685 film 117-120RT
8/8/11
09:58
Page 117
INDEX
list.co.uk/film Films screening this fortnight are listed below with certificate, star rating, credits, brief review and venue details. Film index compiled by Paul Dale ✽ Indicates Hitlist entry Aftershock (15) ●●●●● (Xiaogang Feng, China, 2010) Fan Xu, Jingchu Zhang, Chen Li. 135min. The epic story of a family separated as a result of the enormous Tangshan earthquake of 1976. Sloans, Glasgow. All the President’s Men (15) ●●●●● (Alan J Pakula, US, 1976) Dustin Hoffman, Robert Redford, Jack Warden. 138min. Released in 1976 during the Carter-Ford presidential campaign, Pakula’s political thriller traces the real-life story of journalists Bob Woodward (Redford) and Carl Bernstein (Hoffman) as they uncover an attempted crime in Washington DC’s Watergate Complex that led to the Watergate Scandal and Nixon’s resignation. A classic of the much abused crusader journalist genre. Scotsman Screening Room, Edinburgh. Apocalypse Now (18) ●●●●● (Francis Coppola, US, 1980) Martin Sheen, Marlon Brando, Robert Duvall, Dennis Hopper. 153min. Vietnam as ‘the ultimate trip’. We follow US Army assassin Sheen downriver and deeper into the Heart of Darkness ruled over by Brando’s mad Colonel Kurtz. Alternately pretentious and visually overpowering (the Valkyries helicopter attack, for example), the film’s grandiloquent folly pierces right to the bone of the conflict. Macrobert, Stirling. Arrietty (U) ●●●●● (Hiromasa Yonebayashi, Japan, 2010) Mirai Shida, Ryunosuke Kamiki, Shinobu Otake. 94min. Fourteen-year-old Arrietty (voiced by Shida) and the tiny Clock family live under the floorboards of a suburban home, exploring and borrowing from the human world above. Arrietty may not have the scope of Studio Ghibli’s earliest works, but the result is a beautifully realised smallscale drama. Selected release. Beautiful Lies (12) ●●●●● (Pierre Salvadori, France, 2010) Audrey Tautou, Nathalie Baye, Sami Bouajila. 110min. See review, page 107. Selected release. Bedknobs and Broomsticks (PG) ●●●●● (Robert Stevenson, US, 1971) Angela Lansbury, David Tomlinson, Roddy McDowall. 117min. An apprentice witch and three English kids make their contribution to the war effort via some enjoyable set pieces (the animals’ football match) and some less than wonderful songs. Glasgow Film Theatre. Beginners (15) ●●●●● (Mike Mills, US, 2010) Ewan McGregor, Christopher
Plummer, Mélanie Laurent. 104min. 106min. Pixar’s charmless sequel replaces McGregor is Oliver, whose father Hal the homespun values of the original with (Plummer) has recently died from cancer, impressive racetrack backdrops, violent having at the age of 75 come out as gay and guns-and-missile action, and juvenile enthusiastically embraced the life he had comedy from the belching, flatulent Mater. long denied himself. Whimsicality runs A mechanical slew of pop-culture gags through every frame and incurable romantics indicate a considerable drop in the level of will clutch it to their hearts. Selected release. invention from Finding Nemo or Up. A Better Life (12A) ●●●●● (Chris General release. Weitz, US, 2011) Demián Bichir, Eddie Cars 2 3D (U) ●●●●● (John Lasseter, Brad Lewis, US, 2011) Larry the Cable ‘Piolin’ Sotelo, Joaquín Cosio. 97min. A Guy, Owen Wilson, Michael Caine. Better Life is the simple tale of illegal 106min. See above. General release. Mexican immigrant Carlos’ (Bichir) attempt The Conspirator (12A) ●●●●● to make a better life for his son Luis (Robert Redford, US, 2010) James (Julián) in Los Angeles. When Carlos’ pick McAvoy, Robin Wright, Kevin Kline. up van and tools are stolen the pair know 122min. This courtroom drama about the they must find them to survive. Morally woman charged alongside John Wilkes commendable and mildly successful. Booth – the man who shot Abraham Filmhouse, Edinburgh. Lincoln – is clearly just as inspired by The Big Picture (L’homme qui more recent politics. The results are voulait vivre sa vie) (15) ●●●●● (Eric Lartigau, France, 2010) Romain intermittently preachy and starchy, Duris, Marina Foïs, Niels Arestrup. better suited to stirring a 115min. Duris plays an anti-hero classroom debate than a cinema OUTS deep in emotional crisis. His audience. Macrobert, Stirling. IDE The Devil’s Double wife is having an affair and T H E (18) ●●●●● (Lee when he confronts the object of F E STIVA Tamahori, Belgium, 2011) her affections his problems really L S Dominic Cooper, Ludivine begin. Director Lartigau’s control Sagnier, Raad Rawi. 108min. See of atmospherics is impressive and review, page 107. General release. Duris proves that he is always more Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick watchable when playing tormented souls. Rules (U) ●●●●● (David Bowers, US, Filmhouse, Edinburgh. 2011) Zachary Gordon, Devon Bostick, Bridesmaids (15) ●●●●● (Paul Feig, US, 2011) Kristen Wiig, Maya Rudolph, Rachael Harris. 99min. Anaemic sequel to Rose Byrne. 125min. When her newlylast year’s adaptation of Jeff Kinney’s bestengaged best friend Lillian (Rudolph) asks selling books. Macrobert, Stirling. Elite Squad 2 (Tropa de Elite: her to be chief bridesmaid, Annie (Wiig) is O Inimigo Agora É Outro) (18) delighted, until she meets Lillian’s new best ●●●●● (José Padilha, Brazil, 2010) friend; a beautiful, rich bitch. The cast list Wagner Moura, Irandhir Santos, André overflows with comedy talent and the jokes Ramiro. 115min. See review, page 108. are very funny. General release. Selected release. Captain America: The First Film Socialisme (PG) ●●●●● Avenger 2D (12A) ●●●●● (Joe (Jean-Luc Godard, Johnston, US, 2011) Chris Evans, Hugo Switzerland/France, 2010) Catherine Weaving, Hayley Atwell, Sebastian Stan. Tanvier, Christian Sinniger, Jean-Marc 123min. Joe Johnston, director of The Stehlé. 101min. Still mad and provocative Wolfman and The Rocketeer, takes us back after all these years, legendary French to the early days of the Marvel with the filmmaker and polemicist Jean-Luc Godard archetypal superhero. When Steve Rogers new feature is set on a garish cruise ship (Evans) volunteers to participate in an that’s traveling around the Mediterranean experimental program, it turns him into (with Patti Smith among its guests). There’s super soldier Captain America. As Captain no narrative to speak of: this is part treatise America, Rogers joins forces with Bucky on the state of the European Union, part Barnes (Stan) and Peggy Carter (Atwell) to philosophical debate, part aesthetic wage war on the evil HYDRA organization, experiment and part journal on the decline led by the villainous Red Skull (Weaving). of European civilization. See review at See review at List.co.uk. General release. list.co.uk. Dundee Contemporary Arts, Captain America: The First Dundee. Avenger 3D (12A) ●●●●● (Joe Johnston, US, 2011) Chris Evans, Hugo Flashdance (15) ●●●●● (Adrian Lyne, US, 1983) Jennifer Beals, Michael Nouri, Weaving, Hayley Atwell, Sebastian Stan. Lilia Skala. 90min. Alex (Beals) is a welder 123min. See above. General release. by day and an erotic dancer by night. Iconic Cars 2 2D (U) ●●●●● (John Lasseter, Brad Lewis, US, 2011) Larry the Cable 80s dance classic with a storming Guy, Owen Wilson, Michael Caine. soundtrack. Macrobert, Stirling.
✽
✽ ✽
RBS First Film: Super 8
Outdoor film screenings are about as Scottish as a gladiatorial contests but that hasn’t stopped the Royal Bank of Scotland launching a series of alfresco screenings throughout the summer. That’s the good news, the bad news is you have to be an RBS current account customer to purchase a ticket, now that’s what we call a captive audience. The season opens with JJ Abrams’ excellent sci fi mystery Super 8. rbs.com/filmfirst ■ Hopetoun House, South Queensferry, on Thu 18 and Fri 19 Aug. Pollok Country Park, Glasgow on Thu 25 and Fri 26 Aug.
Film ✽
Profile EYAD ZAHRA Born 20 Safar 1403 AH (Islamic calendar) in Cleveland, Ohio. Background Zahra’s family is Syrian. He was the first of his family born in America, his older brother was born in Syria. Growing up, his mother taught him about Islamic culture, which he now sees as a blessing and a curse. Zahra always had a strong interest in filmmaking and took classes at the undergraduate film program at Florida State University. He made two short films: Jazima (2003) and Distance from the Sun (2004). What’s he up to now? Zahra has just made The Taqwacores, an adaptation of the novel about the US Punk Islam scene by Michael Muhammad Knight. On Punk ‘We deal with some basic themes that you see in many films but look at these issues in a bizarre, off-beat way. That is what punk is to me. I was not a punk expert before this film, not that I am now, but I did my best to reflect the genre and the community and culture and that is what we are aiming for, a rough and tumble film.’ On the vernacular ‘The book had more leeway, the conversations were longer and if you go on the internet someone had made a glossary of all the terms used in the book. What I didn’t want to do was make a film where we have a scene that’s just for the white people in the audience explaining what’s going on. I tried to stay as close to how you would hear people speak should they be living in such a commune.’ On Hollywood movies ‘A lot of times these days people get pumped up about a Hollywood movie, wait for it for weeks and then they go see it, ejaculate and never talk about it again. Obviously a good film is opposite, you don’t know what you are going into, get floored by it and are thinking about it and talking about it with friends for weeks.’ Interesting fact When Knight wrote the novel, the Muslim punk scene did not really exist but since the novel came out the Muslim punk scene has grown. (Kaleem Aftab) ■ The Taqwacores is on selected release from Fri 12 Aug. See review at list.co.uk/film. 11–18 Aug 2011 THE LIST 117