Disclaimer: Frustratingly, there are still a few nominated films that haven’t been released in the UK yet, so I’ll be basing my predictions for those more off of the general consensus The biggest night in the British film calendar is now only a day away, and the anticipation is reaching fever pitch. It is one…
Arriving with an impressive 13 Oscar nominations, Guillermo del Toro brings us another fantastical tale, one featuring an amphibian man, that, despite its other-worldly qualities, is a deeply human tale of love. It is pure cinematic magic. Set in the 1960s, during the Cold War, the film follows Elisa (Sally Hawkins), a mute woman who…
After last year’s ceremony deeply influenced by the Trump era, and this year’s awards circuit being completely characterised by Time’s Up and MeToo, the run up to the Oscars has prompted the usual ‘I don’t want your politics’, ‘awards shows shouldn’t be political’, and the general notion that those in the film industry shouldn’t be…
The latest from Paul Thomas Anderson is hard to categorise. Yes, it is a period piece, it is a romance, but it is also, in some sense, a comedy of psychological games that eventually pushes its characters to the verge of absurdity. It is an entrancing and intriguing piece, prepared to challenge its audience. Set…
2018 marks the 90th Oscars, and, as would be expected, there is a lot of focus on that fact, both from within the Academy, and from outside observers. Sadly, despite the many celebratory events and posts on social media, the emphasis on 90 years, also places emphasis on the discrimination and lack of diversity the film…
This January brings around some of the smash hits of last year’s end of Summer season, as well as a couple of gems that might have flown under your radar. Detroit Kathryn Bigelow’s dramatization of the horrific events at the Algiers Motel during the Detroit riots is a gripping and rage-inducing affair, that sadly tells…
With the Oscar nominations rolling in last week, this year’s batch features quite a few noticeable entries that stand out as untypical Oscar fare, which, based on plot and content alone (i.e. excluding buzz and praise), you wouldn’t immediately think the Oscars would be interest in. There are a huge number of indies in this…
Once again, we have reached the beginning of the fever pitch of Awards Season; the announcement of the Oscar nominations. As was to be predicted, The Shape of Water has taken the lead with 13 nominations (almost tying with the record), followed by Dunkirk with eight, and Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri with seven. The…
Playwright-turned-filmmaker Martin McDonaugh’s work is characterised by its pairing of darkly comic sensibilities with crime led drama, and he continues that thread here. Three Billboards is an astonishing film whose story is derived from a tragic event, yet the film manages to be equally laugh-out-loud hilarious, and utterly heartbreaking. Seven months on from the rape…
The film that gained a lot of complicated publicity due to the controversy prompting a last minute recasting has arrived on our screens a mere couple of months since the Spacey sexual assault allegations surfaced. The result is not the mess that could have resulted from a huge, quick reshoot, but a solid thriller-drama where…
