The Farewell – Sundance London Review Joni Blyth June 5, 2019 Reviews You’ll laugh, you’ll cry, you’ll cringe at awkward speeches – The Farewell is like any good family wedding, or any good funeral come to think of it. In her sophomore feature, writer-director Lulu Wang...
Columbus – Review Kambole Campbell October 7, 2018 Reviews A wayward friendship made in passing in a similar manner to Sofia Coppola’s Lost in Translation, Cho’s slightly dickish but quietly wounded Jin and Richardson’s similarly hurt but enthusiastic Casey meet...
Hearts Beat Loud – Review Kambole Campbell August 3, 2018 Reviews A film with a synopsis that must check every box in the ‘Sundance movie’ criteria, Hearts Beat Loud is a light, enjoyable film that washes over you - though perhaps doesn’t linger in the mind long after...
A Ghost Story – Review Laura Davis August 11, 2017 Reviews After the success of Ain’t Them Bodies Saints (2013), David Lowery reunites Casey Affleck and Rooney Mara in a time-travelling, existential yarn about the dislocation of grief. Questioning why we become...
Short of the Week – Good Crazy James Andrews May 22, 2017 Features, Independent, Short of the Week https://vimeo.com/216850224 What does it mean to be crazy? And what does it cost to be good? Writer/director/star Rosa Salazar's charming comedy takes a sideways look at those questions, as well as...
The Birth of a Nation is Bad and It Should Feel Bad David Brake December 8, 2016 Analysis, Features, Opinion I was talking, late last week, to a friend who works at the Independent about the impending release on these shores of Nate Parker's once-heralded The Birth of a Nation. As our general displeasure with the...
Short of the Week – Thunder Road David Brake October 10, 2016 Features, Independent, Short of the Week https://vimeo.com/174957219 If you're going to do a short film based around the title of one of Bruce Springsteen’s best and most popular songs, you’d better do a good job. Luckily for Jim Cummings,...
Swiss Army Man – Review Ellena Zellhuber-McMillan October 3, 2016 Reviews Swiss Army Man is without a doubt an odd film, however it would be a mistake to write it off - as others have - for purely that reason. The oddest thing about it is that Daniel Radcliffe plays a farting...
King Jack – Review Phil W. Bayles March 2, 2016 Reviews There’s nothing original under the sun, it is said, and King Jack will certainly feel familiar to many. Felix Thompson’s picaresque tale of two boys in smalltown America can trace its ancestry right back...
News of the Week – 5th Feb 2016 Eddie Falvey February 5, 2016 News The Weekly Report All news contained herein corresponds to the world of film. The Weekly Report will seek to cover general film news that has emerged over the last seven days. The End of...
Short of the Week: Two and Two Nick Evan-Cook December 7, 2015 Features, Independent, Short of the Week https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kHOOV83j7bo Babak Anvari's Persian 2011 BAFTA-nominated short Two and Two uses a classroom setting and its credulous inhabitants to highlight the absurdity and...
Take Me To The River – LFF Review Nick Evan-Cook October 10, 2015 Reviews The dark and twisted Take Me To The River is an intriguing and enjoyable little drama - though very slight, and never entirely convincing in terms of its characters' motivations, behaviours or...
The Second Mother – Review Sian Brett September 7, 2015 Reviews In a perfect mix of pathos and comedy, The Second Mother brings light to something key to society: class divide. Regina Casé is a joy to watch as Val, who fosters the unshakable belief that she is a...
The Story of Primer – The Best Sci-Fi You Haven’t Seen Tom Bond August 19, 2015 Analysis, Close-Up, Features The middle of the summer blockbuster season seems an appropriate time to look back at a film which rebelled against so many of that genre’s defining traits. 10 years ago, Shane Carruth’s sci-fi Primer was...
52 Tuesdays – Review Calum Baker August 9, 2015 Reviews One of 2015's most important films, though so deft in style that it's never "Worthy". A parent's FTM transition provides a backdrop, but James (formerly Jane) is never defeatist or self-loathing. Instead,...