absurdist farce, part surreal fetishistic nightmare. Glasgow: GFI‘. Pippi Longstocking (U) ** (Clive Smith/ Michael Schaack/Bill Giggle, Canada/ Sweden/Germany, 2000) 78 mins. There’s something vaguely disturbing about a nine- year-old girl who parades down the street singing ‘Oh what a fabulous day, I’m happy as can be’ having just watched her father being washed out to sea. But maybe that's being churlish. After all, Pippi Ixingstocking‘s anarchic behaviour has won her a place in the hearts and on the bookshelves of many a child since Astrid Lindgren first unleashed the world's first riot girl. But in an age of sophisticated children’s films, Pippi Longstocking with all her exuberance, fails to deliver. Edinburgh: UCI. Pizza King (18) *irir (Ole Christian Madscn, Denmark, 1999) Ali Kazim, Janus Bakrawi, Isam Subeihi. 100 mins. Young Junes, the son of an immigrant, is pushed into his best friend Bobby’s criminal activities. But all Junes wants is to return to the boxing ring, which gives him a sense of identity. The Martin Scorsese influence here is clear. Edinburgh: I-‘ilmhouse. Pokemon (U) *‘k (adults)/***** (kids) (Michael Haigney/Kunohiko Yuyama, Japan/US, 2000) 96 mins. Cloned Pokemon (pocket monster) Mcwtwo embarks on world dominance and so hero kids, Ash, Brock and Misty, accompanied by their Pokemon, set out to make him see the error of his ways. Cue a great deal of gratuitous fighting and an interlude in which it’s explained that lighting is bad ('2!) The stupor induced by viewing the film strand of the phenomenal Pokemon franchise (computer game. collecting cards, etc.) as an adult, convincingly confirms that it's a kid thing, good or bad. General release. Ratcatcher (15) ***** (Lynne Ramsay, UK, 1999) William Eadie, Tommy Flanagan, Mandy Matthews. 93 mins. Seen through the eyes of twelve-year-old James Gillespie, a sensitive boy haunted by the drowning of a neighbour's son, Ratcatcher paints a bleakly realistic picture of Glasgow family life. Ramsay uses meticulous framing, unusual camera angles and atmospheric images to capture the subtle textures of everyday life, as well as complex inner feelings. Edinburgh: Cameo, Odeon. Ride With The Devil (15) **** (Ang Lee, US, 1999) Tobey Maguire, Skeet Ulrich, Jeffrey Wright, Jewel. 138 mins. Ride With l'he1)t'i'il is a dusty epic of Gone With The Wind proportions, set amid the bloody chaos of the same war. Jacob Roedel (Maguire) rejects his father's Unionist beliefs to follow best friend Jack (Ulrich) in lighting the Confederate cause. Amongst their companions is black slave Holt (Wright), whose devotion to his master confuses his loyalty to his own people, whose bondage he is fighting to preserve. An Oscar-worthy and unashamedly traditional Hollywood war movie that benefits from Lee's deft way with the intimate, the ambiguous and the morally complex. Edinburgh: Lumiere. Romance (18) * (Catherine BreiIIat, France, 1999) Caroline Ducey, Rocco Siffredi, Francois Berleand. 95 mins. Our female protagonist is very young and wears either nothing or a white frock throughout. She weeps constantly and nags her boyfriend for attention; denied this, she embarks upon a small-scale sexual odyssey. Long, static shots show a series of sterile, joyless physical encounters, while a morose and pretentious monologue describes her feelings. She concludes that the only true fulfilment comes from motherhood. The great Bill Ilicks dismissed the controversy around Basic Instinct with the observation that said film merited no such kerfuffle, being a ‘piecc of shit'. Indeed. This is worse. Edinburgh: Cameo. Rosetta (15) *‘k‘kii' (Luc and Jean- Pierre Dardenne, Belgium/France, 1999) Emilie Dequenne, Anne Ycrnaux, Fabrizio Rongione. 91 mitts. Rosetta (Dequenne) is seventeen and has one wish: to find a job that will enable her to move out of the caravan that she co-habits with her alcoholic mother (Yernaux). Despite continual disapjmintments in the job market Rosetta refuses to give up hope and battles on like a bull facing a matador. A marvellous exposition of the continuing importance of
cinema in highlighting social barriers and conflict, Rosetta was rewarded with the Cannes Palme d’Or. Stirling: MacRobert. Scream 3 (l8) **** (Wes Craven, US, 2000) Neve Campbell, Courtney Cox, David Arquette. 118 mins. The third instalment of the horror film parody expands the by now familiarjokey film references to satirise the industry that spawned the inspirational Halloween and Friday The 13th series. The victims this time round are the cast of film- within-the-film, Stab 3, the final instalment of the exploitative dramatisation of the Woodsboro murders, which were the subject of the first film. An endless stream of amusing cameos and film references makes Scream 3 as entertaining as the first film. That said, it’s funnier than it is scary. General release. Saving Grace (15) ii (Nigel Cole, UK, 2000) Brenda Blethyn, Craig Ferguson. 94 mins. Saddled with crushing debts after the sudden death of her husband, keen horticulturist Grace (Blethyn) transforms the greenhouse of her Cornish mansion into a marijuana plantation with the assistance of her Scottish gardener, Matthew (Ferguson). Already being touted as this year’s feelgood British comedy, Saving Grace attempts to recapture the magic of Ealing classics; instead it merely feels out touch with modern life. See review. General release. Sex: The Annabel Chong Story (18) *t* (Gough Lewis, US, 2000) Annabel Chong. 86 mins. Chong became an intemational sensation by orchestrating the inaugural ‘World's Biggest Gang Bang’ in which she had sex with 251 men in ten hours to provide her with Andy Warhol’s fifteen minutes of fame. The sex feat also attracted the attention of Gough Lewis who spent the next year filming Chong as she came to terms with overnight celebrity status. A truly depressing picture of the human condition in which even Chong is not afforded the luxury of a sympathetic light. Yet despite the depressing tone, it is impossible not to be enthralled. Edinburgh: Filmhouse. The Singing Ringing Tree (U) mu (Francesco Stefani, East Germany, 1958) 73 mins. Imaginative adaptation of the Grimm Brothers' tale, in which Princess Thousandbeauty's suitor prince has the unenviable task of supplying her with said vegetation in order to win her hand. Stirling: MacRobert. The Sixth Sense (15) **** (M. Night Shyamalan, US, 1999) Bruce Willis, Haley Joel Osment, Olivia Williams, Toni Collette. 107 mins. Nine-year-old Cole Sear (Osment) has a terrible secret. He can see the dead walking the earth; they're around him all the time and it’s scary as hell. Child psychologist Malcolm Crowe (Willis) takes his case and spends all of his time, at the expense of his marriage to Anna (Olivia Williams), attempting to help the boy. Shyamalan’s clever script suggests much and explains little, keeping the audience guessing. Edinburgh: Lumiere. Snow Day (PG) A"ka (Chris Kock, US, 2000) Chevy Chase, Pam Grier, John Schneider. 90 mins. Weatherman Tom Brandston’s (Chase) ratings are sliding as the public reject his traditional routine in favour of slick network rival Chad Symmonz (Schneider). His network manager Tina (Grier) orders Tom to spice up his act by wearing comic book costumes, all of which troubles pale in comparison to family man Tom’s domestic stresses. Chase confounds expectations to appear, for the first time in years, in a movie that is actually funny. Glasgow: Odeon, Odeon At The Quay. Snow Falling On Cedars (15) *** (Scott Hicks, US, 2000) Ethan Hawke, Rick Yune, Youki Kudoh. 126 mins. Adapted from David Guterson’s best-selling novel, Hicks’ follow-up to Shine turns out to be a solemn, rather uninvolving exploration of memory, racial prejudice and reconciliation, set on remote island off the Pacific Northwest coast circa 1950. Hicks establishes the dank, oppressive atmosphere of an isolated fishing community. Yet the jigsaw-puzzle narrative lacks dramatic focus. See preview and review. Glasgow: GI’I‘, Showcase. Edinburgh: Filmhouse, UCI. Paisley: Showcase. ‘
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