Critical Week: Driving me crazy

Screenings continue to be a bit less frequent this time of year, although I somehow found plenty of movies to watch this week. Eddie Murphy is back in action-comedy mode, starring in The Pickup alongside Pete Davidson and Keke Palmer. Their banter is enjoyable even if the plot is almost ridiculously simplistic. Jamie Lee Curtis and Lindsay Lohan are back for Freakier Friday, a hugely enjoyable 20-years-later body-swap comedy sequel. And there were two astonishingly grisly horror movies: Together stars Dave Franco and Alison Brie as a couple that's growing eerily close, while Weapons stars Julia Garner as a teacher whose students have mysteriously vanished. Both are stomach-churningly yucky in all the best ways, and both have serious subtext that holds the interest.

BEST OUT THIS WEEK:
Young Hearts • Weapons
Stans • Freakier Friday
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In addition, there was the family adventure Sketch, about a teen whose drawings come to life and menace a small town. It's well-made and engaging. There were two films from France: The Musicians is an engaging and warmly understated comedy about a group of egotistic artists who form a historic quartet. And Bambi: A Tale of Life in the Woods is a nature documentary adaptation of the classic novel about a young deer growing up. It's beautifully shot, and openly emotive. I also watched Snoopy Presents: A Summer Musical (arrives on Apple TV on 15th August), which I thoroughly enjoyed. As a lifelong Peanuts fan, the line-art animation was particularly nice. And the catchy songs were fun too. I also attended a live performance of new absurdist comedy Lost Watches at Park Theatre.

This coming week I'll be watching Jacob Elordi in On Swift Horses, Bob Odenkirk in Nobody 2, Orlando Bloom in The Cut, Matilda Lutz as Red Sonja, the animated comedy Fixed and the Chinese remake of Richard Linklater's Tape.

Critical Week: Sucker punch

There were three big movies screened to critics this week. Liam Neeson takes on the lead role (as the son of Leslie Nielsen's iconic character) for the reboot/sequel The Naked Gun, which is flat-out hilarious. And as wonderfully stupid as we hoped it would be. Pedro Pascal leads the action reboot The Fantastic Four: First Steps, alongside Vanessa Kirby, Joseph Quinn and Ebon Moss-Bacharach. Groovy visual stylings and superbly character-rooted comedy make it thoroughly engaging. And Sam Rockwell is back for the animated sequel The Bad Guys 2, which is just as funny and action-packed as the first movie. With some terrific new characters and bigger set-pieces. 

BEST OUT THIS WEEK:
Dying • The Bad Guys 2
The Fantastic Four: First Steps
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Further afield, Fiona Shaw and Katherine Waterston are as good as expected in the mother-daughter drama Park Avenue, which is involving but elusive. Even more the evasive, Gazer is a stylised mystery thriller that intrigues but never quite pays off. Slovenian drama Little Trouble Girls is also somewhat slippery in its coming-of-age story about a teen choirgirl. 

Much more gripping is Love, the second chapter in the Oslo Stories Trilogy, which features fascinating characters on offbeat journeys. I also loved watching the 100-year restoration of Eisenstein's silent masterpiece Battleship Potemkin, with a new score by the Pet Shop Boys. I'd never seen it on a big screen, and it looks and sounds gorgeous. It also feels thoroughly modern. Finally, I attended a special 3D premiere of the new trailer for Avatar: Fire and Ash, which looks properly epic. The film itself comes out in December.

This coming week I'll be watching the horror thriller Bring Her Back, British road movie The Ceremony, Dutch coming-of-age drama Young Hearts, the final chapter of the Oslo Stories Trilogy, Sex, and the Ukrainian documentary 2000 Meters to Andriivka. I'll also attend the premiere of the second season of the Netflix show Wednesday.

Critical Week: I feel pretty

While all eyes continue to be on Los Angeles as the extent of the fire damage becomes even more horrifically clear, the film industry here in London continues relatively as normal. Bafta announced their film awards nominations on Wednesday, the usual expected lists with idiosyncratic touches here and there. And among screenings this week, Michelle Yeoh popped in (on great form) for a lively Q&A at a press screening for Star Trek: Section 31, which spins her Discovery character Philippa Georgiou off for her own action-comedy mayhem. It will be interesting to see how franchise fans take on the film's riotous tone.

BEST OUT THIS WEEK:
I'm Still Here • The Writer
A Complete Unknown
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There was also a late screening of Leigh Whannell's latest reworking of a monster classic: Wolf Man. Stars Christopher Abbott and Julia Garner make the most of the emotional angles in the somewhat thin script, and the grisly suspense will keep fans entertained. Tom Hanks and Robin Wright reunite with Robert Zemeckis for Here, a gimmicky experimental film that places a camera in one place for millions of years. The effects and imagery is impressive, but the mini-melodramas feel arch. From Lithuania, the New York-set drama The Writer features just two actors as they talk over the course of one afternoon, and it's properly gripping stuff, taking on big issues and quietly intimate emotion. Finally there was Charlie Shackleton's Zodiac Killer Project, documenting the film he never got to make. It's witty and inventive, and premieres at Sundance.

This coming week, among the films I'll be watching are Steven Soderbergh's Presence, the Irish drama Four Mothers, the musician doc Luther: Never Too Much and a restored screening of Peter Weir's Picnic at Hanging Rock, which I've never seen projected.

Critical Week: Signature move

Awards season is in full swing now that the actors strike has ended, and I've had a couple of nice Q&A screenings this week (see Insta for pics). Big year-end movies are beginning to appear too. Zac Efron, Harris Dickinson, Jeremy Allen White, Lily James and writer-director Sean Durkin came along to present The Iron Claw, their astonishingly involving, powerfully moving true drama about a family of wrestlers. And Joaquin Phoenix, Vanessa Kirby and Ridley Scott were on the red carpet for the Leicester Square premiere of Napoleon, a first-rate epic biopic about the French leader that looks properly amazing on the biggest screen possible. 

BEST OUT THIS WEEK:
Rustin • Saltburn
May December
ALL REVIEWS >

Meanwhile, Colman Domingo is excellent in the biopic Rustin, about the unsung Civil Rights organiser. Alexander Payne's The Holdovers is a 1970s-style wintry delight starring Paul Giamatti and Da'Vine Joy Randolph. Julia Garner and Jessica Henwick are fierce in the harrowing Aussie Outback thriller The Royal Hotel. Taika Waititi's true-life comedy Next Goal Wins is a gently witty story about the world's worst football team, starring Michael Fassbender. Jesse Eisenberg turns into a meathead for Manodrome, a very dark drama that doesn't always work but gets us thinking. From New Zealand, the drama Punch is thoughtful and moving. Hayao Miyazaki's The Boy and the Heron is even more spectacular than expected. Godzilla Minus One is a beefy prequel set in post-war Japan. The doc American Symphony finds surprising emotion while following Jon Batiste as he composes an orchestral piece. And the Powell and Pressburger classic The Red Shoes is even more dazzling in a new restoration. I also caught up with this one...

Dance First
dir James Marsh; with Gabriel Byrne, Fionn O'Shea 23/UK ***
While director James Marsh adds considerable visual flourish to this imaginative biopic about Samuel Beckett, there's a nagging feeling that the story is incomplete, as if it is skipping across the surface of a darkly complex figure. So while the script and performances add nuance in the characters and relationships, everything feels eerily out of reach. Thankfully, superb performances as Beckett from Gabriel Byrne and especially Fionn O'Shea give the film layers of insight and context. 

Films this coming week include Disney's new animated feature Wish, Michael Mann's Ferrari, Tilda Swinton in The Eternal Daughter (a full 15 months after I missed the screening in Venice!), Mexican thriller Lost in the Night, Australian drama A Stitch in Time, deep-fake doc Another Body and arthouse cinema doc Scala!!!, plus LoveTrain at Sadler's Wells and Connor Burns: Vertigo at Soho Theatre.

The Best of 2020: 40th Shadows Awards

To put it mildly, this has been an unusual year. So there has been a wider range of films eligible, as I've included titles released direct to streaming services. I saw all of these in the calendar year 2020, regardless of release dates. My top film of the year is a true original, a blur of drama and documentary that has a lot to stay about the state of the world at the moment. The performances, improvised dialog, camerawork and editing are simply gorgeous. Some of these categories were very difficult to whittle down to 10 - it was often painful cutting the list off there, especially for lead performances.

There is rather a lot more posted on the website, including longer lists and a dazzling array of additional categories and trivia to wrap up the year: 40th SHADOWS AWARDS. Here are the top 10s...

BEST FILM:

1. 
   Nomadland (Chloe Zhao)
2. Mangrove (Steve McQueen)
3. The Mauritanian (Kevin Macdonald)
4. System Crasher (Nora Fingscheidt)
5. Notturno (Gianfranco Rosi)
6. The Half of It (Alice Wu)
7. Da 5 Bloods (Spike Lee)
8. Soul (Pete Docter)
9. The Perfect Candidate (Haifaa Al Mansour)
10. On the Rocks (Sofia Coppola)

DIRECTOR:

1. 
   Steve McQueen - Small Axe
2. Kevin Macdonald - The Mauritanian
3. Chloe Zhao - Nomadland
4. Spike Lee - Da 5 Bloods, David Byrne's American Utopia
5. Nora Fingscheidt - System Crasher
6. Florian Zeller - The Father
7. Christopher Nolan - Tenet
8. Haifaa Al Mansour - The Perfect Candidate
9. Sally Potter - The Roads Not Taken
10. Melina Leon - Song Without a Name

SCREENWRITER:

1. 
   MB Traven, Rory Haines, Sohrab Noshirvani - The Mauritanian
2. Pete Docter, Mike Jones, Kemp Powers - Soul
3. Christopher Hampton, Florian Zeller - The Father
4. Alice Wu - The Half of It
5. Haifaa Al-Mansour, Brad Niemann - The Perfect Candidate
6. Chloe Zhao - Nomadland
7. Alastair Siddons, Steve McQueen - Mangrove
8. Jayro Bustamante, Lisandro Sanchez - La Llorona
9. Eliza Hittman - Never Rarely Sometimes Always
10. James Montague, Craig W Sanger - The Vast of Night

ACTRESS:

1. 
   Julia Garner - The Assistant
2. Helena Zengel - System Crasher, News of the World
3. Jodie Foster - The Mauritanian
4. Elisabeth Moss - The Invisible Man, Shirley
5. Letitia Wright - Mangrove
6. Frances McDormand - Nomadland
7. Joanna Scanlan - After Love
8. Jessie Buckley - Misbehaviour, I'm Thinking of Ending Things
9. Carey Mulligan - Promising Young Woman, The Dig
10. Aubrey Plaza - Black Bear, Happiest Season

ACTOR:

1. 
   Tahar Rahim - The Mauritanian
2. John Boyega - Red, White and Blue
3. Cosmo Jarvis - Calm With Horses
4. Anthony Hopkins - The Father
5. Chadwick Boseman - Ma Rainey's Black Bottom, Da 5 Bloods
6. Riz Ahmed - Mogul Mowgli, Sound of Metal
7. Lee Byung-hun - The Man Standing Next
8. Sacha Baron Cohen - The Trial of the Chicago 7, Borat Subsequent Moviefilm
9. Christopher Abbott - Possessor, Black Bear, The World to Come
10. Robert Pattinson - Tenet, The Devil All the Time, Waiting for the Barbarians

SUPPORTING ACTRESS:

1. 
   Maria Bakalova - Borat Subsequent Moviefilm
2. Olivia Colman - The Father
3. Amanda Seyfried - Mank
4. Cherry Jones - A Rainy Day in New York
5. Dhay - The Perfect Candidate
6. Lesley Manville - Misbehaviour, Let Him Go
7. Talia Ryder - Never Rarely Sometimes Always
8. Orla Brady - Rose Plays Julie
9. Shailene Woodley - The Mauritanian, Endings Beginnings
10. Laura Linney - The Roads Not Taken, Falling

SUPPORTING ACTOR:

1. 
   Barry Keoghan - Calm With Horses
2. Lance Henriksen - Falling
3. Leslie Odom Jr - Hamilton, One Night in Miami
4. Jonathan Majors - Da 5 Bloods, Jungleland
5. Benedict Cumberbatch - The Mauritanian
6. Nicholas Hoult - True History of the Kelly Gang, Rebel in the Rye
7. Steve Toussaint - Red, White and Blue
8. Sverrir Gudnason - Falling
9. Harris Dickinson - County Lines
10. Alfredo Castro - The Prince

WORST FILM:

1. 
   Fantasy Island (Jeff Wadlow)
2. Jexi (Jon Lucas, Scott Moore)
3. Hillbilly Elegy (Ron Howard)
4. Buddy Games (Josh Duhamel)
5. Love, Weddings & Other Disasters (Dennis Dugan)
6. Fatal Affair (Peter Sullivan)
7. The Last Days of American Crime (Olivier Megaton)
8. Come Away (Brenda Chapman)
9. The Ringmaster (Soren Juul Petersen)
10. Ava (Tate Taylor)

N O N - F I L M   D I V I S I O N

TV SERIES:

1. 
   Schitt's Creek (CBC)
2. The Good Place (Netflix)
3. Ted Lasso (Apple)
4. The Mandalorian (Disney)
5. We Are Who We Are (HBO)
6. Dave (FX)
7. Staged (BBC)
8. Normal People (BBC)
9. I May Destroy You (BBC)
10. Shameless (Showtime)

SINGLES:

1. 
   No Time to Die - Billie Eilish
2. Hurt - Arlo Parks
3. Head & Heart - Joel Corry & MNEK
4. Coffee for Your Head - Powfu & Beabadoobee
5. Cuz I Love You - Lizzo
6. Watch Your Step - Disclosure & Kelis
7. Diamonds - Sam Smith
8. This Is the Place - Tom Grennan
9. Far Away - Jessie Reyez
10. Rainfall - Stormzy & Tiana Major9

Critical Week: Peering outsite

As cabin fever sets in with lockdown well into its second month, the longing for human contact is getting intense. But so is a sense of fear about returning to a crowded place like a cinema or pub. At least the weather has turned cold and wet in Britain, which makes going outside not nearly as tempting as it was last week. Meanwhile, watching all of these streaming movies is beginning to weigh me down - especially when even the arthouse films are so mediocre. There were two good ones this week, but the rest left me feeling rather meh. By contrast, TV series are offering a lot more variety and quality at the moment. But here are the movies...

BEST OUT THIS WEEK: 
Bad Education • The Assistant
The Roads Not Taken
PERHAPS AVOID:
Endings, Beginnings
Dangerous Lies

Sally Potter's The Roads Not Taken is a very clever film, although its relentlessly slow, introspective style will put off some audiences. The talent-heavy cast is on peak form, including Javier Bardem, Elle Fanning, Salma Hayek (above with Bardem) and Laura Linney. Julia Garner continues to build on her promise as an actress with the title role in The Assistant, a subtly insightful look at workplace toxicity. Alexandra Daddario and Tyler Hoechlin and a team of shameless scene-stealers make Can You Keep a Secret just about watchable, even though it's a very lazy romcom. Camila Mendes and Jessie T Usher lead the rather obvious thriller Dangerous Lies, which never even tries to grapple with the moral questions it raises.

A spin on the vampire genre, The Shed uses its sunny, rural setting brilliantly, combined with elements from teen movies and family dramas. A spin on the zombie genre, Blood Quantum adds intriguing elements from Canada's indigenous culture to the usual grisliness. The road comedy Vanilla has a nicely loose, improvisational tone to it, but remains a bit silly. And from Israel, 15 Years is an ambitious, alienating drama about a man who sabotages his 15-year romance as well as his closest friendship.

And I have another offbeat collection of things to watch this coming week: Liam Hemsworth in Arkansas, the horror riff Gretel & Hansel, World War II action Enemy Lines,  extortion thriller Cry for the Bad Man, working class drama Working Man, darkly romantic Clementine, evil teen horror Reborn and the documentary Spaceship Earth.

Critical Week: Up in the air

It's been a nice quiet week following the end of the London Film Festival, with only a few screenings. The Eagle Huntress is a gripping, inspiring narrative documentary that was in the LFF, but I'd missed it. It's a stunningly shot story about a 13-year-old girl in Mongolia who takes on a man's world. By contrast, the dopey teen comedy Good Kids wastes its fresh cast with a script that pretends to be a gross-out romp but turns out to be prudish and corny.

There were also three independent dramas. Lazy Eye is a thoughtful, moving story of old lovers trying to reconnect, set in picturesque Joshua Tree, California. And there were the concluding two parts of a trilogy: made in 2013, The Falls: Testament of Faith never had a UK release, so I watched it to catch up on the events following the 2012 original before seeing this year's finale The Falls: Covenant of Grace. A bit over-serious but smart, honest and moving, the three films tell a story that explores the difficult balance between sexuality and religion (the lead characters are Mormons).

This coming week, the big movie is, obviously, Marvel's Doctor Strange starring Benedict Cumberbatch. We also have Idris Elba in 100 Streets, Spike Lee's Chi-Raq, the horror romp The Darkest Dawn, the military drama Burning Blue and Werner Herzog's internet doc Lo and Behold. Plus I have a bit of fringe theatre to take my mind off the cinema this weekend.

30th Flare: Watching movies

The 30th BFI Flare: London LGBT Film Festival kicked off last night with the world premiere of The Pass in Leicester Square, followed by a terrific party at The May Fair Hotel with plenty of time to chat with the actors and filmmakers and catch up with my festival cohorts. The next nine days will play out on the Southbank with a flurry of screenings and events that explore gender, politics and lifestyle. This is one of the biggest film festivals in the UK, and the programme has grown stronger and stronger over the 19 years I have been covering it. Here are some highlights from the festival's first few days...

The Pass
dir Ben A Williams; with Russell Tovey, Arinze Kene 16/UK ****
A strikingly insightful exploration of the constraints of celebrity, this adaptation of John Donnelly's play retains its theatrical stylings, setting the action among four characters in three scenes over 10 years. But it's refreshingly complex, constantly challenging audience expectations and attitudes. And it's hugely boosted by a charismatic performance from Russell Tovey.

Naz & Maalik 
dir Jay Dockendorf; with Kerwin Johnson Jr, Curtiss Cook Jr 15/US ****
With a pointed, warm sense of humour, this wry comedy cleverly sets big themes against each other. Over the course of a single afternoon, writer-director Jay Dockendorf sends these gay Muslim teens on a small adventure that has big repercussions. It's an open-handed, hugely engaging film packed with small surprises.

Jason and Shirley
dir Stephen Winter; with Jack Waters, Sarah Schulman 15/US **
This cheeky fake documentary explores the making of the acclaimed 1967 doc Portrait of Jason. Shot with a homemade aesthetic, the film is clearly improvised, as if filmmaker Stephen Winter just pointed his camera at his actors, letting them play with the premise, then trying to make some sense of it in the editing. It may be intriguing, but this lack of structure leaves the film with no real momentum.

Inside the Chinese Closet
dir Sophia Luvara; with Andy, Cherry, Mei 15/Ned ****
This gentle, meandering documentary looks at the complexities of gay life in China, where young gay men try to blend in by marrying lesbians and adopting children. Without offering glib answers, filmmaker Sophia Luvara observes layers of issues in the generational gap, as new attitudes toward diversity strain against old traditions.

B E S T   O F   Y E A R
Grandma
dir Paul Weitz; with Lily Tomlin, Julia Garner 15/US ****
A sharp script and another beautifully measured performance from Lily Tomlin seamlessly mix comedy and pointed drama to tell an engaging story that isn't afraid to ruffle a few feathers along the way. It may feel both constructed and slight, but between the lines there's plenty of gristle to chew on... FULL REVIEW >