Tag: answering machine

The Old Man
and the Land

Director – Nicholas Parish – 2023 – UK – Cert. 15 – 100m

*****

As he works on the land, an aging farmer hears his two adult children argue about the future of the family farm – plays UK cinemas from Friday, September 20th 2024, with previews from Monday, September 16th following its premiere in the Critics’ Picks Competition at the 27th Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival, where it was the best film out of a superb lot

Movies. You think everything’s been done, then along comes something you’ve never seen before. Or, in this case, seen or heard before.

The Old Man in question is an English farmer (Roger Marten) whose family have worked the land for generations. He’s getting on in years, so won’t be around forever. His wife died a while ago, so he’s now running the farm on his own. He has two children who have long since grown up and left home: a son (voice: Rory Kinnear) and a daughter (voice: Emily Beecham), and the big question is, when he dies, will they take over – or will they get rid of the farm?

In recent years, the UK has produced a number of rural movies that stand in stark contrast to the urban- (Often London-) based films produced.… Read the rest

Tags #GFF24, advice, alcoholic, answering machine, answering message, bereaved, British, brothers and sisters, childhood, children, conversation, countryside, documentary, Emily Beecham, English, everyday, family, farmer, fields, Glasgow Film Festival, Glasgow Film Festival 2024, illusion, image and sound, improvisation, inheritance, land, leave message, left home, London, modern world, modernise, mundane, Nicholas Parish, Nico Mensinga, obscenities, parents and children, phone, phone calls, phone turned off, PÖFF, PÖFF 2023, pub, radical, radio drama, roots, Rory Kinnear, running a farm, rural, siblings, sins of the fathers, solitary, Spain, take over, Tallinn, Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival, Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival 2023, tractor, UK, unsentimental, urban, viable business, visit, workaday, working life

Features Live Action Movies

Sky Peals

Post author By Jeremy Clarke
Post date 8 August 2024
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Director – Moin Hussain – 2023 – UK – Cert. 12a – 91m

****

When his estranged father dies after leaving him an answering machine message, a motorway service station employee starts to question the identity of his father and, by extension, of himself – out in UK cinemas on Friday, August 9th

Adam (Faraz Ayub) receives an answerphone message from his father Hassan (Jeff Mirza) who he’s not seen for years; his father hasn’t much time left, is currently near Adam’s home and wants to meet up and talk. Like the answerphone message left by her soon-to-be deceased husband for the heroine of After Love (Aleem Khan, 2020) – is a British subgenre emerging here with Muslims and bereavement? – the recording plays on Adam’s mind at his workplace, the Sky Peals motorway service station, where he does the night shift preparing burgers in the kitchen and keeps himself pretty much to himself. He complains to his superior that the system isn’t working and customers aren’t getting served their orders, but the old manager has left, and the new one doesn’t start ’til Monday. Meanwhile, people aren’t getting their orders.

The police find a dead body in a car in the service station car park.… Read the rest

Tags answering machine, answering machine message, bereavement, bridge, British, Britishness, burgers, car, car park, CCTV, Claire Rushbrook, co-worker, connect, cultural heritage, dead body, death, degraded image, disappear, dislocation, disorientation, employee, estate agent, estranged, ethnic, Faraz Ayub, father, fish-out-of-water, funeral, furniture, glitch, greeter, home, home life, house clearance, identity, indoor bridge, investigation, Islam, isolation, Jeff Mirza, kitchen, loss, manager, Moin Hussain, mosque, mothers and sons, motorway, motorway service station, move out, mundane, Muslim, Natalie Gavin, new manager, new partner, night shift, orders, Pakistani, pointless, post-industrialisation, prospective house buyers, queues, recoding, recording, relationship, relationship breakup, sell a house, selling off, Simon Nagra, single parent mum, Steve Oram, suit and tie, traditional Islamic garb, UK, uncle, vanish, white British, work social, workplace, Yorkshire

Features Live Action Movies

Jackdaw

Post author By Jeremy Clarke
Post date 24 January 2024
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Director – Jamie Childs – 2023 – UK – Cert. 15 – 97m

When ex-British army mercenary Jack Dawson – a.k.a. Jackdaw – retrieves a package from the North Sea for a client, things go horribly wrong, forcing him to go through the North East in search of answers – British action thriller is out in UK cinemas on Friday, January 26th

Jackdaw is the nickname for Jack Dawson (Oliver Jackson-Cohen from Emily Frances O’Connor, 2022; The Lost Daughter, Maggie Gyllenhaal, 2021; The Invisible Man, Leigh Whannel, 2020), an ex-army mercenary who looks after his down syndrome brother Simon (Leon Harrop). A call comes in to his answering machine for what appears to be a routine job picking up a package from the coastal waters of the North Sea, and it pays well, so might provide the much-needed opportunity for the two brothers to improve their lot. Jack is good at what he does, but the job proves to be far less routine than stated, as he finds himself first the quarry of a pursuit then discovers his brother has been kidnapped. In search of answers, he sets off on visiting a trail of contacts across the underworld of the North of England.… Read the rest