Film

Rebel Ridge

01/01/25

Netflix

Rebel Ridge wrong-foots me. Thanks to the title and blurb, I am anticipating a standard vigilante-revenge flick, but writer-director Jeremy Saulnier has created something far more interesting: a horrifyingly credible tale of police corruption and the suffering it creates.

When ex-Marine Terry (Aaron Pierre) cycles into Shelby Springs with a backpack full of cash, local cops Marston and Lann (David Denman and Emory Cohen) spy an opportunity to simultaneously throw their weight around, impress their Chief (Don Johnson) and boost their small town’s coffers. The image is all too familiar: a couple of thuggish white officers initiating a spurious stop and search and threatening an innocent Black man’s life. Only this time they’ve chosen the wrong guy.

Because Terry isn’t just the kind of person who serves as a role model – strong and self-assured, calm and intelligent, driven by a strong sense of right and wrong – he’s also a martial arts expert. He doesn’t want vengeance but he does want his hard-earned money back so that he can bail his hapless cousin out of jail. However, there’s something rotten at the heart of Shelby Springs, and local court clerk Summer (AnnaSophia Robb) needs his help to root it out…

Despite its premise, Rebel Ridge isn’t a very violent film. In fact, Terry actively avoids physical conflict, using his combat skills only when absolutely necessary. Instead, the focus is on the insidious damage caused by a legal system more focused on protecting itself than the public it’s supposed to serve – an exposé of the way that self-interest trumps morality, leaving carnage in its wake.

David Gallego’s cinematography evokes the Wild West, underscoring the sense that Shelby Springs is a tyrannous and untamed place. Meanwhile, Terry is reminiscent of the ‘good cowboy’, the quiet hero who rides into town and restores order. Pierre is perfectly cast in this role, exuding dignity and strength as well as real emotional depth. When it comes, the final battle feels well and truly earned.

A clever hybrid of action movie and social commentary, Rebel Ridge gets 2025’s film viewing off to a flying start.

4 stars

Susan Singfield

Film Bouquets 2024

2024 has been an interesting (and sometimes infuriating) year for cinema, with some absolute masterpieces crashing and burning at the box office, while inferior sequels have raked in the big bucks. As is our established custom, here’s our regular shout-out of our ten favourite films of the year (plus three ‘special mentions’).

As ever, they are listed in order of release.

The Holdovers

“Alexander Payne spins a moving, endearing and sweetly sad story about human interaction…”

Poor Things

“Hums with pure invention, switching from black and white, to heightened colour, from fish-eye lens interiors and cramped city streets to majestic – almost hallucinatory – landscapes…”

The Zone of Interest

“Real monsters are just everyday people fuelled by hierarchy, encouraged by their superiors to wade ever deeper into the sewer of depravity…”

American Fiction


“Both thoughtful and thought-provoking, American Fiction is an impressive piece of work, deftly straddling the highbrow/lowbrow chasm that so infuriates its protagonist…”

Dune: Part Two

“Allegories about the links between religion and drugs, the evils of colonialism, the ruthlessness of royalty, the inevitability of war between the poor and the privileged…’

Civil War

“A powerful sense of unease builds steadily throughout – I’ve rarely seen urban warfare depicted with such unflinching realism and attention to detail…”

Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga

“A 79-year-old director at the height of his powers, unleashed into the world’s biggest sandbox and invited to play…”

The Substance

“An adept and powerful meditation on the subject of ageing and the ways in which women are constantly shackled and devalued by it…”

Speak No Evil

“There’s a gradual evolution from edgy confrontation into the realms of full-blown horror…”

Anora

“Sean Baker excels at placing marginalised people centre stage and showing them in all their complex, multi-faceted glory…”

SPECIAL MENTIONS

The Outrun

Late Night with the Devil

Robot Dreams

Philip Caveney & Susan Singfield

Wallace and Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl

26/12/24

BBC iPlayer

Christmas without Wallace and Gromit? Unthinkable.

And this year, there’s a brand new feature-length offering for our delectation, which brings back the duo’s most formidable foe, Feathers McGraw, who – ever since the events of 1993’s, The Wrong Trousers – has been languishing in a high security prison or, as some prefer to call it, ‘the zoo’. Meanwhile, at 62, West Wallaby Close, Wallace (who, after the sad demise of Peter Sallis, is now voiced by Ben Whitehead) is still inventing at full throttle, which means that poor Gromit is finding precious little to do. Wallace has even invented a machine that can give his faithful pooch a pat on the head and… well, it’s not the same as getting a pat from your best pal. Right?

But Wallace’s latest brainchild, a smart-gnome called Norbot (Reece Shearsmith), may be an invention too far – particularly when Feathers, from his place of incarceration, devises an incredibly complex method of overriding Norbot’s system an and then further contrives a way of copying him, over and over, to generate a whole army of gnomes committed to freeing Feathers from captivity. 

Feathers still has his sights squarely set on getting his flippers on the fabled blue diamond, which is stored at the local cop shop under the watchful gaze of Chief Inspector Mackintosh (Peter Kay) and his ambitious assistant, PC Mukherjee (Lauren Patel). As Feathers’ evil plan unfolds a proper caper ensues…

As ever, this is a delightfully inventive escapade, consistently funny throughout. Wallace’s Heath Robinson-style inventions are still a reliable source of merriment, while many viewers will enjoy the references to classic movies dotted throughout the narrative. Whitehead recreates Sallis’s distinctive tones with eerie skill and, once again, Feathers McGraw somehow manages to exude an air of total menace without the advantages of anything resembling actual features. Meanwhile, the multiple gnomes are deliciously creepy as they march along in unison, declaiming in Shearsmith’s jovial tones how very helpful they are whilst trying to send Gromit hurtling to his doom.

If the final protracted barge-chase doesn’t quite measure up to the frantic train-set sequence of The Wrong Trousers, this is nonetheless another assured addition to the W & G collection, with the original handmade ingenuity of the earlier films augmented by some impressive CGI touches. Written by Mark Burton and Nick Park and directed by Merlin Crossingham (and Park), it would be a grumpy soul indeed who doesn’t find themselves chortling from start to finish. If the titular twosome have become something of an institution, it’s worth repeating that they have more than earned their place in viewers’ hearts.

Cracking stuff, Gromit! Now pass the Wensleydale and bring on 2025.

4.3 stars

Philip Caveney

Queer

19/12/24

Cineworld, Edinburgh

The writing of William Burroughs is notoriously hard to film. (David Cronenberg came closest with The Naked Lunch in 1991.) Now Luca Guadagnino chances his arm with this adaptation of Burroughs’ 1985 novella, a belated sequel to his most celebrated novel, Junky. Queer, as adapted by Justin Kuritzikes, deviates dramatically from its source material in its second half and heads off in a startling new direction.

Daniel Craig, who seems determined to move as far away from his Bond persona as is humanly possible, plays Lee, a writer (but we never actually see him practising his craft). Craig does give the role his best endeavour, though it must be said it’s hard to believe that anyone could maintain such a buff physique on Lee’s daily diet of mescal, heroin and endless Camel cigarettes. He wanders the streets of Mexico City – which for the purposes of this film has been recreated in Rome’s Cinecita studios – and occasionally hires whichever young man catches his eye for rough sex in a sleazy hotel. But when his gaze falls on handsome young American, Eugene Allerton (Drew Starkey), he becomes hopelessly smitten and spends every waking hour attempting to get him into the sack.

Eventually, he succeeds in this mission but thereafter, Allerton treats him with such cool indifference that Lee becomes determined to learn more about him, so in the film’s second half, the duo set off to the jungles of Ecuador in search of a fabled drug called ayahuasca which is reputed to endow the user with telepathic powers…

Guadagnino is certainly an industrious filmmaker and I never know where he’ll go next. He’s already released the brilliant Challengers this year and I usually enjoy his work, but for me, he is prone to the occasional misstep. Suspiria felt puffed up with its own self-importance and Queer falls into that same category, a film that initially feels full of promise but ultimately delivers very little. Yes, it captures Burroughs’ seedy, nihilistic worldview, but like the source material, it’s strangely distancing and lacking in jeopardy and, frankly, none of the characters have qualities that an audience can root for – unless perhaps you count Jason Schwartzman’s fleeting appearance as Joe, Lee’s occasional drinking companion, who keeps being robbed by the young locals he sleeps with.

Lesley Manviile makes a late (almost unrecognisable) appearance as the feral, jungle-dwelling scientist, Dr Cotter, an expert in the aforementioned hallucinogen, and she helps Lee to achieve his goal of finding his inner self – but by this point I am already becoming uncomfortably aware of the film’s lengthy running time.

In its closing stages, Queer mostly feels uncomfortably reminiscent of Kubrik’s 2001: A Space Oddysey, which is not something I expected to say. And yes, it’s fine to refer to one of the more notorious episodes of Burroughs’ life, but to do so twice feels suspiciously like overkill. Kudos to Craig and Starkey who give this everything they have but, in the end, I just don’t care enough about what I’m watching to make this feel worth the effort.

2.8 stars

Philip Caveney

Carry-On

16/12/25

Netflix

Apart from that unfortunate title – which inevitably calls to mind a series of vintage comedies starring the likes of Sid James and Hattie Jacques – Carry-On is a tense, propulsive thriller, anchored by a dramatically beefed-up Taron Egerton. It’s directed by Jaume Collet-Serra, the man who put Liam Neeson on the train journey to hell in The Commuter.

This is a Christmas movie in the same way that Die Hard is a Christmas movie. That is to say, the action of the film takes place on Christmas Eve and there are some strategically-placed seasonal songs. But it must also be mentioned that, in this story of an evil man trying to explode a case containing Novichok on a packed holiday airplane, love and peace are in decidedly short supply. Which is not to say this isn’t great fun. I personally had a ball with it, but I appreciate it won’t be to everyone’s taste.

Ethan Kopek (Egerton) works at LAX Airport in security. He and his partner, Nora (Sofia Carson), are soon to have an addition to their family, so Ethan understandably has promotion on his mind. To this end, he manages to persuade his boss, Phil Sarkowski (Dean Norris), to let him take a post in the baggage-scanning lane, which carries extra responsibility. Which is an understatement, because Ethan has unwittingly upset the meticulously-laid plans of ‘The Traveller’ (Jason Bateman). He has planned to get the aforementioned Novichok aboard a New York-bound flight and explode it, killing the two hundred and fifty passengers aboard. His excuse for doing so? Somebody is paying an awful lot of money for his services. (The Traveller appears to regard his fellow human beings as disposable items.)

Ethan soon has a stranger’s voice in his ear, instructing him to allow the lethal suitcase onto the plane or risk having Nora murdered. The Traveller’s equally loathsome partner, The Watcher (Theo Rossi), has his eye on her and a sniper rifle loaded and ready to go. Meanwhile, elsewhere, plucky cop Elena Cole (Danielle Deadwyler) has picked up the faintest trace of a clue at the scene of a recent murder and begins to think that something dodgy might be about to go down.

But it’s Christmas Eve and nobody wants to listen…

What ensues is Ethan desperately trying to outmanoeuvre the two villains by any means at his disposal, without incurring his partner’s death (so no pressure there). Elena gradually works out the clues that bring her closer and closer to the airport. But time is ticking steadily away. Is it already too late to stop this frightful incident from occurring?

Collet-Serra and writer T.J. Fixman provide a tale that has more twists than a python on itching powder and the many Christmas references are almost mockingly thrown at the viewer as the story unfolds. (A particular highpoint for me is a no-holds-barred punch up in a speeding automobile as Wham’s Last Christmas pumps out of the car stereo.) Buckle-up for a wild ride!

If some of the elements are a little too familiar – Ethan desperately trying to defuse a bomb as the timer counts steadily down to zero – the presentation always feels fresh enough to make you forgive these occasional transgressions. Is it believable? Well, no, not really, but that’s hardly the object of the exercise. I do like the fact that Fixman has the good sense not to push my credulity too far. People get shot/stabbed/poisoned here and they don’t keep reviving and coming back for more. Which makes for a welcome change.

Meanwhile, Egerton, who has never really convinced in his previous attempts to fill an action-hero role, is utterly convincing in Carry-On and, since this is a Netflix original, it’s there to watch whenever you’re ready to hit the start button.

Those who favour a heart-warming seasonal tale might prefer to wait for Wallace and Gromit.

4.2 stars

Philip Caveney

Emilia Pérez

11/12/24

Netflix

Jacques Audiard has always been an interesting and experimentlal writer/director, seeming to choose his projects at random and rarely sticking to a particular genre, throughout a career that began back in the early 90s. Emilia Pérez deals with the kind of subject matter that would frighten off many respected filmmakers. It’s a bizarre soap opera/fable about crime cartels, gender reassignment and the plight of ‘The Disappeared,’ the millions of people murdered by Mexican cartels. 

Oh, and did I mention that it’s also a musical?

Audiard throws himself headlong into the process with his usual glee and the upshot is that the film is being garlanded with nominations for all the big movie awards – and this at a time when many veteran directors are struggling to get their new projects even funded. If the object of the exercise is to get yourself noticed, Audiard is finally doing it big time. (His last film, The Sisters Brothers, an intriguing offbeat western, came and went with barely a ripple.)

Rita (Zoe Saldana) is an under-appreciated Mexican lawyer, who spends most of her time penning eloquent pleas to get the guilty off the hook. Out of the blue, she is contacted by notorious crime cartel boss. Manitas del Monte (played by trans actor, Karlas Sofia Gascón), a man so steeped in violence he now feels he has only one way of escaping an inevitable fate. He has always longed to be a woman, and wants Rita to secretly arrange gender reassignment for him. In return, he will make her fabulously wealthy and she can choose whatever future she wishes for herself. But Manitas will have to fake his own death and his wife, Jessi (Selena Gomez), and his two young boys can know nothing of their father’s new life.

Four years later, Rita meets Manitas again, but now she’s the titular Emilia, looking to reconnect with her wife and children by posing as the cousin they never knew they had. What’s more, Emilia wishes to atone for all the killing she instigated when she was Manitas…

Is Emilia Pérez a good film? Well, for me it has flashes of brilliance, but there are also some sizeable missteps. The songs, composed by Clément Ducol and Camille range from upbeat dance tunes to quirky half-spoken, half-sung observations about anatomy that sometimes veer close to the absurd. While these serve to highlight the fairytale unreality of the piece, the constant shifting of tone makes the film feel uneven. The ‘Mexican’ locations are pretty convincingly recreated (in France) by cinematographer Paul Guilhaume and I think the elements dealing with The Disappeared are genuinely moving. On the performance front, Saldana is an absolute powerhouse as the very adaptable Rita, singing and dancing up a storm – and it’s great to see her performing as a human being rather than as a green-skinned, spandex-clad alien!

As a cis male, I might have missed some of the nuances around the transgender elements of the story – and Gascón certainly delivers a compelling and heartfelt performance – but the process of transition seems to be used here as a metaphor for wiping the slate clean and beginning a new life, untainted by the past. However, the lesson Emilia ultimately learns is that this is impossible, and she has to do more than change the way she lives if she wants to atone for her earlier crimes. This makes the underlying message a little muddled.

But again, I feel I must tip my hat to Jacques Audiard who, at seventy years of age, is fearlessly going where few other directors would dare to tread. Long may he continue to thrive!

3.6 stars

Philip Caveney

We Live in Time

02/12/24

Cineworld, Edinburgh

Directed by John Crowley, We Live in Time is a superior rom-com/weepie hybrid, anchored by stunning performances by two of Britain’s best actors, Florence Pugh and Andrew Garfield. Tonight’s advance screening – courtesy of Cineworld Unlimited – is extremely busy; in fact, we’ve managed to grab the very last two seats.

Pugh plays gourmet chef Almut Brühl, who hits a dressing-gown clad Tobias (Garfield) with her car while he’s bending down to pick up a piece of chocolate orange that’s fallen into the street. Luckily for the ‘rom’ part of the ‘com’, they’re both single: indeed, Tobias’s poor road-safety skills are the result of his reaction to signing his divorce papers. Before long, they’re in love – but then the ‘weepie’ element comes along, in the form of an ovarian cancer diagnosis, and a whole truckload of difficult decisions.

Nick Payne’s script is a sprightly delight, skipping around in time and tone with absolute assurance. The chronology is disrupted: we start in the middle of the story, then veer back and forth between the early stages of the couple’s relationship and the later trauma of Almut’s illness. It’s laugh-out-loud funny and devastatingly sad, a duality that’s reflected throughout the film.

Because Almut’s not ‘normal’. She’s a fascinatingly complex character: her restaurant serves Anglo-Bavarian fusion food; she’s bisexual; she’s fit and strong (a committed runner) and frail and weak (from the chemo). She’s a loving mother but it’s not enough: “I want to be remembered as more than a dead mum.” Almut treads her own path, and Tobias – softer and more passive than his go-getting partner – is her biggest supporter. Even if her driving force is sometimes hard to bear.

That Pugh makes a convincing chef is perhaps unsurprising as her father is a restaurateur. Naturally, given the couple’s jobs – Tobias is a data analyst for Weetabix – food plays a big part in this movie. Cinematographer Stuart Bentley highlights the seductive pleasure of a whole range of edible wonders, from Almut’s Michelin-starred concoctions to Jaffa Cakes dunked in mugs of tea and eaten in the bath.

We Live in Time is every bit as compelling as its heroine, and certainly worth a trip to your local cinema on New Year’s Day, when it’s out on general release. Just remember to pack your hanky – and maybe a fancy snack or two.

4.4 stars

Susan Singfield

Conclave

01/12/24

Cineworld, Edinburgh

The Pope has died peacefully in his sleep and, following the long-established conventions of the Catholic church, archbishops and cardinals from across the world gather in The Vatican to undertake the complicated ritual of choosing a successor. The task of organising the ensuing (and highly secretive) process falls to Cardinal Lawrence (Ralph Fiennes), the dean of the college of cardinals, who must put aside his personal grief in order to referee the resulting contest. But who will claim the coveted role?

Will it be Italian hardliner (and notorious racist) Tedesco (Sergio Castellitto)? How about the reserved but highly respected African contender, Adayemi (Lucian Msamati)? Might the prime slot fall to the influential and oleaginous American, Tremblay (John Lithgow), whose recent activities seem to suggest he’s not entirely trustworthy? And let’s not forget the wild card, newly arrived from Kabul, Benitez (Carlos Diehz), a bishop that none of the main players even knew existed, until now.

Meanwhile, one of the few women here with any influence, Sister Agnes (Isabella Rosselini), seems to be holding back on some important nuggets of information…

Lawrence is rooting for his old friend, Bellini (Stanley Tucci), a man determined to bring Catholicism into his more liberal worldview but an unexpected rivalry springs up when Lawrence finds himself also emerging as a potential candidate, something he most certainly does not want. After suffering doubts about his own faith, he’s been looking for an excuse to step quietly away from the church of Rome…

After his epic remake of All Quiet on the Western Front, director Edward Berger has turned his skills to a much more intimate story. Conclave, adapted by Peter Straughan from the novel by Robert Harris, generates its own, claustrophobic grip as the conclave moves through vote after vote, the various candidates jockeying for supremacy. This is serious, grown-up filmmaking and has about it all the mystery and intrigue of a superior crime drama. It’s heartening to note that a big crowd has turned out for this Sunday afternoon showing, a situation that these days is too often the preserve of more lightweight family fare.

It’s probably true to say that those who are already familiar with the novel are not going to be quite as blown away as I am by the film’s head-scrambling outcome, which I really, REALLY don’t see coming. (Those in the know, please keep the information to yourselves.)

Conclave is a compelling film, that has something revelatory to say about one of the most powerful and oppressive religions on the planet. It’s a film, moreover, that ingeniously encapsulates its most fundamental premise into a deceptively simple final shot.

4. 4 stars

Philip Caveney

Moana 2

30/11/24

Cineworld, Edinburgh

Moana wasn’t a smash in cinemas when it was released in 2016 (at least not by Disney standards) but it went on to develop a massive following once it started streaming. This belated sequel was itself originally intended to go straight to the small screen, but an executive decision decreed that it should first have a theatrical release and it appears to be doing far better than anyone expected.

It’s three years after the events of the first film and Moana (Auli’i Cravalho) is still a Wayfinder, mounting regular expeditions to try and find other tribes to connect with, but the evil god Nalo remains determined to keep the many nations of Polynesia divided. Pretty soon, Moana reconnects with demi-god, Maui (Dwayne Johnson), and she chooses an odd crew to accompany her on a new quest, a search for the cursed island of Motofetu, which has sunk to the bottom of the ocean. They are: eager young follower, Loti (Rose Matafeo); grumpy farmer, Kele (David Fane); and hunky Maui-worshipper, Moni (Hualalai Chung). Of course, comic relief comes in the form of the chicken and the pig, who are along for the ride – but I have to confess to growing tired of their repeated pratfalls fairly early on.

As with the first film, the animation is utterly spectacular, the evocations of nature incredibly accomplished – and I love the fact that the story is deeply rooted in Polynesian folklore. But the middle section feels strangely cluttered as Moana has to contend with the Kakomora – a tribe of er… coconuts – and she spends a lot of time in the bowels of a giant clam, much of which comes across as a kind of weird, hallucinatory goo-fest. The various goings-on are supposed to be clear to young audiences, but I’m pretty sure I’m not the only adult present, who – at various points – completely fails to understand what’s going on and why the characters are doing what they’re are.

A brief interlude where Moana interacts (and sings) with a malevolent ‘bat-lady’ called Matangi (Awhimai Fraser) is a welcome highlight – it also helps that this antagonist has a face – and I’d like to have seen more of her. (I probably will in the inevitable Part 3.)

Moana 2 has a PG certificate and warns only of ‘mild threat’ but some of the younger viewers at the packed screening I attend are clearly a bit distressed by the darker elements of the story. I’d say this is more suitable for kids aged seven and above but, whatever it’s doing, it seems to be going down a storm and it’s clearly going to generate massive profits for the House of Mouse.

3.8 stars

Philip Caveney

My Old Ass

26/11/24

Amazon Prime

Maybe because it’s lumbered with what must rank as one of the most unprepossessing titles in cinematic history, this charming film failed to make it into UK multiplexes and can only be found lurking amidst the ‘recently added’ section on Amazon Prime. Written and directed by Megan Park, it’s an engaging story, anchored by a tremendously appealing central performance by Maisy Stella.

She plays Elliott, a teenage girl living in the wilds of Canada. She’s recently finished school and is preparing to head off to university in Toronto. Meanwhile, she’s intent on enjoying her remaining days at home: making out with an attractive female assistant at her local coffee shop (an ambition that’s quickly ticked off the ‘to do’ list), and then heading off with her two pals, Ruthie (Maggie Ziegler) and Ro (Kerrice Brooks), for an unconventional birthday celebration. The trio have laid their hands on some hallucinogenic mushrooms and plan to spend the night in the local woods, getting utterly wasted. (With typical teenage insensitivity, Elliott is blissfully unaware that her family are waiting at home for her with a birthday cake).

The resulting trip has some unexpected consequences. Elliott encounters a version of herself from the future. Older Elliott (Aubrey Plaza) is thirty-nine, still in college and, judging by the scant information she gives away, living in a dark and unpredictable world. She has only one bit of advice for her younger self. Stay away from somebody called ‘Chad.’ (She refuses to say any more on the subject.)

The following morning, older Elliott has disappeared but she has left her phone number and, it turns out, the two of them can talk to each other across the decades, even exchange text messages. And then young Elliott bumps into a handsome and charming stranger (played by Percy Hynes White) and, despite her previous aversion to boys, she begins to feel powerfully attracted to him.

His name? You guessed it. Chad.

My Old Ass is a charming, bitter-sweet story that celebrates the freedom of youth and, at the same time, points out the futility of trying to deny your inner longings and the inevitability of change. As I said, Stella is tremendous in this and I expect to see her in more movies in the not too distant future. Elliot’s relationship with her mother, Kathy (Maria Dizzla), and her two brothers, Max (Seth Isaac Johnson) and Spencer (Carter Trozzolo), are effectively drawn – I particularly enjoy Spencer’s obsessive preoccupation with the actor, Saoirse Ronan – and the picturesque Canadian settings are beautifully utilised.

Aubrey Plaza makes a welcome addition to any film (she was the best thing about Francis Ford Coppola’s Megalopolis) and my only complaint is that here she’s somewhat underused, popping up only twice in person. But it doesn’t prevent the story from keeping me intrigued and hooked to its charming – and sometimes quirky – worldview.

So, the next time you’re stuck for something new to watch, head to Amazon Prime and give this a whirl. It’s a delight.

4 stars

Philip Caveney