Director – A.B. Zax – 2022 – US – Cert. PG – 86m ***** A small town US bookstore and its enthusiastic, bookworm owner are seen in good times and bad, bad being the global pandemic when it’s just getting by, profits plunge and the business is threatened with closure – out in UK cinemas […]
Director – Tomu Uchida – 1965 – Japan – Cert. 15 – 183m ***** Voted third in Kinema Junpo magazine’s 1999 list of the greatest Japanese film of all time, Tomu Uchida’s A Fugitive From The Past (1965) is the pinnacle of a directorial career that also includes Bloody Spear At Mount Fuji (1955) and […]
Director – Tom Gormican – 2022 – US – Cert. 15 – 105m **** Down on his luck, actor Nick Cage (playing himself) accepts the job of spending time at a fan’s house for one million dollars, unaware that his host is a crime lord pursued by the CIA – on digital Friday, July 8th […]
Director – Naoko Yamada – 2016 – Japan – Cert. 12a – 130m **** Groundbreaking and innovative Japanese drama about school children, bullying, remorse, isolation and self-loathing – plays in the Annecy Animation Festival 2022 which is taking place in a 100% on-site edition this year right now in the Special Programmes section (a Special […]
An introduction to the films of Korea’s late and, lamentably, largely unknown director Kim Ki‑young – originally published in Manga Max, Number 8, July 1999. Reprinted here to coincide with London East Asia Film Festival (LEAFF)’s screening of Woman of Fire (1971) on Friday, October 29th. If you missed it, the restoration screens again on Friday, […]
Director – Hong Khaou – 2019 – UK – Cert. 12a – 85m ****1/2 A man who has lived in England for 30 years returns to Saigon and Hanoi to discover the Vietnam his late parents left behind – in cinemas and on Vimeo, BFI Player, Curzon Home Cinema, Amazon and elsewhere from Friday, September […]
Melancholic Director – Seiji Tanaka – 2018 – Japan – Cert. 15 – 114m ***** Melancholic Director – Seiji Tanaka – 2016 – Japan – Cert. 15 – 15m ***** On Dual Format Blu-ray/DVD, rental on Apple TV and Amazon from Monday, September 7th Quiet, unemployed Tokyo University graduate Kazuhiko (Yoji Minagawa, also the film’s […]
Director – Josephine Mackerras – 2019 – UK, France, Australia – Cert. 15 – 103m **** Available in the UK on Amazon Prime, Barbican On Demand, BFI Player, Curzon Home Cinema from Friday, July 24th Working mum Alice Ferrand (Emilie Piponnier) has everything she wants in life – a devoted husband François (Martin Swabey), a […]
Director – Dave Mclean – 2019 – UK – Cert. 15 – 91m **1/2 A local Dundee lad and his two mates get into the promotions end of the music industry and find themselves dealing with gangsters – in cinemas from Friday, September 25th Dundee lad Davie (Conor Berry) arouses the ire of a man […]
Director – Paul Bettany – 2014 – US – Cert. 18 – 105m ***** Released on DVD in 2016. First time British writer director Paul Bettany (better known as an actor) dedicated this to “the couple who lived outside my building”. Illegal Nigerian, Muslim immigrant Tahir (Anthony Mackie) and American, agnostic junkie Hannah (Jennifer Connelly) […]