Jiro Dreams Of Sushi (2011)
★★★★☆
Jiro Dreams of Sushi is a beguiling and beautifully crafted documentary focusing on the life of Japanese sushi chef Jiro Ono.
★★★★☆
Jiro Dreams of Sushi is a beguiling and beautifully crafted documentary focusing on the life of Japanese sushi chef Jiro Ono.
★★★★☆
A colourful journey through India’s rich history, Deepa Mehta’s Midnight’s Children is a beautiful adaptation of Rushdie’s unfilmable novel, vibrant and beguiling.
★★★★☆
Reinventing Hardy’s Tess Of The d’Urbervilles in a colourful India in its own glorious revolution, Michael Winterbottom’s Trishna is a bitter fall from grace.
★★★☆☆
Aktan Arym Kubat’s The Light Thief is a mishmash of comedy, politics and poetry, and yet a haunting portrait of the death of cinema.
★★★★☆
With geriatric sex and teen suicide, Lee Changdong’s Poetry is no sensationalist exploitation drama, but a dark, tender coming of (old) age.
★★★★★
Following its own merciless and tragic logic, Asghar Farhadi’s divorce parable A Separation is deceptively straightforward, exposing the loss of humanity beyond bitter recriminations.
★★★★☆
A stunningly cinematic adaptation of Murakami’s novel, Tran Anh Hung’s Norwegian Wood may be a cheerless picture of teen love, sex and death, but it is colourful.
★★★☆☆
A hypnotic journey into reincarnation, monkey gods and talking catfish, Apichatpong Weerasethakul’s Uncle Boonmee is a puzzling but award-winning controversy.
★★★☆☆
Like an Iranian Falling Down, Rafi Pitts’ The Hunter pushes one man over the edge in a city seething with male anguish and state violence.
★★★★☆
A Rohmeresque ramble under the Tuscan sun, Kiarostami’s Certified Copy is a freewheeling battle of the sexes. And Juliette Binoche is in a bitter mood for love.
★★★☆☆
When her simple son is sent to prison for the murder of a local girl, Boon Joon-Ho’s Mother springs into action. Thank you, Mommie dearest.
★★★☆☆
Set in a border backwater in Northern Iran, Babak Jalali’s Frontier Blues follows four men rapidly losing the plot in a land without women.
★★★☆☆
Iranian visual artist, Shirin Neshat’s directorial debut focuses on the lives of four women set against a backdrop of political turmoil in 1950s Iran.
★★★☆☆
Combining documentary and fiction, Jia Zhang Ke’s 24 City looks at the rise and fall of a Chengdu aeronautics factory. It’s China’s capitalist revolution in miniature.