Love Actually (2003)
DIRECTOR: Richard Curtis
CAST:
Hugh Grant, Liam Neeson, Alan Rickman, Emma Thompson, Colin Firth, Laura Linney,Bill Nighy, Keira Knightley, Kris Marshall, Heike Makatsch, Martin Freeman, Joanna Page,Chiwetel Ejiofor, Andrew Lincoln, Martine McCutcheon, Thomas Sangster, Lúcia Moniz, Rodrigo Santoro, Rowan Atkinson, Billy Bob Thornton
REVIEW:
Love Actually is taglined as ‘the ultimate romantic comedy’, and while I wouldn’t go that far, it might be the most ambitious. Continue reading
28 Days Later (2003)
DIRECTOR: Danny Boyle
CAST:
Cillian Murphy, Naomie Harris, Brendan Gleeson, Megan Burns, Christopher Eccleston, Noah Huntley
REVIEW:
Hailed as one of the most frightening movies ever made, 28 Days Later is one in a long series of films addressing mankind’s fear of and fascination with the end- a catastrophic apocalypse that nearly wipes out the human race, but in a different vein than most. Director Danny Boyle’s and screenwriter Alex Garland’s vision of the end isn’t nuclear war or environmental disaster, but disease, specifically a genetically engineered virus known as rage. One drop of infected blood and the victim is almost instantly driven into a berserk frenzy by uncontrollable rage. This leads to it generally being considered a zombie movie, but this isn’t your daddy’s zombie movie, where the decaying walking dead somehow manage to get the petrified victims despite moving like molasses. The zombies here are fast, vicious predators, the characters are three-dimensional individuals rather than cardboard zombie food, and the filmmakers supply a little depth alongside scaring the living crap out of the audience. The result is that rare breed, a film that is both smart and scary. Continue reading
About a Boy (2002)
DIRECTOR: Chris Weitz and Paul Weitz
CAST:
Hugh Grant, Nicholas Hoult, Toni Collette, Rachel Weisz
REVIEW:
Based on the book by Nick Hornby, produced by the producers of Bridget Jones’ Diary, and directed by the team of brothers who brought us American Pie, About A Boy is a prime example of how an approach heavy on irreverent wit and keeping the cloying sentimentality to a restrained minimum can inject enough freshness into a generic stock premise to make what could have been a bore a breezy and enjoyable viewing experience. Continue reading
Elizabeth (1998)
DIRECTOR: Shekhar Kapur
CAST: Cate Blanchett, Geoffrey Rush, Joseph Fiennes, Richard Attenborough, Christopher Eccleston
REVIEW:
The reign of Queen Elizabeth I of England began in 1558, when at the age of twenty-five, she succeeded her half-sister Mary I. Over the course of the next forty-five years, she ushered in the so-called Golden Age and became one of the longest-reigning and most popular and successful monarchs ever to sit on the British throne. Director Shekhar Kapur’s lavish period costume drama Elizabeth, however, focuses on the early years of Elizabeth’s reign, when the young queen was surrounded by enemies and plagued with uncertainty, and facing the prospect of losing her throne—and her life—so soon after taking it.
Continue readingPriest (1995)
DIRECTOR: Antonia Bird
CAST:
Linus Roache, Tom Wilkinson, Robert Carlyle, Robert Pugh, Christine Tremarco, Lesley Sharp, Cathy Tyson
REVIEW:
It is a not uncommon experience for me to happen across some older independent film I had only fleetingly heard of or not heard of at all, that turns out to be underrated and worthy of more recognition than it received. Priest is not a “great” movie, but it is an intelligent and thoughtful drama that provides some food for thought and a serious examination of themes involving homosexuality (and to a lesser extent sexuality in general), celibacy, incest, and religion, and how they relate to and conflict with each other. Continue reading