A Private War (2018)
★★★☆☆
Rosamund Pike in Matthew Heineman’s A Private War is a perfect incarnation of the legendarily fearless war reporter Marie Colvin.
★★★
Vice (2018)
★★★★☆
The career of notorious US Vice-President Dick Cheney is given The Big Short treatment by Adam McKay in dark satire Vice.
Destroyer (2018)
★★★☆☆
Nicole Kidman plays startlingly against type in Karyn Kusama’s LA noir Destroyer.
The House by the Sea (La Villa) (2017)
★★★☆☆
Robert Guédiguian reflects on bittersweet changes in life, death and society in his native south of France in The House by the Sea.
Tides (2017)
★★★☆☆
Tides directed by Tupaq Felber is a black-and-white, quiet unfolding of old friendships.
Peterloo (2018)
★★★★☆
The irony of Mike Leigh’s latest film Peterloo about demanding political representation is that almost 200 years later, this week people are marching for practically the same reasons – to demand a people’s vote, this time on Brexit.
BFI LFF Review: The White Crow (2018)
★★★☆☆
Art and politics are uneasy bedfellows in The White Crow, David Hare’s story of ballet and defection, a directorial debut for Ralph Fiennes.
Possum (2018)
★★★★☆
Possum by Matthew Holness is a suffocating, dark, very British psychological horror.
Utøya – July 22 (2018)
★★★☆☆
Utøya – July 22 by Erik Poppe is a stunning real-time reconstruction of the Norwegian massacre.
BFI LFF Review: Sew the Winter to My Skin (2018)
★★★★☆
Sew the Winter to my Skin is an excoriatingly angry film set in the Apartheid 1950s from South African director Jahmil X.T. Qubeka.
Us and Them (2017)
★★★★☆
Joe Martin’s Us and Them is a violent riff on the inequalities of contemporary British society that incense articulate young working-class Danny (Jack Roth, channelling his father Tim) and what he does about it.
BFI LFF Review: Crystal Swan (2018)
★★★★☆
The female-centric team of director Darya Zhuk, co-screenwriter Helga Landauer and cinematographer Carolina Costa give Alina Nasibullina a Madonna-esque starring role in post-Soviet black comedy Crystal Swan (Khrustal).
Under the Tree/Undir trénu (2017)
★★★☆☆
Under the Tree by Hafsteinn Gunnar Sigurðsson is a mordant suburban black comedy that escalates an everyday situation into shocking Icelandic horror.
Racer and the Jailbird
★★★★☆
Xavier Beauvois’ The Racer and the Jailbird stars Adèle Exarchopoulos and Matthias Schoenaerts in an intense, high-speed love affair.