America
CD: Neil Young and Crazy Horse - ColoradoMonday, 21 October 2019
Neil Young’s prolific, patchy output rejects the very notion of major releases, though only a major artist would be given so much rope. His thirtieth album of the century (new or archive) still stirs anticipation as his first with Crazy Horse in... Read more... |
Zombieland: Double Tap review - dead dull redoThursday, 17 October 2019
Another unnecessary sequel: we’re used to this sort of thing. The film knows it, too, as lead dork Columbus (Jesse Eisenberg) meekly thanks the audience during the opening credits: “There are lots of options when it comes to zombie entertainment, so... Read more... |
The Peanut Butter Falcon review - sentimental comedy is so damn heartwarmingWednesday, 16 October 2019
It’s an uncomfortable feeling to find oneself completely at odds with an audience in a cinema, but it happens. The recent London Film Festival screening of The Peanut Butter Falcon came complete with the two lead actors and the co-directors and... Read more... |
LFF 2019: The Irishman review - masterful, unsentimental gangster epicTuesday, 15 October 2019
Time passes slowly and remorselessly in The Irishman. Though its much remarked de-ageing technology lets us glimpse Frank Sheeran (Robert De Niro) executing German POWs aged 24, none of the gangsters here ever seem young. Everyone is heavy with... Read more... |
Thomas J Campanella: Brooklyn - The Once and Future City review - out of Manhattan's shadowSunday, 13 October 2019
For visitors to New York, it’s all about Manhattan, its 23 square miles of skyscraper-encrusted granite instantly familiar, its many landmarks – enshrined in movies and music – must-sees on the itinerary of first-time tourists. The other... Read more... |
Gemini Man review - high-concept, high-tech Zen weirdnessFriday, 11 October 2019
Will Smith’s giant hand looms out of the screen towards you, gripping his gun’s trigger with weird realism. Director Ang Lee’s lonely devotion to filming in 120 frames per second 4K 3D, already widely loathed by audiences in less developed form in... Read more... |
The Day Shall Come review – Homeland Security satire lacks biteThursday, 10 October 2019
A new film by Chris Morris ought to be an event. The agent provocateur of Brass Eye infamy has tended to rustle feathers and spark debate whatever he does. His last film, Four Lions, dared to find comedy in Islamic terrorism in 2010,... Read more... |
Assassins, Watermill Theatre, Newbury - Sondheim musical in scalding formThursday, 10 October 2019
“Every now and then the country goes a little wrong”: so goes one of the many lyrics from the Stephen Sondheim-John Weidman musical Assassins that makes this 1990 Off Broadway musical (subsequently chosen to open Sam Mendes’ Donmar Warehouse in 1992... Read more... |
American Woman review - leading lady Sienna Miller moves up a gearWednesday, 09 October 2019
Sienna Miller’s career has been short on leading roles, though she excelled in the TV drama The Girl and has notched up some memorable supporting roles. However, if there’s any justice, her commanding and deeply-felt performance in American Woman... Read more... |
Zadie Smith: Grand Union review – a roller coaster collectionSunday, 06 October 2019
“Adorable cock, nothing too dramatic, suitable for many situations,” remarks Monica on the penis of her university boyfriend. She is the candid protagonist of ‘Sentimental Education’, the second of 19 short stories that form Grand Union, an eclectic... Read more... |
Ben Lerner: The Topeka School review - lessons to be learnedSunday, 06 October 2019
The Topeka School begins with a female listener getting bored of hearing her boyfriend talk. Which did not bode well, as the perspective’s was the boyfriend, and I am a female reader. Such a self-effacing move is typically Lerneresque: he excels at... Read more... |
CD: Wilco - Ode to JoyThursday, 03 October 2019
Wilco’s Jeff Tweedy has been pondering how to react to oppression, and his own music’s obsolescence. What use is a rock band’s eleventh album at the best of times, he’s wondered, let alone in these worse ones under Trump?Wilco’s response is not to... Read more... |
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