Category: drama
REVIEW: The Last Princess (2016)
Following the death of her emperor father, Deok-hye (Son Ye-jin) - the last princess of Joseon dynasty - is forcibly relocated to Japan as part of that country's ongoing occupation of Korea. Trapped in Japan alongside her brother, Deok-hye struggles to return home to her people - and to assist in the resistance efforts against ...
REVIEW: In Another Country (2012)
Isabelle Huppert plays three different women, all named Anne, all visiting the Korean seaside town of Mohang during the off-season. It is an odd little set-up for this South Korean portmanteau film, written and directed by arthouse darling Hong Sang-soo and screened in competition at the 2012 Cannes Film Festival. I generally find Hong a ...
REVIEW: Lion (2016)
Five year-old Saroo lives in Khandwa, India. After getting onto the wrong train he soon finds himself 1,600 kilometres away in Calcutta, unable to speak the language or to ever find his way home. Eventually he is adopted by Australians Sue and John Brierley (Nicole Kidman and David Wenham). Decades later, an adult Saroo discovers ...
REVIEW: The Virgin Queen (1955)
It is the year 1581. Captain Walter Raleigh (Richard Todd), freshly returned to England from war in Ireland, ingratiates his way into the court of Queen Elizabeth I (Bette Davis). He hopes the gain the Queen's permission to launch a naval venture, but instead finds himself trapped in court as her new favourite. The Virgin ...
REVIEW: Lost and Love (2015)
It is estimated that roughly 70,000 children are kidnapped in China every year. Human traffickers snatch children from their homes and off the street to sell for foreign adoption, and often to domestic Chinese families desperate to have a child that they have been unable to produce themselves. Partially inspired by a true story, Peng ...
REVIEW: Bringing Out the Dead (1999)
Frank Pierce (Nicolas Cage) is a burned-out paramedic working New York City's graveyard shift. He is haunted by visions of a patient he failed to save, and despite his pleas his supervisor refuses to fire him. Over a series of nights, Frank's experiences push him closer to the edge, but also connect him with Mary ...
REVIEW: The Grandmaster (2013)
Ip Man was a martial artist, born in the Chinese city of Foshan in 1893 before ultimately moving to Hong Kong and becoming a master teacher of the wing chun school of kung fu. His most famous student was action film star Bruce Lee. In recent years Ip has become the centre of his own ...
REVIEW: The Name of the Rose (1986)
The monk William of Baskerville (Sean Connery) and his novice Adso (Christian Slater) arrive at a Benedictine abbey in northern Italy to join a Papal debate on the poverty of Christ. He instead finds himself pushed into investigating an apparent suicide by one of the scribes in the abbey, an investigation that soon reveals a ...
REVIEW: The Boar King (2014)
A typhoon sweeps across southern Taiwan, causing landslides that devastate a mountain community. A-Ying (Wu Yi-Ting), the owner of a local hot spring, steps out into the storm and is never seen again. His widow Mei-Cho (Lu Yi-Ching) is left to pick up the pieces, while a property developer starts pressuring the surviving residents to ...
REVIEW: Rebels of the Neon God (1992)
In a Taipei neighbourhood, the lives of two disaffected teenagers collide. Hsiao Kang (Lee Kang-sheng) struggles through cram schools at his father's insistence while growing steadily self-destructive. Ah Tze (Chen Chao-jung) is small-time thief who, along with his best friend Ah Ping (Jen Chang-bin) and girlfriend Ah Kuei (Wang Yu-wen), haunts the city's arcades and ...
