Film index
The Clrcle (Dayereh) (PG) 00.. (Jafar Panahi. Iran/Italy. 2001 ) Fercshteh Sadr Orafaei. Narges Mamizadeh Razlighi. 91 mins. Through a series ofquotidian incidents. Panahi (The ll’liile Balloon) presents a devastating yet profoundly empathetic portrait of Moslem women's stunted lives in Iran. Nobody could fail to be angered by the casual cruelties. wicked discrimination and blatant hypocrisy shown here. Yet. by the same token. nobody could fail to be impressed and inspired by the courage and resilience of these women. Linked only by their depressingly similar fates. the women rebel against the circle of discrimination. bravely denying their second-class status. GFT. Glasgow. Courage Of Lassle (L‘) 00. (Fred Wilcox. LS. 1942) Elizabeth Taylor. 92 mins. 1n MGM's third canine adventure. everyone's favourite collie becomes a war hero. After which Wee young Liz Taylor manages to turn the scamp into a good domestic pet. Ah. GFT. Glasgow.
The Crlmson RIvers (15) 000 (Mathieu Kassovitz. France. 2001 ) Jean Reno. Vincent Cassel. Nadia Fares. 105 mins. Kassovitz's fourth film as director is a gruesome. glossy Seven-style murder mystery adapted by Jean-Christophe Grang from his own bestselling crime novel. Reno and Cassel's police detectives are investigating two seemingly unrelated cases: a brutal murder outside an Alpine university town and the desecrated grave of a child in suburban Sarzac. The action and suspense sequences are very slick. but once the mystery is solved the film loOses impact. and ultimately fails to deliver the shocking dénouement that sealed Set-en's place in cinema history. L'Cl. Edinburgh.
The Croupler(15)0000 (Mike Hodges. L'K. 1997) Clive Owen. Gina McKee. Alex Kingston. 94 mins. Jack (Owen) is a struggling writer who takes up a job in a London casino where he quickly proves himself to be an accomplished
Neil Diamond adds some sparkle to the llves of Jason Blggs, Jack Black
croupier. But he finds himself assisting Jeni (Kingston). a South African gambler who's apparently in debt to a gang ofcriminals. Hodges' taut. intelligent and darkly amusing drama combines cinematic flair and thematic substance. unfolding in a dream- like. hall-of-mirrors world. peopled by con- artists. card-sharks. and inveterate liars. Propelled by Owen's impressively watchful and poised central performance. it boasts a delicious ()edipal twist in its dcnouement. Lumiere. Edinburgh.
Grho Deep End (15) eeee (L’S. Scott McGehee. David Siegel. 2001 ) Tilda Swinton. Goran Visnjic. Jonathan Tucker. 99 mins. Assured adaptation of Elizabeth Sanxay Holding's 1947 crime novel about a mother (Swinton) attemping to conceal the
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murder of her child's low life lover. Her actions are complicated by a blackmailer (Visnjic) who threatens to expose the crime and the romantic affair thus ruining the teenager (changed from the book's daughter to a gay son. which effectively updates the drama). The traditional web of intrigue is replaced by the emphasis on hiding a crime within the confines of domesticity. a bril- liant move on McGehee and Siegel's part. and one which shows great fidelity to Holding's much undervalued writing. See review. Selected release.
The Devil’s Backbone (ll lsplnazo del Dlablo) (15) 0.0.. (Guillermo del Toro. Spain. 2001) Marisa Paredes. Federico Luppi. Eduardo dc Noriega. 107 mins. 1n del Toro's expertly-crafted ghost tale set during Spain's Civil War a young Carlos is brought to a remote orphanage presided over by an odd elderly couple (Luppi and Paredes). and haunted by the ghost of another orphan. A powerful political backdrop is seamlessly interwoven with a strong religious subtext. and there are numerous cultural references including the surreal imagery of Salvador Dali and the Victorian Gothic writings of MR. James. Gloriously photographed by Almodovar's cinematographer Guillermo Navarro. this is brilliant visual. allegorical storytelling. Selected release.
Dlrt For Dlnner (15) (Branwen Okpako. Germany. 2000) 75 mins. Documentary about the experiences of Sam Meffire. one of Germany's few black policemen around the time of unification. who was used to launch an anti-racist advertising campaign. Part of the German Film Festival. GFT. Glasgow.
Dog lat Dog (15) O. (Moody Shoaibi. CK. 2001) .Mark Tonderai. Crunski. Nathan Constance. 93 mins. Four black youths in London are down on their luck. They are spurned by girlfriends. employers. drug dealers and even their families. They haven't even got a decent and funny script to work with. Times are bad for the characters and they're almost as hard for the audience. But salvation is at hand. both for the group and the movie. They are offered a gig at a local night club. Assassins. and the soundtrack to the film is the best to a British film in the last decade. No doubt. Tonderai's old job as a Radio 1 DJ helped. L'GC Renfrew Street. Glasgow.
La Dolce Vlta (l8) eeeee (Federico Fellini. Italy/France. 1960) Marcello Mastroianni. Anita Ekberg. Anouk Aimee. 173 mins. Paparazzi Mastroianni mixes with the beautiful people of rich Roman society and is ambivalently shocked and fascinated by the vigour of their excessive decadence. Everything you ever wanted from a Fellini movie — black humour. grotesque sexuality. inspired visual imagination and the wonderful Marcello. See it. Filmhouse. Edinburgh.
Down From The Mountaln (L') 0... (Nick Doob. Chris Hegedus. LS. 2001 ) 97 mins. This record of the concert
given by the musicians who recorded the soundtrack to 0 Brother. Where Art Thou 3’ features the late John Hartford as MC. Early on. backstage. he is at death's door. but on stage the wonderful music animates him into ajig. Hartford is only one of the amazing bluegrass musician assembly including fellow veteran Dr Ralph Stanley as well as younger artists such as Gillian Welch and Alison Krauss. And there are a number of songs not on the original soundtrack. GFT. Glasgow.
Dr Dollttle 2 (PG) 0.. (Steve Carr. US. 2001) Eddie Murphy. Kristen Wilson. voice of Lisa Kudrow. 87 mins. A Mafioso racoon turns up at the doc's home and demands that he visit Beaver. Godfather of the forest creatures. Beaver's problem is that two nasty humans want to ‘develop' their home. If only Dolittle can mate endangered species bear Ava (voiced by Lisa Kudrow) with circus dude bear Archie. then by law the forest will be protected. Simple. cheesy and eco-friendly. Odeon. Edinburgh; Cineworld. Falkirk.
lloge de L'amour (PG) 0000 (Jean- Luc Goddard. France. 2001) Bruno Putzulu. Cecile Camp. Jean Davy. 98 mins. Godard‘s latest film sees him once again grappling with two constraints: the progressive and the elegiac. Here Putzulu plays an artist who in the film's monochrome. celluloid first half struggles to get a project off the ground. In the colour. videoed second section. set a couple of years before. he interviews a Resistance expert and we watch how what we see may become the source of inspiration for the film Putzulu wants to make. Blending the old with the new. Godard offers a technical correlative to a story that punningly plays on the many forms resistance may take. GF'I'. Glasgow; Filmhouse. Edinburgh.
Enlgma (15) O... (Apted Michael. CK. 2001) Dougray Scott. Kate Winslet. Saffron Burrows. 117 mins. Tom Jericho (Scott). a crack WWII codebreaker. is called back from premature retirement to break the Nazis' new cypher. On his return. he discovers that Claire (Burrows). the woman who broke his bean. has gone missing and. with the aid of her housemate (Winslet). begins to discover that she was not entirely what she seemed. Apted's screen adaptation of Robert Harris's best-selling novel is. rarely enough. both relatively faithful and rather good. though scriptwriter Tom Stoppard increases the love interest and fiddles the plot a little. but the mixture of cynicism and heroism that characterised Harris's characters is undiluted in the film. Selected release.
Ferry Up The Amazon (PG) (Alex McCall. L'K. 2001 ) 90 mins. Documentary about the Reverend Willie McPherson and his scheme to buy a small ex-RN ferry. sail it from Scotland to South America and thence up the Amazon to hand it over as a source of income to the street children of Peru. L'GC Renfrew Street. Glasgow; Filmhouse. Edinburgh.
Flddler On The Roof (L') 0... (Norman Jewison. L'S. 1971) Chaim Topol. Norman Crane. Paul Michael Glaser. 181 mins. Based on Sholom Aleichem's play. Fiddler is the story of Tevye. a Jewish milkman living in pre- Revolutionary Russia. Unlike the majority of musicals. where fixed smiles and colourful dance routines are de rigour. this is a much more sombre affair. set in poverty but filled with dry humour. Tevye's marriage plans for his daughters and their rebellion against the all-pervasive ‘traditions' form the core of the film. Jewison's direction is slick and his pacing even. but it is Topol as chye who carries the film with a role he seems to have been born for. Grosvenor. Glasgow.
The 51 It State ( l8) 0.. (Ronny Yu. L'S/L'K/Canada. 2001) Samuel L. Jackson. Robert Carlyle. Emily Mortimer. 92 mins. There's much about this comedy thriller that'sjust plain daft: Jackson's California drug dealer donning a kilt for his visit to rainy Liverpool. Carlyle's scousc thug more concerned with the Liverpool~ Manchester footy match than minding Jackson. Carlyle's ex (Mortimer) going