Film Reviews by Philip in Paradiso

In 1954 London, Reynolds Woodcock, a fashion designer, creates dresses for members of high society. His fashion house is successful and run by him with the crucial support of Cyril, his sister. When he meets a plain waitress in a restaurant, out in the countryside, he turns her into his main model, then starts a relationship with her.

The film is about that relationship, between him and her (Alma). It is a very good period film and an interesting sentimental tale of 2 people who get to know each other and, gradually, find a meaningful way that they can communicate. The acting is very good and so is the re-creation of London in the 1950s.

The film is slow-moving and, in some ways, very little happens, beyond the meanders of the 2 characters' relationship and the ups and downs of the fashion house's business. There is something oppressive and claustrophobic about the story because Reynolds, the central character, basically is a control freak who is obsessive in everything he does. He can be possessive and abusive, in his own way.

So, overall, a movie I would recommend, but a somewhat strange experience in more ways than one, starting with the looks of the Germanic-sounding lead actress, Alma, who is expressive and magnetic, but not conventionally pretty, to say the least, in my view.

This hyper-realistic French film is relatively short (90 mins) but as hard-hitting as a movie of this kind can be. It is the very ordinary story of an ordinary couple that has split up, and there are 2 kids caught up in between the wife and the husband. They have ordinary jobs in an ordinary-looking French town.

And yet the film manages to create an overwhelming sense of tension and gradually rising fear that is memorable. All the actors are excellent. In some ways, yes, it is a dull story to begin with about an ordinary family falling apart, but you can feel the pain and the sorrow, and the suspense will eventually grip you beyond anything you expected. I thoroughly recommend it.

On the DVD, there is a bonus short film of 30 mins that was supposed to come before the feature film, but you can watch it afterwards. The director should have included it as a preamble to the story, in fact: it, too, is very good. If you watch it first, the feature film makes even more sense.

Walter Fane, a bacteriologist, marries Kitty Garstin (Naomi Watts) and they move to China (Shanghai), where Walter has been posted to work in a government lab, studying infectious diseases. The marriage is soon in trouble, when Kitty starts an affair with a British official in Shanghai...

The film is well-made and the acting is generally good, but the film is almost too slick and too polished to feel 'real' and 'raw'. There is something missing, somehow, which prevents the movie from being a truly great film. But it is still a very good period film that I would recommend if you like that kind of historical love drama.

It is based on a very good novel by S Maugham, which I have read. What bothered me is that the dynamics of the relationship between Dr Fane and his wife have been altered in the film adaptation, and considerably so. In the movie, and without giving too much away, to a certain extent, Dr Fane is the central character, or he is at least as important as Kitty. In the novel, everything revolves around Kitty, primarily. The way that their relationship evolves is very different from what is portrayed in the film.

S Maugham is actually far more radical and much harsher in his portrayal of human nature and sentimental relationships: there are no concessions to 'good taste' and common sensitivities in the novel. The film, probably to please a wider public, drifts towards a more conventional form of romance, somehow, even though the setting is dramatic and even tragic in other ways. Ultimately, the novel's angle is more interesting than the simpler take on the characters put forward in the film. And the novel was written in the 1920s!

On balance, I would recommend the film, but I would advise you to read the book first, if you don't know it. And you will see the difference between a satisfying work of fiction (the movie) and great art (the novel).

Battle for Sevastopol is a 2015 biographical war film about Lyudmila Pavlichenko, a young Soviet woman who joined the Red Army to fight the Nazi invasion of the USSR during WWII. The movie revolves around the events of the siege of Odessa and the siege of Sevastopol. Against the backdrop of the war, the heroine gets involved romantically with various men.

L Pavlichenko became a very successful sniper, killing over 300 enemy soldiers during the war. She is one of the top Russian/ Soviet snipers of all times and, allegedly, the female sniper with the highest kill number of all times.

The movie is well-made in the Russian tradition. It is a good war movie and there is humour, here and there. There is, however, something a little bit predictable about the story (but it is in fact a true story...), which has, perhaps, more to do with the way the film is shot. It's hard to say what it is, but there is something that is missing, which could have turned what is a good war movie into an unforgettable war epic.

Also, living conditions in Stalin's USSR cannot have been as comfortable as shown in the film, I would have thought, more particularly when it comes to food supplies, which appear plentiful!

Still, it is a good film that I would recommend. And the central character was certainly an extraordinary person.

This film is an arch-love story. In the ruins of post-war Poland, Wiktor and Zula fall deeply, obsessively and destructively in love. As performing musicians/ artists forced to work for the Communist propaganda machine (as members of a folk troupe), they dream of escaping to the West. One day, they spot their chance to make a break for freedom in France.

On one level, there is something predictable in the way that the love story between the 2 central characters develops. On another, the film is full of surprises and the lead actress is simply amazing and stunning, in terms of her presence and sensuality on screen. Somehow, the use of black & white enhances her charm and beauty, and gives the film more depth and elegance.

My problem is with the 2nd half of the film, which I do not find entirely plausible in terms of the storyline. I cannot go into details because it would be a spoiler. But I simply cannot see the 2 characters reacting in this kind of way in real life, also given the broader political and social-economic context at the time (the 1950s).

It is still a beautiful and intensely romantic film that I would certainly recommend, which you are unlikely to forget.

This is a very well-made political thriller. In November 1979, Iranian activists storm the US Embassy in Tehran in retaliation for President Jimmy Carter’s giving the Shah asylum in the US during the Iranian Revolution. While c.55 of the embassy staff are taken hostage, 6 avoid capture by sheltering in the Canadian ambassador’s home. After 3 months, a CIA agent is sent over to organise their ‘ex-filtration'.

The facts are well-known and the script takes liberties with them, more particularly in a way that glorifies the CIA and the Americans (of course), while playing down the role of the Canadians, and misrepresenting the attitude of the British and NZ Embassies, which did offer to help and provide some assistance.

Having said this, it is a very good film, which re-creates the cauldron-like atmosphere in revolutionary Tehran very well, and is very good at creating a huge sense of tension and suspense. B Affleck is competent in the way he plays his part, although rather wooden and expressionless. Then again, I watched the interview with the real-life CIA agent (see bonus on the DVD) and he is even more devoid of any facial expressions than B Affleck is in the film!

Overall, I would say it is a very good film and would recommend it.

This is quite a unique film in that it is a lengthy documentary, shot up to a point like a fiction movie, showing a unit of Danish soldiers (infantry) in the front line, against the Taliban, in Afghanistan, at the height of the involvement of NATO troops in Helmand Province, where British troops took so many casualties and fought so bravely.

On the plus side, it is a documentary like none other. It is amazing how close to the fighting the film crew are, and that they were allowed to film totally freely, from what we can see, to the point where the Danish soldiers discuss operations in a completely uncensored and raw way (with certain consequences down the line, as it happens). Nothing like this would ever be allowed in and by the British Army, I believe. You get to experience the war for what it is: a mixture of extreme boredom and extreme danger, with acts of heroism thrown in when duty calls, and all the ambiguity of modern warfare.

On the minus side, the film, being so factual and realistic -- because it is reality, to a large extent -- is strangely un-cinematic, and often lacks tension. This is probably what war really is like: 10% action and suspense, and 90% preparation, training, waiting around, and boredom. It affects the film, somehow. By the end of the unit's tour of duty, little has actually happened, but for the inevitable casualties (mostly IEDs), and the odd shoot-out.

Having said all this, I would recommend the film if one wants to have an idea of what really goes on in Afghanistan and what modern soldiering in far-away theatres such as the Middle East really is like. It may encourage potential recruits to join the army, or it may not, as the case may be...

An American university student in Paris, who is fanatical about films, meets a peculiar brother and sister (Eva Green), who are twins and fellow film enthusiasts. The twins have a very close, claustrophobic relationship. The 3 of them become entangled in an erotic triangle. The film is set against the backdrop of the 1968 Paris student riots. The film constantly makes references to various movies of the classical and New Wave cinema.

On one level, the film is interesting and there are echoes of the director's earlier works (such as 'Last Tango in Paris'). The erotic trio is intriguing. Eva Green is remarkably seductive and sexy in her acting, attitude and personality. The reconstitution of the Paris of the 1960s is very well done.

On another level, the movie is somewhat annoying because the central characters, the twins, are irritating and immature: they are typical French, privileged, middle-class students who pretend to be non-conformist revolutionaries. They hate all things that are 'bourgeois' but cannot see that they, themselves, are pure products of the arty, intellectual bourgeois class, French style. The young American is, in fact, far more mature and far more perceptive, but in awe of the twins -- more particularly Eva Green's character. (No doubt this portrayal is largely deliberate on the part of the director, but the characters are nevertheless annoying!)

There is something a bit contrived about the constant references to old movies: it is understandable in a film about film enthusiasts, but it adds to the artificiality of the narrative -- with the theme of the film that includes another film (or various other films), while reality reflects the fiction of the movies, rather than the opposite.

So, it is a good film of a peculiar genre, worth watching, but not quite a masterpiece.

This is a slightly unusual film. It is a Scandinavian war movie about Afghanistan. This is not that common.

There is some fighting in it, but not so much. Quickly, the movie goes into a different mode, asking uncomfortable questions: what is a just war? What is a good decision in such extreme situations? Who is guilty and who isn't? What would you have done? There are no easy answers. There are bad ones, and very bad ones.

The film is a bit slow and a bit ponderous, once removed from the battlefield, but the tension is ever-present and feels real.

This is not a Hollywood spectacular. It feels more like a documentary. For this very reason, I would certainly recommend it. It will change your perception of war and army life, unless you are familiar with both.

This good feature film focuses on the Russian mafia. It is quite well made and everything should work to make it really good but, somehow, it fails to hit the mark. It is hard to know why. All the ingredients are there but it is not as good as it could be. And yet the plot is strong.

One reviewer said it feels more like 'a TV film', and that's perhaps what it is. Of all the characters, the only one that really grabs one's attention is Dima (Stellan Skarsgård), the Russian mobster who fears for his life. The violence is often suggested rather than shown, which could have worked but seems, somehow, to deprive the film of those moments of high drama one would expect.

Somehow, it is quite a cerebral film.

So, it is worth seeing, but could just as well be missed.

This movie is about a brothel c.1895/ 1900 in Paris. It is a high-end establishment run by a Madame. The film is very descriptive and perhaps a bit slow, showing us the life of the girls, with their clients and when not working.

What is interesting is that it is very much a women's society, despite the fact they are all there, ostensibly, to serve the selfish needs of men (and rich men). But the film is made from the point of view of the women, which gives it an interesting angle.

The movie is not a masterpiece, however. Somehow, it is a bit slow and demonstrative. Also, the pop music occasionally used to accompany the story grates, in my view. And the very last shots at the end of the movie are tagged on as an ideological statement rather than anything else.

During the 1980s, US Customs Service special agent Robert Mazur, as 'Bob Musella', offers to launder the dirty cash of a Colombian drugs syndicate, as he poses as a banker/ financial adviser. B Musella infiltrates the Medellin cartel, and helps expose the money-laundering organization of drug lord Pablo Escobar. In so doing, he also exposes the activities of BCCI, the international bank.

The film is very interesting for a range of reasons. First of all, all the events described are based on what actually happened, and it is quite remarkable. Second, the story is told very well. The sense of tension is almost unbearable at times, as extreme violence can erupt at any time, in the company of Colombian criminals who seem unpredictable and demented and are, ultimately, cold-blooded killers.

Incidentally, it was R Mazur's investigation that led to the complete collapse of BCCI, in the USA but also in the UK and in other countries where it operated.

It is an excellent film.

In 1892, in New Mexico, Captain Joseph Blocker of the US Army is ordered to escort dying Cheyenne chief Yellow Hawk and 4 members of his family back to their tribal lands in Montana. Capt Blocker hates Indians but is forced to accept; it is to be his last mission before retirement. On the way, he picks up a farmer’s widow, Rosalee, whose entire family has been slaughtered by a Comanche raiding party.

The film narrates the journey, fraught with danger, of Capt Blocker, his men, Rosalee, and the Cheyenne party under his responsibility to Montana. The movie, as other reviewers have said, is bleak, dark and violent. But it is also beautiful: beyond the obvious western that it is, it is also a journey of discovery, particularly for Christian Bale, the lead character, who is simply amazing in the part he plays.

My only reservation would be regarding the last third of the film or so, which slips into some sort of sentimentality, when the cruel and violent white men realise that they have been treating the Amerindian population appalingly -- and no doubt it is true they did. It strikes me as a politically correct re-interpretation of American history that most probably does not reflect the dominant feelings among whites in the USA at the time, who, I believe, held racist views and had no feeling of guilt about those at all...

Overall, it is still an excellent film and a very good western.

Ageing gangster Benjamin ‘Lefty’ Ruggiero is introduced to a jewel thief named Donnie Brasco. Donnie succeeds in earning Lefty’s trust. Lefty teaches Donnie the rules of the Mafia and introduces him to several ‘made men’. Donnie actually is an FBI Special Agent, tasked with unmasking the New York-based crime family Lefty belongs to.

This is one of the best gangster movies I have ever seen. The acting is very good (including Al Pacino's), the atmosphere rings true, and there is tremendous suspense. The film is actually based on a completely true story: the 'real' Donnie Brasco was undercover within the Mafia for 6 years. Johnny Depp is excellent in his part as D Brasco.

The film gives a good idea of how the Mafia operates and when/ why it resorts to violence. It seems quite realistic to me. I strongly recommend it.

Weeks before the 2011 Egyptian revolution, Noredin, an officer in Cairo's corrupt police force, investigates the murder of a famous club singer at the Nile Hilton Hotel. What initially seems to be a crime of passion turns into something far murkier that involves a wealthy businessman-cum-politician, who seems to enjoy impunity. Noredin refuses to stop his investigation, thus putting his life in danger.

This is a very good film in that it depicts very well the ramifications of corruption within the Egyptian police force and politics, but, in fact, throughout Egyptian society. Noredin himself is a corrupt operator who, for once, wants to 'do the right thing'.

Although the film lacks pace or focus at times, overall, it is captivating, more particularly if you know the Middle East and North Africa, as it re-creates the atmosphere prevailing in large cities, in Arab countries, very well.