Thrilling Bloody Sword (1981)

Bless Justin Decloux and Gold Ninja Video as I would never have come across the Taiwanese martial arts adventure Thrilling Bloody Sword (1981) without their blu-ray release. The title gave me a different impression of what this film would be, which I bought sight unseen from Gold Ninja Video, as some violent wuxia swordsman action […]

The Store (1983)

I’ve only seen two Frederick Wiseman documentaries, and I tend to forget the rhythms of them. Moments brought together in montage and then staying with one scene, before moving onto the next. Cataloguing an institution by shifting around, sometimes faces will reoccur and appear again, others will be forgotten and moved on from. The Store […]

Sholay (1975)

Sholay (1975) screened last year in cinemas as part of an anniversary 4K edition. I wish I had seen it in a cinema. Due to life and the three hour plus run time, I had to watch it broken up, almost treating it like a serial. A full blown cinematic epic whose cultural impact and […]

Pickpocket (1997)

In Jia Zhangke’s Pickpocket (1997) aka Xiao Wu, which was shot in the Chinese town of Fenyang (where Zhangke grew up), there are a few street scenes where something happens, often to the main character, and people passing by begin to stop and look; there’s a feeling that these are not extras, but actual people wondering what’s going […]

Animal (2023)

Animal (2023) is a film about work and it’s about that mid-life crisis feeling of the party leaving you behind. Director Sofia Exarchou focuses on ‘animateurs’ employed by a resort hotel on Crete; the hotel is not high class or exclusive, it looks affordable enough for older Europeans as a holiday destination. The animateurs are […]