Adrenalin pumping action and a big-name cast feature in Fast X. The film is the tenth in the Fast and Furious franchise, which began in 2001. The pretence for Fast X goes back to 2011’s Fast Five. You might recall from the earlier movie that Dom Toretto (Vin Diesel) and his crew took out nefarious…
I don’t know about you but I’ve felt a bit jaded going to the movies lately. I mean, there’s only so many explosions, car/boat/spacecraft chases or unlikely romances a person can take. Which is to say, if you want an antidote to all that, you really should consider the terrific French thriller November. Co-writer and…
The latest film from Brandon Cronenberg (son of legendary Canadian filmmaker David Cronenberg) is a hybrid mix of sci-fi, horror and trenchant social commentary. He takes on class, wealth, privilege, artistic conceits, power, western decadence, guilt and the breakdown of civilization. It comes across like a fevered, darker and more transgressive variation on the recent…
Based on the novel Text for You by Sofie Cramer, Jim Strouse’s (The Incredible Jessica James) Love Again is a fantasy dramedy, where everything is carefully manufactured to get to the outcome you know is coming. That, of course, involves inevitable bumps along the road. Naturally, it’s the journey that counts – at least from…
Book Club: The Next Chapter is a feel-good sequel to the 2018 film Book Club. It concerns the ongoing fate of the four women at the centre of the original as they undertake a special girls’ trip. Vivian (Jane Fonda), perpetually single, has just been asked for her hand in marriage by her long-term, suave…
Writer-director Elegance Bratton’s own story of overcoming fierce odds to become a US marine inspired his film The Inspection. We’re in New Jersey in 2005 and 25-year-old Ellis French (Jeremy Pope) leads a threadbare existence. Estranged from his mother, Inez (Gabrielle Union), he’s been on his own since the age of 16 and the one…
Four elderly women head off on a road trip to the 2017 Superbowl in Texas in support of their idol Tom Brady – the famed quarterback for the New England Patriots regarded as one of the greatest players in the history of the NFL. Another of those films which delight in seeing older folk kick…
One of the hits of the 2022 Jewish International Film Festival was this quirky dramedy about a Holocaust survivor who comes to believe that his new next door neighbour is actually Adolf Hitler living incognito. Somewhere in South America in 1960. Grumpy and surly Malek Polsky (David Hayman) is a Holocaust survivor who lost his…
Action, humour, a ripping soundtrack and heartfelt back-story combine to make Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 an appealing package. In this third film in the trilogy, fan favourites return and are pitted against a megalomaniac arch villain searching for perfection at any cost. At the start of the movie the Guardians of the Galaxy…
Political rivalry between church and state might seem like a dry subject for a movie, but writer-director Tarik Saleh turns into a compelling drama in Cairo Conspiracy. As well as directing episodes of Westworld and Ray Donovan, Saleh directed Chris Pine in the 2022 actioner The Contractor. So he knows his way around intrigue. Cairo…
