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Far from the Madding Crowd – Review

Vinterberg’s adaptation easily ticks the required boxes of a successful period drama. The sets are ready to be stepped onto, and there’s artistry and homeliness to the costuming. Moreover, Vinterberg...
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Stonehearst Asylum – Review

This is not a horror film. To say more would spoil the surprise(s). Instead, know that Stonehearst Asylum is frequently fantastic, utterly assured, and fully committed to pulling one genre switcheroo after...
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Child 44 – Review

"Then they came for me," bemoans the end of Martin Niemöller's poem, "and there was no one left to speak for me." In Child 44 Daniel Espinosa has crafted an interesting drama about the bureaucracy of...
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Last Knights – Review

Looking like a rather drab Meatloaf video (think candles and chambers) played on half-speed with a perma-frowned Clive Owen solemnly plodding about, Last Knights struggles to engage from the off. As its...
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The Last Five Years – Review

Broadway and musicals are a perfect couple. However, problems arise when you decide to add another to the relationship: the medium of film. On stage, energy is easy to sustain - and that is likely where The...
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Hot Tub Time Machine 2 – Review

Life has a balance and if you break this equilibrium, bad things happen. In this case, the result is Hot Tub Time Machine 2. In the first outing, the balance between puerile humour and nostalgia was just...
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Cobain: Montage of Heck – Review

Somewhat overlong and not as incisive as it could be, Cobain: Montage of Heck is nonetheless a satisfying portrait of a troubled genius. Cobain's turbulent story is told mostly through a collage of...
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Lost River – Review

Virtually plotless, Lost River is a lurid technicolour nightmare featuring a senseless mishmash of shot types, a warped Miss Havisham and a caricaturish Matt Smith. There’s no subtlety here; the sparse...
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Jauja – Review

Jauja* would work much better as a short film. Framing the vivid Argentinian landscape in a 4:3 ratio is a provocative choice that pays off far better for Alonso than his bloody-minded insistence on static...
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Good Kill – Review

From their portacabin of death, all-American jocks get to blow shit up with only RSI to fear; the lady cries yet complies; Ethan Hawke has a moral crisis whilst remaining utterly immoral; Betty Draper makes an...
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John Wick – Review

It's fitting that the seemingly ageless Keanu Reeves should play John Wick. Like its leading man, the film feels unstuck in time; a forgotten '80s classic that would have starred the likes of Stallone or...