Presence review: Chiller where audience becomes the ghost January 22, 2025 While he made his name in the mainstream with the Magic Mike and Ocean’s Eleven films, Steven Soderbergh has experimented with genre and form in a number of smaller movies. In the horror genre, he made 2011’s frighteningly prescient pandemic horror Contagion, and delved into the darker corners of the mind with 2018’s Unsane. Now, [...]
Here film review: de-aged Tom Hanks can’t save soulless flop January 16, 2025 Robert Zemeckis is known for his love of cinema innovation, using motion capture to make Jim Carrey into Scrooge, or bring to life The Polar Express. In Here, he takes some of Hollywood’s biggest names through the different stages of life. It’s about a house, and the people who have lived on that spot, from [...]
Vermiglio review: Italian drama is a serious Oscar contender January 16, 2025 Vermiglio review and star rating: | ★★★★☆ With the Oscars on the horizon, Vermiglio will be hoping to make the cut as the Italian entry for Best International Feature. The title refers to a remote Italian village struggling to cope with the impact of the Second World War as it comes to an end. The family [...]
A Complete Unknown: Bob Dylan biopic gets the mercurial genius January 16, 2025 A Complete Unknown | ★★★★☆ One of Hollywood’s favourite sons takes on the lofty role of an American icon in A Complete Unknown. Timothee Chalamet plays Bob Dylan in the period that made him a megastar. Starting in 1961 where he was an anonymous folk singer looking to make his name in New York’s Greenwich [...]
Emmanuelle: Softcore porn reboot somehow makes watching sex boring January 15, 2025 Emmanuelle (2024) | ★★☆☆☆ Emmanuelle, the 1974 film that helped drag softcore erotica into the cultural mainstream, remains among the most successful French movies of all time. Watched by some 300 million horny men and women, it was an X-rated affair, briefly banned in its home nation, perhaps best-known for an infamous scene in which [...]
A Complete Unknown review: Timothee Chalamet stars in thrilling biopic January 14, 2025 A Complete Unknown review and star rating: | ★★★★☆ Timothee Chalamet’s career is beginning to feel like a high-wire act. He’s a fabulous actor, but one whose off-screen cult of personality seems forever on the cusp of eclipsing his on-screen talent. I feared taking on Bob Dylan, a man who seems to vanish like a shadow [...]
Babygirl review: Nicole Kidman wows again in sexy drama January 9, 2025 Movies about sex can often be lost in sensational headlines, any message overshadowed by the intrigue of a famous person being naughty on-screen. Babygirl, nominated for Best Picture – Drama at last weekend’s Golden Globes, will be hoping Oscar voters see the story behind the shagging. Nicole Kidman stars as Romy Mathis, a powerful chief [...]
Where to spend New Year’s Eve: London’s very best events December 26, 2024 From boozy dinners to DJs and where to catch the fireworks, Larissa Steel has ten ideas for you this New Year’s Eve New Year’s Eve feels like a far-off thought – but the capital’s best events are booking up ahead of Christmas, so now’s the time to secure tickets. Here are some of the very [...]
Christmas Day TV: why the new Wallace and Gromit is today’s must-watch film December 25, 2024 A British Christmas tradition returns in Aardman’s Wallace and Gromit, the animated duo that have warmed our hearts since their first appearance 35 years ago. There’s been little from the witless inventor and his canine chum ever since 2008’s A Matter of Loaf and Death, but a new deal with Netflix has seen them ride again. [...]
The best books of 2024: From Sally Rooney to Boris Johnson December 12, 2024 Okay, that headline is ever-so-slightly misleading – while many of the entries on this list are indeed among the best books of 2024, others earn their place by virtue of being emblematic of their time (Boris Unleashed), zeitgeist-capturing (Bad Girls of Ancient Greece) or simply so utterly bonkers we felt they earned a spot (The [...]