V For Vendetta
Director: James McTeigue US/UK, 2005 By the third instalment, ordinary audiences had just about enough of The Matrix and its red pills, digital rain and ringing telephones. Certainly there were strong themes underpinning that trilogy, but old Neo did a bit too much dodging of slo-mo bullets and not enough exploring metaphors. However, in V For Vendetta, [...] More about V For Vendetta
In Bruges
Director: Martin McDonagh United Kingdom, 2008 In Bruges tells the story of two hitmen who lie low after a contract in the picturesque Belgian city. This is McDonagh’s first feature-length effort, having started out writing award-winning plays and then winning an Oscar for his short Six Shooter in 2006. Unsurprisingly then, the film is full of superb [...] More about In Bruges
Snatch
Director: Guy Ritchie United Kingdom, 2000 After Lock, Stock And Two Smoking Barrels sold so well and Snatch showed that the grotty London gangster motif had mileage, Ritchie’s career seemed to go downhill fast. Perhaps it was because his limitations were exposed by unfamiliar material. Or maybe his vampire wife had taken too many creativity transfusions from [...] More about Snatch
Happy Go Lucky
Director: Mike Leigh United Kingdom, 2008 Mike Leigh is probably the last artist working today who still thinks suburban England has something to say. In his latest film, we’re presented with just under two hours’ worth of the usual struggling folk, weekends down the pub and indifferent weather. It’s all as sickeningly familiar as starter homes and [...] More about Happy Go Lucky
Once Upon A Time In The West
Director: Sergio Leone Italy/US, 1968 A single set on Once Upon A Time cost as much as the entire production on one of Sergio Leone’s previous films. Certainly the director made full use of big studio backing to deliver his vision, one of cinema’s most bewitching and monumental works and the death of the western genre (which [...] More about Once Upon A Time In The West
Y Tu Mamá También
Director: Alfonso Cuarón Mexico, 2001 What’s odd about Y Tu Mamá También is how it can be so many things all at once: a road movie, a coming of age comedy, a sexy love story, a political critique. By way of illustration, this latter motif peppers the movie: there are soldiers and police and beggars and put-upon [...] More about Y Tu Mamá También
Atonement
Director: Joe Wright United Kingdom, 2007 When a young girl uses a series of events to doom the romance of the housekeeper’s son and her elder sister, the course of each of their lives is changed beyond foresight. So goes the story of Atonement, an adaptation of Ian McEwan’s manipulative novel by upcoming British director Joe Wright. Whilst [...] More about Atonement
No Country For Old Men
Director: Joel Coen; Ethan Coen United States, 2007 It’s probably fair to say that the Coen brothers had been off their game for a few years. Since 2000’s O Brother Where Art Thou, we’ve had to swallow a lukewarm homage to film noir and a couple of flaccid big studio pictures. With No Country, the brothers are [...] More about No Country For Old Men
The Darjeeling Limited
Director: Wes Anderson United States, 2007 Anderson’s films are often about families or groups of individuals who form strong bonds. What’s becoming increasingly clear after seeing Darjeeling is that the director’s troupe of actors is imitating his art: almost all of the cast here seem to have appeared in multiple Anderson movies. And Darjeeling is hardly the black [...] More about The Darjeeling Limited
Die Fälscher (The Counterfeiters)
Director: Stefan Ruzowitzky Austria, 2007 A busy master forger, Salomon Sorowitsch is a man with little concern for political ideals. And that’s what keeps him alive when war breaks out and he ends up in Sachsenhausen concentration camp. Receiving preferential treatment to other prisoners, Sorowitsch is given the task of forging the currency that will keep the [...] More about Die Fälscher (The Counterfeiters)
