Remainder Review

If you like your films a little out of the ordinary, then give Independence Day: Resurgence a miss this weekend and see if you can find a cinema playing Remainder instead. Think Donnie Darko meets Synecdoche, New York and you might be getting an idea of what an oddball little film this is.

Here's a snippet of my review from last year's London Film Festival:

Rushing through a city and pulling a black case behind him, an unnamed man (Tom Sturridge) is hit by falling debris from the sky. After awaking from a coma and going through extensive rehabilitation, he discovers that he has been awarded with £8.5 million to keep quiet about the incident. He is plagued by strange visions of a building, a boy, an old woman and some cats on a roof, and decides to hunt down these elements in order to piece together the fragmented puzzle forming in his head. His recreations are handled by helper Naz and become more elaborate, including eventually the staging of a bank robbery.

Sturridge's character becomes like a filmmaker, manipulating and directing these recreations from his mind, while an ever-expanding roster of 'actors' are employed to carry out the actions and scripts that he envisions. The surreal nature of his visions means he must dress extras in morph suits, have people repetitively play Chopin in the same building and an old lady constantly cook liver so that the smell will waft up to his apartment. He is obsessive in capturing the detail, repeating the process over and over again to the befuddlement of all others involved...

Interested? Head to Starburst Magazine for the rest of my review of Remainder.

Here's the trailer:

More reviews from I Love That Film:

Tale of Tales

 The Measure of a Man

The Conjuring 2

Mon Roi

Green Room

Son of Saul

Louder Than Bombs

Tale of Tales Review: Three Stories For the Price of One!

Do you really need three stories for the price of one?  Tale of Tales thinks so. I wouldn't mind, but apart from being set in the same world, these three have nothing to do with each other. Pulp Fiction this ain't. This film is completely mad, but not in the most satisfying of ways. Here's the synopsis bit of my review:

Based on a 17th century collection of tales by Italian author Giambattista Basile, the film features three different storylines, not all as engaging as each other and never tied together in any satisfactory way. First up, Salma Hayek and John C. Reilly take centre stage as the king and queen of a dusty kingdom where all the entertainers in the land can’t keep the queen from desiring a baby. After a visit from a mysterious hooded figure who offers them the chance of creating offspring, Reilly’s devoted king steps up to the plate and boldly goes to kill off a sea monster in order for his wife to be able to eat the heart and thus, magically conceive. Needless to say, things are never this simple and things soon turn awry.

Meanwhile, Vincent Cassel is a lecherous king who has seemingly used up all the women in his nearby kingdom and is looking for more playmates to be debauched with. After hearing a lone beauty singing beneath his castle walls, he ventures out to find the owner of such a sweet voice. Little does he know, the voice belongs to one of a pair of ugly old crone sisters who may or may not have found their way here after auditioning for Cinderella. Not wanting the king to see them in their decrepit state, they hide behind the door of their home but the king is nothing if not persistent. Then things get really weird.

Finally, Toby Jones is yet another king, whose only daughter he dotes on until the day he discovers he has a talented flea who has taken a shine to him. While the flea grows into his beloved pet, his teen daughter wants to find a prince, but gets more than she bargained for when her father makes a dubious choice by giving her to an ogre.

If you want to read what I really thought of all this, head to Tastic Film now to read my full review of Tale of Tales from the Cannes Film Festival.

Here's the trailer:



More recent reviews from I Love That Film:

The Measure of a Man

The Conjuring 2

Mon Roi

Green Room

Son of Saul

Louder Than Bombs

Hardcore Henry

The Measure of a Man Review

The film that won Vincent Lindon the Best Actor award at Cannes in 2015 is finally released in UK cinemas this weekend. The Measure of a Man is a challenging watch, but worth the effort. Here's a snippet of my review:

Last year in Cannes, it was Marion Cotillard and the Dardennes brothers examining contemporary workplace relations in Two Days, One Night. That razor sharp, but repetitive critique of the ills of modern corporate practices is bested this year by The Measure of a Man which finds its unemployed protagonist facing a moral dilemma when he finds a new job working in shop security.

We meet 51 year old Thierry mid conversation at the job centre, frustrated by the pointless course he has recently wasted his time completing in order to find that there are no jobs waiting for him at the end of it. Along with his wife, Thierry has a disabled son who he wants to put through further education. Money is tight, and after meeting with his bank manager, Thierry grows increasingly desperate to find employment. After rejections, humiliation and disappointment, he finds work in surveillance and security at a supermarket. But when required to spy on his fellow workers, Thierry may be pushed to act in opposition to his morals.

To read more of my review of The Measure of a Man, head to Tastic Film now.

Here's the trailer:



More recent reviews from I Love That Film:

The Conjuring 2

Mon Roi

Green Room

Son of Saul

Louder Than Bombs

Hardcore Henry

The Conjuring 2 Review

James Wan returns to horror after conjuring Paul Walker back from the grave in Fast and Furious 7. People loved The Conjuring, so it's no surprise to see a sequel. But as someone who found the original film a little bit average, I was surprised to find The Conjuring 2 so scary. It's great to have Wan back working in the genre that made him! Here's a snippet of my review:

"Never play with Ouija boards. Unfortunately, the kids in the 1977-set The Conjuring 2 will have been too young to see The Exorcist, so inevitably they unleash a demonic force in their home when they mess with a homemade hotline to unfriendly spirits. Janet Hodgson lives with her single mother and three siblings in a rundown house in Enfield. When Janet starts to go bump in the night by being lifted out of her bed and planted downstairs in the living room, paranormal investigators the Warrens travel to England to see if they can help.
 
This isn't supposed to be your average haunting. The fact that the Hodgson family are poor and English is supposed to make a difference. But actually, they still live in a typical house with large bedrooms full of things to smash, a living room with a spooky rocking chair in the corner, and the all-important set of stairs that can creak whenever anything (supernatural or otherwise) steps on them. The accents might be different and the walls could do with a lick of paint, but this is still your average haunted house movie..."

To read more of this review of The Conjuring 2, head to Starburst Magazine now!

Watch the trailer below:




More recent reviews from I Love That Film:

Mon Roi

Green Room

Son of Saul

Louder Than Bombs

Hardcore Henry