Critical Week: I have a bad feeling about this

I arrived back in London on Tuesday, and any thoughts of starting back to work slowly quickly evaporated as I have worked to catch up on things. Not only is there a backlog of movies to watch and write about, but one of London's biggest film festivals starts next week. And it's the Oscars on Sunday night, the climax to this year's awards season (I'll post my picks and predictions as usual this weekend). Meanwhile, next year's awards season is building up some buzz already, with the astonishing Late Night With the Devil, a 1970s TV talk show pastiche that spirals into inventively thrilling demonic horror. At the centre, David Dastmalchian delivers a career redefining performance.

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Other films included American Dreamer, a scrappy comedy-drama starring Peter Dinklage and Shirley MacLaine that's likeable but never quite comes together. Bonded is a very low-budget American slasher thriller that has some underlying charm. And Crossing is a stunner of a drama from Swedish-Georgian filmmaker Levan Akin (And Then We Danced). Set mainly in Istanbul's trans community, it's screening next week at BFI Flare, and deserves to be in awards conversations this time next year. I also had time to catch up with one of last year's movies while I was on the plane back to London...

Silent Night
dir John Woo; with Joel Kinnaman, Catalina Sandino Moreno 23/US ***
Leave it to action veteran John Woo to make the very most out of an explosive thriller that has no dialog at all. The story centres around a man who loses his son, and his voice, to local gang violence, so he spends the next year training to get even. Kinnaman ably balances the beefy tough-guy nonsense with a deeper emotionality, which is even more strongly felt thanks to Sandino Moreno as his understandably frightened wife. But instead of meaningfully grappling with ideas of grief and revenge, the film essentially turns this man into Batman, a seemingly independently wealthy vigilante with a muscle car and a personal arsenal. Woo makes it look fabulous, but any point is lost in the glorious mayhem.

This coming week I'll be watching Cate Blanchett in The New Boy, Sydney Sweeney in Immaculate, Emile Hirsch in State of Consciousness, Luc Besson's Dogman, relationship drama Thirty, plus several more films that will be showing at the 38th BFI Flare: London LGBTQIA+ Film Festival, which kicks off next Wednesday with the drag-scene romance Layla. I'll also be staying up all night to watch the Oscars on Sunday night!

LFF: Escape on Day 8

The end is in sight for the 61st BFI London Film Festival, as we cross into the later half of this week with several more starry gala screenings to come. I noticed things felt a little quieter in the press screening rooms today, but perhaps that's because I'd seen some of the bigger films at Venice, so I was catching up on slightly more off-kilter things. It's always tricky finding time to see the more marginal films, but they tend to be the surprises, the ones you remember. Here are some more highlights...

Film Stars Don't Die in Liverpool
dir Paul McGuigan; with Annette Bening, Jamie Bell 17/UK ***.
With a gorgeous visual style and vivid characters, this true story is packed with superb details that bring the people and situations to life. It's an offbeat narrative, rejecting the usual structures as it flickers back and forth in time over the course of about three years, but it offers some sharp comedy and big emotional moments along the way. And a nice comment on how Hollywood discards old actors.

Brawl in Cell Block 99
dir-scr S Craig Zahler; with Vince Vaughn, Jennifer Carpenter 17/US ****
After infusing the Western with horrific new life in 2015's Bone Tomahawk, S Craig Zahler is back with a thunderous reinvention of the prison movie. Set in the present day but playing out like a 1970s exploitation thriller, this increasingly grisly story unfolds with choreographed precision, grinding the audience into its emotional depths with several genuinely hideous plot turns. And it's anchored by a superbly thoughtful/fierce performance from Vince Vaughn... FULL REVIEW >http://www.shadowsonthewall.co.uk/17/brawcell.htm

Man Hunt
dir John Woo; with Zhang Hanyu, Masaharu Fukuyama 17/Jpn ***.
John Woo returns to his roots with this rampaging action movie, which also pays homage to the history of Japanese cinema as an innocent man tries to clear his name. Set in the present but shot in cheesy 1970s style, the film is a lot of fun with its convoluted plot and breathtakingly choreographed action scenes. It also features all the Woo trademarks, from shattered glass to fluttering doves. And bullets, lots of bullets... FULL REVIEW >http://www.shadowsonthewall.co.uk/17/fi.htm#manh

A Ciambra
dir-scr Jonas Carpignano; with Pio Amato, Koudous Seihon 17/It ***.
Following on from his 2015 refugee drama Mediterranea, Italian filmmaker Jonas Carpignano switches the focus to catch up with another character, a young Romany teen who is straining to come of age. Shot like a documentary with mainly non-actors, the film is abrasive and pungent, maintaining a close-up perspective on this cocky teen's forays into what will clearly become a hopeless life of criminality.

Beyond the Clouds
dir-scr Majid Majidi; with Ishaan Khattar, Malavika Mohanan 17/India ***.
Iranian maestro Majid Majidi brings his humane filmmaking approach to India with this complex story about makeshift families. While it may be a bit melodramatic and abrupt in its approach, this is a provocative drama set around the moment when revenge clashes with compassion. It's also beautifully shot with a lively, expressive cast.

The Journey
dir Mohamed Al Daradji; with Zahraa Ghandour, Ameer Ali Jabarah 17/Iraq ***
The title of this film may seem weakly generic, but this is a sharply pointed drama that uses an allegorical structure to strong effect. With a range of characters and emotions and a plot that unfolds in real time, this is an engaging, sometimes harrowing profile of a suicide bomber. It maybe somewhat arch, but it's also thoughtful and powerful in its yearning for truth.

Venezia74: Be a team player on Day 10

The sun was out again today at the Venice Film Festival, a relief after the deluge and ongoing wash-out last night on the Lido. There's definitely a sense that things are winding down here. Most journalists are gone, the films seem oddly less glamour-intensive and those of us still hanging in there are looking a bit like the walking undead. The collateral sections gave out their prizes this evening at the Venice Days villa on the beach, so we were very glad the weather held for us today. Here are the three films I watched...

Man Hunt
dir John Woo; with Zhang Hanyu, Masaharu Fukuyama 17/Jpn ***.
John Woo returns to his roots with this rampaging action movie, which also pays homage to the history of Japanese cinema as an innocent man tries to clear his name. Set in the present, but shot in cheesy 1970s style, the film is a lot of fun with its convoluted plot and breathtakingly choreographed action scenes. It also features all the Woo trademarks, from shattered glass to fluttering doves. And bullets, lots of bullets.

Hannah
dir Andrea Pallaoro; with Charlotte Rampling, Andre Wilms 17/Bel ***
With barely any plot development or dialog, this film is essentially a cold exercise in watching a person deal with the collapse of her family. Fortunately, she's played by Charlotte Rampling, an actress who rivets the audience even when she's just watching something happen off-screen. Which she does a lot in this movie. But in her eyes, the emotions of the situation are very real, even if we never quite understand why.

Custody [Jusqu'à la Garde]
dir-scr Xavier Legrand; with Denis Menochet, Lea Drucker 17/Fr ****
A punchy drama that grips the audience with a complex situation and shifting characters, this French film only gradually reveals the truth about the dissolution of a marriage. Writer-director Xavier Legrand and his skilled cast take a bold and intense approach to a story that unfolds through a series of perspective-shifting encounters. It's often painful to watch, building to a confrontation that leaves us deeply shaken.

Tomorrow is the last day of the festival, so I'll try to catch up with a couple of things I missed. And then the big awards presentation is in the evening, so I'm looking forward to some upset decisions from Annette Bening and her jury.