In 1940s China, British ex-pat child James Graham (Christian Bale) is a spoiled, entitled little brat, until World War II arrives with an invasion from Japan, separating him from his parents and leaving him to fend for himself in his abandoned home before eventually becoming interned in a prisoner-of-war camp.
Jeffrey Beaumont (Kyle MacLachlan) returns from university to his smalltown home of Lumberton to look after the family hardware store when his father is hospitalised from a heart attack. After visiting the hospital, Jeffrey discovers a severed human ear in the woods, and begins investigating into its origin, leading him to team up with policeman’s daughter Sandy (Laura Dern) and lounge singer Dorothy Vallens (Isabella Rossellini) who seems connected in some way. Also connected is local gas-huffing psychopath crime lord Frank Booth (Dennis Hopper) and his crew of cronies, but how deep is Jeffrey going to delve into the seedy world beneath the perfect veneer of suburbia?
In 1860s Massachusetts, the March family has four daughters, all with different artistic aspirations. Meg (Emma Watson) is an actress who is happy complying to society’s ideals of feminity, Jo (Saoirse Ronan) is an aspiring writer with intentions to make it on her own, cherubic Beth (Eliza Scanlen) is a musician, favouring the piano, and Amy (Florence Pugh) a painter who sometimes feels put out as the youngest child (although it was only in researching for this post that I discovered she was supposed to be the youngest, as it felt like Beth far more filled out that role). Their mother Marmee (Laura Dern) tries to mould them into good, charitable adults whilst their father is fighting in the American Civil War, and over the seven year period of the film, they all have varying dalliances with their wealthy neighbour’s grandson Laurie (Timothee Chalamet).
This review is part of the LAMB’s Oscar coverage this year, in which each award category and Best Picture nominee has its own dedicated post. As no-one else seemed interested in Bohemian Rhapsody I offered to cover it instead, then languished for a few weeks working out just how I was going to do that. I’m posting it here as well just in case the makers of the 1001 book lose theirs minds even more than usual and add it to the 2019 edition. Here we go.
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Cleo (Yalitza Aparicio) is a live-in maid for a middle class family in Mexico City in the 1970s. We follow a year in the life of the household, seen primarily through the interactions with Cleo and her personal life.
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Eleanor “Nell” Lance (Julie Harris) is a meek, tormented woman who spent the entirety of the past eleven years caring for her invalid mother until her recent passing. Left with seemingly no real purpose in life, barely anywhere to stay and only half a car to her name, Nell jumps at the chance to partake in a study focusing on people with histories of paranormal occurrences staying at the notoriously haunted Hill House. The only other candidate is the far more free-spirited Theo (Claire Bloom), and the two are joined by the scientist running the experiment, Dr. Markway (Richard Johnson) and the sceptical future heir to the building, Luke (Russ Tamblyn). Upon arriving at the house, however, it becomes clear to Nell that she is meant for more than just an experiment, and the house itself may have other plans for her.
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James Bond is back back back in his tenth adventure, this time being forced to team up with a Russian counterpoint, Agent XXX, on the hunt for a microfilm with information on some missing nuclear submarines.
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This review was originally written for Blueprint: Review.
Todd Solondz is almost the dictionary definition of an acquired taste when it comes to film. For most directors, subjects like rape, dead parents, domestic terrorism and a lifetime of remorse wouldn’t necessarily inspire a comedy, yet they’re all par for the course with Solondz in this darkly comic anthology following the various owners of an ambivalent female dachshund.
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When siblings Johnnie (Russell Streiner) and Barbra (Judith O’Dea) visit their father’s grave to lay flowers, they notice a strange man ambling towards them, who attacks when he arrives. Johnnie appears to be taken down protecting his sister, who flees and finds shelter at a nearby house after discovering dozens more mindless attackers. Soon Ben (Duane Jones) shows up at the house too, and reveals this outbreak of unprovoked attacks seems to be happening everywhere. Ben safe-guards the house from the attackers, but it’s when they discover five more people hiding in the basement that the real problems arise.
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After a crew of thieves – including two corrupt cops – partially botch the robbery of a bank’s safety deposit box for Russian gangsters, the team are given another chance and their fee is withheld until she successfully steal more information, key to the release of the gang’s boss. The only way to pull off the heist is to distract all the local cops long enough for a decent window of time, and the corrupt officers Marcus (Anthony Mackie) and Franco (Clifton Collins Jr.) believe the best way to do this is to pull a “Triple 9”, to kill a cop. And they think they’ve got the perfect target in Marcus’ new greenhorn partner Chris (Casey Affleck), the nephew of prominent Detective Sergeant Jeffrey Allen (Woody Harrelson). Meanwhile, the thieves’ leader Michael (Chiwetel Ejiofor) receives grief from the Russian boss’ wife Irina (Kate Winslet), whose sister (Gal Gadot) is the mother of Michael’s son. The rest of Michael’s team is comprised of Russell (Norman Reedus) and his younger, unstable brother Gabe (Aaron Paul).
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Life Vs Film 