Arizona Dream
Almost 20 years before the overhyped Inception focused on the phenomenon of dreaming Emir Kusturica directed Johnny Depp in the surreal comic fantasy Arizona Dream. The movie was produced by…
The Inquirer archives
review
The King’s Speech
Despite taking the top awards at the 2011 Oscar Ceremony, or perhaps because of that, I was in no hurry to see director Tom Hooper's The King's Speech, although I…
Black Swan
Director Darren Aronofsky's award-winning film Black Swan is a dark and disturbing psychological thriller, reminiscent of Alfred Hitchcock’s Marnie and Roman Polanski's Repulsion, focusing on the highly competitive and pressurised…
Apocalypse Now: Full Disclosure
It has got to be one of the most eagerly anticipated Blu-ray releases of all time and finally, almost 5 years since the hidef format launched, Apocalypse Now has been…
Casuals
After the phenomenal success of independent publishing house Pennant Books with its stable of football fan culture, sporting legends and true crime titles regularly topping the best seller lists, the…
Cass
As a film about football and, in particular, football hooliganism, I really wasn't expecting to enjoy Cass very much; as a rule, it would be the sort of low-budget, grubby…
Peter Greenaway
I turned 18 the year that Peter Greenaway's The Cook, the Thief, His Wife & Her Lover was released, I saw its opening at the Lumiere Cinema in London and it blew me away. …
True Grit (2010)
It's uncertain whether Joel and Ethan Coen set out to make their most commercially successful film in a 30 year career by electing to remake the classic John Wayne Western…
Jack Lemmon
I hadn’t planned to write about actors specifically, as my intent was to focus on certain key films and directors. However, as this is also a personal journal it should…
Be Kind Rewind
Sometimes you think you know exactly what a film is going to be like that you overlook it initially and as time passes and you never get around to watching…
Donnie Darko: The Director’s Cut
It's been 20 years since Richard Kelly's admirable and ambitious directorial debut Donnie Darko was released to an unsuspecting cinema audience with its blend of teenage angst and paranoid schizophrenia…
Psycho
In 1959 Alfred Hitchcock signed a deal with Universal Studios allowing him to make any picture he liked as long as the budget was under $3 million. He still owed Paramount…