Djinn and bear it: Under The Shadow is a scary treat
DVD, Blu-ray, VOD, TV and cinema highlights for the next seven days...
With the likes of The Witch and The Babadook wowing audiences and critics alike, slow-burn psychological horror is very much back in vogue. Under the Shadow (in cinemas and on VOD) WWW½ is another fine example of the form, starting off at a languid pace then gathering speed, tension and atmosphere as it builds to a genuinely bat-shit crazy - not to mention frightening - final act.
The film - in Farsi (with subtitles) by Iranian/British writer/director Babak Anvari - is set in Tehran in 1988, during the Iran/Iraq war. Shideh (Narges Rashidi), a former medical student kicked out of university for political agitation during her country's revolution, is left home alone with daughter Dorsa (Avin Manshadi) after husband Iraj (Bobby Naderi) is shipped off to do his military service. When Shideh's apartment block is hit by an Iraqi missile, something nasty - a djinn spirit - gets in through the resultant hole in the roof. The supernatural creature takes an immediate interest in Dorsa...
Like all the best horror films, Under The Shadow isn't really about ghosts and monsters but merely uses them to talk about real-world concerns, in this case a mother's terror at the prospect of losing her daughter and husband to the bloody war raging outside their door. Shideh also fears for her own future under a regime she clearly despises, especially after her chance to pursue a career in medicine is denied her.
As the film progresses and the war intensifies, more and more of Shideh's neighbours flee, ultimately leaving mother and daughter alone in the apartment complex. It is in these moments of intense isolation and vulnerability that Anvari ramps up the chills, hitting you with several moments guaranteed to send a big fat shiver down your spine.
I've seen a thousand horror films over the years so these days it takes something really special to get under my skin. This did.
Ghost world: Mother and daughter under attack
Nineteen-thirties track and field legend Jesse Owens - one of the greatest US Olympians of all time - deserves a biopic with a much bigger budget and a far starrier cast but, for now, Race (DVD and VOD) WWW will do just fine. Initially Stephen Hopkins' movie comes across as a rather by-the-numbers affair, as we follow Owens (Stephan James) to Ohio State University then, under coach Larry Snyder (Jason Sudeikis), see him break a number of world records in the 100m, 200m and long jump. He qualifies for the American Olympic team to compete in Berlin in 1936 but is soon under pressure to pull out in protest at Germany's Nazi regime. Of course, the irony is that Owens - a black man living in a time of segregation and rampant racial discrimination - is treated almost as badly in his own country as he would be under Adolf Hitler.
Catch me if you can: Owens biopic has its moments
Race becomes rather more interesting once we reach Berlin and see Owens wiping the floor with all-comers as he takes home a clutch of gold medals in front of Hitler himself. In fact, the Nazis command quite a bit of screen time, most notably in a subplot involving a feud between filmmaker Leni Riefenstahl (Game Of Thrones' Carice van Houten) and the regime's minister of propaganda, Joseph Goebbels (a chilling portrayal from Barnaby Metschurat). Goebbels is clearly vile but Hopkins impresses as he seeks to find decency and humanity even in a country about to plummet headlong into the moral abyss. Riefenstahl and German long-jump star Lutz Long both treat Owens with more courtesy and respect than practically anyone (well, anyone white) back home.
Hopkins' film is entertaining, provocative and even inspiring, but far from perfect. The obvious budgetary constraints result in some distinctly ropey-looking CG effects while the extent of the prejudice Owens faced in the US - even amongst his supposed team-mates - is downplayed.
Warcraft: The Beginning (DVD, Blu-ray and VOD) WW½ took a bit of a critical shellacking on its cinema release and the movie's US box office was disappointing. Yes, Duncan Jones' long-awaited adaptation of the World Of Warcraft fantasy online role-playing game is unwieldy and silly at times, but ultimately transcends its Dungeons & Dragons/Lord Of The Rings influences to deliver one of the summer's better blockbusters. The CG is excellent (the Orc v human battle scenes have a real physical 'crunch' to them), while Jones serves up some pleasing twists and turns, including a fiendish but nicely worked ending. Sequel, please.
If ever a film deserved the description 'visceral' it is surely Amat Escalante’s drug-war drama Heli (Tuesday morning, 01:30, Film4) WWW. The titular character is a young Mexican whose family is targeted by a local cartel after his 12-year-old sister and her older boyfriend conceal stolen packages of cocaine. When the crime is discovered the revenge perpetrated upon these kids is terrible to behold (torture, rape and murder). Escalante’s film shows how the cartels’ mephitic presence seeps into every area of their victims’ lives and the ways in which it foments hatred and criminality. A drug war story with vengeance at the centre of its jet-black heart, Heli possesses an uncompromising ugliness that puts similarly-themed but vanilla Hollywood fare such as Sicario firmly in the shade.
Hel on Earth: The drug war has never seemed uglier
Finally, there's Grandma (Wednesday, 21:00, Sky Cinema Select) WW½, which sees irascible septuagenarian Elle (Lily Tomlin) battling, bullying and begging to raise enough cash to fund her grand-daughter's abortion. Paul Weitz's film is brave and likable, even though the 'tough old boot with a heart of gold' trope has surely been done to death at this point.
What I shall be watching this week: Bizarro horror The Greasy Strangler (DVD, Blu-ray and VOD), Ava DuVernay's prison documentary The 13th (in cinemas and on Netflix), and as many movies as I can fit in at the London Film Festival.
TV, Radio, DVD, Blu-ray, VOD and cinema picks for the next seven days... Monday 30th: Rams (VOD, DVD and Blu-ray) is an increasing rarity - a foreign language movie that performed well at the UK box office. Grímur Hákonarson's film is an Icelandic oddity, concerning two elderly and long-estranged brothers forced to put aside their differences when disease threatens their livelihoods as sheep farmers. At times bleakly funny, at others just plain bleak, this is a tragicomic character study that invites you to root for its sibling protagonists however unreasonable and cantankerous their behaviour. Ultimately, it's also rather touching. Darker still is The Club (DVD and Blu-ray), a Chilean drama from Pablo Larrain (No) about a group of disgraced priests and a nun, living out their days in a remote seaside town away from prying eyes. Their secluded existence comes under threat when a crisis counsellor is sent by the church to investigate an unfortunate incident. It's like Father Ted in Hell. Since launching in the UK last month, the Criterion Collection has focused solely on Hollywood so the release of Michelangelo Antonioni's L'Avventura (Blu-ray) is much appreciated. Slow but rewarding, it's a gorgeous-looking but icy mystery drama telling the story of a young Italian socialite (the luminous Monica Vitti) who goes missing on a yachting trip in the Mediterranean. In her absence, her lover and best friend start to fall for each other...
Icelandic oddity Rams: Bleakly funny
Our Brand Is Crisis (DVD, Blu-ray and VOD) – a political satire starring Sandra Bullock and Billy Bob Thornton as warring election strategists in Bolivia – had terrible reviews and tanked at the box office. I shall probably regret seeking it out but will almost certainly do so anyway – Bullock and Thornton are difficult to resist, even in a film one critic accused of having "one of the worst and phoniest endings in movie history". Goosebumps (DVD, Blu-ray and VOD) is, as the title suggests, based on the hugely successful line of children's 'horror' books by R.L. Stine. In this inventive, breathless and thoroughly enjoyable romp, Jack Black stars as a version of the author himself, besieged by every creature he's ever created when a bunch of local kids accidentally set them free from the locked volumes on his shelves. Rob Letterman's film owes a debt or two to the likes of Gremlins although never quite hits those kind of heights. It's bloody good family fun all the same and a perfect way of passing a boring half-term afternoon. To the multiplex now for Warcraft: The Beginning, which opens today. I know precisely nothing about the World Of Warcraft online video game it's based on but quite enjoyed the trailer (Orcs at war with humans) and Duncan Jones (Source Code, Moon) is a safe pair of hands in the director's chair. If you like a bit of CGI-soaked epic fantasy, I suspect this may well be right up your street.
Orcs go to war with humans in Warcraft: The Beginning
Tuesday 31st: There seems to be a definite 'end of the world' flavour to today's TV movies. Melancholia (21:00, Sky Arts) is the Lars von Trier film for people who really don't like Lars von Trier films. Kirsten Dunst and Charlotte Gainsbourg are sisters, the former suffering from debilitating depression that leads her to sabotage every area of her life, including the relationship with her sibling and recent marriage. If that wasn't difficult enough to contend with, a rogue planet (the titular Melancholia) is on a potential collision course with Earth. The 2011 film showcases the Danish provocateur at his warmest and most humane. This is probably Von Trier's most accessible work while Dunst has never been better. Then there's 2012 (21:00, 5Star) in which John Cusack stars as a writer battling to get his family to safety when a series of solar storms set off a global catastrophe. It's all a bit clumsy and bombastic, to be honest, and you could probably say the same about Armageddon (12:20, Sky Action) but Michael Bay's big-budget killer-asteroid extravaganza is a lot more fun. Bruce Willis, Ben Affleck and Liv Tyler star.
Melancholia: LLars von Trier's most accessible film
Wednesday 1st: Lots of new stuff on Netflix UK today, including a couple of intriguing documentaries. Speed Sisters is about the Middle East's first all-women race car driving team. Based in Palestine, the five fearless females race on improvised tracks all over the West Bank. Meanwhile, The Propaganda Game sees filmmaker Álvaro Longoria touring North Korea in a bid to show us the 'real' country, perhaps one that is different to its negative depiction in the West.
Speed Sisters: The fast and the furious
Thursday 2nd: Thursdays are always a bit underwhelming for films on TV so please allow me to point you in the direction of a VOD treat. Subscription service MUBI are currently showing all three volumes of Miguel Gomes's Arabian Nights trilogy - The Restless One, The Desolate One and The Enchanted One. The Portuguese director adopts the structure of the famous Arabian Nights stories - a woman named Scheherazade spinning a series of tall tales to keep herself alive - and uses it to explore a modern-day Portugal hit by austerity and despair. It's an intriguing mix of the satirical, the polemical and the utterly bizarre. The Film Programme (16:00, BBC Radio 4) is jammed with good stuff this week. First up, presenter Francine Stock talks to writer/director Shane Black and producer Joel Silver about The Nice Guys(see Friday). Then director Louise Osmond and producer Rebecca O'Brien discuss Versus, their new documentary on director Ken Loach. No doubt anticipating the release of the aforementioned The Nice Guys, Film4 are showing 48 Hours (23:20) and its not-as-good sequel Another 48 Hours (01:15). Nick Nolte is a hard-nosed cop, Eddie Murphy a wise-cracking criminal, in one of those chalk-and-cheese buddy-movie team-up concoctions that Lethal Weapon ended up perfecting a few years down the line.
Versus: Double Palme d'Or winner Ken Loach
Friday 3rd: Russell Crowe and Ryan Gosling star as a pair of mismatched private detectives in The Nice Guys, which hits UK cinemas today. Shane Black's 1970s-set homage to buddy comedies of the past, including the likes of Lethal Weapon and 48 Hours (see Thursday), sees the pair stumble into a sprawling conspiracy while investigating the supposed suicide of a once-prominent female porn star. Race is the real-life story of black athlete Jesse Owens who represented the USA in front of Adolf Hitler at the 1936 Berlin Olympic Games. Stefan James is Owens and Jason Sudeikis his trainer. Versus: The Life And Films Of Ken Loach is certainly a very timely release, what with the British director of Kes and The Wind That Shakes The Barley having just walked away with the second Palme d'Or of his career at Cannes. That was for his latest film - I, Daniel Blake - which doesn't open here until later in the year. This documentary about his work and politics will more than do in the meantime though. If you're staying in, Sky Movies Premiere have not one but two recent(ish) comedy releases worth a look. Dope (11:45 and 22:05) is, basically, Boyz N The Hood with nerds and certainly a lot cleverer than it has been given credit for. Rick Famuyiwa's film plays with and comments on black stereotypes in movies while explaining why such stereotypes persist. It contains some genuinely very funny moments, too. Just as good is Spy (16:00 and 20:00) which, following Bridesmaids and The Heat, marked the third team up between director Paul Feig and star Melissa McCarthy. July's Ghostbusters will be their fourth collaboration. You can read my full review from last year here. Ben Bailey Smith and James King sit in for Simon Mayo and Mark Kermode on Kermode And Mayo's Film Review (14:00, BBC Five 5). This week's guest is Sir Ben Kingsley, who talks about his new film Learning To Drive.
These Nice Guys don't finish last
Saturday 4th: Steve McQueen's 12 Years A Slave (21:00, Channel 4)adapts the 1853 memoir of Solomon Northup (Chiwetel Ejiofor), a free African-American man who was kidnapped in Washington DC in 1841 and sold into slavery. It boasts a great script, terrific cast (Lupita Nyong'o the stand-out), stunning cinematography, and a story so jaw-dropping it'll take you a while to process it all. Director McQueen is a truly fearless filmmaker and his triple Oscar winner deserved every plaudit and award it got.
12 Years A Slave won the Best Picture Oscar
Sunday 5th: James Stewart, John Wayne, Gregory Peck, Henry Fonda and Debbie Reynolds head an impressive cast in How The West Was Won (12:30, BBC Two), which follows three generations of a 19th Century American frontier family as they strive to survive through the gold rush, the Civil War and the building of the railways. A truly epic Western that I probably haven't seen since I was about 10 years old. Secret Voices Of Hollywood (21:00, BBC Four) is a fascinating documentary which lifts the lid on 'ghost singers', such as Marni Nixon and Betty Noyes, who provided the movie singing voices of screen legends such as Audrey Hepburn and Debbie Reynolds. They often worked with little or no credit while the actors and actresses they stood in for were not always best pleased about being replaced. You can see a clip here.
How The West Was Won: A truly epic Western
The Last 5 Films I've Seen
1. The 400 Blows (1959):François Truffaut made his directorial debut with this heartbreaking drama about 14-year-old Antoine Doinel, a Paris schoolboy constantly in trouble with his parents, teachers and, ultimately, the law. Jean-Pierre Léaud, recently awarded an honorary Palme d'Or at Cannes, stars. 2. Masculin Féminin (1966):An older Léaud also features here, this time as a disillusioned young man who has just completed his national service. Jean-Luc Godard's snapshot of youth in 1960s Paris is a wild and winning concoction of pop, politics and sexuality.
3. Eye In The Sky (2015): Incredibly tense examination of modern drone warfare, which is also surprisingly complex and refreshingly even-handed. Boasts terrific performances from Helen Mirren and the late Alan Rickman, in his final screen role.
4. A Hologram For The King (2016): Tom Hanks is the down-on-his luck salesman trying to flog 3D conference equipment to the king of Saudi Arabia in a very likeable but ultimately pretty lightweight comedy/drama.
5. Our Kind Of Traitor (2016):Gripping spy thriller starring Ewan McGregor and Naomie Harris as a holidaying London couple caught up with the Russian mafia and the British Secret Service. Damian Lewis and Stellan Skarsgård deliver the pick of the performances.
The 400 Blows was Truffaut's first film as director
UK box-office top 10 1. X-Men: Apocalypse R 2. Angry Birds 3. The Jungle Book R 4. Captain America: Civil War R 5. Bad Neighbours 2 6. A Hologram For The King R 7. Florence Foster Jenkins 8. Our Kind Of Traitor R 9. Secret Cinema: 28 Days Later 10. Thomas & Friends: The Great Race
