Last Seen Movie - The Latest Movie You Have Seen; ratings

[Reza]

Deep Water (Adrian Lyne, 2022) 4/10

Director Lyne ("9 1/2 Weeks", "Fatal Attraction", "Indecent Proposal", "Lolita", "Unfaithful") returns to the screen after 20 long years and tries hard to maintain his lurid reputation. If there's any flaw here its that he is a tad too slow to get to the juicy stuff which unfortunately turns out not to be all that lurid after all. The premise is very promising though. The story, based on the novel by Patricia Highsmith, was first adapted in 1981 as the french film, "Eaux profondes" with Jean-Louis Trintignant and Isabelle Huppert. Here Ben Affleck plays the cuckold, desperately in love with his sexy European wife (Ana de Armas), who likes to walk around topless at home and openly indulges in affairs with young men. This listless marriage is tolerated by the husband just as long as the word "divorce" is never mentioned for the sake of their cute precocious daughter. When he decides to start murdering his wife's lovers the dynamic of their relationship shifts but in a surprising direction. The problem with Hollywood has always been to depict sex in a certain squeamish manner, almost as if calling out to the hijab to come and cover up. Lyne, especially during the 1980s, was pretty much no-holds barred when it came to sex and sleaze on the screen. Rip roaring kinky sex was unabashadly on display which made a couple of his films into guilty pleasures. While de Armas bares her body - she's Spanish so nudity is no big deal - the violent aspect of the plot is too softly presented. We want blood, sex and gore. Instead we literally get Disney, which is the studio at the helm, making its first erotic film in a very long while. The studio obviously has no clue about the meaning of the word "erotic". It's no wonder the film's best performance comes from the little tot - Grace Jenkins - who plays the all knowing little daughter. One eagerly awaits Bond girl de Armas' next project - the NC-17 rated film based on Joyce Carol Oates' novel "Blonde" about Marilyn Monroe.

Julia (Fred Zinnemann, 1977) 9/10

Alvin Sargent's screenplay, based on a chapter of Lillian Hellman's book of memoirs, "Pentimento", mainly concentrates on a cloak-and-dagger episode in the life of Hellman (Jane Fonda), the famous American playwright, who is seen here as a struggling writer living with her mentor and lover, famed author Dashiell Hammett (Jason Robards), who finally tastes sucess when her play, "The Children's Hour", makes her the toast of Broadway. The film's main thrust, however, is about the deep friendship between Hellman and her lifelong friend Julia (Vanessa Redgrave) who came from a privileged background but spent her entire life fighting the then growing menace of fascism. Hellman is recruited by one of Julia's compatriots (Maximillian Schell) to smuggle money to her in Berlin while enroute to the USSR for a promotional tour. The film's highlight is the scene set in a Berlin cafe where the two friends meet after many years - with two great star actresses getting to emote as a visibly shaken and upset Fonda is consoled by the luminous Redgrave, whose brief moments throughout the film provide her with an etherial quality. The film was later criticized that the screenplay failed to capture the friendship between the two women who seem awkward in each other's company. There was further controversy when it was discovered that there was no real person by the name of Julia and Hellman had created the character from an amalgamation of different people. Viewed from this point of view the character of the often mysterious Julia comes sharply into focus as a Christ-like figure to whom Hellman looks up to with a great deal of awe. Superbly acted film, with outstanding production values, won three Academy awards - for the screenplay and for both Robards and Redgrave. In addition it was nominated for Best Picture, for the performances by Fonda & Schell, for Zinnemann's direction, Douglas Slocombe's cinematography, Anthea Sylbert's costume design, George Delerue's score and for film editing. Meryl Streep makes her film debut as a bitchy society dame.

Star! (Robert Wise, 1968) 4/10

Ponderous film just goes on and on making Julie Andrews sing every five minutes as she poses in front of the camera wearing a new outfit with each scene change. The lovely costumes were nominated for an Academy award but pity they forgot to concentrate on the screenplay as the studio seemed hell bent to duplicate Andrews' success in "The Sound of Music" - she was under contract for a second film - so it was decided to bring the life of Thirties British revue star and stage performer Gertrude Lawrence to the screen. Andrews acts, sings and dances her heart out as she is pursued by a bevy of admirers (Michael Craig, Richard Crenna, Robert Reed) while she befriends and performs on stage with Nöel Coward (Daniel Massey - who was actually Coward's godson and was nominated for an Academy award for his witty performance). Many of the scenes in the film are remarkably similar to "Funny Girl", the rags-to-riches story about stage performer Fanny Brice, also coincidently released the same year. At almost three hours this film is overstuffed and rightfully crashed at the boxoffice being one of several expensive musicals at the time that brought the Fox studio to its knees. Episodic film is beautiful to look at although despite being set in London, Paris and the Riviera there are far too many scenes with back projection which confirm that the cast never left the studio lot. Although the film purports to be about Lawrence it is quite clear that we are watching a film about Andrews who never does manage to resemble Lawrence - Maggie Smith most certainly would have been a better casting choice. An "A" for effort - the film got a slew of Oscar nods - for Ernest Laszlo's dazzling cinematography, the costume, production and sound design, the score and title song and one for Daniel Massey. Unfortunately the audience in the late sixties was mostly unaware of Gertrude Lawrence whose star shone bright during the Twenties and Thirties so having Andrews have a go at singing and dancing, and that too at such an inordinate length, was just not going to cut it.

Starting Over (Alan J. Pakulla, 1979) 5/10

Divorce was big in Hollywood films during the late 1970s and none bigger than in "An Unmarried Woman" where Jill Clayburgh gets dumped by her husband, and following much angst takes up with a sexy painter (Alan Bates) but makes a feminist point by going on alone through life. A year later and she is back here tackling the singles scene once again as an insecure school teacher although the screenplay (written by James L. Brooks and based on Dan Wakefield's novel) is about a divorced man (Burt Reynolds) who gets dumped by his ambitious songwriter wife (Candice Bergen) who he cannot forget. Antiseptic comedy-drama was an attempt by Reynolds to shake off his yahoo action screen persona but he merely ends up floundering. Clayburgh, as the mousy woman he dates, was inexplicably nominated for an Oscar - she was on a brief roll back then with important films back-to-back, although her character doesn't quite gell with Reynolds. Candice Bergen, as the daffy ex-wife who insists on singing her awful songs in a hideous voice, was also nominated for an Oscar. While she is not quite funny here her performance seems to be a warm-up towards her very funny role as Murphy Brown on tv almost a decade later. Silly sitcom-like situations also don't help. Reynolds was famously annoyed later on when both Clayburgh and Bergen received Oscar nominations while he was ignored and not helping at all was his off-screen lover (Sally Field) winning the Oscar that year for "Norma Rae".

[Reza]

The Adam Project (Shawn Levy, 2022) 5/10

A recent article had an apt comment about the kind of audience - "developmentally retarded adults acting like kids" - Hollywood caters to. This, too, is one of them and sitting through it makes me a retard as well. Time travel nonsense has a pilot (Ryan Reynolds) in 2050 going back in time to discover why his wife (Zoë Saldana) disappeared. He teams up in 2018 with his younger self (Walker Scobell) and his neglectful but loving and brilliant quantum physicist dad (Mark Ruffalo) who wrote the algorithm necessary for controlled time travel. They come up against the evil businesswoman (Catherine Keener) who funded the scientist's research and took over the project after his death in 2022. Lots of whizzing noisy action set pieces where the kid's expertise in box games comes in handy as he annihilates soldiers sent to kill them. Hollywood, through its constant barrage of similar junky comic flicks, continues to keep us stuck in retard mode. We need to come up for air sometimes by inhaling a Kurosawa, Bergman, an Allen & Antonioni or a Fellini to understand that there are stories about normal people too who don't go whizzing through the air.

Scenes From a Marriage (Hagai Levi, 2021) 5/10

American remake of the iconic 1973 Swedish miniseries (by Ingmar Bergman) gets a gender flip in this outing. A long married couple, with a daughter, suddenly finds their relationship in a twist when the wife (Jessica Chastain) announces that she has been having an affair and has fallen in love with a much younger man. She is the family breadwinner while her husband (Oscar Isaac) is a stay-at-home writer and dad. He cannot understand why she wants out of the marriage and even willing to abandon their daughter for long periods of time. Searing and often harrowing look at a collapsing marriage has great chemistry between the two stars but the screenplay does not fully explain the wife's state of confusion about her marriage which tilts the drama in favour of Isaac who is superb as the bewildered man trying to understand his wife's decision. The story covers several years as the couple struggle to live their independent lives while they both often meet up for sexual trysts which result in further angst. This should have been made as a feature length film instead of a 5-part miniseries which begins to drag after a while. Stick to the version by Bergman which has influenced many filmmakers over the years and has outstanding performances by Erland Josephson (in this original version its the husband who wants out of the marriage), Liv Ullmann and Bibi Andersson.

Vicky Cristina Barcelona (Woody Allen, 2008) 6/10

Second tier-Allen has surprisingly not too much of Barcelona where the film was mostly shot. Two American tourists, also close friends, take a trip to Spain. Vicky (Rebecca Hall) the methodical one, with a steady boyfriend back in New York, is appalled when a Spanish painter (Javier Bardem) invites both girls for a weekend holiday with him which also includes a visit to his bed. After persuasion by Cristina (Scarlett Johansson), the unconventional friend, they both go ahead with the trip. Despite the initial incredulous hesitation she goes ahead and has a one-night stand with the sensual man. When her boyfriend arrives planning a quickie wedding in Spain she agrees to get married while her friend takes up with the painter. The affair is going great guns when the man's former, very tempestuous, wife (Penélope Cruz), moves in with them after a failed suicide attempt. The threesome soon practice free love while she discovers her vocation as a photographer after being encouraged by both her lovers. Things take an ugly turn when the American decides to step aside resulting in gunplay by the former wife. Allen's familiar neuroses about sex and love gets re-worked over, Johansson takes on the mantle of Diane Keaton and Mia Farrow (as Allen's new muse) and Cruz won an undeserved Oscar.

[gunnar]

Portrait of a Lady on Fire (2019) - 8/10 - Near the end of the 18th Century, a female painter is hired to paint a portrait of a woman to be sent to her prospective husband. However, the subject is reluctant to be painted. This was well acted and an interesting film. Choosing to go with natural sounds instead of a soundtrack seems like it was the right decision.

In a Better World (2010) - 8/10 - Anton is a Swedish doctor who splits time between his home in Denmark and a Sudanese refugee camp. He is separated from his wife and his older son Elias gets bullied on a daily basis. Christian is an angry young man who moves back to Denmark from London after the death of his mother. He ends up in the same class as Elias and stands up to the bully who torments his new friend. The two families are each going through tough times, but the friendship between the two boys can make matters better or worse (or both). It's a well acted drama for the most part.

Salaam Bombay! (1988) - 7.5/10 - Krishna lives on the streets of Bombay, working part time for a tea seller and doing odd jobs to try and save 500 rupees so that he can go home. His friends are the other street kids, a drug seller, and a couple of the local prostitutes. We get to see the daily lives of Krishna and some of his friends. Krishna becomes infatuated with a new young girl who is brought in to the brothel. It's a pretty good movie and I thought the acting was also good.

[gunnar]

Turning Red (2022) - 7/10 - A young girl discovers that she now turns into a giant red panda when her emotions get out of control. It causes problems, but also creates opportunities. It's a decent Pixar film that gets more fun as it goes along. I'd put it below Encanto and Luca from last year, but it's entertaining, though fairly predictable as well.

Booksmart (2019) - 8/10 - It's the day before graduation and two of the top senior girls realize that they have spent all of their time studying and should have had more fun while in school. They set out to find the huge party that is happening that night, but it is harder to find than they thought it would be. I thought it was pretty funny and I could relate to a lot of it.

Leave No Trace (2018) - 8/10 - A 13 year old girl (Thomasin McKenzie) has been living deep in the woods in a Portland, Oregon park with her father (Ben Foster) for the past four years. He is a veteran suffering from PTSD and he has been keeping up her education while in the woods. They are discovered by authorities and brought in for testing and assessment. McKenzie and Foster are each very good in their roles.

[gunnar]

Parallel Mothers (2021) - 7/10 - Penelope Cruz stars as Janis, a woman in her 40s who unexpectedly gets pregnant. While in the hospital, she befriends her roommate Ana (Milena Smit), a much younger woman who is also expecting a baby. The movie wasn't bad and the acting from Cruz and Smit was good, but I'd rate it as my least favorite of the six Almodóvar films that I've seen so far. The side plot with the mass grave from the Franco era seemed a bit out of place even if it did tangentially relate to the main story.

Ghostbusters: Afterlife (2021) - 7.5/10 - Egon Spengler's daughter and grandchildren move to his farm in Oklahoma after his death. I thought the movie was a lot of fun. It may have reused elements from the first film, but it did so in an entertaining fashion.

The French Dispatch (2021) - 6/10 - I've enjoyed the other Wes Anderson films that I've seen, but I found this one to be mostly boring and uninteresting. It is certainly visually stylish as expected and I did like the animated sequence toward the end plus scattered bits throughout the film, but overall I'd call this one a miss for me.

The Worst Person in the World (2021) - 8/10 - Julie is a young woman who changes her mind about her major, her career path, her boyfriend, etc. with some regularity. Eventually she meets Aksel, a successful comic strip artist who is a bit older than her and more settled in what he wants. The movie is told in a number of sections and the acting is very good. I think that there are many people like Julie in a number of ways who find it hard to stick to one career plan because they don't really know what they want yet.

[Reza]

The Batman (Matt Reeves, 2022) 7/10

This Batman is relentlessly dark. LITERALLY. The film appears to have been shot with the camera lens covered with dark muslin. It was such a bloody chore to see the actors on the screen as none of the buildings or rooms in Gotham City had light bulbs. And every shot outdoors was set during nightime or at dawn. So yet more darkness. I was actually surprised to see that Peter Sarsgaard had a role in the film which I discovered during the end credits. The screenplay sets the story during an early phase in Bruce Wayne's adult life while he is still fumbling with his Batman persona. Robert Pattinson, who is very good in the part, plays him very scarred with life, and with the relentless doom and gloom related to rampant crime on the streets. His parents' traumatic murders also hang heavy over him although there is no flashback to their death. He seems tongue tied around Selena Kyle - Catwoman (Zoë Kravitz), who is a waitress with a side business as a drug dealer, a cat burglar and is bisexual (which again was a plot point, amongst many, that totally escaped me in the dark). Batman's relationship with Alfred (Andy Serkis), his faithful butler, is curt, formal and quite hostile unlike how the butler was portrayed in previous film versions by both Michael Caine and Jeremy Irons. And Jeffrey Wright makes a fine Lieutenant Gordon allowing this new franchise to show the cop climb up the ladder to Commissioner in subsequent sequels. Causing mayhem in every possible form are assorted villains - The Riddler (Paul Dano), a serial killer who sets off bombs around the city, the Penguin (Colin Farrell stuck under tons of prosthetics) who is a small time mobster running a nightclub, and Catwoman's father (John Turturto) who is a Gotham crimelord. The film ends with a spectacular action set piece involving a flood. So much of the film's excitement is lost due to the dark images as its so difficult to decipher what is going on. Look forward to future installments with Pattinson.

Days of Glory (Jacques Tourneur, 1944) 8/10

Hard to believe but once upon a time the United States considered Russia to be an important ally. Much praise was lavished on a country which, suddenly post-WWII, became seriously so persona non grata that Americans actually turned in on themselves to betray their own fellow countrymen suspected of being communist. That hilarious (and ridiculous) about turn would take place some years on from the timeline of this film. Rousing wartime propaganda is set in Russia during the Nazi invasion and focuses on a group of guerrillas hiding in an underground bunker in the woods from where they emerge to kill german soldiers. Their leader is a former engineer (Gregory Peck in his film debut) who with rabid precision and mounting excitement goes for the kill. He also finds time for romance with a Russian ballerina (Tamara Toumanova - the celebrated Russian prima ballerina making her film debut) who strays from her troupe and finds herself at the bunker. Stock characters all around - poetry spouting peasant, teenage partisan also in love with the ballerina, his naive young sister wanting to marry her own brother and a female fighter also in love with their leader. Hollywood's American response to the bravery of Russia and its people against a common enemy. The film failed with both critics and the public at the time and is since looked at with embarrassment ever since America decided Russia was a menace and a threat. However, it is an interesting film and despite the corny dialogue during the sappy love scenes the film is moving and both stars are surprisingly very effective and etherial (as most big stars came across on screen). This mostly set-bound film is beautifully shot by Tony Gaudio and was nominated for an Academy award for its Visual Effects.

Trail Street (Ray Enright, 1947) 6/10

Bat Masterson (Randolph Scott) brings law and order to a Kansas town as he goes after a corrupt land baron. George "Gabby" Hayes provides comic relief, lovely Anne Jeffreys provides saloon-girl oomph and Robert Ryan surprisingly does not scowl playing the good guy also facing up to the cattle baron and his henchmen. Visually striking Western is a cut above the regular shoot 'em ups.

[gunnar]

Ascension (2021) - 7/10 - This documentary takes a look at average Chinese citizens. It starts with people being recruited to work in factories and then shows people working in a number of different factory settings. We also get to see people undergoing a variety of training sessions, creating social media videos, and much more. There is no narration so we get to hear what people are talking with each other about and draw our own conclusions. I thought it was interesting, though it can seem much longer than it actually was without a narrative thread.

Spencer (2021) - 8/10 - The movie takes place during a visit to Sandringham House over the Christmas holidays in the early 1990s. You definitely can feel the suffocation and isolation that Diana is feeling. She's trapped by all of these royal protocols, eyes constantly watching her, and struggles with her mental health. Kristen Stewart does a pretty nice job in the role and it makes for a good psychological drama.

Drive My Car (2021) - 9/10 - Yusuke Kafuku is a well known stage actor and director who is brought in to put on a Chekhov play in Hiroshima. He is assigned a driver for the duration of the play who will drive him whenever he needs to get around. This is a beautiful film with excellent acting. It's nearly 3 hours long, but didn't feel like it. It's now my favorite film from 2021.

[Reza]

Tammy (Ben Falcone, 2014) 1/10

An eclectic cast surrounds the film's two main protagonists. Dan Aykroyd and Allison Janney play Tammy's concerned parents, Kathy Bates and Sandra Oh play frisky lesbian lovers and Toni Collette plays the next-door neighbor who moves in with Tammy's husband and Gary Cole and Mark Duplass play love interests of the film's protagonists. Unfortunately both lead characters come across as total assholes and nothing they do (in their roles as complete and utter fuck-ups) is even remotely funny which defeats the purpose of the film as its supposed to be a comedy. Tammy (Melissa McCarthy), a complete loser, takes off on a road trip with her alcoholic grandmother (Susan Sarandon) who also happens to be a nymphomaniac. Forced comic situations, obnoxious behavior, a lot of whining and forced stabs at character development all make this one of the worst films of all time. Both McCarthy and Sarandon won richly deserved Razzie awards for their awful performances.

Escape in the Fog (Budd Boetticher, 1945) 5/10

A nurse (Nina Foch) dreams about a murder on a foggy bridge and then runs into the "victim" (William Wright) who just happens to be a G-Man in pursuit of Nazis. Low budget B-film noir was one of director Boetticher's early programmers years before he would find acclaim with topnotch Noirs and Westerns starring Randolph Scott. Pretty Foch is feisty.

Spielberg (Susan Lacy, 2017) 8/10

The genius of director Steven Spielberg is traced through interviews with film critics, his colleagues, both in front and behind the camera, as well as with him as scenes from his films are shown. The documentary also shows the method by which he works and has glimpses of rare student and home-movies and a look into his own personal life which often finds a place in many of his films as corroborated here by his parents and sisters.

[gunnar]

Summer of Soul (…or, When the Revolution Could Not Be Televised) (2021) - 8/10 - During the summer of 1969, a series of free concerts were held in Harlem and the tapes sat in a basement for 50 years because nobody was interested in televising it at the time. I was born the following year, but grew up listening to many of the songs and groups that are shown in the film. There are lots of familiar names - Stevie Wonder, Sly and the Family Stone, Gladys Knight and the Pips, an so on. The film mixes in cultural information for what was going on elsewhere at the time and interviews concertgoers and musicians. I enjoyed it quite a bit and enjoyed both the music and the commentary.

Cruella (2021) - 8/10 - I wasn't really very interested in watching this film, but it turned out to be a lot of fun. Emma Stone kills it as Estella/Cruella and Emma Thompson seems to be having fun as the Baroness as well. It also has excellent costumes, makeup, etc.

Being the Ricardos (2021) - 6/10 - The film chronicles a week in the life of Lucille Ball in which a story about her communist ties might be published, she discovers she is pregnant, there are rumors of Desi being unfaithful, and so on all while prep work for the latest episode is underway. The movie was almost painful to watch early on, but I did think it got better in the second half. The scenes with the radio show and meeting with the CBS executives were pretty good and there were other things I did like.

Writing With Fire (2021) - 7.5/10 - Khabar Lahariya is a newspaper in India which is run entirely by women. This documentary starts at the time when the paper shifted almost entirely to digital. It shows some of the learning curve that the reporters had and follows several of the reporters as they report on rape cases, politics, and other issues. They also face some difficulty due to their gender or caste. I thought it was pretty interesting and the reporters seemed to be doing a good job.

Lunana: A Yak in the Classroom (2019) - 8/10 - A young teacher in Bhutan has another year left on his government service before he can (hopefully) leave for Australia to pursue his dream of being a singer. He is assigned to teach in Lunana, the remotest school in the country. It is an 8 day hike through the mountains from the nearest city. He doesn't want to be there, but finds himself changed by the children and the community. It's a nice and enjoyable film.

[gunnar]

Don't Look Up (2021) - 7/10 - A Doctoral student discovers a comet heading toward Earth that could be an extinction event. She and her mentor are invited to the White House to discuss the matter and are essentially blown off. They try a newspaper and a talk show with little success. It's a satire based on the world we live in and I really wanted to like it more. Leonardo DiCaprio and Jennifer Lawrence are pretty good in their roles, but I didn't care for Mark Rylance or Meryl Streep here. Rylance in particular was very grating whenever he appeared. Good premise with enough decent material to make it worth watching, but also a bit disappointing.

Luca (2021) - 8.5/10 - Two boys from under the sea turn into humans while above the surface (as long as they don't get wet). They spend the summer in a small Italian town, making friends and hoping to earn enough money to buy a Vespa. It's a Pixar movie so you somewhat know what to expect, but it is very good with nice voice acting, visuals, and story.

[gunnar]

The Shoes of the Fisherman (1968) - 7/10 - Anthony Quinn plays an Archbishop who has been in a Siberian labor camp for 20 years. He is suddenly set free and sent to Rome where the Pope makes him a Cardinal. When the Pope dies, the Cardinals are deadlocked in the election of a new Pope and settle on a compromise candidate. I enjoyed the movie, though I thought it could have been cut down a bit more. There were some nice scenes, but also some that kind of dragged a bit.

War and Peace (1965-1968) - 9/10 - Sergey Bondarchuk's masterpiece does justice to Leo Tolstoy's classic novel about the Napoleonic War. It's beautifully shot and has great battle scenes. The acting is very good and the long runtime allows the film to cover a lot of ground. It's broken up into four parts with a different emphasis in each and Bondarchuk himself plays Pierre, one of the main characters. My favorite part was the one that focused on Natasha Rostova. I think it was very deserving of winning the Academy Award for foreign film, though it had very good competition with The Firemen's Ball, The Boys of Paul Street, Stolen Kisses, and The Girl with a Pistol (all of which I liked and in that order after War and Peace).

[Reza]

Eat Drink Man Woman (Ang Lee, 1994) 10/10

Ang Lee's exquisite little film is a riveting and often humourous look at the importance of family and the chaos that is part and parcel of relationships. The screenplay charts the lives of an ageing celebrated chef - a widower - and the muddled sex lives of his three daughters. The eldest is a spinster school teacher, turned Christian, pining for a lover who dumped her nine years before and who ends up causing a ripple with her love life. The middle combative daughter is a sexually liberated airline executive and is most like her father in temperament and has inherited his love for cooking and food. The youngest works in a fast food restaurant and gets involved with the boyfriend of her best friend. Lee smartly balances the various relationships including the old man's best friend and associate, a divorced neighbour with a daughter and her garrulous dragon of a mother just returned from the United States. The bond that holds these characters together is food mixed with lashings of sex. Food and sex go hand in hand in life and while scenes in the film depicting sex are discreetly handled Lee goes all out in his depiction of food. The chef's elaborate Sunday meal, prepared for his family, is an orgasmic ode to the art of cooking as the camera sensually snakes through the kitchen as meat and vegetables are sliced, cut mashed and fried in sizzling oil. Dishes upon dishes are spread across the dining table as soup, meat, salads and deserts are savoured and critiqued. While the characters suppress their sexual desires nobody enjoys food and the original family structure disintegrates. Once everyone gets what they want the old chef, who had lost his sense of taste, finds it has returned and he can once more savour the taste and aroma of food. Sihung Lung is outstanding as the finicky old chef and is surrounded by a superb ensemble cast. Like Lee's previous film ("The Wedding Banquet") this too was nominated for an Academy award in the foreign film category. Outstanding film and a must-see.

Slaves of Babylon (William Castle, 1953) 2/10

Low budget biblical sword and sandal story, courtesy of the Old Testament, is set during the reign of King Nebuchadnezzar II of Babylon. He of "Hanging Gardens" fame who destroyed Jerusalem and put all the jews in captivity between the high walls of his mighty city - which apparently was not true as the jews lived under happy conditions. Daniel, the disgruntled jewish advisor to the King, summons a slave (Richard Conte) to go seek the shepherd Cyrus - prophesised as the great King Cyrus of Persia - so he can defeat the Babylonians and set the jews free. Meanwhile Daniel gets fed to the lions but survives thanks to his belief in the right god. Sad to see Conte reduced to appearing in such a schlocky poverty row epic. Silly hokum.

[gunnar]

Dear John (1964) - 8/10 - This Swedish film focuses on the brief romance between a seaman and a young waitress in one of the ports. The waitress also has a four year old daughter from a previous relationship and the three spend a day together at the zoo. Much of the story is told in flashback and it is pretty well done.

House of Flying Daggers (2004) - 8/10 - in 9th Century China, the government is trying to destroy the rebel group known as the Flying Daggers. A blind dancer is thought to be the daughter of the former leader of the Flying Daggers and the government wants to use her to find their leader. This is a pretty cool martial arts romance and I enjoyed it a lot.

The Family (1987) - 7.5/10 - The film follows 80 years in the lives of an Italian family with the entire picture taking place at their very large family apartment in Rome. It starts with the birth of Carlo before the first World War and stops at different points over the years as Carlo and his family age, get married, have kids, etc. It's a nice film that kind of meanders through and we get to see the changes in the family along with some of the high and low points along the way.

[Reza]

En man som heter Ove / A Man Called Ove (Hannes Holm, 2015) 9/10

Character study of a retired widower (Rolf Lassgård) who is a cantankerous curmudgeon with a truckload of pet peeves and annoyances. A man with an extremely short fuse, with set routines who goes around making life hell for his neighbors. As the film progresses we gradually discover his past life with a loving wife. He daily visits her grave and talks to her, and through flashbacks, we get to see his entire life unfold with many tragedies as well as happy moments. Not willing to go on without his wife he unsucessfully keeps trying to commit suicide which keeps getting interrupted by new neighbors. His life suddenly starts changing as he begins to interact with the folks next door - a pregnant woman from Iran and her two kids - begins to look after a mangy cat and suddenly shows great sensitivity by taking in a young gay man who has been kicked out of his house by his family. Based on the bestselling swedish book by Fredrik Backman, the film is a poignant look at loneliness and ageing and shows that one should not judge a person from his outward demeanor. People have many layers hidden inside which they often hide due to life's many vicissitudes. The story could easily have tipped into treacly sentimentality but is superbly held together by the gruff performance of Rolf Lassgård who manages to create a very flawed character and gradually reveals his many hidden strengths. Hit film was nominated for an Academy award in the foreign film category as well as for its makeup.

Uncharted (Ruben Fleischer, 2022) 7/10

As with most films today this too is strictly for the youth market with material that lazy Hollywood regurgitates over and over again. The film is based on a video game which in turn was ripped off from the "Indiana Jones" franchise - which by the way Spielberg ripped off from the adventure serials of the 1930s. Take a young hot actor. Check. Pair him off with an older star - a formula done to death with the buddy-cop films of the 1980s - and have them banter throughout. Check. And then put them through a roller coaster ride of outrageous set pieces. Check. A street smart teenage pickpocket (Tom Holland) is hired by a crooked treasure hunter (Mark Wahlberg) to join hands with him in search of a 500-year old treasure. There is a map and two important keys that need to be stolen before they can get to the treasure. And there is also the young man's long-lost brother (who also coveted the treasure) and becomes a reason for him to join the crook on the hunt. Hollywood's mania for diverse casting is followed ad nauseum - the two female leads, playing two-timing, back-stabbing villains are Pakistani-American Sophia Ali and African-American-Korean Tati Gabrielle, both high on the "hot babe" scale. Compared to them the third villain played by Antonio Banderas seems like such a damp squib - a boring white man, even if he is Spanish, and hence different to the two white english-speaking leads. I was kinda surprised there was no gay character. Wonder how they missed out on that. The success of all such films depends on its action-packed set pieces. This has two. The one where Holland falls out of a plane, hanging on to a trail of large containers, followed by a red Mercedes convertible also nose diving out of the plane,
has been done to death many times in the past but the one where two helicopters raise two Spanish galleons, fly away with them while allowing the cast to swing between the two dangling ships as they battle it out to the death is eye-popping and exciting. The beautiful Barcelona cathederal plays an important role as the cast skirmishes deep down below its catacombs in search of clues. Despite the familiarity of its plot and situations and the excessive use of CGI the film is great fun and manages to entertain. Of course the minute you leave the cinema you forget it all. However, the end conveniently sets things up for a sequel.

Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara (Zoya Akhtar, 2011) 9/10

Three friends go on a roadtrip in Spain just before one of them is about to get married. Shot entirely on location in sunny Spain the film perfectly captures the joys and anguish of friendship. Pragmatic Abhay Deol, the groom-to-be, discovers to his horror the annoying possessive nature of his fiancé (Kalki Koechlin) - she pays him a surprise visit during the roadtrip - while uptight and workaholic Hrithik Roshan is given lessons in how to live in the present from a beautiful scuba diver instructor (Katrina Kaif), and happy-go-lucky Farhan Akhtar hides his pain behind his buffoonery as he visits with his estranged father (Naseeruddin Shah) who abandoned him and his mother (Deepti Naval). The perceptive screenplay (by Zoya Akhtar & Reema Kagti) is spot-on in accurately capturing the nuances found in long term friendships with lovely poetry (by Javed Akhtar) used as voiceover revealing hidden depth within the characters. The film incorporates many iconic Spanish touches - Running of the bulls in Pamplona, flamenco dancing during the "Señorita" number shot in Alájar, the La Tomatina festival held in Buñol where participants throw tomatoes and get involved in a tomato fight purely for entertainment purposes. In addition there are scenes shot underwater with Roshan and Kaif deep-sea diving at Costa Brava and later the three men go sky-diving in Sevilla. The film suceeds with its masala mix of road trip, romcom and buddy-buddy action. The film, Zoya (for direction), Farhan (for supporting actor & dialogue), the cinematography, and choreography won Filmfare awards while Roshan, Deol, Koechlin, Javed Akhtar for the lyrics to "Señorita", the music direction (Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy) and Alyssa Mendonsa's playback singing (for the song "Khwabon Ke Parindey") were all nominated.

[gunnar]

La venganza (1958) - 7.5/10 - Juan returns home to his Spanish village after 10 years in prison for a crime he didn't commit. His sister makes him swear an oath to kill the man she thinks is responsible for framing him, but later regrets that oath when she falls in love with the man. This is a nice film with pretty good acting overall.

Youth (2015) - 8/10 - Michael Caine is a retired composer and conductor who is vacationing in the Swiss Alps along with a film director friend (Harvey Keitel) and others. An emissary of the Queen wants him to conduct a special performance, but he isn't interested. His daughter is also having some marital problems. Caine gives a very nice performance and I certainly enjoyed this a lot more than the other Sorrentino picture I watched recently, The Great Beauty.

A Simple Story (1978) - 8/10 - Marie is 39 and is divorced with a 16 year old son. She finds out that she is pregnant about the same time that she has decides to leave her current partner, seeing no future with him. The film follows Marie and her friends and family over the next few months. It's a very nice film.

The Time Machine (1960) - 7.5/10 - I liked this adaptation of the H.G. Wells classic. The special effects were a bit primitive in places, but it was decent overall.