Spike Jonze’s film about a lonely man who falls in love with his computer operating system (you’ll just have to go with this one) manages to be weird, witty and wise all at once. Joaquin Phoenix is endearing as the bruised divorcee withdrawing from real human contact, while Scarlett Johansson provides the soft voice to spark his imagination. But the greatest plaudits must go to Jonze’s Oscar-winning script which doesn’t put a word wrong.
15 cert – USA 2013 – Director: Spike Jonze
Running time: 126 minutes – Language: English
Cast: Joaquin Phoenix, Scarlett Johansson, Amy Adams
Lucus is forced to start over after his marital breakup. Just as things are starting to turn around, his life is torn apart when an untruthful remark made by a child spreads throughout his small community into a collective state of hysteria. An unnerving yet engrossing psychological drama which highlights the best and worst of human character traits. Mads Mikkelsen (a Royal Affair) won the Best Actor Award at the 2012 Cannes Film Festival for his penetrating portrayal of the wronged school teacher.
The Kings of Summer is a unique coming-of-age indie film about three teenage friends who, in the ultimate act of independence, decide to spend their summer building a house in the woods and living off the land. Free from their parents’ rules, their idyllic summer quickly becomes a test of friendship as each boy learns to appreciate the fact that family – whether it is the one you’re born into or the one you create – is something you can’t run away from.
A desperate family from the northern Philippines leave the rice fields to seek a better life in the city. Within a week of moving into the capital, they are struggling to feed their children. When the father at last lands a job with a security firm, he thinks he has made the right move, but a high mortality rate among his co-workers and some shady business dealings at work raise his doubts. Metro Manila is an intense and emotionally gripping crime thriller set in the colourful squalor of modern Manila.
The Grand Budapest Hotel recounts the adventures of Gustave H (Ralph Fiennes), its legendary concierge and Zero Moustafa, the lobby boy who becomes his most trusted friend. The story revolves around the theft and recovery of a priceless Renaissance painting and the battle for an enormous family fortune – all set in the fictitious central European country of Zubrowka between the wars. Wes Anderson has attracted an ensemble cast in this typically stylish and visually scrumptious screwball comedy.
This Oscar-winning documentary shines a spotlight on the untold true stories of the backup singers behind some of the greatest musical legends of the 21st century. This is both a tribute to the unsung voices who brought shape and style to popular music and a reflection on the conflicts, sacrifices and rewards of careers spent harmonizing with others. Along with rare archival footage and a peerless soundtrack,
Ahmad is an Iranian man who has come back to France to finalise his divorce from Marie who is pregnant by Samir and is planning to marry him. To complicate matters further, Samir’s own wife is in a coma, having tried to commit suicide for reasons that are only very slowly revealed. With five children involved in this triangle, the mistakes of the past weigh heavily on the future of all those involved. As in his previous film ‘A Separation,’ Farhadi’s interest is in the looks and gestures of his main characters as they struggle to understand each other’s motivations and feelings.
Woody Grant, a crotchety and senile old drunk mired in the backwoods of Billings, Montana, becomes convinced that he will be the winner of a million dollar sweepstake prize if he can somehow get himself to Nebraska, 750 miles away. Everyone else thinks this is all a scam but when Woody shows himself determined to do the journey on foot, if necessary, his son David agrees to drive him and so begins a bizarre riff on the classic American road movie. A delightful bitter-sweet depiction of a side of America we rarely get to see on the screen.
Gloria is a fifty-something divorcee with grown-up children who works in an office during the week and goes dancing in nightclubs on the weekend. Gloria is lonely, but not desperately so. She’s interested in sex, but she’s not looking for pity. She’s worried about losing control, but she’s also aware that she needs to move outside of her comfort zone. Not quite a comedy and not quite a drama, this Chilean film looks at middle age from a refreshingly even-handed and real-life perspective, not a contrived or tragic one which is so often portrayed in the cinema. Paulina Garcia’s note-perfect performance as Gloria won her Best Actress at the 2013 Berlin Film Festival.
In 19th century Bengal, visionary, poet and musician Lalon Fakir inherited the best of the liberal traditions of Buddhism, Hinduism and Islam to develop a philosophy of life which was both secular and tolerant. The film retraces the life of the spiritual leader whose moderation and pacifism drew upon him and his followers the wrath of fundamentalist Hindu and Muslim institutions. The Times of India describes Moner Manoosh as ‘ a visually stunning film which explores the burning issues of intolerance and sexual freedom to give it a sense of dynamic relevance to the global world we inhabit today.’