Film
Emma Thompson is surprisingly convincing as the star of this action thriller
Dead of Winter is an action thriller starring Emma Thompson and you have to hand it to her. Has such…
A Big Bold Beautiful Journey is anything but
A Big Bold Beautiful Journey is, I have to tell you, anything but. I should have trusted the trailer. When…
Is Grey Gardens the greatest documentary ever made?
A middle-aged woman wearing what looks like Princess Diana’s infamous ‘revenge dress’ and a balaclava from an IRA funeral approaches…
Lower your expectations for Spinal Tap II
This Is Spinal Tap is now such a deserved comedy behemoth that it’s easy to forget how gradual its ascent…
Fails to outshine the original: The Roses reviewed
The Roses is a remake of The War of the Roses (1989), the diabolically funny black bitter comedy that was…
Alien: Earth is wantonly disrespectful to the canon
I once spent a delightful weekend in Madrid with the co-producer of Alien. His name was David Giler (now dead,…
Woody Allen without the zingers: Materialists reviewed
Celine Song’s first film, the wonderful Past Lives (2023), earned two Oscar nominations. So expectations were riding high for Materialists.…
A mafia drama like no other
The Kingdom is a mafia drama like no other. It’s directed by Julien Colonna whose father was a Corsican mob…
Be warned: the new Naked Gun is actually funny
As the lights went down for The Naked Gun – the ‘legacy sequel’ to the spoof cop franchise – I…
I watched it between my fingers: Bring Her Back reviewed
The Australian twins Danny and Michael Philippou started off as YouTubers known for their comically violent shorts – Ronald McDonald…
Jurassic Park Rebirth is the dumbest yet
Midway through Jurassic World Rebirth the scientist character played by Jonathan Bailey, whom we can all immediately spot as a…
Magnificently bloodthirsty: 28 Years Later reviewed
First it was 28 Days Later (directed by Danny Boyle, 2002), then 28 Weeks Later (Juan Carlos Fresnadillo, 2007) and…
The politics of horror
Everyone forgets the actual opening scene of 28 Days Later, even though it’s deeply relatable, in that it features a…
Darkly comic samurai spaghetti western: Tornado reviewed
Tornado is a samurai spaghetti western starring Tim Roth, Jack Lowden and Takehiro Hira (among others). Samurai spaghetti westerns aren’t…
Literate and sensitive romance: Falling Into Place reviewed
Falling Into Place is a love story written by Aylin Tezel, directed by Aylin Tezel, and starring Aylin Tezel. That’s…
A remarkable story: The Salt Path reviewed
The Salt Path is an adaptation of the best-selling book by Raynor Winn. It tells the true story of how…
Wes Anderson’s latest is as hollow as anything AI could come up with
AI is coming for everyone’s jobs, but especially mine. There is absolutely no good reason for The Spectator to keep…
Cinema has reached a nadir in the new Mission: Impossible
You have to time your arrival at cinemas carefully if you want to avoid the high-volume, rapid-fire edits of trailers…
Tantalisingly ambiguous – or just plain baffling: Hallow Road reviewed
An 80-minute film which for almost all of the time features two people in a car mightn’t sound particularly ambitious.…
What did Leni Riefenstahl know?
Leni Riefenstahl: what are we to make of her? What did she know? Often described as ‘Hitler’s favourite filmmaker’, she…
Dry retelling of the Odyssey – but Fiennes is ripped: The Return reviewed
Uberto Pasolini’s The Return stars Ralph Fiennes and Juliette Binoche in a retelling of the last section of Homer’s Odyssey.…
Never fully comes to life, alas: Mr Burton reviewed
Mr Burton is a biopic of Richard Burton’s early years and an origins story, if you like. It stars Harry…
I genuinely feared The End would never end
Joshua Oppenheimer’s The End is a ‘post-apocalyptic musical’ starring Tilda Swinton and Michael Shannon that is being sold as a…
Who wants a ‘girl boss’ Snow White?
Disney’s new Snow White is a live-action remake of the beloved 1937 classic that was cinema’s first full-length animated feature…
