Film index
Throne of Blood (PG) om (Akira Kurosawa. Japan. I957) Toshiro Mifune. lsuzu Yamada. Minoru (‘hiaki 1 10min. lt‘s Shakespeare's Scottish play. Japanese-style. as samurai Mifune is spurred on by his wife and the spirits to murder his best friend and then his master. Although the barest plot and striking images remain from the original. Kurosawa‘s atmospheric settings in mist- shrouded forests give the film a brooding power. North Edinburgh A rts ('enlre. Edinburgh.
Tokyo Story (U) .0.” (Yasujiro ()zu. Japan. 1953) (‘hishu Ryu. (‘hieko Higashiyama. Setsuko Hara. Haruko Sugimura. So Yamamura. Kuniko Miyakelilderly couple Shukishi (Ryu) and Tomi (Higashiyama) leave their provincial home to visit their two married children in post-war Tokyo. Their offspring. however. are too busy with their lives to look after them properly and send them to a noisy spa resort. Realising they are a burden. mother and father return home. with only their widowed daughter-in-law Noriko (Hara) having shown them any real compassion. Then an unexpected bereavement reunites the disparate family members. ()zu‘s brilliant seminal meditation on age and the generation gap was always one of cinema‘s post war masterpieces: here in its new reissued cleaned up form it is breathtaking. If you haven‘t seen this before then miss at your peril. Part of a small Yasujiro ()zu season. (ii-7: Glasgow; Film/muse. Edinburgh.
Tooth (l7) 0 (lidouard Nammour. L'K. 2004) Yasmin Paige. Rory (‘opus. Maisie Preston. Sally Phillips. Tim [)utton. Harry Iinfield. Phyllida Law. 91min. See review. page 30. General release. Touching the Void (15) moo (Kevin Macdonald. Canada. 2003) Nicholas Aaron. Brendan Mackey. Simon Yates. Joe Simpson. 106mm. Brilliant cliff-hanging reconstruction feature documentary of the terrible events that overtook mountaineers Joe Simpson and Simon Yates when they tried to climb a Peruvian mountain in 1985. Macdonald pulls every trick out of the bag to make this as heart-churnineg scary as a real climb in blizzard conditions. it is. as they say. quite a ride. Selected release. Trilogy: One ( 15) moo (Lucas Belvaux. France/Belgium. 2003) (‘atherine Frot. Lucas Belvaux. Dominique Blane. ()rnella Muti. (iilbert Melki. Patrick Descamps. l l lmin. After nearly 15 years behind bars. revolutionary terrorist Bruno Le Roux (Belvaux) escapes. He heads straight back to his cell‘s base in (irenoble. He intends to settle some old scores. regroup his old team and hook up with his ex-lover ((‘atherine Prot). But things ain't what they used to be: most of his allies are dead and those that are still alive have settled into a life of middle-class denial. Bruno has to devise a plan but first he needs to shake the vicious cop. Manisc. (Melki) from his tail. The beginning of Belvaux's remarkable trilogy of films. whatever you believe to be the truth in this film will not be the truth you believe by the end of the
CIN
third film. Sheer brilliance. I-‘ilmhuuse. lidinlnu‘gh.
Trilogy: No (PG) 00 (Lucas Bclvaux. l-‘rance/Belgium. 2002) ()rnella Muti. Francois Morel. Valerie Mairesse. Bernard .\'laz/.inghi. Dominique Blane. (iilbert Melki. (‘atherine Prof. Lucas Belvaux. 97min. The first 'Ii‘ilugv film was a political thriller detailing the hard-bitten story of escaped left wing terrorist Bruno (Belvaux). In this film Bruno gets to take a back seat as in the foreground is the crazy hysterical relationship of (‘ecile and Alain (‘ostes (()rnella Muti and Francois Morel). Alain and ('ecile are the couple from the first film who own the log cabin. As we enter their private world we realise how had these two middle-age petits bourgeoisies are for each other. She is a hot-blooded Italian. and he is a mixed-up hyixwhondriac. What unravels is a wholly unnecessary but hilariotis farce where the incompatibility of the way both these characters communicate embroils them both (but Alain mostly) in a web of madness. slapstick and deceit. Film/muse. Edinburgh.
Trilogy: Three ( IS) oooo (Lucas Belvaux. France/Belgium. 2002) Dominique Blane. (iilbert Melki. ()rnella Muti. (‘atherine lirot. Francois Morel. Lucas Belvaux. 123mm. The conclusion of Belvaux's remarkable li‘ilngy foctises on the intimate drama between policeman Pascal (Melki) and his morphine addicted wife Agnes (Blane). We have. of course. spent a little bit of time with these two before. Pascal is and was the vindictive copper on the trail of Bruno (Belvaux) in the first li'llugy film. and Agnes was and is the woman who offers Bruno protection in the
EMA
5th Jim Poole Short Film Award
Call for Entries
Entries now being accepted of Scottish Short Films. Closing date for submissions Friday 12th March 2004. For an entry form or further information
contact Diane Henderson dianeWcameocinema.'co.ul< or 0l3l 228 931 l
www.picturehouses.co.uk
40 THE LIST 5—19 Feb 2004
Terence Stamp keeps house in Disney’s The Haunted Mansion
chalet of her neurotic friend (‘ecile (Muti). This time we focus on the heart breaking reality of a wife who has forced her legally bound husband to forage around the back door of drug dealers for most of their married life. Powerful endgame to a fascinating cinematic experiment. I’ilnilmuse. Edinburgh.
Winkle ( l 2) (Joji Matsuoka. Japan. l992) A tale of mismatched marriage and menage
ii trois from Japanese director Joji Matsuoka.
Part of a season of (‘ontemporary Japanese Films. (ii/ntnrehillU/Z Glasgow.
The Virgin Spring (18) oooo (Ingmar Bergman. Sweden. 1959) Max \"on Sydow. Birgitta Valberg. (iunnel Lindblom. 88min. As in The Seventh Sea! a couple of years earlier. Bergman conjures tip a brooding and cruel medieval landscape within which to situate a heavily symbolic morality play. Here. a young virgin is raped and murdered after her elder sister summons up a pagan curse. but when Von Sydow avenges her death by dispatching the swineherds who commited the original atrocity a spring spouts up from the ground on the spot where she died. Edinburgh I’ilm (iuild. lidinhtujeh.
The Wicker Man ( 18) ooooo (Robin Hardy. L'K. 1973) Edward Woodward. Britt likland. Diane (‘ilento. Ingrid Pitt. Christopher Lee. 102mm. A devoutly celibate policeman (Woodward) arrives at a remote Scottish island to investigate a schoolgirl disappearance and becomes involved in local pagan rituals. A Hammer classic. with some extremely scary and erotic moments. Part of 5/50. five of the best Scottish films ever made. 01"]: Glasgow; Film/muse. Edinburgh.
The Year of the Quiet Sun (the) O... (Krzysztof XanUssi. Poland/W (iermany/L‘S. I984) Maja Komorowska. Scott Wilson. Hanna Skarzanka. liwa [)alkowska. V'adim (ilowna. 107mm. ZanUssi is often cited as one of the most influential post-war filmmakers by his Polish contemporaries. but try finding any of his moviesand you will be f'mstrated. This was one of the few that got a decent theatrical release in the West. mainly because one of the lead characters is an American (il. Worth checking out. for these reasons alone. This simple love story between a Polish refugee from the liast and an American soldier is set just after World War ll in a village near the newly drawn border between (iermany and Poland. As powerful and as uplifting as '/,anussi's earlier The ('unlruet. Iz'rlinluu'gli l'ilm Gui/(l. Ifrlinhtu‘gh. Young Adam ( 18) oooo (David Mackenzie. UK. 2003) liwan Mc(iregor. limin Mortimer. Tilda Swinton. Peter Mullan. 93min. Mackenzie remains loyal to the dark. existentialist spirit of Alexander 'l‘roechi’s 1954 novel about Joe. a nihilistic drifter who seems only to find connection with the world through sleazy sexual encounters. Shot in seedy green and grey hues. the film opens on the (‘lyde where Joe (McGregor) is working on a barge owned by lilla (Swinton) and her hUsband l.es (Mullan). The men are in the process of dragging a corpse of a young woman from the water. an act done with particular care by Joe. thus hinting at his complicity in her demise. A flawless and coherent adaptation of a dark and disturbing tale and a work of haunting beauty. Part of 5/50. five of the best Scottish films ever made. (il’l: (ilusgmv; I-ilmhnuse. Iz'tlinhurgh.