Studiocanal
Blu-Ray Review: The Driver
It takes a great deal of planning and coordination to pull-off the perfect heist. You need to do your research, without looking suspicious. Know your target inside out. Then, you need to assemble a team of reliable and trustworthy criminals who all have their own individual skillset. Each member will play their part in doing …
Blu-ray Review: The Trial
There are probably no other American directors who can hold a candle to Orson Welles when it comes to being an enigma. The larger-than-life figure left a huge mark on cinema. He was a genius who had a habit of starting a project and then getting distracted. Or running out of money. Then again, when …
Blu-Ray Review: The Teckman Mystery
Today, while women still struggle to experience a level playing with men when it comes to filmmaking, it was rare to see anyone but a white man behind the camera in post-war Britain. Indeed, along with Muriel Box, Wendy Toye was one of the only pioneering female directors during the 1950s and 1960s. She started …
Blu-Ray Review: The Sleeping Tiger
Nurture of nature? One of the oldest debates in the book. Are we fated to live out the lives our genes afford us, or is our upbringing instrumental in making us the person we will become? For those who are proponents of the latter, childhood is the most important stage of development. It’s in these …
Blu-Ray Review: Raw Deal
Arnold Schwarzenegger was one of the most recognisable faces of action cinema during the latter part of the twentieth century. He was arguably the biggest box office pull at one stage and his muscle-bound image became part of popular culture. Most of his early films follow a similar pattern. His dialogue was restricted (due to …
Blu-Ray Review: Red Sonja
Few actors can claim such an interesting history as Arnold Schwarzenegger. Born in Austria to a father who was a member of the Nazi Party serving in the Wehrmacht, he had a strict Catholic upbringing. As a teenager he began weightlifting and it changed his life. Using his fame as Mr. Olympia to smash his …
Blu-Ray Review: Frieda
War films tend to focus on the battle. The heroic victory and the courageous feats of bravery. The spirit of defiance. Of determination. They’re often little more than propaganda. Or, on the flipside, the unspeakable evil which makes humans do the most terrible things. It’s rare for a picture to concentrate on the aftermath. The …
Blu-Ray Review: Appointment In London
While feckless politicians may invoke the Second World War to whip up self-serving nationalistic fervour, only a moron would want to replicate the spirit of being bombed every night. Countries like to look back at (victorious) conflicts through rose-tinted glasses. Britain is one of the worst offenders. Most films about the period paint a romantic …
Blu-Ray Review: The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie
Luis Buñuel was undoubtedly one of the most distinctive, and successful, European filmmakers of his generation. Spending much of his youth in Paris, the Spaniard was deeply involved with the surrealism movement. He carried this with him throughout his career, going on to make a number of critically acclaimed and iconic films. Working across a …
Blu-Ray Review: High Crime
Tales of good versus evil are almost as old as mankind itself. The earliest writings often refer to such conflicts and most major religions have this message at their core. In today’s popular culture this normally metamorphosises into superheroes versus villains or cops versus robbers. The latter has fascinated people for decades. The cat and …