Tag: Biography

  • The Disaster Artist.

    The Disaster Artist.

    Since its release in 2003, Tommy Wiseau’s The Room has gained cult status, becoming a regular favourite among late night audience there to bathe in the absurdity of the whole affair. The stilted awkward delivery of a baffling script combined with the eccentricities of Wiseau’s central character, and a sprawling narrative that drifts from one incomplete story to…

  • Grace Jones: Bloodlight and Bami.

    Grace Jones: Bloodlight and Bami.

    An intensely observational documentary, Grace Jones: Bloodlight and Bami is Sophie Fiennes’ ambitious exploration of the icon and the enigma that is Grace Jones. Combining striking stage performances with more intimate footage of Jones in hotel rooms, dressing rooms and in her native home of Jamaica, Sophie Fiennes’ bold approach to her equally bold subject creates a…

  • Trumbo.

    Since the film industry was heinously targeted in the 1950s by Joseph McCarthy and his communist witch hunts, it seems only natural that we would make films about it. The latest in this long line of Hollywood blacklist melodramas is Trumbo, directed by Jay Roach. Best known for bringing us the Austin Powers trilogy, Roach…

  • Life May Be.

    Mark Cousins gave a lecture on the art of the video essay during my time at Edinburgh University. The director and film buff extraordinaire is probably most well known for his Channel 4 documentary The Story of Film. Last year he delighted us again with A Story of Children and Film; another cinematic essay which studied…

  • Steve Jobs.

    Have you ever been told an honest or depressing story you wish you could “un-hear”? That’s what it feels like to watch Steve Jobs. Divided up into three dramatic acts, Steve Jobs takes place in the final minutes before three different product launches. In each sequence we meet technology mogul Steve Jobs at different points in…

  • This Boy’s Life.

      Based on the life and memoir of writer Tobias Wolff, This Boy’s Life captures the frustrations of childhood and the trust we place in our elders to protect us until we’re capable of doing it for ourselves. We first meet the young Toby on the run with his mother. Escaping her latest abusive boyfriend, the…

  • Last Days.

    I mean, talk about a yawn-fest. Last Days is one of the most dull and uninteresting films I have ever seen. I’m familiar with Van Sant’s style so I was prepared for long scenes of “not much really happening” but Last Days takes this to an unbearable level. This is Gus Van Sant’s depiction of the final days of…

  • Philomena.

    I hadn’t read any reviews of Philomena before I went into the screening. I was looking forward to seeing the film but wasn’t particularly desperate to fit it into my week. Luckily, I made time to see it on Saturday evening. I say luckily because it’s turned out to be one of the greatest releases of this…

  • Rescue Dawn.

    Werner Herzog’s Little Dieter Needs to Fly is quite possibly my favourite documentary. Venturing into the Vietnamese jungle, Herzog accompanies the war veteran Dieter Dengler who we witness re-living, physically and geographically, his experiences of torture, cruelty and imprisonment at the hands of the Vietcong. The film focuses on Dengler’s reactions to his memories and…

  • Behind the Candelabra.

    Being only two decades old, there was something about Michael Douglas’ performance in Behind the Candelabra that I was never going to fully understand. Archive footage of documentaries and performances are the only experience and knowledge I have of the real Liberace. Steven Soderbergh’s latest release was turned down by movie studios in America as nobody seemed to want…

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