★★★
‘Choose kind’ might sound like the awkward cousin of everyone’s favourite Trainspotting quote but it is, in fact, the fundamental precept of R. J. Palacio’s bestselling book – and now Stephen Chbosky’s film adaptation – Wonder. Cinema’s answer to positive-affirmation woodblocks (‘You can’t blend in when you were born to stand out’), the new film might not live up to the promise of its name and premise but no one could ever deny that its heart is in absolutely the right place.
★★★
Those under the impression that the meta hip-horror genre had crawled back into the grave with Scream 4 might find themselves experiencing déjà vu on watching Christopher B. Landon’s Happy Death Day. Mind, they won’t be alone in the feeling. If you’ve ever watched: Groundhog Day, Mean Girls, Halloween, Scooby-Doo, Clue, American Pie, A Nightmare on Elm Street, or, indeed, Screams 1 to 4, this one’ll resurrect familiarity. As a chirpy take on the slasher genre – more playful than the Wes Craven send-ups – there’s a lot of fun to be had here but a feature of slightly less eclectic genre pickings would have been welcome.
★★★★
If watching A Bigger Splash was like climbing into a jacuzzi and discovering that it may contain a crab, Luca Guadagnino’s third chapter in his so-called trilogy of desire, Call Me By Your Name (which follows the former and I am Love before it), might be considered akin to climbing into said jacuzzi, finding it crab free, being handed a cornucopia of cool, Sicilian lemonade, and then having to remain as the water drains away. It may be la dolce vita, but love stings.
The Film Blog 