Categories
Animation Features Movies

Boonie Bears Time Twist
(Xiong Chu Mo
Ni Zhuan Shi Kong,
熊出沒·逆轉時空)

Director – Lin Huida – 2024 – China – Cert. PG – 105m

***1/2

The Boonie Bears’ friend Vick is tricked into giving up his memories of the bears in exchange for working at an office job far away in the city – out in UK and Ireland cinemas on Friday, September 13th

Although it works perfectly well as a standalone film, Time Twist is an odd place to start for anyone new to China’s long-running Boonie Bears franchise because the Boonie Bears are here relegated to secondary character status in a story about their friend Vick (once again voiced in the English language version by Paul ‘Maxx’ Rinehart). Here he’s introduced as ‘the logger’ who first fell in and became friends with the Bears (in what those already familiar with the franchise will know as their Pine Tree Mountain forest / national park home) before becoming, as a slogan hand-stamped on the image puts it, a ‘Certified Loser’.

He boards the bus to nearby Shen City, after momentarily looking wistfully at a flier on a telegraph pole reading ‘Lumberjacks / Hiring’. There, he picks up a job as an intern in an office, where his computer keyboard skills and overall ingenuity get his ‘intern’ tag replaced by one for ‘engineer’.… Read the rest

Categories
Features Live Action Movies

All Is Vanity

Director – Marcos Mereles – 2021 – UK – Cert. 15 – 72m

*

A photographer, an intern, a model and a make-up artist unite for a photography shoot that goes horribly wrong – out in cinemas on Friday, October 14th

What went wrong, exactly,? asks the opening voice over. He’s referring to a day, a night and a day when a photographer (Sid Phoenix) with an unpaid intern (James Aroussi) in tow, a model (Isabelle Bonfrer) and a make-up artist (Rosie Steel) gather in a London studio to do a photographic fashion shoot for the All Is Vanity clothing brand. There’s a degree of tension and drama between the four. The photographer has the intern’s introductory letter on his phone and tells him he takes himself far too seriously: no-one wants to know his internal conflicts or motivation. He doesn’t have nice things to say about he model either, noting before she arrives that she can be a bit of a bitch.

It doesn’t bode well when she arrives late and holds up the shoot. The photographer likes the clothes and the décor in the studio that the brand has chosen, but doesn’t think the two work together. Something strange is going on because at one point the power goes off and the problem doesn’t appear to be blown fuses.… Read the rest

Categories
Features Live Action Movies

The Good Boss
(El Buen Patrón)

Director – Fernando León de Aranoa – 2021 – Spain – Cert. 15 – 116m

***1/2

With a prestigious business competition coming up, a factory boss must keep the judges from stumbling upon his personal and corporate dirty laundry – out in cinemas on Curzon Home Cinema on Friday, July 15th

Any day now, the local committee will descend upon the Blanco Scales factory to see if the business should receive the prize money for an upcoming good business award. No-one knows exactly when they are likely to turn up, though, least of all Blanco (Javier Bardem) himself. So, clearly everything needs to be in good order to impress the judges when they turn up. Which should be fine, because Blanco prides himself in looking out for his work force and the company is one big, benevolent, happy family.

Except that it isn’t, because although Blanco sees it that way, the reality is that he only cares for his workforce insofar as doing so will enhance their productivity. He fires dissatisfied employee Jose (Óscar de la Fuente) who promptly sets up camp outside the factory gates – on land Blanco doesn’t own so he can’t evict him – and proceeds to chant anti-Blanco slogans on a daily basis.… Read the rest