Category: Live Action

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Nino
(Nino)

Director – Pauline Loquès – 2025 – France – Cert. 15 – 96m

****1/2

A young man attempts to cope with the news that he has throat cancer in his first weekend following diagnosis – out in UK cinemas on Friday, June 19th

There are some films you watch which are so close to parts of your own life that it’s impossible to be objective about them. This doesn’t happen very often to this writer, but it happened on this film. Over a year ago, completely out of the blue, I was diagnosed with breast cancer. As a UK citizen I’m entitled to free healthcare, and as a cancer patient my treatment is fast-tracked. My initial experience was of being tested for cancer, waiting a week or so for the results to come back, and having the presence of the cancer confirmed. That gave me around ten days to adjust, but it was a terrible shock. Not least because my (mis)understanding was that men didn’t get breast cancer, only women did, so that couldn’t possibly be what I had. And, obviously, it was life-changing.

Cut to the film Nino. A name film, named after its central character. What follows is my own highly personalised reaction as a cancer patient / survivor.… Read the rest

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Hell or High Water

Director – David Mackenzie – 2016 – US – Cert. 15 – 102m

*****

Two brothers embark on a series of bank robberies even as two Texas Rangers follow their trail – out in the UK on 4K UHD

Entering the Texas Midlands bank early in the morning, a woman employee (Dale Dickey from the G, 2023; Iron Man 3, Shane Black, 2013) finds herself at gunpoint from two masked men in the middle of a robbery of a Texas Midlands bank. Sadly, only Mr. Clauson (William Sterchi) has the keys to the safe – and he won’t be in ‘til 8.30. At which point, one of the pair pistol whips him after his friendly, “good mornin’”. The gung-ho car driver is the elder brother Tanner (Ben Foster from Christy, David Michod, 2025; The Messenger, Oren Moverman, 2009); his quieter younger brother Toby (Chris Pine from Wonder Woman, Patty Jenkins, 2017; Star Trek, J.J. Abrams, 2009) tells him to slow down.

Another Texas Midlands interior: an old man (Buck Taylor from Yellowstone, TV series, 2018-24; Gettysburg, Ronald F. Maxwell, 1993) is talking with the teller (Kristin K. Berg) about the box of old coins he found when the pair burst in and take the money from the till.… Read the rest

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Disclosure Day

Director – Steven Spielberg – 2026 – US – Cert. 12A – 145m

The first two hours *****

The last half hour ***

Hoping to reveal to mankind the hitherto censored truth about aliens visiting Earth, a man and a woman flee their pursuers across the United States – out in UK cinemas on Wednesday, June 10th

The plot is in the title. This is the day we find out. The day when everything is revealed. As in the film’s posters. The man (Josh O’Connor from Rebuilding, Max Walker-Silverman, 2025; The History of Sound, Oilver Hermanus, 2025; La Chimera, Alice Rohrwacher, 2023) and the woman (Emily Blunt from The Fall Guy, David Leitch, 2024; Oppenheimer, Christopher Nolan, 2023; A Quiet Place, John Krasinski, 2018)) saw a deer and a bird. The implication is that that encounter caused them to see and understand; the title further suggests that they want to disseminate that understanding to the wider world. All this sounds very evangelical to me: receive the message, get the word out. You shall know the Truth, and the Truth shall set you free.

Daniel (O’Connor) has been caught with a rucksack containing a bunch of objects.… Read the rest

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Exit 8
(Hachiban Deguchi,
8番出口)

Director – Genki Kawamura – 2025 – Japan – Cert. 15 – 95m

*****

A commuter tries to leave the Tokyo Underground but finds himself retracing his steps within a repeating system from which there is no exit – out on digital Monday, June 8th and Blu-ray Monday, June 29th in the UK and Ireland

A packed carriage on the Tokyo Underground. A commuter (Kazunari Ninomiya from Letters from Iwo Jima, Clint Eastwood, 2006), heading to his first day at a new job, can’t help but notice a young mother whose baby is crying. This is not a situation anyone likes to find themselves in, least of all the young mother. One male passenger takes it upon himself to berate and belittle the woman for selfishly allowing her child to make a noise in such a crowded, public space, inconveniencing everyone present. On one level, is he simply voicing what everyone else in the carriage is thinking? On another, is he completely out of order? After all, the mother is not the child making the noise, and she is doing her best to calm it. The irate passenger is clearly not helping the situation.

Perhaps someone should intervene and tell the man to leave the woman alone.… Read the rest

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Köln 75
(Köln 75)

Director – Ido Fluk – 2025 – Germany – Cert. 15 – 112m

*****

How an 18-year-old girl came to stage what would become the biggest selling jazz album in history – narrative feature is out in UK cinemas on Friday, June 5th

At a party honouring her career as a music promoter, 50-year-old Vera Brandes (Suzanne Wolff) is upbraided by her dentist father (Ulrich Tukur from The White Ribbon, Michael Haneke, 2009; The Lives of Others, Florian Henckel Von Donnersmarck, 2006; Solaris, Steven Soderbergh, 2002; Lulu, George Moorse, Peter Zadek, TV movie, 1991) that she never amounted to anything. In a quasi-documentary sequence, she intervenes as narrator to talk about this being a really bad start, and proceeds to play, like a presenter in a music documentary, some music takes abandoned by bad starts from, among others The Cramps and Bob Dylan.

The film starts again, this time with 18-year-old Vera Brandes (Mala Emde) who enjoys hanging out with friends at jazz venues, such as the one where English club owner Ronnie Scott (Daniel Betts from September 5, Tim Fehlbaum, 2024; Alien Romulus, Fede Alvarez, 2024; Allied, Robert Zemeckis, 2016) is playing. Getting his attention by buying him an ice cream cone, Vera chats with him and, by the time she has walked her bicycle with him to his hotel has been commissioned to book him a European tour “because I can’t imagine anyone saying no to you.”… Read the rest

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Masters
of the Universe
(2026)

Director – Travis Knight – 2026 – UK – Cert. 12a – 132m

***1/2

Prince Adam must recapture Castle Grayskull and the throne of Eternia after his parents, the king and queen, have been deposed by the evil Skeletor – out in UK cinemas on Wednesday, June 3rd

As his father King Radnor (James Purefoy from High-Rise, Ben Wheatley, 2015; Ironclad, Jonathan English, 2011; Solomon Kane, M.J. Bassett, 2009) of Eternia and his trainer Duncan the Man-at-Arms (Idris Elba from A House of Dynamite, Kathryn Bigelow, 2025; Pacific Rim, Guillermo Del Toro, 12013; The Wire, TV series, 2002-4) know only too well, young Prince Adam (Artie Wilkinson-Hunt from Good Luck, Have Fun, Don’t Die, Gore Verbinski, 2025; Strike, TV series, 2017) is a bit of a wimp and generally fares badly at Duncan’s open air group combat training classes in the grounds of ancestral home Castle Grayskull. Adam’s best friend and Duncan’s daughter Teela (Eire Farrell from The Wasp, Guillem Morales, 2024; Barbie, Greta Gerwig, 2023) is much better at learning this stuff than he is.

Nothing has prepared either of the pair for real combat, such as when, out of nowhere, Castle Grayskull is attacked by the villainous Skeletor (Jared Leto from Tron: Ares, Joachim Rønning, 2025; House of Gucci, Ridley Scott, 2021; Blade Runner 2049, Denis Villeneuve, 2017; Dallas Buyers Club, Jean-Marc Vallée, 2013) and his forces who defeat the King and his Queen Marlena (Charlotte Riley from London Has Fallen, Babak Najifi, 2016; Edge of Tomorrow, Doug Limon, 2014; Easy Virtue, Stephan Elliot, 2008) and take over the castle even as Duncan, armed with various inventive items of weaponry, helps the two children to escape.… Read the rest

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Being Towards Death
(10 Jian Gan Si Dui,
10间敢死队,
lit. 10 Fearless Squad)

Director – Sicheng Chen – 2026 – China – Cert. 12a – 120m

**

The terminally ill patients thrown together in hospital Ward 10 decide to adopt a positive attitude towards both life and death – out in UK cinemas on Friday, June 5th

This has one of those weird Oriental movie titles that doesn’t translate that easily into Western languages, the number 10 referring to the ward for terminally ill patients in a particular hospital and the rest meaning a sort of optimistic equivalent of a suicide squad, but less a military type do or die operation than a determination to live in the inevitable face of inescapable, imminent death. The translators have settled on a term borrowed from philosopher Martin Heidegger which probably works better in German than in English, in which language it feels incredibly clunky. It refers to the act of living authentically in the face of death, which is very much what this movie is about. Somewhere in the middle of the narrative, Ward 10’s occupants, who feel increasingly like a close-knit family, name themselves (in the English subtitled version) the Ward 10 Fearless Squad, which would perhaps have been a better title.

Director Sicheng Chen (Detective Chinatown 3, 2021; Detective Chinatown, 2015) opens with that old cliché, the man about to jump off the top of a building.… Read the rest

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The Misfits

Director – John Huston – 1961 – UK – Cert. – 125m

****

As the Old West fades, a woman tries to navigate the men who appear to be dying with it in the final film of both Marilyn Monroe and Clark Gable – back out in UK cinemas on Friday, June 5th; the season Marilyn Monroe: Self Made Star plays BFI Southbank throughout June and July

Reno, Nevada. Local resident Isabelle (Thelma Ritter from Rear Window, Alfred Hitchcock, 1954; Pickup on South Street, Sam Fuller, 1953; All About Eve, Joseph L. Mankiewicz, 1950) meets garage tow truck driver Guido (Eli Wallach from The Good, The Bad and the Ugly, Sergio Leone, 1966; The Magnificent Seven, John Sturges, 1961; Baby Doll, Elia Kazan, 1956) as he inspects the damage to the car of Roslyn (Marilyn Monroe) who claims, from an upstairs window, that it was caused by men bumping into her vehicle to get her attention.

The worldly Isabelle attempts to coach the hapless Roslyn as to what to say in the divorce court, a service Isabelle would appear to have performed for previous house guests. Following the hearing, and a brief encounter with Roslyn’s ex Raymond (Kevin McCarthy from Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Don Siegel, 1956), the two women head out to a cocktail lounge to celebrate.… Read the rest

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We’re Nothing
at All
(Ngo Mun
Bat Si Sam Mo,
我們不是什麼)

Director – Herman Yau – 2026 – China, Hong Kong – Cert. 18 – 128m

*****

A seasoned forensics expert pieces together the story behind a bus bombing as the lives and motives of those responsible is revealed in interweaving serial flashbacks – out in UK and Ireland cinemas on Friday, May 29th

A police procedural but not exactly a thriller. This starts off with an unforgettable sequence as, below us, a bus silently weaves its way through streets. And then, without warning, explodes. You’d be forgiven for thinking that, after this bravura opening, you’re in for yet another Hong Kong cops and robbers action movie. And yet, while this is undeniably a police procedural, and contains enough gore and grisly bits to earn it a BBFC 18 certificate, it’s far from your standard HK action outing. Given that Herman Yau’s previous work has included a thriller about a cannibal serial killer The Eight Immortals Restaurant – the Untold Story aka Bunman – the Untold Story (1993) and cops and robbers bomber thriller Shock Wave (2017), this is something of a surprise.

Rather, it’s a drama. If you will, a police forensics drama. The matter of fact, real time nature of the opening sequence introduces no characters whatsoever.… Read the rest

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Power Ballad

Director – John Carney – 2025 – Ireland – Cert. 15 – 98m

*****

A rock musician reduced to playing weddings but happy with his lot meets a former boy band star who steals one of his songs – out in UK cinemas on Friday, May 29th

High heeled feet head for the dance floor. “Cel – e – brate Good Times – Come On.” The happy couple are enjoying themselves. You seem like a good crowd, says the frontman Rick (Paul Rudd from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem, Jeff Rowe, Kyler Spears, 2023; Ghostbusters: Afterlife, Jason Reitman, 2021; Ant-man, Peyton Reed, 2015), of the standards band (Rory Keenan from The Guard, John Michael McDonagh, 2011; Ella Enchanted, Tommy O’Haver, 2004; Reign of Fire, Rob Bowman, 2002; Keith McErlean from Flora and Son, 2023, Sing Street, 2016, both John Carney; Paul Reid from Flora and Son). Here’s a song from my last album.

In Rick’s mind, he and his band are on a night stage at a music festival playing to a vast, enthusiastic and indeed magical crowd holding smartphone torch lights. The wedding party don’t share his enthusiasm, however, and the floor is clearing as he inadvertently brings the evening to an end.… Read the rest