Documentary films in a theatrical environment can be dull and lacking in cinematic verve. Nobody should be concerned about THE BENGALI DETECTIVE, a touching but humorous look into the life of Rajesh – a private detective in Kolkata.
Having cared for her developmentally disabled son Ronnie for over 64 years, Eleanore faces some difficult decisions. Naomi Barnwell reviews.
The responsibility of owning a dog is so great because there is nothing you can do to stop a dog from loving you. That’s meant to be true of Christ, too. In Paddy Considine’s début as a feature director, TYRANNOSAUR, both ideas are tested to bloody destruction. One of them does not fair well.
A new adjective seems to be quietly slipping its way into our modern language, and it is to describe things as ‘Kermodian’. Daniel Harling caught Mark Kermode at CFF2011.
Ruby Maris-Stephens of Long Road Sixth Form College reviews Bombay Beach.
Anyone perturbed by ageing demographics in developed countries should be intrigued by this inspiring documentary about the American ‘National Senior Games’. This film illustrates that life continues well into the third age. Graham Hughes reviews.
Comedy is notorious for its tendency to get lost in translation and while it’s entirely possible that Jos Stelling’s 1999 tragicomic farce, NO TRAINS NO PLANES will have Dutch audiences rolling in the aisles, the film’s strange brand of surreal sentimental slapstick will likely leave British viewers cold.
“A Romanian comedy?” I heard someone asking in disbelief after the film was over. And truly, the main memories evoked by the words “Romanian New Wave” are usually tedious long shots of aborted babies and people walking. It is no wonder then that it is hard to believe that one of the founding films of the new wave, Cristian Mungiu’s 2001 hit OCCIDENT, is a hearty comedy.
This 2006 film by Radu Muntean focuses on the night of between the 22nd and the 23rd of December 1989, when in Bucharest the Revolution was in full swing. Steve Williams reviews.
Amazingly based on a true story, THE POLL DIARIES plumbs the depths of the human condition using protagonist Oda as its main focus. Discussing rarely seen topics, the film uses the Baltic coast as a backdrop for Oda’s experiences in Poll just before the start of the first world war in 1914. An older and more knowing Oda narrates intermittently, providing hindsight to a beautifully crafted film. Naomi Barnwell reviews.
