Tag: ordinary

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Rebuilding

Director – Max Walker-Silverman – 2025 – US – Cert. PG – 96m

****

A divorced man whose home has been destroyed by a forest fire begins to reconnect with his pre-teenage daughter – out in UK cinemas on Friday, April 17th

This opens with an image of red hot embers rising and falling a black night sky. A couple of brief, opening, expository shots is all we are shown of the tragedy, but it’s enough: much of the remainder of the narrative takes place against a backdrop of leafless, tall, burned trees, an area of likely great former beauty now reduced to desolation. This is not the cinema of big budget disaster scenarios with no-holds barred pyrotechnic effects: it’s something altogether much lower key and quieter, an exploration of the effect of natural disasters on the lives of those people who survive them.

The fire has destroyed the 20 acres of property on the edge of the forest where Dusty (Josh O’Connor from The History of Sound, Oliver Hermanus, 2025; Mothering Sunday, Eva Husson, 2017; God’s Own Country, Francis Lee, 2017) lives, an area of outstanding natural beauty. He sells off his surviving livestock at an auction, then calls in on his ex-wife Ruby (Meghann Fahy from The White Lotus, TV series, 2022) who lives in the nearby town with their pre-teen daughter Callie-Rose (Lily LaTorre) and his mother-in-law Bess (Amy Madigan from Weapons, Zach Cregger, 2025; Pollock, Ed Harris, 2000; Field of Dreams, Phil Alden Robinson, 1989).… Read the rest

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Round 13
(13ème Round)

Round 13

Director – Mohamed Ali Nahdi – 2025 – Tunisia, Cyprus, Qatar, Saudi Arabia – 85m

*****

A young boy is diagnosed with a tumour in his arm, and his parents must guide him through his ensuing medical treatment – premieres in the Critics’ Picks Competition of the 29th Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival

My third Critics’ Picks entry is another five star movie. Which is great, but once again, I wonder, for how many more films can this last? What IS true is that this is not another ‘urban unease and finding your way in the world’ movie like China Sea (Jurgis Matulevičius. 2025) or Mo Papa (Eeva Mägi, 2025), it’s something altogether different.

Sabri (Hedi Ben Jabouria) is a very ordinary eight-year-old boy who likes boxing. We first meet him out with his dad in the cinema where the pair are watching a black and white movie about boxing. They return home where Sabri looks at his dad’s old photos of his days as a boxer in Rome.

They are interrupted by Sabri’s mum Semia whose name curiously isn’t spoken until about ten minutes before the end of the movie (Afef Ben Mahmoud) and who wants to know why she can never reach Kamel (Helmi Drid), the boy’s dad, on the phone.… Read the rest

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The Zone of Interest

Director – Jonathan Glazer – 2023 – UK, Poland – Cert. 12a – 106m

*****

A drama about the everyday, domestic lives of the Commandant of Auschwitz, his wife, and their family – out in UK cinemas on Friday, February 2nd

How do people sleep at night? If they do bad things? Well, some people who do bad things are tormented by them. They sleep badly. Their conscience, however repressed by them, disturbs them. The others? Well, they seem to sleep soundly.

The Zone of Interest is about people who, as part of their daily routine, do or at least consent to, even inaugurate, unspeakable things. These people are a respectable married couple and their extended family. The focus here is on the ordinary, everyday activities they pursue rather than the unspeakable activities. A nice bathing trip to the river; a later panic when there might be an infection in the river and family members are bathing in it. (The bad stuff seeps into the everyday, routine, speakable stuff, it seems.) Mum taking the little one round the garden and telling her the names of the flowers. Mum running an efficient household, with an army of servants. Mum trying on a second-hand, fur coat.… Read the rest

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Nitram

Director – Justin Kurzel – 2022 – Australia – Cert. 15 – 112m

*****

A drama re-imagining of the events in the life of a young man leading up to Tasmania’s 1996 Port Arthur Massacre – out in cinemas on Friday, July 1st

This extraordinary character study starts off with a sense of foreboding which never really lets up. Children are interviewed at the Royal Tasmania Hospital’s Burns Unit and asked how their accidents occurred. We expect cautionary tales of lessons learned. But the second child interviewed states matter-of-factly that he still plays with firecrackers, Then we see Nitram (Caleb Landry Jones) as a grown youth, some years later, doing exactly that in the garden of the house in which he lives with his parents, to the annoyance not only to his parents who have to put up with it but also to the neighbours.

His mum (Judy Davis), worn down by years of such behaviour, insists Nitram surrender the fireworks to his father (Anthony LaPaglia) who is weighed down by financial worries – he needs to get a loan off the bank – and ineffectual at discipline. She also insists he put his filthy overalls in the wash (and they are pretty disgusting) before sitting down to eat dinner with them, which he then does, returning to the table in his underpants, which she lets pass with no comment since he’s complied.… Read the rest