What’s in a title? Well, for the 2020 indie thriller, Stalker, quite a lot. Just a cursory google will see the film lost under the weight of one of Russian cinema’s most well-regarded sci-fi epics from Andrei Tarkovsky. Then there is Neil Jordan’s 2018 film, Greta, which also goes by […]
Reviews
Masculin Féminin (1966): further adventures of Jean-Luc Godard (Review)
Criterion have supplied a typically solid set of extras for their UK Blu-Ray release of Jean-Luc Godard’s Masculin Féminin, including archive interviews with star Chantal Goya, appreciation by critic Freddy Buache and footage of Godard directing the film-within-a-film (of which, more later). If you want more, though, Emmanuel Laurent’s 2010 […]
Fast Times at Ridgemont High (1982); So Fast Even Modern Hollywood Hasn’t Caught Up With it Yet (Review)
Released to Criterion Blu-ray this week is the perennial favourite of the American high school teen comedy, 1982’s Fast Times at Ridgemont High. A film of debuts – it was the directorial debut of Amy Heckerling, the scriptwriting debut of Cameron Crowe and inevitably launched the careers of many young […]
A Glitch in the Matrix (2021): Room 237 director’s latest labyrinth (Review)
Everyone sees themselves as a hero in their own story. For some people, that’s a romantic lead, for others it’s a little guy against the system. Personally I see myself as a battered but unbowed white knight, who takes up his steed and his shield every time people start egregiously […]
I Start Counting (1969): or, when is a reissue really a box set? (Review)
The BFI’s Flipside label has a reputation for unearthing the seamier, seedier side of British cinema, which is true but it isn’t the limits of the range’s ambitions. It would be hard to fit Bill Forsyth’s That Sinking Feeling or the John Mortimer adaptation Lunch Hour into such a scheme, […]
Threshold (2020) The modern hustle of regional horror (Review)
The last Arrow Video film I covered was Clapboard Jungle, an incredible resource for the would-be filmmaker. One piece of advice reiterated by many interviewees is to get out into the world and make something. The regularly regurgitated advice is to use any immediately available camera – even a smartphone […]
Raw (2016) Raw in subtext & execution in all the right ways (Review)
Do animal lovers prevent themselves from eating meat because they love animals? There is a scene early into Raw that says otherwise. Justine (Garance Miller), a lifelong vegetarian, could not care less for animals. She is disgusted by the presence, the shedding hair, and the presumed stench of a dog in close […]
Secrets & Lies (1996) The Other Big British Film of 1996 (Review)
Britain in the 1990s. What a time to be alive. We had Britpop, we had the dawn of a new era in terms of New Labour, we had great fashions, we had great art, and we almost, almost, had football coming home. We also had some great movies too. When […]
The Darjeeling Limited (2007) Wes Anderson’s Problem Play (Review)
You may not think of Wes Anderson fandom as a rough-and-tumble affair, but I’ve seen violent gang brawls – Louis Vuitton satchels thrown in anger, men savagely beaten with their own powder-blue loafers – erupt over the issue of what the Texan director’s worst film is. For me, it’s his […]
Clapboard Jungle (2020) Part Vlog Part Vital Tool for the aspiring filmmaker (Review)
New Arrow Video documentary, Clapboard Jungle, is a curious creation. It’s a documentary about filmmaking that covers multiple strands almost simultaneously. It’s a personal diary of director Justin McConnell as he grapples with the existential angst of being an up and coming writer-director who is seeing their peers, whether talented […]