Pig (2021)

I appreciate people who avoid trailers or reading reviews (and can easily skip reading this); the idea of taking a movie in without preconceptions, expectations or spoilers is like the pure film viewing experience. But I can’t help myself – I like watching trailers, I like reading advance reviews, probably to my detriment. So it […]

Another Year (2010)

Revisiting Mike Leigh’s film, Another Year (2010), there are images of the middle-aged couple Tom (Jim Broadbent), a geologist, and Gerri (Ruth Sheen), a counsellor, that are so appealing and heart-warming to me. Gerri cuddling Tom while he prepares dinner or both of them sitting underneath a tarp with a cup of tea while it […]

Love Streams (1984)

I really love revisiting John Cassavetes’ films – often, it feels like you have to acclimatise to the tones. The characters aren’t asking you to love them: they are tough to take. Love Streams (1984) I only saw for the first time a couple of years back and was always keen to revisit. While it’s […]

Personal Shopper (2014)

Irma Vep might be director Olivier Assayas’ high-point and the first film I saw of his back in the late 1990s. I’m a fan of Assayas when he also skirts with the thriller genre, the films of his that involve tracking characters through geo-political espionage such as Demonlover, Boarding Gate (one of my faves) and […]

Terrorizers (1986)

In Edward Yang’s film Terrorizers (1986) or The Terrorizers, there’s a repeated motif of characters standing near a window. Gazing out as wind blows through the curtains or sitting on the floor looking up at a closed window, characters exist within interiors that are often framed in master shots. There’s something at once beautiful and […]