Reviews & features: Film, Issue 584
Breach
23 Aug 2007
Chris Cooper interview
Chris Cooper’s got pedigree. The 56-year-old American actor began his impressive big screen career with the great independent filmmaker John Sayles, making four films with him, including Cooper’s 1987 debut, the miner’s union drama Matewan, and the…
And When Did You Last See Your Father?
23 Aug 2007
‘It’s not my story, of course. It’s Blake’s story,’ says screenwriter David Nicholls of his latest project. Having cut his teeth on TV drama Cold Feet, Nicholls successfully adapted his own novel Starter For Ten for the cinema before he agreed to give…
Hallam Foe
23 Aug 2007
(18) 95min
As writer and philosopher William Gass once noted: ‘for the voyeur, fiction is what’s called going all the way’. No one knows this better than rural Scottish boy Hallam Foe (Jamie Bell). While his father (Ciarán Hinds) and stepmother (Claire Forlani…
Two Days in Paris
23 Aug 2007
(15) 100min
French actress Julie Delpy jumps behind the camera for the second time with a film that pays a heavy debt to her most famous screen role, that of Céline in Richard Linklater’s Before Sunrise and Before Sunset. Two Days in Paris is an investigation…
Once
23 Aug 2007
This Belfast-set musical romance about a lovelorn busker and a Czech immigrant single mother who get together to make music is a sort of low-key The Commitments (and Glen Hansard of Irish rock band The Frames appears in both films). It’s got its…
Run Granny Run
23 Aug 2007
Don Ameche In the 20 or so years before his death in 1993, Ameche had become the über OAP in huge box office hits Trading Places and Cocoon. His best late great performance was as shoe shiner come ageing mafia don in David Mamet’s hugely enjoyable…
Ex Drummer
23 Aug 2007
Based on the degenerate novel of the same name by the hugely popular Flemish novelist and poet Herman Brusselmans, Ex Drummer is like a checklist of the Belgian writer’s obsessions, noticeably alcohol, sex, disability, boredom, violence, punk rock and…
Stardust
23 Aug 2007
This British blockbuster adaptation of Neil Gaiman’s marvellous English fantasy novel looks fantastic. It’s seriously marred, however, by a lacklustre script co-written by Jane Goldman (Mrs Jonathan Ross) and director Matthew Vaughn. Despite fine art…
State of the World
23 Aug 2007
Portmanteau films are always hard to pull off. After the carbohydrate rich, protein poor dish that was Paris, je t’aime, this six short film look at the state of the world is much more demanding. No film more so than Wang Bing’s Brutality Factory…
Time of His Life: The Films of Eddie McConnell
23 Aug 20071 John Grierson Feted Scottish documentary cameraman and filmmaker McConnell was mentored by the Stirlingshire documentary filmmaker Grierson in his early days in the profession. Much of Grierson’s dedication to the idea of cinematic truth and lyricism…
Manufacturing Dissent: Unconvering Michael Moore
23 Aug 2007
Is Michael Moore a self-regarding political liability who also screws with journalistic codes of conduct, or a wayward truth seeker who has no truck with compromise as he pursues fairness and justice? We probably didn’t need Deborah Melnyk and Rick…
The Serpent
23 Aug 2007
This slick French thriller – somewhat reminiscent of another recent export from that country, Tell No One – employs the familiar framed-for-murder/man-on-the-run scenario. The fugitive in question here is Parisian fashion photographer Vincent Mandel…
Jennifer Fox
23 Aug 2007
5 words to describe the film you have at the EIFF? Transformative, humorous, innovative, intimate and unpredictable. 4 of your favourite cinemas in the world? Film Forum, New York; Curzon, Soho; Empire Bio, Copenhagen; L’entrepot, Paris.
Weirdsville
23 Aug 2007Cult independent Canadian filmmaker Allan Moyle proved himself an able chronicler of the 1990s with sleeper hits Pump Up The Volume (1990) and Empire Records (1995) but moved mostly into television in the new millennium. He returns to the big screen…
Lynch
23 Aug 2007This Danish/US co-production is the first authorised documentary feature about the great enigmatic filmmaker David Lynch. Shot in highly stylised black and white, the film offers a glimpse of Lynch at work behind the scenes on his last film Inland…
Two Days in Paris
23 Aug 2007
The lovely French actress Julie Delpy has the honour of closing this year’s EIFF with her second film as writer and director. This lighthearted culture clash comedy focuses on highly-strung photographer Marion (played by Delpy) and her American…
Four Wenches and a Free For All
23 Aug 2007
An entertaining hour is spent in the company of these talented actors. The laughs aren’t massive, with some jokes a little obvious, but the more creative ones include the ‘Vodafriend’ shop where you can exchange your old mate for a newer model with more…
Breach
23 Aug 2007
(12A) 110min
Superior political thriller based on the true story of an FBI turncoat who created the biggest security breach in the organisation’s history. Chris Cooper is excellent as FBI agent Robert Hanssen and Ryan Phillippe is equally good as the undercover…
Sugarhouse
23 Aug 2007
(15) 90min
Based on Dominic Leyton’s play Collision about a middle class man (Steven Mackintosh) who finds himself forming an unlikely alliance with crackhead D (Ashley Walters) when a volatile gangster Hoodwink (Andy Serkis) comes after him. Hammy, dull and…
