005 musical Rent, a film that isn't quite as potent as the stage version but still boasts excellent performances. And I watched all eight episodes of The Franchise (it's a long flight!), an amusing comedy series about the cast and crew of a superhero movie. It's likeable and sometimes very funny, but feels a bit random.

Before leaving London I also watched two very small American dramas: Midnight in Phoenix is a micro-budget thriller about two guys who go on the run after witnessing a violent robbery. It's a bit uneven, but has strong emotions and solid characters. Things Like This is a snappy New York romantic comedy that's a little awkward but features nicely complex characters and connections.

While I'm out here, I am hoping to catch Tom Cruise in Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning, and possible also Disney's live-action remake of Lilo & Stitch. But my emphasis is on spending time with my family, and it's nice to have movies take the back seat for a couple of weeks.

BEST NEW FILMS: The Wedding Banquet (9th May cover with Lily Gladstone and Kelly Marie Tran) • Motel Destino • The Extraordinary Miss Flower • Good One (16th May cover with Lily Collias) ALL REVIEWS >

Screen: May TV Roundup

There's been some very high-profile television over the past few months, including shows that have made global headlines, like Adolescence and the third season of The White Lotus. There have also been a few new series that are happy to simply keep us smiling, like The Four Seasons and The Studio. We need more of these at the moment! This roundup starts with four shows that came back for another season...

The White Lotus: series 3
Writer-director Mike White continues to take on major themes in unusually subtle ways, this time at a resort Thailand that's so beautiful we will all start saving up now. And the guests and staff are a terrific collection of people who are dealing with a range of issues that relate to morality and spirituality. It's so skilfully written and played that each scene worms its way into our subconscious. Standouts in the exceptional ensemble include Jason Isaacs, Parker Posey, Carrie Coon, Aimee Lou Wood, Patrick Schwarzenegger and Sam Nivola, plus a blazing Sam Rockwell. There are some loose threads that feel a bit messy, but this is top-tier TV. (Max)

Hacks: series 4
With a much darker tone, this season kicks off as war rages between the imperious Deborah (Jean Smart) and the feisty Ava (Hanna Einbinder). And things get very nasty indeed in these sharply well-written and performed episodes, with various subplots helpfully providing comic relief, most notably the ongoing antics of agents Jimmy and Kayla (Paul W Downs and Megan Salter). The depiction of the world of late night television is astute, including a properly pointed look at network TV politics. But as always, it's the rollercoaster relationship between Deborah and Ava that keeps us hooked, and it's a fantastic ride this time around. (Max)

The Conners:
series 7
There are only six episodes in this show's final season, capping a span of 37 years in the life of this working class family. The writers set out to both maintain the timely, salt-of-the-earth sensibilities while providing strong arcs for each of the central characters, and they manage to do this with clever plotting and their usual hilariously barbed dialog. The focus is on the veteran cast members, who continued to deepen their roles from episode to episode. So we'll miss John Goodman, Laurie Metcalf, Sara Gilbert and Lecy Goranson, and it's a little frustrating that Michael Fishman (as DJ) wasn't back for the emotional goodbye. (ABC)

Wolf Hall: The Mirror and the Light
Based on Hilary Mantel's historical novel, Wolf Hall gripped the nation in 2015, and it's taken a decade to get Part 2. The story picks up immediately, following Thomas Cromwell (Mark Rylance) as he tries to navigate backchannel politics in the court of Henry VIII (Damien Lewis) and Jane Seymour (Kate Phillips). Beautifully written by Peter Straughan, and skilfully played by an excellent ensemble, this is a gorgeously made series that lives in its quieter moments. While the pacing is slow and delicate, the dialog is packed with subterfuge, as relationships are twisted by gossip and ambition. History is rarely recounted with so much introspection. (BBC)

S O M E T H I N G   N E W

Adolescence
This feels like landmark television, with four utterly unmissable episodes. It's written, directed and performed with staggering skill to tell a story that feels almost terrifyingly urgent. On the surface it's about a detective (Ashley Walters) investigating the murder of a teen girl by a 13-year-old boy (Owen Cooper), whose father (Stephen Graham) can't comprehend the situation. But the show is actually a deep dive into the impact of toxic masculinity on society, touching on a range of jaw-dropping aspects. Philip Barantini directs each episode in a single long take that ramps up the intensity and provides powerful gut punches. (Netflix)

The Studio
While this comedy is somewhat goofy, it's also so much fun that we never want it to end. Seth Rogen leads the cast (and creative team) to take us behind the chaotic scenes, playing a Hollywood studio boss who's in over his head. Each episode works as a meta-joke exploring various aspects of moviemaking with humour that's both jaggedly smart and profoundly silly. And amid the broad jokes are some knowing observations about Hollywood. The quality slips in the final few episodes, which begin to feel somewhat repetitive, but the terrific cast includes the great Catherine O'Hara, and more A-list cameos per episode than seems humanly possible. (Apple)

The Four Seasons
Loosely based on the 1981 film, this eight-part series created by Tina Fey centres on three couples who take four holidays together over the course of a year. As their relationships shift, there's plenty of sharp comedy and strong emotion thanks to first-rate actors Fey, Steve Carell, Colman Domingo, Will Forte, Kerri Kenney and Marco Calvani. Most enjoyable is the way the show is unafraid to indulge in some very silly antics alongside the much more serious storylines. So even if it all feels a bit too smart to be believable, the terrific actors find strongly grounded moments along the way. All of which makes it hugely entertaining. (Netflix)

Mid-Century Modern
Almost painfully broad, this is an old-school sitcom with a queer twist, essentially remaking The Golden Girls with three gay men in Palm Springs. Nathan Lane is the sardonic leader of the pack, Matt Bomer is the brainless himbo and Nathan Lee Graham is the wry socialite, with the great Linda Lavin as the resident house mother. This could work a treat, but the writing is almost painfully simplistic, falling back on obvious jokes and a string of starry cameos. Thankfully, the actors are excellent at providing the textures needed to make the characters likeable. But without much of interest going on, it's not easy to care if they return for more. (Disney)

Étoile
This has promise, an ensemble comedy centred around an exchange between premiere ballet companies in New York and Paris, but it's assembled in a bewilderingly uneven way. Everything is infused with slapstick, creating deliberately wacky characters who are both unsympathetic and frankly implausible. This almost works for quirky artistes like Tobias Glick's obsessively awkward choreographer, but it rings badly false with the administrators who take up the vast majority of the screen time. It seems like a crime to saddle actors like Charlotte Gainsbourg and Luke Kirby with such one-note roles. Still, it's just about watchable. (Amazon)

Mr Loverman
This is a beautifully written and directed series, based on the Bernardine Evaristo novel about a lively Afro-Caribbean family man in London (a stunningly complex role for Lennie James) who is secretly in love with his best friend Morris (Ariyon Bakare), but is still unable to come out of the closet. The show flickers back to previous times and places in their decades together, punctuated by both everyday encounters and momentous events. Most intriguing is how this sensitive, observant show traces how gay rights evolved around these two men, and their very different reactions to that. And the final episodes are powerfully moving. (BBC)

Carême
Loosely based on real historical figures, this French series centres around the very first celebrity chef Antonin Careme (Benjamin Voisin) in the early 19th century, and throws him into the middle of soapy romance and lots of political intrigue under Napoleon's turbulent rule. The food on display is fabulous, of course. And there's some fun to be had in Careme's sexual shenanigans, even if the plot badly bogs down in the more thriller-style elements that leave it little more than a quest for revenge. At least it plays out with some nice twists, and strong performances from the seductive Voisin, Lyna Khoudri, Jeremie Renier and others. (Apple)

GUILTY PLEASURES: Britain's Got Talent, Fool Us, The Traitors (Australia), Drag Race (17/Down Under), Million Dollar Secret.

NOW WATCHING: Overcompensating, Your Friends & Neighbors, Andor 2, The Last of Us 2, The Handmaid's Tale 6

COMING SOON: MurderBot, Adults, Stick, Long Way Home, And Just Like That 2, Fubar 2, Squid Game 3.

Previous roundup: MARCH 2025 > 

Stage: The world needs one-star hotels

Blood Wedding
by Barney Norris, after Lorca
director Tricia Thorns
with Nell Williams, Alix Dunmore, Christopher Neenan, David Fielder, Esme Lonsdale, Kiefer Moriarty
set Alex Marker • costumes Carla Joy Evans
lighting Neill Brinkworth • sound Dominic Bilkey
Omnibus Theatre, Clapham • 30.Apr-24.May.25 ★★★★

Inventively reimagining Lorca's 1933 Spanish tragedy, Barney Norris sets the story in rural England as a pitch-black comedy. The naturalistic dialog and offhanded performances bring the characters to life over a series of scenes that ratchet up the intensity with a mix of humour, passion and poetic philosophy. It's strikingly involving, forcing the audience to grapple with the bigger issues right along with the people on-stage. And the intimacy of the Omnibus Theatre makes it riveting, aided by skilfully effective set, costumes, lighting and sound design.

In a small town in Wiltshire, Georgie (Williams) is preparing for her marriage to Rob (Neenan), a charmer who is four years younger. Rob's dubious mother Helen (Dunmore) arrives to help them secure a shabby community hall for their wedding reception, managed by the scruffy Brian (Fielder). As they speak, it becomes clear that Georgie is heading into this marriage as an escape from her frustrating life, having fallen out with her mother and lost her job. Then she runs into her old classmate Danni (Lonsdale), who is pregnant and has a baby boy with her husband Lee (Moriarty). But Georgie has a past with Lee, and they have lingering feelings for each other, expressed through brittle verbal jabs.

Shifting the setting like this is especially inventive because it manages to catch the zeitgeist of present-day Britain, with its mix of people who are happy with life as it comes and others who feel stuck in a dead-end routine, just hanging on without any real meaning. These ideas ripple up through pointed conversations that continually pull the audience in further, creating unusually complex characters who are easy to identify with. Each actor is excellent, with a particularly emotive turn from Dunmore and a show-stealing soliloquy by Fielder. Neenan and Moriarty have distinctly likeable personalities, even if Rob comes off as a bit cheerfully dim and Lee more coldly fatalistic. And Williams and Lonsdale find strong nuance as young women whose childhood friendship bends around them in an unusual circle. 

The overriding idea here is that, even in a place as out of the way as a Wiltshire village, the human experience has an epic sensibility, both for each person individually and for a wider community through the scope of history. In other words, there's always much, much more to people than meets the eye. Norris' writing is brilliantly incisive, using everyday conversation that bristles with witty banter and cuts to the underlying yearnings all of us feel about who we are and where we come from. There are also resonant comments about how life takes its own path, no matter what we try to do about it. And best of all, the play reminds us that everything is nicer with bunting. 

For info, OMNIBUS CLAPHAM >

photos by Phil Gammon • 2.May.25

Critical Week: I'll drink to that

In this full week between two short ones, I've been working to get ahead of things before taking a break starting next week. So I've been both attending screenings and watching films at home on links. And there were a couple of big ones along the way. Blake Lively and Anna Kendrick are back for the frothy comedy-thriller Another Simple Favour, this time set in gorgeous locations around Capri. Both silly and violent, it's also very entertaining. Florence Pugh and Sebastian Stan lead a ragtag ensemble in Thunderbolts*, a more character-based Marvel film than usual, with a terrific linear narrative that outs the effects nonsense into emotional context.

BEST OUT THIS WEEK:
Where Dragons Live • Thunderbolts*
Parthenope • Another Simple Favour
ALL REVIEWS >

Nicolas Cage gives one of his wonderfully bonkers performances in The Surfer as a guy who simply wants to return to surf the waves on the Australian beach where he grew up. Then things get outrageously messy. From Scotland, the 18th century samurai-Western mashup Tornado is set in the Highlands, slow and riveting, and superbly played by Koki, Tim Roth, Jack Lowden and more. From Italy, Paolo Sorrentino's Parthenope is yet another sumptuously gorgeous free-spirited epic odyssey, enjoyable and yet oddly out of reach. From Brazil, Karim Ainouz's bracingly colour-drenched dramatic thriller Motel Destino is bursting with passion and yearning. The Argentine drama Most People Die on Sundays has a much lighter tone than the title suggests, and it's a warm exploration of identity and connection. And the British doc Where Dragons Live is a fascinating look at a middle-class family sifting through its personal history.

This coming week, I'll have a few things to watch over the long weekend before heading off to visit my parents for a couple of weeks. Films include the musical drama Midnight in Phoenix, and there's also a stage production of Blood Wedding at the Omnibus in Clapham.