Slumdog Millionaire
Right now, Mumbai looms in the Western imagination as a place where terrorists gun down tourists in luxury hotels. I can't work out if now's a good or a bad time to release Danny Boyle's lush Mumbai fairytale. But SLUMDOG MILLIONAIRE is so wonderfully filled with human hope and redemption that it's more vital now than ever.
Rock N Roll Nerd
Back in 2004, Tim Minchin was a ranga from Perth who wrote weird satirical songs that record companies didn't know how to market. Then he had a makeover (I love makeovers.) Rock'n'roll eyeliner! Chemically straightened hair teased up, like Russell Brand! Unbuttoned shirts! And get this: it totally worked.
The Wackness
A 90210 joke here, a Boyz II Men comment there, some RIP Kurt Cobain street art for good measure, and hey presto: it's 1994! Welcome to director Jonathan Levine's THE WACKNESS.
This earnest, urban melodrama is hardly Spike Lee. When white guy Luke (Josh Peck) falls in love with white girl Stephanie (Olivia Thirlby), the warm fuzzies aren't exactly dumbed down, but there's no brain-breaking politics either.
Hunger
Word association: when I say "hunger strike", do you think "brimming with cinematic possibilities"? Maybe not. Turner Prize-winning artist and first-time feature director Steve McQueen thought otherwise, and it just won him the Camera d'Or prize at Cannes. (Shows what you know, huh?).
Choke
Chuck Palahniuk owned the late 90s. From the moment FIGHT CLUB splattered into popular consciousness, he stood in the cyclone-eye of our every swirling subcultural anxiety.
It seemed inevitable that we'd be bombarded with so many Palahniuk film adaptations that we'd finally have to learn how to spell his name - and yet it's taken this long to see CHOKE hit cinemas, translated into a dirty indie comedy with delusions of grandeur.
Celebrity, Dominick Dunne
Why does Dominick Dunne hate Frank Sinatra? Because Ol' Blue Eyes once instructed a flunky to punch Dominick in the head as a lark. Yes, Dunne's career trajectory - from social climber to movie producer to "the defining voice of VANITY FAIR" - is weighed down by a torrential downpour of Old Hollywood name-dropping.
Burn After Reading
Ever since BLOOD SIMPLE back in 1984, Joel and Ethan Coen have produced a steady stream of unrelentingly oddball features that totter on the border between melodrama and black humour. Now, after the unexpected success of last year's NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN, it seems the Coen Brothers can do, well, whatever they please.
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