In the hands of director Alex Cox, a potentially tacky melodrama is transformed into a tragic nightmare of muck, pain, and addiction. Sid & Nancy is often a miserable and even difficult watch, but its treatment of its subject matter feels unique … Continue reading REVIEW: Sid & Nancy (1986)
In Veronika Franz and Severin Fiala’s The Lodge, a father leaves his two grieving children alone in a winter cabin with his new girlfriend while they mourn their mother’s death. If nothing else, The Lodge may be 2020’s winner for “Worst Father of … Continue reading REVIEW: The Lodge (2019)
In the years between playing James Bond and his 1980s career resurgence, Sean Connery starred in a wide array of dramas, thrillers, and action films – many of which have languished in obscurity. Ransom, aka The Terrorists, is one such half-forgotten film: an … Continue reading REVIEW: Ransom (1974)
Aaron Boone (Craig Sheffer), convinced that he is a uncontrollable serial killer, seeks to find the rumoured secret city of Midian – a place where monsters are said to go. He is trailed by his therapist (David Cronenberg), actually the … Continue reading REVIEW: Nightbreed: The Director’s Cut (1990)
Robert Roy MacGregor was born in 1671 near Loch Katrine in Scotland’s Perthshire. As a young man, like many Scottish patriots, he was drawn to the 1689 Jacobite uprising – an armed rebellion to restore Stuart dynasty rule to the … Continue reading “Neither asked nor given” | Rob Roy (1995)
In April 1746 Scotland’s Jacobite army – exhausted, starving, and on the run – was intercepted by the British royal army on a sodden field near Inverness known as Culloden. Over the subsequent hour, the rebel forces were savaged by … Continue reading REVIEW: Culloden (1964)
US army mechanic Brian Murphy (Rob Freeman) wakes up on a beach in West Africa, having survived a plane crash. The country is in chaos. It is everyone for themselves – and the dead are walking the African wilderness. The … Continue reading REVIEW: The Dead (2010)
Selene (Kate Beckinsale) is a ‘death dealer’, a vampire assassin fighting in a vampire-versus-werewolf war that has lasted for many centuries. When she rescues ordinary human Michael Corvin (Scott Speedman) from werewolf (or ‘lycan’) attack, she grows to suspect that … Continue reading REVIEW: Underworld (2003)
When a woman named Sarah is killed in an accident, she leaves family and friends behind to grieve, including her distanced mother Mimi (Celia Imrie), best friend and business partner Isabella (Shelley Conn), and her daughter Clarissa (Shannon Tarbet). As … Continue reading REVIEW: Love Sarah (2020)
In 1884 London the physician Frederick Treves (Anthony Hopkins) meets John Merrick (John Hurt), a severely deformed and apparently non-verbal young man living in a carnival show. Taking Merrick in to the hospital where we works, Treves starts on what … Continue reading REVIEW: The Elephant Man (1980)
