THE SENSE OF AN ENDING

THE HANDMAIDEN

Cert 18 156mins Stars 5

Scheming ambition leads to lust, lunacy and betrayal in this sumptuous erotic thriller.

It’s inspired from the novel Fingersmith, by Sarah Waters, and her Victorian era story makes a remarkably deft transition to Japanese occupied Korea of the early twentieth century.

The Welsh writer also wrote the book which inspired the BBC’s naughty romp, Tipping The Velvet. This is far more explicit.

A pair of con artists conspire to defraud a wealthy Japanese woman. Fujiwara pretends to be an aristocrat to woo the Lady Hideko, while his partner Sook-hee is placed in her household, assuming the position of her handmaiden.

Beginning with Sook-hee, the story unfolds in three parts, presenting the point of view of the leading players in turn.

Writhing with sapphic desire, this exquisitely told tale is ripe with erotic literature, punishment, and torture.

The gorgeous performers embrace their parts while the succulent cinematography makes a fetish of consumption. Indulge yourself.

 

THE HATTON GARDEN JOB

Cert 15 92mins Stars 1

A gem of a real life story is wasted in this botched attempt at a crime caper.

In 2015, four retired ex-cons exploit the British publics love of a Bank Holiday Monday, to pull of the UK’s biggest ever bank heist.

Using nothing more complicated than their experience, a blow torch and some wheelie bins, they made off with an estimated at £35 million from a bank vault in London’s Hatton Garden diamond district.

Phil Daniels and Larry Lamb lead the pilfering pensioners, but they’re made supporting characters in their own drama.

Instead Matthew Goode’s middle class master criminal is crowbarred into proceedings, and steals all their thunder. And posh thesp, Joely Richardson, is wildly miscast as a Hungarian mobster.

Desperate editing employs freeze frames, fast cuts and random funk tunes to try to hold our attention, but to now avail.

This is a depressing waste of likeable talent, and not worth disturbing your retirement for.

THE BOSS BABY

Cert U 97mins Stars 3

Escape your job and embrace your family with this energetic and colourful animation.

It’s a bold choice to make a kids’ movie whose main plot is a corporate conspiracy and has jokes about ‘yes men’, memos and meetings.

But by throwing in a top drawer cast alongside pirates, dinosaurs, spaceships and an aeroplane load of Elvis impersonators, this romp makes the balance sheet add up.

With the arrival of a baby brother, the perfect world of seven year old Tim Templeton is thrown into disarray.

Tim discovers the suit wearing, memo writing interloper can secretly talk, and describes himself as The Boss Baby.

The script suggests all CEO’s are uncaring career obsessives because they never received enough love as a children. I’m sure those loveable scamps Alan Sugar or Richard Branson could not agree less.

Tim’s parents work for Puppy Co., a global manufacturer of pets toys. The company have hatched a plan to replace children with puppies in the affections of every family around the world.

So the squabbling siblings join forces to restore harmony to the home.

Alec Baldwin, Steve Buscemi, Tobey Maguire and Lisa Kudrow bring their considerable experience to the pint sized cast.

It’s never dull and is a reasonable family diversion during the Easter break. There’s lots of corporate jokes for the adults and there are enough bare bums on show plus vomit and snot, to amuse the little ones.

Tim’s over active imagination is given full flight in a series of fabulous fantasy sequences. Presented in a variety of animation styles, they’re the highlights of the film and as a result, this is best seen in 3D.

I’m surprised to find I enjoyed The Boss Baby as much as I did, mostly because I’m not such a great fan of puppies or babies. Or to be honest, bosses.

 

 

SWISS ARMY MAN

Cert 15 Stars 3

In this remarkably odd black comedy, former Harry Potter star Daniel Radcliffe takes on his most fantastical role yet.

He plays a farting corpse called Manny, who inspires a shipwrecked soul to use him as a jetski to the mainline. After this curious beginning, it all becomes a bit weird.

On his mission to return home, Paul Dano’s Hank utilises the cadaver as a host more practical devices, such as a compass and a gun.

There’s a wonderful chemistry between Dano and Radcliffe, even if the biology and physics are tested to their limits.

FRANK AND LOLA

Cert 18 Stars 1

This glossy and vacuous thriller is extraordinarily ponderous and preposterous.

Michael Shannon and Imogen Poots are the unfortunate souls required to face off in this self regarding tale of betrayal and revenge. He plays an intense high-end Las Vegas chef, and she’s an aspiring fashion designer.

When Lola reveals her complex personal history, it triggers Frank’s obsessive nature. But Lola loves playing games and who knows if she’s telling him the truth. More importantly, who cares?

Even a visit to sex club fails to raise the pulse, the pace, or our interest.

AFTERMATH

Cert 15 90mins Stars 2

Arnold Schwarzenegger’s screen career takes an interesting detour in a rare serious-minded role. Sadly his decent attempt at acting goes unrewarded in this dull aeroplane disaster.

It takes off with good intentions but stalls mid-flight. Unable to decide on the best route, it crashes somewhere between tired revenge thriller and underpowered drama.

The story is inspired by true events of 2002 when two planes collided mid-air. The resulting carnage on the ground left no survivors, but created a wake of angry relatives.

As a grief stricken grandfather, Schwarzenegger fails to secure an apology from the authorities. So he hunts down Scoot MacNairy’s hapless air-traffic controller.

The build up to the crash is nicely tense, while the scenes of the rescue services trawling the wreckage are sensitive and effective.

But the ploddingly paced script is even handed to a fault, leaving us without a hero or villain, or little in the way of drama.

CITY OF TINY LIGHTS

Cert 15 110mins Stars 3

This thoughtful British thriller takes the gloom of 1940’s Hollywood film noir, and illuminates it with the neon dazzle of contemporary London.

The likeable Riz Ahmed brings a streetwise soft spoken charisma to a long awaited and deserved lead role, which carries dominates the film.

As a whisky drinking downbeat private detective called Tommy, he begins a missing persons investigation which escalates into murder.

The fabulous Cush Jumbo plays a prostitute concerned about her colleague. She seems to have more screen time than co-star Billie Piper, who is the more prominent in the advertising. The former star of TV’s Secret Diary of A Call Girl is a good match for the material, though we see less of her than we’d like.

There’s some snappy lines and the script doesn’t shy from the complexities or frictions of the modern metropolis. Regardless of the final scene being too bright, this is a nicely reflective piece of work.

 

 

 

SMURFS: THE LOST VILLAGE

Cert U 90mins Stars 2

The boys in blue are back for another animated adventure, but this time the girls are doing it for themselves.

Following the success of Disney’s female-led adventures such as Frozen, and Zootropolis, this latest ham-fisted Smurf reboot tries to offer a more female friendly experience.

Smurfette leads Brainy, Hefty, and Clumsy into the Forbidden Forest on a journey of self-discovery, where they find a lost village of female Smurfs.

This is an attempt to address a longstanding criticism regarding Smurfette’s status as the only girl in the village. Unfortunately the clumsy script reduces her status from a spare rib to a non-Smurf, saying she was created from a piece of clay by an evil Smurf-hating wizard.

Despite this bizarre twist, it’s generally good natured and filled with slapstick and shenanigans. However all but the youngest of kids will struggle to be entertained, and the patience of parents will be tested to the limit.

 

FREE FIRE

Cert 15 91mins Stars 4

Load up and get this blast of a B movie in your movie going sights. Set in 1970’s Boston, US, it’s a funked-up, hard core, post-industrial spaghetti western.

British writer-director Ben Wheatley gives a rapid fire impetus and a wickedly humorous spin on an age old set up.

Masterfully containing the action in a debris littered factory, there’s a briefcase of money, a van load of guns, and too few brains.

Irish republicans spar with a South African arms dealer and the American mob. Nationalist needling escalates quickly, and every bullet hurts in the carnage that follows.

The modest budget seems mostly to have been spent on the brilliant cast, which includes Oscar winner Brie Larson and Peaky Blinders’ Cillian Murphy.

The bleak vision of humanity is underscored by the ironic use of the sweet songs of John Denver. It’s a tense as steel and as hard and dirty as the factory floor. Don’t miss.