La Zona (Mexico, 2007)

Whilst this film may go through the steps by ‘the numbers’ (a fancy way of saying it’s a bit predictable) it is bang up to date in its take on gated communities and private security. It’s so formulaic that a crucial plot point, where the bourgeoise boy befriends the ‘slumdog’ fugitive, is not even played [...]

Paranoid Park (France-US, 2007)

I found it difficult to care for the characters in this film, usually a fatal problem for a movie unless it’s a popcorn roller-coaster pic. It’s Gus van Sant’s use of non-professionals, ranging for okay to terrible, that alienated me from the film; this isn’t a problem in itself as he did the same in [...]

State of Play (US-UK, 2009)

The remake of the excellent BBC political thriller from 2003 deftly transfers the narrative to Washington DC and updates the ‘state of the nation’ message. The original six-parter had nearly six hours to play with, however the necessary compression is skilfully wrought though the motivation of the politicians is less clear in the film. Kevin [...]

Monsters vs Aliens (US, 2009)

This postmodern (all the monsters are from ’50s SF movies) concoction has some interesting visuals and shedloads of limp gags (one or two are OK) and a terrible ‘girl finds career-minded fiance is not worth it’ sub plot. I saw the film at the National Media Museum’s IMAX (Bradford, UK) in 3D; the first 3D [...]

Defiance (US, 2008)

This is little-known World War II territory, a true story of Jewish resistance, in what’s now Belarus. And although its leads are obviously recognisable, the tone of the first part of the film is muted using mostly blue filters (or is the look added post-production?) to give a suitably gloomy vision. Also the heroes act [...]

Blindness (Canada-Brazil-Japan, 2008)

A Lord of the Flies for the 21st century. This harrowing film , based on Nobel prize winner Jose Saramago’s novel, investigates what happens if everybody goes blind. The first sufferers are interned in an old hospital and the main section of the film investigates the dynamics of what might happen. The film is science [...]