Reviewed by Rachael Kaines Mountains May Depart is the latest film from Chinese writer and director Jia Zhang-ke. The film offers an insightful and measured look at the effects of globalisation, as well as a meditation on the current and future state of diaspora and the dissolving of culture. Mountains May Depart is a movie split into three parts: the nostalgic and hopeful past of 1999, the unpleasant present of…
Read MoreBest Films of 2017 by Rachael Kaines
Screenword’s own Rachael Kaines selects her favourite films of 2017. 1 – Call Me By Your Name (Luca Guadagnino) Could you imagine anything better than spending a summer somewhere in Northern Italy, reading, swimming, and falling in love? Me either.
Read MoreBest Films Of 2017 By Robert Chandler
Continuing our end of the year series, writer and producer Robert Chandler picks his favourite films of 2017 for Screenwords. 1-LAST FLAG FLYING It won me over. I was cautious. A somewhat sequel to The Last Detail, one of the great American films of the early 1970s, a film that dealt with life and the inevitability of death, through the journey of three young soldiers: two of them, Jack Nicholson…
Read MoreFilm Review: Jumanji: Welcome To The Jungle
Reviewed by Freda Cooper The word Jumanji immediately conjures up misty eyed memories of the 1995 family comedy starring Robin Williams and a young Kirsten Dunst. With a magical board game at its heart, it boasted some special effects that weren’t just impressive for their day, they also stand up surprisingly well now. 22 years later, we have an updated version for today’s generation, in theory a standalone, but who…
Read MoreBest Films Of 2017 By Lee Hill
1-Twin Peaks: The Return (David Lynch) More than just a revival of a cult TV show, this was an 18-hour feature as mysterious, surreal and heartbreaking as Mulholland Drive and perhaps the closest a filmmaker has come to the novelistic reach of Gravity’s Rainbow or John Updike’s Rabbit books since RW Fassbinder’s Berlin Alexanderplatz.
Read MoreFilm Review: Brigsby Bear
Reviewed By Freda Cooper If you ever obsessed over a TV series as a kid, then you’ll have more than a little sympathy for James (Kyle Mooney) in Brigsby Bear. He’s grown up with Brigsby Bear Adventures, a weekly show about a loveable teddy in outer space, part fun, part education. He knows every plot line down to the minutest detail, can recite chunks of dialogue and his bedroom is…
Read MoreFilm Review: The Dinner
Reviewed By Rachael Kaines The Dinner is a drama set, unsurprising, around a dinner. Written and directed by Oren Moverman, the film follows Paul Lohman (Steve Coogan) and his wife Claire (Laura Linney) as they have dinner with Paul’s brother Stan (Richard Gere) a U.S. Senator and his wife Katelyn (Rebecca Hall). The couples discuss what to do about their children, who have put themselves in a bad situation.
Read MoreFilm Review: The Disaster Artist
Reviewed by Rachael Kaines James Franco, (much like Tommy Wiseau the man he plays), directs, produces, and stars in The Disaster Artist, easily his finest film to date. Based on a book by Greg Sestero about the nightmare experience of making a horrendous movie called The Room, and the extremely strange experience of being friends with the writer, director, producer, and star, Tommy Wiseau.
Read MoreFilm Review: The Man Who Invented Christmas
Reviewed By Linda Marric It’s fair to say that despite his popularity amongst TV viewers on both sides of the Atlantic, Dan Stevens has found it hard to make a full transition from his high profile TV role in Downton Abbey into the film world. However, with his latest roles in the brilliantly understated Marshall and now playing a young Charles Dickens in the charming yet flawed The Man Who…
Read More