Love The One You're With (15) *** (Robbie Moffat, 2000, UK) Paul Cunningham, Hazel Ann Crawford. 92 mins. Filmed in Glasgow with largely local actors, Love The One You ’re With highlights the realities of homelessness in the city. London property dealer Charlie Grant (Cunningham) finds himself stranded in Glasgow without cash, credit cards or car after an impounding and a mugging. Befriended by the local homeless he spends the long weekend on the streets and in the soup kitchens. A worthy glimpse into Glasgow’s underworld and homelessness problem. Here, the medium really is the message. Stirling: MacRobert. The Luzhin Defence (12) it (Marleen Gorris, UK, 2000) John Turturro, Emily Watson, Geraldine James. 110 mins. In this Nabokov adaptation Gorris tells the story of genius chess player but socially inept Luzhin (Turturro) who is at Italy’s Lake Como for the World Chess Championship, and falls for the languorous Natalia (Watson) who's looking to escape a few of the advance moves of her societally skilled mother (James). For all its admiration for the moves only a genius could predict, Gorris tells a story that requires minimal second guessing; something Turturro's likeable performance can‘t do much to alleviate. Glasgow: GF'I‘, Odeon At The Quay. Edinburgh: Dominion, Filmhouse. le-Z (15) iii (John Woo, US, 2000) Tom Cruise, Thandie Newton, Dougray Scott. 124 mins. Evil ex-super spy Sean Ambrose (Scott) has stolen a lethal chemical weapon, and he wants big bucks not to unleash it. Ethan Hunt (Cruise) is charged with retrieving it and enlists beautiful cat thief — and Ambrose 's ex-lover — Nyah Hall (Newton). M:l 2 works best and is most faithful to the spirit of the original Mission: Impossible while the operation remains covert, but Woo blows it with a clumsy all- out action finale. Glasgow: Showcase. Edinburgh: Cameo. Paisley: Showcase. Maborosi (PG) *irk (Hirokazu Koreeda, Japan, 1995) Esumi Makiko, Naito Takeshi. 110 mins. When her husband commits suicide, a young Japanese woman becomes convinced she's some kind of Angel of Death, while her family try to obliterate this social shame by arranging a new marriage. Slow and contemplative, with minimal dialogue, fonner documentarist Koreeda fills his feature debut with frames shot in sembdarkness. Arthouse traditionalists will delight at its lingering pace. Edinburgh: Cameo.
Mansfield Park (15) *tit (Patricia Rozema, US, 2000) Frances O'Connor, Alessandro Nivola, Jonny Lee Miller. 112 mins. Rozema has supplemented her adaptation with extracts from Jane Austen's own letters andjoumals, turning the novel’s heroine - a poor girl who is adopted by wealthy relatives and taken to live in the grand house of the title — into a quick- witted, sharp-tongued free spirit budding writer. The film may not be strictly faithful to the novel, but there's no mistaking its intelligence, vigour and wit. Dunfermline: Carnegie Hall.
Me. Myself And Irene (15) *irir (Peter and Bobby Farrelly, US, 2000) Jim Carrey, Renee Zellweger, Robert Forster. 116 mins. Carrey plays both Rhode Island State Trooper Charlie Baileygates and Charlie’s alter ego, Hank. Charlie’s sweet and kind; Hank is a sexually aggressive, misogynistic loudmouth. When Charlie/Hank is/are assigned to escort the lovely lrene (Zellwcger) to New York State his split personality threatens to take over his life completely. The rude sight gags and stinging one-liners are blatantly in evidence, while the story also works as something more than just a shaky scaffold holding up the comic set-pieces. The revelation, however, is Carrey himself. His Charlie/Hank creations are the mark of a master craftsman. See review. General release.
Miss Julie (15) tits: (Mike Figgis, UK, 2000) Saffron Burrows, Peter Mullan, Maria Doyle Kennedy. 100 mins. Figgis' adaptation of Strindberg's play is almost a period Dogmc film. The hand-held cameras loop freely around the central characters, lending the film a live feel, as if recording a theatre performance. Miss Julie and her footman, Jean, skirmish throughout, alternately flirting and hating, both
desperate to cross the boundaries of class imposed upon them, both hoping to use the other as a means of escape. A gripping, claustrophobic tale shot at a breakneck pace, in a unique style with career-best performances from the small cast. Edinburgh: Filmhouse.
Mission: Impossible (PG) shit (Brian De Palma, US, 1996) Tom Cruise, Jon Voight, Emmanuelle Beart. 110 mins. Unlike the fondly remembered TV series which pushed the notion of teamwork, this lavishly produced Hollywood thriller is driven by Cruise's solo star power. As the only survivor of a hit on his espionage team, he races across the world, setting up double bluffs to flush out a mole. There are a couple of dazzling set pieces, but they're padded out by yards of complicated plot. Slick, but cold. Edinburgh: Cameo. Muppets From Space (U) *tt (Tim Hill, 1999, US) Dave Goelz, Steve Whitmire, Frank Oz. 88 mins. For their sixth big screen adventure, the focus of our Muppet attentions is Gonzo, that blue, hooked nosed . . . thing. No one is really sure what Gonzo is, so when he gets a message which he believes is from space, the race is on to make contact with his extra terrestrial brethren. Mappers From Space captures the spirit of the first movie and the original TV series where the subsequent films never did. Motherwell: Moviehouse.
My Dog Skip (U) iii (Jay Russell, US, 2000) Kevin Bacon, Diane Lane, Frankie Muniz. 95 mins. My Dog Skip is an unashamedly sentimental coming-of—age story about a nine-year-old boy’s relationship with his pet Jack Russell terrier, set during World War Two in the small Mississippi town of Yazoo. The film casts a nostalgic glow over the past, but it doesn’t shy away from giving us glimpses of harsher realities, including nods to the era's racism and the traumas of war. But the prevailing mood is appropriately one of gentle sweetness. Glasgow: ABC, Grosvenor, Odeon At The Quay, UCl. Galashiels: Pavilion.
Not One Less (PG) ***** (Zhang Yimou, China, 2000) Wei Minzhi. 100 mins. A teacher of a small school in an isolated, impoverished village is forced to leave the education of his 28 pupils in the hands of 13-year-old substitute Wei Minzhi for a month. But with poverty forcing over one million students to leave school to look for work every year in China, Wei is set the task of retrieving a desperate student from the big city. Essentially, this is a personal interest perspective on a dramatic social problem. The cast comprises non- professionals, and the calibre of the heart- rending performance by Minzhi makes the film all the more impressive. Kirkcaldy: Adam Smith.
Nurse Betty (18) *ttt (Neil LaBute, US, 2000) Renee Zellweger, Morgan Freeman, Greg Kinnear. 110 mins. When smalltown Kansas waitress Betty (Zellweger) witnesses the murder of her white trash car salesman, she suffers a reality shift that leaves her believing the cheesy melodramatic world of her favourite daytime soap, A Reason To Live, to be real. Much of the film's humour is derived from the disparity between melodrama and real life; the occasions when they intersect are simultaneously hilarious, painful and poignant. Not as misanthropic as LaBute’s first two films, Nurse Betty is nevertheless far more vital than other Hollywood comedies. Edinburgh: Cameo.
0 Brother, Where Art Thou? (12) *tit (Joel Coen, US, 2000) George Clooney, John Turturro, Tim Blake Nelson. 107 mins. Preston Sturges’ Sullivan '5 Travels and Homer's The Odyssey are the starting points for this 305-set screwball comedy. Smooth- talking Everett Ulysees McGill (Clooney), simpleton Delmar (Nelson) and maladjusted Pete (Turturro) are members of a chain gang on the run looking for buried loot. Their journey up and down the state of Mississippi brings them into contact with assorted eccentrics based on Homer's mythological figures. A lighter work for the Coens, more Raising Arizona than Fargo, but it's still a rare treat. A truly captivating confederacy of dunces. General release.
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