Month: May 2026

Our Land

Post author By Jeremy Clarke
Post date 4 May 2026
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Director – Orban Wallace – 2025 – UK – Cert. 12a – 90m

***

An exploration as to why the English people only have the ‘right to roam’ over some eight per cent of their countryside – out in UK cinemas on Friday, May 8th, with previews Tuesday, May 5th, Wednesday May 6th

This sets out its stall with a bold move: an arresting animated sequence by May Kindred Boothby in the style of woodcut prints accompanies a brief, verbal historical overview by Robert MacFarlane (the nature and geography writer whose book of the same name was recently turned into the documentary Underland, Rob Petit, 2025) of English land ownership. It goes back to the 1066 Norman invasion by William the Conqueror who declared land the property of the Crown (!) and then doled that land out to the barons that had helped him become King of England. Prior to this, any English person had the right to go anywhere within the countryside.

What follows after that visually inventive and historically informative introduction admirably manages to avoid one of the common pitfalls that far too often beset documentaries whose subject is one specific issue. Namely, presenting one point of view as the irrefutable final word on the matter.… Read the rest

Tags ’John Grant, 1066, access, acres of land, activist, aristocracy, baron, behave responsibly, behaviour, birthright, Cairngorns, campers, car park attendant, Charborough Estate, commodification, conservationist, constitution, countryside, Countryside Code, Crown property, Devon, Dorset, earl, England, England and Scotland, England and Wales, English culture, English land ownership, English landowner, exclude people of colour, field, Flete Estate, folie, garden, good and bad monarchs, government, Great Fulford Estate, Guy Shrubsole, historical precedent, history, Hugh Inge-Innes-Liliingston, Imposter Syndrome, inheritance, Isle of Bute, joggers, John Mildmay-White, King of England, Lady Isabel Tree, Land Reform (Scotland) Act of 2003, landowner, landowning class, London Transport, managed access, mass trespass event, mass trespass of 1932, Maxwell Ayamba, May Kindred Boothby, mental health, Merrie England, mixed race heritage, Mothecombe, Nadia Shaikh, nature, Nick Hayes, Norman invasion, obligation, open-source access, Orban Wallace, Our Land, peasants, people of colour, pheasant shoot, pheasants, police, private property, protocol, public access, re-enactment, rewilding, Richard Drax, right to roam, rights, Robert MacFarlane, Rothiemurchus Estate, Scotland, Scottish landowner, Scottish Outdoor Access Code, security cameras, shutting gates, slave trade. Francis Fulford, South Downs, Staffordshire, stewardship, The Book of Trespass, The Lie of the Land, Thorpe Estate, trespass, trespasser, UK, under a spell, Wainwright Prize, walkers, Who Owns England?, William the Conqueror, woodcut prints

Documentary Features Live Action Movies

Ada
My Mother the Architect

Post author By Jeremy Clarke
Post date 1 May 2026
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My Mother the Architect
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Director – Yael Melamede – 2024 – US – Cert. 12a – 81m

***1/2

A portrait by her New York-based daughter of top Israeli architect Ada Karmi Melamede – out in UK cinemas on Friday, May 1st

This opens with the filmmaker daughter asking her architect mother if she wants to speak English or Hebrew. The mother is happy to speak both. For the titles, we watch her hands drawing / designing buildings on white paper as we hear various one-liners about her qualities as an architect.

Daughter Yael lists “ a few things you should know about my mother.” Ada Karmi Melamede is eighty and goes to the office every day. She is one of a family of architects who built Israel from the ground up. She left Israel twice, once to study in London and once to spend time in New York, where Yael and her family grew up. She returned to Tel Aviv in 1983 and her career took off: she has been working ever since. The Israel Supreme Court. Airports. Universities.

Architecture seems to be her model for discussing the world. She talks about the importance of roots in buildings, decrying glass towers that have no roots, of which she clearly thinks there are too many.… Read the rest

Tags “a country being formed”, 1960s New York City, academic, Ada – My Mother the Architect, Ada Karmi Melamede, air conditioning, airport, apartment blocks, archaeology, architect, architectural drawings, architecture, back to Israel, bereavement, buildings, Chang’e, cultural aspirations, curved lines, democracy, designing, designing buildings, dictatorship, Doug Suisman, drawing, elevation, English, Frank Gehry, freehand, fulfilment, glass and transparency, guiding principles, Hebrew, idealism, intensity of light in Israel, Israel, Israel Supreme Court, Jerusalem, Kenneth Frampton, legashim, light, London, memory, mothers and daughters, move a window around, Neot Hovav Museum and City Council, New York, NYU Columbia, office, parents and children, Paul Goldberger, pencil, pencil and computer, pencil and paper, pencil line, portrait, Roman wall, Rome, roots, routes, Supreme Court Building, teaching, Tel Aviv, tenure, the Pantheon, time, under construction, university, Western Wall Heritage Foundation, words, Yael Melamede, Zoom call

Features Live Action Movies

Wild Foxes
(La Danse des Renards)

Post author By Jeremy Clarke
Post date 1 May 2026
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(La Danse des Renards)
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Director – Valéry Carnoy – 2026 – Belgium, France – Cert. 15 – 91m

***1/2

A promising young school boxer’s mindset changes following an accident which damages his arm – out in UK cinemas on Friday, May 1st

This starts off with the camera darting nimbly around a boxing ring in a gym in which two teenage fighters (one in red, one in blue) spar while their compatriots and trainer spur them on from the sidelines. Camille (Samuel Kircher), in blue, is the winner. Afterwards, five of them lark around in the changing rooms, filmed on a smartphone. (The French title, with its reference to dancing, seems particularly apt here.)

A coach journey. Camille rehearses his fighting moves in a mirror and hangs up the medal round his neck. And on a football field with a team mate. And back in the gym. Which routine is interrupted when his trainer Bogdan (Jean-Baptiste Durand) summons him for a talk with the director. The dates have come through for the Brussels competition in June, but rather than train alongside his professional team mates, Cam wants to stay at the gym and practice with his friend Matteo (Faycal Anaflous) – who has been warned by the gym, one more screw up and you’re out.… Read the rest

Features Live Action Movies

I’ve Seen All I Need To See

Post author By Jeremy Clarke
Post date 1 May 2026
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Director – Zeshaan Younus – 2025 – US – Cert. 15 – 84m

A woman mourns her sister, dead in circumstances which remain far from clear – impenetrable drama is out in UK cinemas on Friday, May 1st

NSFW

Parker (Renee Gagner from Gazer, Ryan J. Sloan, 2024) sits on a chair and delivers a monologue. Apparently she’s doing an audition for an acting part. Either way, she rambles on about being finger-fucked in a car by a man who would later be turned to red mist as he served abroad with the military. The sequence, which consists of one unbroken, locked-off camera shot, is unlikely to engage you on any level. And it’s typical of everything else about this lacklustre effort.

In the middle comes a sequence in which car headlights appear in a night of pouring rain, and a series of characters gather outside a warehouse. One of them pulls out a gun. Shots are heard to be fired, by which time the picture has cut to a sunset landscape so you could be looking at the end of this mysterious meeting that looks like it isn’t going to go well, or it might be unrelated. It’s hard to tell.… Read the rest

Tags acting, actor, actress, audition, bar, drink, ghost story, gun, headlights, I’ve Seen All I Need To See, military, noir, pouring rain, Renee Gagner, Rosie McDonald, sister, US, warehouse, Zeshaan Younus