★★★
The ever-captivating Andrea Riseborough turns in yet another powerful and arresting performance at the cold heart of Nancy. From debutant feature director Christina Choe, this painfully melancholic not-quite thriller offers an empathetic character study, concerned with themes of loss, isolation and deception. It is, through and through, an actors movie, albeit one that should move Choe towards finding a deserved spotlight.
★★★★
‘I think the magnitude was just beyond their comprehension’ says one voice at the close of this fascinating, intensely personal, curatorial documentary by Peter Jackson. The speaker is a First World War veteran describing his return to civilian life; in one fell blow, he strikes on the problem with current perceptions of the war experience. Fundamentally, there has always been something distancing about the jolty silent film footage that provides the modern viewer’s only way ‘into’ the trenches. Embracing new technological advances, however, Jackson has changed the game and produced the most visually visceral and true-to-life Great War documentary ever made.
★★
Having finally conceded Spider-Man to Disney’s branch of Marvel, Sony have a problem. Their biggest asset is essentially, temporarily, gone and they have no headline act for the not-so-new world of cinematic universes. To their favour, the studio have nine hundred comic book characters to play with in their historic acquisitions and room for world-building expansion. It’s just a shame that Sony’s answer to their big problem is Venom.
The Film Blog 