Critical Week: All for one

I've spent the past three weeks in California with my parents, and moviegoing wasn't at the top of the list for things to do. Now back in London, I need to do rather a lot of catching up. This is especially true for TV series, as ballots are due in about 10 days for the Dorian TV Awards. And time is complicated by the arrival of a new film festival in London next week, as SXSW takes over the slot was previously occupied by Sundance London for the past 11 years. As for this past week, I basically got off the plane, took a power nap and then headed to a press screening of Karate Kid: Legends, an enjoyable bit of formulaic entertainment that teams up Jackie Chan and Ralph Macchio with newcomer Ben Wang (above).

BEST OUT THIS WEEK:
Tornado • The Salt Path
The Phoenician Scheme
The Astronaut Lovers
ALL REVIEWS >

The only film I watched in the US was the big one, Mission: Impossible - The Final Reckoning, in which Tom Cruise once again impresses us with his stunt skills (plus some acting too) in a story that's a bit heavy on exposition. But it's still a must-see on a large screen. Disney's live-action remake of the animated classic Lilo & Stitch is enjoyably energetic but less anarchic than before. 

Wes Anderson is back with another stylised comedy, the star-packed The Phoenician Scheme, which is a lot of fun even if the plot begins to feel a bit dense. Jesse Armstrong's pointed comedy Mountainhead stars Steve Carell, Jason Schwartzman, Cory Michael Smith and Ramy Youssef as tech billionaires. It's talky and rather uneven, but also entertaining and astute. And from Australia, Dangerous Animals is an enjoyably nasty twist on the shark-attack thriller, with Jai Courtney as a deranged killer who uses his victims as bait. Genre fans will love it.

This coming week I'll be watching Ana de Armas in the John Wick spinoff Ballerina and Andrew Rannells in I Don't Understand You, catching up with Natalie Portman and John Krasinski in Fountain of Youth, and attending the first SXSW London film festival.

Critical Week: Making Music

We're charging into both festival and awards seasons here in London at the moment, led by the London Film Festival and followed by a flurry of niche festivals over the coming months. And the movie awards season is already underway as my inbox fills with for-your-consideration emails. But this means I can finally start catching up on the year's high-profile movies. And with the writer's strike settled, we can hope the actor's reach an agreement soon so red carpets can get back to their former glitz. 

BEST OUT THIS WEEK:
The Old Oak • Flora and Son
The Exorcist: 50th Anniversary
PERHAPS AVOID:
The Plus One
The Re-Education of Molly Singer
ALL REVIEWS >

Films this week included John Carney's latest gorgeous music-infused Irish drama Flora and Son, starring Eve Hewson and Joseph Gordon-Levitt (above). I attended the very cool UK premiere of Gareth Edwards' The Creator, a hugely involving and expertly made sci-fi thriller with John David Washington and a wonderfully villainous Allison Janney. And Benicio Del Toro is excellent in the crime drama Reptile, an overlong plod livened up by strong performances. 

For the youngsters, there was a return to Robert Rodriguez's franchise with the enjoyably silly reboot Spy Kids: Armageddon and the animated adventure Paw Patrol: The Mighty Movie, which only very young viewers will love. There were two American comedies: The Plus One is a destination wedding comedy, while The Re-Education of Molly Singer is a back-to-university romp. Both have their moments, but aren't original or funny enough to stand out. 

I also attended the lively world premiere of I Am Urban, an authentically gritty 1990s-set British true-life drama that's more experimental than narratively engaging. This year's Palme d'Or winner Anatomy of a Fall is a riveting drama starring the magnificent Sandra Huller. The lovely Sundance award winner Smoke Sauna Sisterhood is a powerful doc featuring Estonian women ... naked. And finally there was the Kyiv City Ballet's Tribute to Peace at the Peacock Theatre.

This coming week looks just as busy, with the 50-years-later sequel The Exorcist: Believer, Emerald Fennell's Saltburn, David Fincher's The Killer, British comedy Mind-Set and acclaimed doc The Eternal Memory, plus even more as the 67th London Film Festival kicks off next Wednesday.

Critical Week: Founding fathers

It's my birthday week, so I've been a bit off-schedule, spreading celebrations over three days (as you do!). But I still managed to watch a number of films, including two on the big screen. On Netflix, America: The Motion Picture is a wacky animated mash-up of US history and pop culture silliness. It's utterly idiotic, but the barrage of gags means that some of them elicit laughter. On Prime, The Tomorrow War is a bloated action epic thankfully starring the hugely watchable Chris Pratt as a biology teacher (of course with special ops training) sent to the future to save humanity from spike-shooting aliens. It's utterly idiotic, but cheesy enough to keep us entertained. And on HBO Max, No Sudden Move is a gritty mob thriller expertly directed by Steven Soderbergh, with an superb ensemble led by Don Cheadle, Benicio Del Toro and Jon Hamm. It's snaky and involving, but holds onto its best thematic kick too long.

BEST OUT THIS WEEK:
The Man With the Answers
Another Round • Summer of Soul
Freaky • No Sudden Move
PERHAPS AVOID: Voyagers
ALL REVIEWS >

As for cinema screenings, there were The Last Bus, an involving and never sentimental drama with Timothy Spall as a very old man travelling the length of Great Britain on public busses, and Jumbo, an inventively well-made French romance based on a provocatively offbeat true story. I also watched The God Committee, a dark morality drama starring a serious Kelsey Grammer; the Argentine dramatic horror Rock, Paper and Scissors, which scarily pits siblings against each other; and the glorious Summer of Soul, beautifully documenting a shamefully forgotten Harlem concert series from 1969.

I also returned to a West End theatre to finally catch up with the musical Everybody's Talking About Jamie, a triumphantly engaging story about a teen who wants to be his colourful self. It has properly great songs too, which bodes well for the film adaptation that's due in the autum.

This coming week, I am looking forward to in-cinema screenings of Black Widow with Scarlett Johansson and Florence Pugh, and The Duke with Helen Mirren and Jim Broadbent. Other films to watch include Emile Hirsch in Son and Nicolas Cage in Pig. I'm also taking a couple of days off, getting out of London for the first time in a year.

Requisite Blog Photo: Dora and me

More like Dora and the Lost Film Critic Slightly Too Early on a Sunday Morning. 

Critical Week: Over the borderline

Back in London after a two-week break, I've been catching up on several films, including the sequel Sicario: Day of the Soldado (UK title Sicario 2: Soldado), a gritty and intensely gripping thriller following on from the more resonant first film. Josh Brolin, Benicio Del Toro and Isabel Moner are excellent. Tonal issues make the romcom Ideal Home surprisingly challenging - it feels like a gentle family film, but is packed with more provocative adult elements. Steve Coogan and Paul Rudd are superb at the centre. And Mary Shelley is a fascinating biopic about the author of Frankenstein, although it feels like it has smoothed out the real story. Elle Fanning is terrific in the title role.

A little further afield, My Life With James Dean is a gentle, wry French comedy about a filmmaker on a bizarre odyssey in a sleepy coastal town. It's artful, quirky and hilarious. And Postcards from the 48% is a solidly assembled doc digging into the issue of Brexit. It may be one-sided, but frankly there hasn't yet been a compelling argument in favour of leaving the EU, aside from emotional nationalism. Which makes the film seriously scary.

Coming up this week are screenings of the Dwayne Johnson action Skyscraper, Nick Offerman in Hearts Beat Loud, Emma Thompson in The Children Act, the comedy A Swingers Weekend and probably a few more as I continue to play catchup...

Critical Week: Lost in La La Land

I had never seen Beyond the Valley of the Dolls, Russ Meyer's notorious 1970 romp that gets a special edition DVD release in the UK next week. So of course I had to sieze the chance to catch up with it ... and it's even more bonkers than I imagined. This is the raucous story of three young women who take their rock trio to Hollywood and fall in with all kinds of decadence, hedonism and wanton debauchery. Roger Ebert's script is so freeform that it feels like a spoof, especially with the hilariously moralistic epilogue. It's completely nuts. But also thoroughly groovy.

Also seen this week: Sebastian Silva's offbeat comedy-drama Nasty Baby, in which he stars with Kristen Wiig as best friends trying to conceive a child against the odds. It's strikingly well made, but the plot points are a bit heavy-handed. Benicio Del Toro is superb in A Perfect Day, a comedy-drama set in the Balkans in 1995. The M.A.S.H.-like vibe works, and the cast is great, but it feels oddly superficial. And Mavis! is a documentary about Mavis Staples, whose 50-year-career has spanned just about every genre of American pop even as she continues to fill her songs with hopeful messages. Not particularly notable as a film, but she's amazing.

This coming week we have screenings of the Casey Affleck action thriller Triple 9, the Oscar Isaac thriller Mojave, the Tim Roth drama Chronic, the Juliet Stevenson drama Departure, the Brazilian drama Aya Arcos and the adventure doc Meru.

And of course Sunday is the London Critics' Circle Film Awards at the May Fair Hotel - of which I am the chair - so organising the event is taking up most of my time this week. Watch this space for a full report and pics!

Critical Week: Double trouble

Tom Hardy himself popped up at the press screening for his stylish and entertaining movie Legend, in which he delivers two astonishing performances as the Kray twins, who ran London's gangland in the 1960s. Ed Helms stars in Vacation, a next-generation sequel to the Chevy Chase comedies that's just as rude but more silly than edgy. Robert Redford and Nick Nolte star in the enjoyably earthy comedy A Walk in the Woods, based on the Bill Bryson book. Marcia Gay Harden heads to Costa Rica in the warm comedy-drama After Words, and has a life-altering encounter with a cheeky local. And Josh Hutcherson heads to Colombia in the realistic, gritty thriller Escobar: Paradise Lost, where he becomes entangled with the 1990s drug kingpin, played with disarming charm by Benicio Del Toro.

A little further afield, we had the sequel Sinister 2, which has an extreme embargo on it: until the day it opens. We also saw the beautifully made gentle Los Angeles drama Brahmin Bulls, with Sendhil Ramamurthy and Roshan Seth as father and son; actor-turned-filmmaker Craig Roberts' perhaps too audacious,but skilfully made British coming-of-age movie Just Jim; actor Steve Oram's even more experimental, and rather genius, sociological pastiche Aaaaaaaah!; the rather bleak but moving Australian homophobia drama Drown; and Dishonoured Bodies, a collection of nine somewhat preachy but very cleverly assembled experimental shorts by Spanish filmmaker Juanma Carillo.

This coming week we have the NWA biopic Straight Outta Compton, Zac Efron in We Are Your Friends, Kevin Costner in McFarland, Rupert Friend in Hitman: Agent 47 and M Night Shyamalan's The Visit.

EIFF 8: Staring at the sea

Straight from Cannes, the anthology film 7 Days in Havana beings the EIFF back to Cuba again, with segments from a series of top directors. And the Latino seaside theme continues in Chile's The Lifeguard - both films are covered below, along with the world premiere of Peter Strickland's new movie. Last night was the festial's elite party in Edinburgh Castle, to which mere mortal journalists aren't invited. I haven't heard anything about how it went, but it was nice to have a free evening since there are two parties tonight: a tango-themed concert for Future My Love and a later event for the anthology film The Fourth Dimention.

7 Days in Havana
dir Pablo Trapero, Benicio Del Toro, et al; with John Hutcherson, Emir Kusturica 12/Sp ***
There's plenty of colour and culture in this anthology, which could have been titled La Habana Te Amo, to match the similarly uneven Paris Je T'Aime and New York I Love You. It has moments of artistic inventiveness, but barely breaks the surface... FULL REVIEW

Berberian Sound Studio
dir Peter Strickland; with Toby Jones, Cosimo Fusco 12/UK ****
Clever filmmaker Strickland (Katalin Varga) aims this film right at movie geeks, mixing comedy, drama and horror to tell the story of a tweedy British sound designer (Jones) who travels to a notorious Italian studio to mix the audio for a grisly 1970s schlock movie. The director insists that this is a serious historical drama, but the voice actors and sound artists all recognise it as a trashy romp about demonic witches. Intriguingly, Strickland only shows us the film within a film's title sequence, evoking the rest of it through a wonderfully detailed sound mix as we see how the audio track is assembled. This is often wickedly hilarious, not to mention an engaging look at analog sound assembly. Then things start to twist and turn, as the gruesome movie starts to merge with real life. Stunningly visual, the film is utterly mesmerising. Well, right up to the slightly unsatisfying coda.

The Lifeguard
dir Maite Alberdi; with Mauricio Rodriguez, Jean Pierre Palacios 11/Chl ****
From Chile, this sundrenched, sand-blown film chronicles a few days in the life of Mauricio, a lifeguard on a busy beach that has a fierce undercurrent. His philosophy is that preventing someone from getting into trouble is better than swimming to their rescue, so he uses his whistle liberally while never going into the water. This puts him at odds with Jean Pierre, the guard the next tower, who seems to do nothing all day long, waiting for someone to get into trouble. That's pretty much the plot of this film, which just follows Mauricio's interactions, including people asking stupid questions, trying to flout the rules, gossiping about each other and tormenting him about his dreadlocks. What makes it compelling viewing is the astounding cinematography, editing and sound mixing, which skilfully and artfully capture the tiniest details. And this includes getting far beneath Mauricio's skin.