Film
What lies beneath
Just before the outbreak of the second world war a discovery was made in a riverside field at Sutton Hoo…
Think twice
The White Tiger is adapted from the Booker-prize winning novel (2008) by Aravind Adiga. It is directed by Ramin Bahrani…
They wouldn’t let it lie
The comedy Blithe Spiritwas written by Noël Coward in 1941. It is, essentially, about a séance going wrong and a…
The secret history
Andrei Konchalovsky’s Dear Comrades! is based on a true event and set in 1962 in the Russian city of Novocherkassk…
A fine romance
Sylvie’s Love is an exquisitely styled, swooning, old-school, period Hollywood romance and while it has been described as ‘glib’ in…
It’ll blow you away
When I recommend this documentary to people, telling them it follows the journalistic investigation into a fire that broke out…
Whiplash
Hillbilly Elegy is an adaptation of the best-selling memoir, published in 2016, by J.D. Vance and it’s quite a story.…
What cinema is for
Cuties is the subject of a moral panic and a hashtag #CancelNetflix. It tells the story of Amy (Fathia Youssouf),…
Hundrum
Mulan is Disney’s latest live-action remake, coming in at 120 minutes, compared with the 1998 animation, which ran to 80.…
Double trouble
American Pickle is a comedy based on a short story by Simon Rich, originally published in the New Yorker, and…
Holiday park hell
Make Up is the first full-length film from writer–director Claire Oakley, set in an out-of-season holiday park on the Cornish…
There will be blood
Two films about young women this week, one at the cinema, if you dare, and one to stream, if you…
Licensed to kill
Clemency stars Alfre Woodard as a prison warden on death row whose job is beginning to take its toll, and…
The great pretender
In the past Werner Herzog has given us a man pushing a ship up a mountain, a 16th-century conquistador going…
Nearly nul points
This comedy stars Will Ferrell and Rachel McAdams as an Icelandic duo whose biggest dream is to represent their country…
Going through the motions
Resistance stars Jesse Eisenberg and tells the true story of how mime artist Marcel Marceau helped orphaned Jewish children to…
Black lives didn’t matter
Spike Lee’s Da 5 Bloods is about four African-American vets who return to Vietnam to locate the body of their…
Allen key
A Rainy Day in New York is Woody Allen’s 49th film and it’s not been without its troubles. When accusations…
Catastrophe
At the outset of lockdown I gave you my list of top mustn’t-watch films — that is, the ones that…
There’s something about dairy
You may be asking yourself: have I reached that point in lockdown where I’m watching Icelandic dramas about the price…
The Heckler: Why does anyone still rate Vertigo?
Here’s something that may interest you. Or not. (Could go either way.) I was looking over Sight & Sound’s ‘100…
Doggie style
This week I’d like to point you in the direction of the British Film Institute and its free online archive…
Deborah Ross
First, the latest digital film release: The Assistant, starring Julia Garner in a slowly, slowly, catchy, catchy tale that won’t…
Don’t look now
As all other publications are offering guides saying what to watch from home during this pandemic — ‘the 50 best…
The great seducerBryan Appleyard
Hud is a film that has haunted me for decades. I was never sure why. It seemed to be something…
