Innholdsfortegnelse for July 2024 i Total Film

I feel like the work that I'm just interested in doing is more in the grey areas,’ Andrew Scott told GQ, reflecting on a time in his career when he was mainly playing villains – first Jim Moriarty in the BBC's Sherlock and then C in James Bond movie Spectre. He's taken on more varied roles since then, from the Priest in Phoebe Waller-Bridge's Fleabag (a character that catapulted him to internet stardom even more than Sherlock already had) to a leading part in Andrew Haigh's deeply personal – and critically acclaimed – All of Us Strangers. Now, he gets to play what's likely one of many murder suspects in Rian Johnson's third Knives Out movie, titled Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery. We know he's being joined…

The star of last year's charming Peckham-set romcom Rye Lane, David Jonsson is a stage-trained actor with his sights on the screen. About to make his first major franchise play as ‘artificial person’ Andy in Alien: Romulus, the in-demand performer is also penning fashion retail series Hype for Baby Reindeer production outfit Clerkenwell. Not bad for a… human. What stood out to you about Andy? He's the first Black synthetic, and there are many other firsts with Andy, which I won't spoil. When you meet Andy he needs a system update, really! He's not functioning on all cylinders. But who is he underneath it all? That's the biggest part of his story. Were you surprised by the film's practical approach? I'm an indie boy, you know? I was a little…

OUT 12 JULY CINEMAS The marital bed turns into an arena for one woman's waking nightmare in writer-director Jason Yu's feature debut. When Hyun-su (Lee Sun-kyun) begins sleepwalking and uttering threats in the night, his wife Soo-jin (Jung Yu-mi) fears that he may hurt her and their newborn baby. ‘Are you going to kill my daughter?’ the terrified mother asks as he snoozes on the sofa. ‘I don't know,’ comes the chilling response. Yu treats Hyun-su's sleep disorder with the gravity of a demonic possession, with Soo-jin enlisting doctors and spiritualists to get to the bottom of his ailment. The story is sparse but purposeful, Yu cranking up the tension as Soo-jin's wariness grows. But as Hyun-su's somnambulism takes its toll on Soo-jin's mental state, is she the best judge…

SCREEN OUT 28 JUNE CINEMAS, APPLE TV+ A companion piece of sorts to Killers of the Flower Moon, Erica Tremblay's narrative feature debut finds its star Lily Gladstone in a contemporary yet familiar role: that of an Indigenous woman railing against prejudice, poverty and injustice. Set on the Seneca-Cayuga reservation in north-east Oklahoma, its story of an aunt's attempts to locate her feared-dead sister while raising her teenage niece flirts with road-movie and crime tropes before revealing its true subject: the female ties that bind communities in the face of masculine violence. Jax (Gladstone) can't get the authorities to give a fig about her missing sibling Tawi (Hauli Gray). But when it comes to Tawi's unruly daughter Roki (Isabel Deroy-Olson), they can't wait to hand over custody to her white…

OUT 21 JUNE CINEMAS Dale Dickey's glorious, granitetough performance as Ann Hunter, a revenge-seeking grandma, gives real heft to this gritty Coen-esque noir about a ruthless elder-care guardianship scam. Director Karl R. Hearne (Touched) wrings love and pathos from Ann's prickly partnership with Romane Denis’ slacker granddaughter, Emma, desperate to get her ‘G’ sprung from a deadly care home, and looking for help in all the wrong places. But too many crooks (and convolutions) spoil the plot, as betrayals and backstabbings twist the race to grab G's hidden nest-egg into a story pretzel.…

OUT 12 JULY DIGITAL Burnt-out Chicago detective Samuel L. Jackson comes to (checks notes) Edinburgh to help local policeman Gianni Capaldi (who also co-wrote and produced) catch a serial killer in Terry McDonough's tepid thriller. But besides that eye-catching casting coup, everything else is strictly by the book. Even strong support from Vincent Cassel, John Hannah and Kate Dickie can't dispel the sense we're watching a TV special with added gore and a script that riffs on Se7en. ‘Why do these serial killers always bring this cult shit into it?’ Jackson wonders. Why indeed?…

OUT 28 JUNE CINEMAS Hot on the heels of the Oscar-winning Poor Things, Yorgos Lanthimos delivers another eccentric feature with Emma Stone, Willem Dafoe and Margaret Qualley. But aside from sprinklings of sex, the similarities end there. Rather than working with writer Tony McNamara (Poor Things, The Favourite), Lanthimos here reteams with scripter Efthymis Filippou (Dogtooth, The Lobster, The Killing of a Sacred Deer), hinting that something darker and more surreal awaits. And boy, do we get it… Split into three parts, Kinds casts Jesse Plemons in three roles: a dutiful man going to extremes to please his wealthy funder (Dafoe); a policeman suspicious that his wife (Stone) isn't really his wife at all; and a sex-cult member looking for a woman who can resurrect the dead. The intriguing set-ups…

OUT NOW ICON FILM CHANNEL 12 JULY CINEMAS A calming ‘forest bath’, this glossy and charming but slightly contrived wordless documentary gets very up-close and personal for a year with the animal, bird and bug inhabitants of a 200-year-old French oak. Bathed in golden light or swaddled in snow, critters including squirrels, wood mice and jays fight for acorns, sex, territory and their lives – note the Top Gun-worthy goshawk chase. Less cuteness (acorn weevils bonking to Dean Martin's Sway) and more carnivorous action (owls go hungry here) would have given it some bite.…

OUT 21 JUNE CINEMAS The flux of migrant stories we've seen on our screens in the last few years speaks to the terror and division of our times. Green Border, directed by Polish veteran Agnieszka Holland (Europa Europa), is an urgent, gruelling addition. Holland's drama follows Syrian husband and wife Bashir (Jalal Altawil) and Amina (Dalia Naous), their three children and Bashir's elderly father (Al Rashi Mohamad) as they follow the promise of safe passage into Europe via the Białowieża Forest on the border of Belarus and Poland. Only Belarusian dictator Alexander Lukashenko is using refugees as ‘live bullets’ to provoke the European Union, and Polish guards throw back anyone they encounter. We watch agape as these political footballs, along with Afghan English teacher Leïla (Behi Djanati Atai) and more,…

SCREEN OUT NOW CINEMAS Following a lonely girl's adventures aboard a floating restaurant filled with fantastical creatures, Deep Sea resembles Spirited Away, James and the Giant Peach and Life of Pi in its story. In execution, director Tian Xiaopeng's (Monkey King: Hero Is Back) film is a dazzling showcase for CG animation; the gorgeous blend of 3D models and Chinese ink-painting designs fully justify a big-screen viewing. Yet at times, there's almost too much visual chaos to absorb: while the rug-pull emotional denouement stuns, some of the middle act borders on exhausting.…

OUT 5 JULY NETFLIX Seven years after Mary and the Witch's Flower, Japanese animators Studio Ponoc's return is 2024's best imaginary-pal movie so far. Like IF, the focus is a sorrowful girl, Amanda (Rio Suzuki), who becomes separated from her ‘Imaginary’ Rudger (Kokoro Terada) by evil Mr. Bunting (Issey Ogata). As they try to reunite, the plot logic cartwheels, sometimes awkwardly. But director Yoshiyuki Momose keeps the pacing spry, the hand-drawn images lush and the emotional stakes clear. There's a deft balance of rainy-day melancholy with magic and menace: Bunting's ghostly assistant is essentially J-horror for kids.…

OUT NOW CINEMAS Having languished in development hell, Soi Cheang's technically impressive, if narratively underwhelming, ass-kicker finally reached Cannes last month. Budgeted at $40m, it's one of the most expensive Hong Kong films ever made and it shows as Lok (Raymond Lam), a refugee in 80s HK, doublecrosses triads and hides out in the mean streets of Kowloon Walled City, where he tangles with a criminal overlord (Louis Koo). Plot twists may be obvious but the frenzied fights are inventive and bruisingly balletic.…

OUT NOW DIGITAL Richard Armitage takes a break from Harlan Coben adaptations to take a supporting role in this World War Two tear-jerker. Based on a true story, it tells of Jewish boy Max (Jett Klyne), who survives Nazi persecution by hiding out in the forests of Eastern Poland. Maxwell Smart's ordeal formed part of director Rebecca Snow's 2019 documentary Cheating Hitler: Surviving the Holocaust and is indeed a stirring example of resourceful resilience. Beyond Armitage's turn as a guilt-ridden farmer, however, it's hard to see what's gained from replaying it as drama.…

1987 OUT 24 JUNE 4K UHD EXTRAS Commentaries, Documentaries, Interviews, Booklet I hate jokes,’ is not the sort of utterance you'd necessarily expect to hear from the brains behind a film often hailed as one of the best British comedies of all time. But, despite the best efforts of a cult following seemingly committed to reducing the film to a drinking game and a series of barbed quotations, Withnail & I has never been your typical genre piece. Set at the arse-end of the 1960s, writer-director Bruce Robinson's alcohol-fuelled snapshot of a decade in terminal decline follows two resting actors – Richard E. Grant's Withnail and Paul McGann's Marwood – as they escape the bohemian decay of their Camden Town flat for a weekend away in a country cottage owned by…

1981 OUT 24 JUNE 4K UHD EXTRAS Commentaries, Intro, Documentary, Featurettes, Gallery, Booklet Released in 4K with extensive extras, Joe Giannone's cut-price 1981 slasher is one of the most fun Friday the 13th rip-offs, as long as you don't mind some cheese with your sleaze. At a camp for gifted children, the counsellors find themselves stalked by Madman Marz (Paul Ehlers), an undead, axe-wielding farmer. Dawn of the Dead‘s Gaylen Ross makes for a Mary Sue heroine, but the atmospheric locations, cheapand-cheerful SFX and, er, spirited performances lend plenty of vintage charm.…

2013 OUT NOW BD EXTRAS Making Of, Featurettes, Book, Art cards Long before his feted X trilogy, director Ti West trod less surely with this found-footage faux-doc. Three Vice journos investigate a seemingly idyllic ‘sober-living community’, where one reporter's sister (Amy Seimetz) lives. But is the retreat's ‘Father’ (Gene Jones) legit? West crafts a tense mystery that dissolves when it embraces – simultaneously – predictable and implausible horror twists, spiked with crude shock tactics. Still, Seimetz impresses and the alarmist diatribes of Jones’ skincrawling cult leader have a Trumpian ring to them.…

1990 OUT NOW BD EXTRAS Commentaries, Short, Debut feature, Featurettes, Auditions, Deleted scenes Richard said “Withdrawal in disgust is not the same as apathy,”’ sang REM on 1994's What's the Frequency, Kenneth? Richard Linklater's characters said that and more in the Hit Man helmer's second feature, a walking-and-talking Sundance splash that foreshadowed his career and 90s indie cinema's forms and fixations. Included in Criterion's reissue, Linklater's experimental 1988 debut It's Impossible to Learn to Plow by Reading Books navigates themes of travel and aimless youth. These motifs recur in Slacker as a nameless character (Linklater) grabs a taxi, ever moving. While Linklater's presence suggests a self-aware POV on the world depicted, his on-screen monologue about choices and branching realities also flags up the film's themes. Coloured by a sense of community…

VARIOUS TITAN COMICS Where next for the onscreen Avengers? For ideas, dip into Titan's decade-by-decade survey. This highly readable history counts up various departures/debuts to map out the heroes’ journeys as a moveable feast. As writers also fluctuated, rifts, romances and returning characters helped spin out the Avengers’ shape-shifting continuation. With the New/ Young/Ultimate/Uncanny/Forever Avengers all emerging as strong latter entries, Earth's Mightiest appear inexhaustible.…

WITHNAIL & I A moment of cool amidst a distinctly grim 60s London, as Marwood (Paul McGann) lurches his battered Jaguar into shot, pausing to flip down the lenses on his John Lennon-style shades, before peeling off to Jimi Hendrix twanging the guitar. GET CARTER It's a power move, removing someone else's glasses. Jack Carter (Michael Caine) lets old acquaintance Eric Paice (Ian Hendry) know who's boss – revealing his eyes, he declares, ‘Still the same… piss-holes in the snow,’ as he stares into his soul. MEN IN BLACK The shades are part of MIB's anonymous ‘uniform’, and when Agent J (Will Smith) cooly dons them, it's hard to disagree with his: ‘I make this look good.’ But the Ray-Bans also serve a purpose, shielding wearers from the effects of…

CONTRIBUTING EDITOR LEILA LATIF @LEILA_LATIF I had so much fun talking to Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman. I've loved them both since the 1990s. Who would have thought one day I'd get to talk to them about clowns, shame spirals and pegging? NEWS EDITOR LAUREN MILES @LAUREN_M1LES I asked Umbrella Academy star Tom Hopper about shooting BBC series Merlin. He joked about his character having so few lines: ‘The Knights of the Round Table used to say that we're the best-paid extras in the business!’ ONLINE ENTERTAINMENT EDITOR EMILY MURRAY @EMILYVMURRAY It was great to dive into all things Hit Man with director Richard Linklater for the podcast, discussing everything from do movie stars still exist to bringing sex back to cinema. I could've easily spoken to him all day……

What do you always take to set? I need to be thinking about my character from the moment I arrive on set: I find objects can be an endless supply of inspiration for that. I might take a photograph, use a certain scent, but often for me, it's usually music. There was a PJ Harvey track I used for one character and it was quite confronting. I found that listening to that endlessly would immediately put me into the character's mindset. Have you ever stolen anything from a film set? No – I have always asked for things, but I've always been told ‘no’! In the early days of Game of Thrones, people used to be given a prop that was most significant to their character. But then HBO said…

WENDY JACOBSON: Titania, played by Jameela Jamil in She-Hulk. She's such a heightened, hilarious character and also an actor who can improv and is razor-sharp and can banter. I can't imagine being an actor, period, but I can't imagine having to work opposite someone like Ryan Reynolds, who is just so quick and so smart and so funny all the time – but that woman could handle it. RYAN REYNOLDS: I made a movie called Mississippi Grind and I would love to see Deadpool hanging out with my character in that, Curtis. Seeing those two guys, because they have some overlap but there is something really sad about both of them, too. I'd love [that to] just be explored a little bit. How about you, Hugh? HUGH JACKMAN: I'd love…

OUT 21 JUNE CINEMAS As far back as I can remember, I always wanted to be a biker…’ All right, so nobody actually says that line in Jeff Nichols’ absorbing study of a Chicago motorcycle crew living their lives on two wheels at the tailpipe of the 1960s. Yet someone may as well do, given how much his latest opus unabashedly echoes GoodFellas in its technique, plotting and structure. From an opening face-off outside a dusty out-of-town drinking hole that ends with a violent freeze frame, the Take Shelter and Midnight Special director plumps for a voiceover-driven, subculture-scrutinising approach that thrums with Scorsese-isms (check out those nostalgia-laden needle drops!) and knowing Henry Hill-esque callbacks. Yet while the style seems familiar, the material feels fresh: a testament not only to how…

FILM OUT NOW ARROW, BD EXTRAS Commentary, Video essays, Booklet, Poster Witchy folk-horror drama gives way to more real-world terrors in Tereza Nvotová's ferocious study of parochialism and patriarchal oppression, filtered through the lens of Slovakian folklore. Natália Germáni stars as Šarlota, a young woman returning to the village she fled decades earlier, haunted by memories of a tragic accident. Treated with suspicion by the locals, she befriends fellow outsider Mira (Eva Mores); but when two children go missing the pair get caught up in a gripping modernday witch hunt.…

OUT NOW DIGITAL 5 JULY CINEMAS Inspired by the true story of a Swedish serial killer, this Nordic noir stars Andrea Riseborough and Stellan Skarsgård as the therapist and policeman tasked with making sense of the case. No easy feat when the killer himself (Gustaf Skarsgård) isn't even sure what happened. Directed by Ran Huang from a screenplay co-written by Megan Everett-Skarsgård (Stellan's wife), this bleak thriller isn't short on intensity, emanating from its perma-scowling cast and moody cinematography. The grim atmosphere is impressively sustained throughout but is ultimately one-note.…

OUT 28 JUNE CINEMAS, DIGITAL Set in the weeks after the death of Diana, Princess of Wales in 1997, this compassionately observed drama from Danish writer/director Niels Arden Oplev (The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo) concerns a pair of sisters, Inger (Sofie Gråbøl) and Ellen (Lene Maria Christensen), who embark on a group tour from Copenhagen to Paris. Inger's schizophrenia, however, makes everyday tasks highly challenging. Structured as a road trip, Rose explores the stigmatisation of its central character and the emotional strain endured by her loved ones, aided by an unshowy turn from The Killing‘s Gråbøl.…

OUT NOW CINEMAS 1 JULY DIGITAL Twenty-five years after his young son disappeared, Bill (David Edward-Robertson) still seeks answers on the Yorkshire Moors, calling in a dowser, a psychic and one of his son's old childhood friends to look for… what? A body? A spirit? Closure? Something altogether darker? Drenched in atmosphere, director Chris Cronin's feature debut is an ambitious folk horror and unhurried character study, its carefully orchestrated scares sinking into your bones like dawn fog. Bernard Hill makes a small but telling contribution in his final film.…

SCREEN OUT NOW CINEMAS We all know by now that a Nicolas Cage film has the capacity to be a rollercoaster of ups and downs. Benjamin Brewer's Arcadian is no exception. It throws us into a world in a state of noisy upheaval, as Cage's Paul scavenges what he can to survive and runs home to his infant sons. The opening stretch is blissfully context-free; how and why the end of the world happened isn't important – only the aftermath is. Fifteen years on, Paul and sons Joseph (Jaeden Martell) and Thomas (Maxwell Jenkins) spend their days peacefully. Cage gives a quiet, sincere performance as a father bonding with two teenagers (teaching Joseph how to drive is a highlight). At night, however, they barricade themselves inside to hide from feral…

OUT 21 JUNE CINEMAS Set in 1934, this CGI animated noir adventure imagines a bug's life as an Agatha Christie-esque mystery. Taking a much-needed holiday after being fired from a case, Inspector Sun (voiced by Ronny Chieng) – a spider, by the way - boards a Shanghai-to-San Francisco seaplane, where a murder most foul requires his detective skills. Colourful and inventive, the film makes good use of its anthropomorphic characters and authentic period setting. Twists in the tale will keep adults guessing, although it might go over younger viewers’ heads.…

OUT 5 JULY CINEMAS Stand down, Bloom fans: this experimental French-language doc is in fact inspired by Virginia Woolf's novel Orlando: A Biography, memorably adapted by Sally Potter in 1992. Telling of an Elizabethan nobleman who lives 300 years, never ages and becomes a woman halfway through the story, it's a feminist classic that's now viewed as a formative paean to gender fluidity. ‘Someone once asked me, “Why don't you write your biography?”’ says director Paul B. Preciado at the start of this playful exploration of its themes and legacy. ‘I replied: “Because Virginia Woolf wrote my biography in 1928.”’ Preciado doesn't care for Potter's film, believing it to be ‘anchored in a culture of transvestism’ from which he felt excluded. His highly original response is to enlist two dozen…

OUT NOW CINEMAS Perhaps best known to film fans as the place where Daniel Craig's Bond meets Ben Whishaw's Q, the National Gallery in London means something to millions. This contemplative documentary sees a range of voices, from visitors and employees to famous talking heads, muse on why it speaks to them, and then choose a favourite painting from its massive collection. Michael Palin inadvertently recalls Skyfall by picking a Turner, while Claudia Winkleman peers lovingly at a da Vinci from beneath her fulsome fringe. Strictly for art lovers only.…

1974 OUT 5 JULY CINEMAS 15 JULY 4K UHD, DIGITAL EXTRAS Commentaries, Featurettes, Interviews, Short, Posters, Soundtrack, Booklet Newly restored for its 50th anniversary, Francis Ford Coppola's 1974 Palme d'Or winner – made between the first two Godfathers – reveals a writer-director at the height of his powers. Inspired by Michelangelo Antonioni's Blow-Up (1966), and infused with Watergate paranoia – although it was written long before the scandal itself – it's a chilly character study/thriller centring on obsessive surveillance expert Harry Caul (a career-best Gene Hackman). When he's hired to catch a cheating spouse, Caul stumbles on something much more sinister, but where does the conspiracy start and his traumatised catastrophising begin? The pivotal sequence is a complex street scene which Caul replays over and over, like a lonely filmmaker who…

1992-95 OUT NOW BD EXTRAS Commentaries, Featurettes, Deleted scenes, Galleries, Storyboard comparison Subjected to a lawsuit after the filmmakers ignored the Stephen King story its title comes from, this 1992 techno-thriller was forced to remove the master of horror's name from its marketing. Nevertheless, the first Lawnmower Man is a charming curiosity, notable for cutting-edge visuals and sweat-drenched performances from Jeff Fahey and Pierce Brosnan. This set collects the theatrical and director's cuts, plus the low-grade 1995 sequel, Beyond Cyberspace…

1987 OUT NOW BD EXTRAS Commentary, Archival shorts, Booklet ‘I've lived in London my entire life and it still surprises me nearly every day,’ says filmmaker Stephen Poliakoff. That idea drives his 1987 feature debut, which sees Charles Dance's apathetic statistician dragged through London's hidden worlds on a Blow-Up-esque quest – shot entirely on location – to recover a missing public information film. Even though the story never quite delivers on its tantalising set-up, Hidden City still fascinates with its tour of a secret side of London that might otherwise be lost to time.…

1969 OUT NOW BD, DVD EXTRAS Documentaries Although adapted from a novel by Joseph Kessel, Jean-Pierre Melville's suspenseful portrait of Resistance operations in Nazioccupied France draws power and authenticity from the filmmaker's own wartime experiences. A haunting exploration of the heroism of ordinary people in the face of unbeatable odds, Army of Shadows returns to Blu-ray with a striking 4K restoration (although, disappointingly, there's no native UHD release on the cards) and an additional documentary exploring Melville's time with the Free French movement.…

SUSAN SEIDELMAN ST. MARTIN'S PRESS Spurred by a question on her Wikipedia page ‘Whatever happened to Susan Seidelman?’ - the director answers in her own words, splitting her story into two acts: the first covering her 60s upbringing, the second her filmmaking debut (1982's Smithereens) and subsequent success (Madonna vehicle Desperately Seeking Susan, Sex and the City). Packed with behindthescenes insight, this is a bright, profane and spirited memoir from a fearless talent.…

‘I SPECIFICALLY LOOK FOR ROLES THAT ARE NOT LIKE MY LIFE’ It's May 2024, and Natalie Portman is speaking to Total Film having wrapped another day's shoot in London on Guy Ritchie's globe-trotting adventure, Fountain of Youth. If it feels like an unexpected choice, well, that's to be expected from Portman, whose career has defied expectations since she began working as a child. Straight out of the gate, it was early roles in adult fare like Leon and Michael Mann's Heat that marked her out as a serious talent who could hold her own against heavyweights like Gary Oldman and Al Pacino. The Star Wars prequel trilogy would give her a platform of unprecedented scale, but even while starring as Padmé Amidala for George Lucas, she found time for the…

SCREEN OUT 28 JUNE CINEMAS Kevin Costner made his directorial debut with Dances with Wolves (1990), but he hasn't helmed a film since 2003's Open Range. Now he's back with the gargantuan Horizon, a classical horse opera in the John Ford mould that will reportedly span four films, with Chapter 2 slated for release in August. A kaleidoscopic ensemble piece, Chapter 1 is set during the American Civil War. Exploring the expansion of the American West, it follows white settlers across Wyoming and Montana as they travel to a town called Horizon. The environment proves hostile; early on, Costner lets rip with an astonishing scene involving an ambush by Native Americans. Among those facing the carnage is Frances (Sienna Miller), a mother of two who hides beneath ground with her…

OUT NOW CINEMAS Nearly 30 years after the original Bad Boys, Will Smith and Martin Lawrence bounce back with a fourquel that sees their Miamicop characters Mike Lowrey and Marcus Burnett fighting to clear the name of their boss Captain Howard (Joe Pantoliano), who's posthumously accused of corruption. The intervention of a mysterious new foe (Eric Dane) means they end up on the run themselves, along with Lowrey's son Armando (Jacob Scipio). The plot isn't desperately involving: it's a vehicle to take our heroes - who range from hapless to highly skilled - from one action-comedy scene to another. After Marcus has a brush with death, much of the laughs comes from his newfound mystical beliefs, including the conviction that he's invincible. Less amusing is his ongoing obsession with junk…

OUT NOW CINEMAS 1 JULY DIGITAL Saltburn vibes abound in this tale of a teacher reunited with her old girlfriend in a leafy country pile. Actor Jo (Greta Bellamacina) is about to get hitched, to a beau we never see. Yet having Scarlet (Amber Anderson) around inevitably evokes memories of their youthful fling, recreated in flashbacks that awkwardly require the 30-something leads to play their characters at school age. The hen do that follows sees Tamsin Egerton and others swell Jaclyn Bethany's all-female ensemble. Sadly, her film irks more than illuminates.…

SCREEN OUT 8 JULY BD EXTRAS Commentary, Featurettes, Promo video, Short film, Booklet, Poster Wellington Paranormal‘s Tom Sainsbury writes, directs and stars in this well-crafted wilderness horror about a man on the verge of a nervous breakdown whose trek through the New Zealand bush is interrupted by overeager hikers and… something far more dangerous. Serving up a canny mix of creeping paranoia with subtle humour, this low-budget gem meticulously builds towards an outrageous finale reveal we guarantee you won't see coming.…

OUT 28 JUNE CINEMAS ‘Don't open the gate to past sorrows,’ director Lina Soualem remembers her mother, the actor Hiam Abbass, chiding her whenever she asked about Abbass leaving the village she was raised in to pursue her chosen career. This moving and intimate documentary does just that, returning Abbass to her former home for an emotional exhumation of her Palestinian family's history of hardship and displacement. Positioning Abbass’ success within a wider generational tableau, Soualem's heartfelt film tells an affecting story of sad goodbyes and brave new beginnings.…

SCREEN OUT 5 JULY CINEMAS Two very different milieux collide in this amusing midlife-crisis comedy from Quebecois filmmaker Monia Chokri. Forty-year-old Sophia (Magalie Lépine-Blondeau) is a married philosophy professor, whose existence is turned upside down when she embarks on a passionate relationship with brawny builder Sylvain (Pierre-Yves Cardinal), who is renovating the couple's chalet. Smartly shot with an emphasis on reflected images and partial perspectives, The Nature of Love is powered along by the palpable chemistry between its romantic leads.…

OUT 28 JUNE CINEMAS A girl tries to come to terms with her granny's illness in this uplifting family animation. Unable to accept the news, 11-year-old Mary (Mia O'Connor) cooks a batch of colcannon and kicks off an adventure involving four generations of women. Adapted from Roddy Doyle's 2011 novel, Enzo d'Alò's film was co-produced by seven countries - including Ireland, contributing prestigious voice talent (Sharon Horgan, Brendan Gleeson) and lush landscapes. Against this backdrop, d'Alò blends coming-of-age themes with modern fantasy sweetly.…

OUT 8 JULY DIGITAL I'm the thorns that protect the rose,’ insists gentle Alejandro (Julio Torres), shielding his monstrously rude critic boss Elizabeth (a roaring, magenta-haired Tilda Swinton) from the New York art world's naked hatred. In this whimsical absurdist comedy, wannabe toy designer Alejandro will be sent back to El Salvador if he can't urgently earn visa sponsorship by arranging an art show of the weird egg paintings made by Elizabeth's cryogenically frozen husband Bobby. Writer-director-actor Torres whips up a head-spinning combo of deadpan art-world parody and poignant immigration satire, as the naive Alejandro negotiates sex-worker cleaning jobs, scary sublets and Elizabeth's tantrums, trying to stay one jump ahead of deportation. Infusing the chilly New York reality with lo-fi fantasy sequences enables Torres to show off his wayward imagination:…

OUT 26 JUNE CINEMAS Documentary-maker David Stewart and the Yorke Dance Project pay tribute to visionary choreographers Robert Cohan and Kenneth MacMillan in this 74-minute double-bill. Exploring themes of grief and revenge, the second part adapts MacMillan's 1988 Hamlet-inspired ballet Sea of Troubles into filmic form, albeit not entirely successfully – Stewart's camera proves rather less nimble than his performers. But the five solo dances of Portraits are intimate and starkly captivating, pairing expressionist movement with empty space to haunting effect.…

SCREEN OUT NOW CINEMAS Cinema's recent roster of female long-distance swimming stories, such as Nyad and Vindication Swim, gets a medalworthy entrant in this handsomely-produced biopic of Trudy Ederle, the first woman to swim the English Channel, in 1926. Very much a ‘Girls Can Do Anything!’ movie, it plunges slight and sickly New Yorker Trudy (a determined Daisy Ridley) into conflict with her stern German immigrant father (Kim Bodnia) as she pursues forbidden swimming lessons and enters ‘indecent’ trial competitions. Soon, she's neck-deep in local records and trophies. Director Joachim Rønning (Pirates of the Caribbean: Salazar's Revenge) gives the script a glossy, period-perfect New York setting, full of post-World War One patriarchal attitudes that Trudy fights as tenaciously as the waves. Ridley brings the engaging pluck and vulnerability of Star…

OUT NOW NETFLIX Jennifer Lopez makes a foray into sci-fi action as Atlas Shepherd, a data analyst on an off-world mission to capture the world's first AI terrorist (Simu Liu). When things go awry, she must learn to trust her AI mech suit. Director Brad Peyton (San Andreas) flaunts his James Cameron influences on the film's giant metal sleeve, while Lopez finds emotion amid the weapons-grade pyrotechnics. But the impressive effects and solid (if minimal) world-building barely mask the thin plot and hammy characters: like AI, Atlas isn't that clever beneath the surface.…

1976 OUT 28 JUNE CINEMAS Some films get more relevant with each passing year. Nighon 50 years old, Sidney Lumet's merciless stab at the media hasn't lost any of its savage edge. At its black heart is Peter Finch's masterful turn as Howard Beale, the anchorman for UBS Evening News who announces his suicidal intentions on air when he learns his show is about to be axed. As the ratings soar with the help of TV producer Diana Christensen (Faye Dunaway), Beale saves his job and becomes the ‘mad prophet of the airwaves’, audiences lapping up his populist rants. Scripted by playwright Paddy Chayefsky (who won an Oscar for his troubles, one of four the film claimed), Network‘s hook is Beale spiralling out of control as executives spy a chance…

1969 OUT NOW 4K UHD EXTRAS Commentaries, Making Of, Deleted scene, Poster, Collectibles Michael Caine, Mini Coopers and bloody doors being blown off feature in a 4K collectors’ edition of Peter Collinson's iconic British comedy caper, restoring the film to vibrant life. Caine is the ex-con aiming to steal a cache of gold bullion in Turin, backed by Noël Coward's imprisoned kingpin. The film's knockabout humour – including Benny Hill's Professor Peach – still stands up, as do the action sequences, right up to the finale in the Alps. All together now: ‘This is the self-preservation society…’…

SCREEN 1956 OUT NOW BD EXTRAS Featurettes, Booklet Praised by François Truffaut and Lindsay Anderson on its unveiling at Cannes in 1956, this Hungarian melodrama from writer-director Zoltán Fábri thoroughly merits its digital restoration. It relates the love story between country girl Mari (Mari Töröcsik) and Máté (Imre Soós), a peasant member of an agricultural collective. Thanks to its orchestration of camerawork, editing and music, Merry-Go-Round conveys the effervescence of youthful romance, offering the possibility of happiness.…

1949 OUT NOW DVD, BD, DIGITAL EXTRAS Commentary, Documentary, Featurettes A year after their 1948 classic The Red Shoes, Powell and Pressburger toned down the Technicolor for this black-and-white tale of home-front WWII bravery. Based on the 1943 novel by Nigel Balchin, it charts the romance between brooding and troubled bombdisposal expert David Farrar and his colleague Kathleen Byron. Released in spiffy 4K, it's shot in oppressively noirish tones by Christopher Challis, but doesn't have the magic of the Archers’ enduring works.…

LEON BLACK Curb is oft-regarded by fans as having two eras – before and after Leon Black. After Larry's wife Cheryl (Cheryl Hines) finally tired of his antics, a new foil was needed. Meet charismatic freeloader Leon Black, as played by J.B. Smoove. ‘It works for these two characters to be friends, even if it feels like Leon is bogarting his way into Larry's house,’ Smoove told Rolling Stone. Leon is seen as one of the few characters to always have Larry's back; a good-natured if chaotic presence who revitalised the show's mojo.…

FURIOSA: A MAD MAX SAGA Fury Road composer Tom ‘Junkie XL’ Holkenborg's follow-up spends more time spinning its wheels than its attack-mode predecessor. The first half stresses slow-build malevolence and mood, low on momentum and melody, with a Dune-ly duduk complementing the abrasive electronic atmospherics. The Stowaway and Fata Morgana add imposing presence and mystery, respectively, before The Bullet Farm heralds a clamorous charge to the finish: Dementus Is Gaining and The Darkest of Gods finally maximise the all-engines roar required. JOHN WILLIAMS IN TOKYO Before conductor Seiji Ozawa died this year, he invited John Williams to conduct the Saito Kinen Orchestra in Japan. Featuring a loving tribute to Ozawa, the emotive results amply justify revisiting Williams’ biggies. The three marches (Superman/Raiders/ Imperial) are romping and spry; the Potter cues…

BASEBALL: THE MOVIE ‘Football is war, basketball is a dance, but baseball is cinema.’ So writes critic Noah Gittell in this studious treatise on how the movies have portrayed – and occasionally betrayed – America's favourite pastime. Selective rather than exhaustive, the book's sociohistorical approach means that the likes of The Jackie Robinson Story, Bang the Drum Slowly and The Sandlot are explored in detail while others (Sam Raimi's For Love of the Game, for example) are left on the bench. NEIL SMITH LIFE THROUGH AN APERTURE: THE FILMS AND PHOTOGRAPHY OF KEITH HAMSHER Keith Hamshere was briefly a child star for screen and stage, but went on to become a prolific and respected stills photographer for massive blockbusters and troubled productions from James Bond and Star Wars to Ishtar.…

AMAZING AMÉZIANE TITAN COMICS The second instalment in graphic novelist Amazing Améziane's ‘Cineaste Trilogy’ purports, like its predecessor Quentin by Tarantino, to be the filmmaker in his own words. Thus, here we get an imagined version of Francis Ford Coppola narrating a whistle-stop tour of his career highs and lows. From his formative collaboration with the late Roger Corman to the chaos of Apocalypse Now, it's a comprehensive biography, with striking artwork matching the tone of the works discussed. Next up: Scorsese……

FOR SALE This modernist masterpiece is the perfect home for a multigeneration family. While it's primarily constructed from glass and steel to accentuate those bold lines, cedarwood details on the facade help it to blend into the forest setting of Forks, Washington. Floor-to-ceiling windows offer stunning natural views and keep the place flooded with light, so much so it might even look like your skin's shimmering at times. Beautifully appointed throughout, it's the kind of place you could happily live forever.…

CHRIS HEMSWORTH THOR: LOVE AND THUNDER (2022) April 2022 ‘The amount of improv and craziness got out of hand – in the best way. We had to just keep reining it in, saying, “OK, this is hilarious, but what's it about?”… We had to keep coming back to the love story. That was what was going to anchor these characters, and anchor this story, and ground it.’ April 2024 ‘I got caught up in the improv and the wackiness, and I became a parody of myself… I didn't stick the landing.’…