NEW PRINT/CLASSIC CASABLANCA (U) 102min 0.0”
Michael Curtiz's superb 1942 classic re-emerges from the evergreen bush in a sparkling new print (both celluloid and digital depending where you see it). Nothing much has changed -— it's war time in Algeria and cynical nightclub owner Rick (Humphrey Bogart) is still dealing with feelings of isolationism and self dependence until old love llsa (Ingrid Bergman) turns up with her saintly resistance fighter husband Victor Laszlo (Paul Henreid). There are Nazis and corrupt collaborators everywhere. especially the deeply unreliable Captain Renault (the brilliant Claude Rains) but Algeria is a neutral country. a trading point where European asylum seekers can buy travel permits so they can flee to the safer zones of the US and beyond.
Casablanca is a great movie — witty. funny. moving and compulsiver entertaining. If you haven't seen it for a while it's freshness. modernity and odd relevance may surprise you. If you have never seen Casablanca. then this is your moment. Book now. (Paul Dale) I F/lmhouse. Edinburgh from Fri 76- Thu 22 Feb only.
COMEDY/SPOOF HOT FUZZ (15) 120min 000
It is slightly depressing that the highest grossing British films of last year and this were. and will be, television spin- offs. Last year Sacha Baron Cohen delivered up the better-than—we— probably-deserve feature film Borat. and now comedian Simon Pegg and writer—director Edgar Wright attempt to cash in. for the second time. on the cult following for their TV series Spaced with Hot Fuzz. It seems the small screen has finally annexed the big one.
To be fair Hot Fuzz is not really a Spin-off. for that would mean serious hot—housing of half decent ideas originated from a sketch or sitcom show. No, Hot Fu// is a culmination of many alternatively juvenile, inventive and amusing ideas touched on in Spaced and then built on in the superior zombie parody Shaun of the Dead.
The plot. for what it's worth. concerns unirnpeachable London copper Nicholas Angel (Pegg). whose record is so clean he's making everyone else at the Met look bad. His superiors move him to a rural beat where he is given short shrift by Inspector Butterman (Jim Broadbent). and DS' Andy Wainwright (Paddy Considine) and Andy Cartwright (Rafe Spall). Only impressionable young PC Danny (Nick Frost) is impressed by the
HISTRY/THRILLE-R THE GOOD SHEPHERD (15) 166min 0000
In 1977 a US Privacy Study Commission surmised that the real danger of the Central Intelligence Agency is ‘the gradual erosion of individual liberties through automation, integration, and interconnection of many small, separate record-keeping systems, each of which alone may seem innocuous, even benevolent, and wholly justifiable.’ By this point the CIA and the unnamed secret cabals that preceded had been practicing the dark arts of counter intelligence and disinformation for almost half a century and the issue of infringement of homeland liberty had ceased to be an issue for them.
The true story of the CIA (or as true as can be ascertained) is a fascinating and deeply worrying one and here actor/director Robert De Niro and screenwriter Eric Roth (Munich, The Insider) attempt to tell it through the prism of one of its most powerful operatives — Edward Wilson (based on James Angleton, the head of counterintelligence at the CIA from 1954 to 1974). It’s a long but fascinating journey into the heart of white bread paranoia, fraternity house allegiances, private grief, patriotism and the bewildering self-importance of the chess game that is espionage.
De Niro and Roth keep things low key, steady and very adult, this is cinema that plays an impressive and unpatronising long game, reminiscent in parts of Alan J Pakula’s All The President’s Men, Sidney Lumet’s Prince of the City or Coppola’s The Godfather series (Coppola exec produced this film). Considering that this is only De Niro’s second film in the big chair The Good Shepherd is a model of restraint and good storytelling. Shifting back and forth in time from the Cuban Missile Crisis to WWII and so on, the true horror of the CIA’s WASPy stronghold on modern America begins to unfold, you are left in no doubt that the road to hell is indeed paved with emotional disorder and fear.
Despite looking too young to play the older Wilson, Matt Damon does an exceptional job in a role that is defined by evasion and silence. While Angelina Jolie, Billy Crudup, William Hurt and Michael Gambon among others fill out a near faultless cast. On this evidence De Niro may soon be surpassing his old friend Martin Scorsese as a filmmaker, for this certainly has the reach and scope that the master’s last few features have so sorely lacked. Recommended. (Paul Dale)
I General release from Fri 23 Feb. Also at Cinewor/d, Renfrew Street, Glasgow on Mon 79 and Tue 20 Feb as part of Glasgow Film Festival.
The Rock and Bad Boys II), Katherine Bigelow (particularly Blue Steel and Point Break) and a load of other mainstream perpetrators of the US buddy policier? Or a tired retread of the hidden suburban/rural peril genre all too recently revisited in the TV series Suburban Shootout and Desperate Housewives? Well, both really. Hot Fuzz is likeable, energetic and inventive in parts but ludicrously f overlong. Also. Wright as director has none of the control over tone he exhibited in Shaun (he is an avowedly huge fan of Zombie films). Hey whatever! This will be a huge hit, but do yourself a favour and also watch Cannon and Ball's 1982 comic opus Boys in Blue or Will Hay's 1938 comic gem Ask a Policeman. Or read some
officious bobby. But there are dark secrets hiding in them hedgerows and Angel may just be the right man in the Nabokov, for as the great man pointed wrong place at the wrong time. '
out: ‘Satire is a lesson, parody is a So what have we really got here? Is '
game'. (Paul Dale) it just a silly parody of the complete oeuvres of Michael Bay (particularly
I General release from Fri 7 6 Feb.
' See Answer Machine, page 7 72.
Film
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Hewitt plays Alice. a nurse who sets out to test the fidelity of her husband (Jimi Mistry) after receiving a reckless love—note from love-cheat Archie Gray (Scott). With no less than six workshy screenwriters failing to pull in a decent shift, Hay is forced to fall back on such dubious attractions as jokes about radishes and a late cameo from Neighbours’ Stefan Dennis. A damp squib of a romcom. (Eddie Harrison) Odeon, Edinburgh from Fri 76 Feb Because I Said So (12A) 102min O Daphne Wilder (Diane Keaton) is the proud, overbearing mother of three daughters: psychologist Maggie (Lauren Graham), sexy and irreverent Mae (Piper Perabo) and lovely, insecure Milly (Mandy Moore). Milly doesn't have much luck with men. so Daphne decides to set her up with the perfect man. Wackiness and confusion ensue. Absolutely abysmal, unfunny family comedy directed by Michael Heathers Lehmann. Where did it all go wrong Michael? (Paul Dale) General release from Fri 76 Feb. School for Scoundrels (12A) 101 min 0 Shoddy. incoherent and laugh-free remake of Robert Hamer's entertaining 1960 caddish comedy of one upmanship and manners. Set in modern day New York this version follows the unsurprising adventures of kind hearted but awkward Roger (Jon Heder from Napoleon Dynamite) as he immerses himself in a secret class to help weak men become Alpha Males run by the mendacious Dr P (Billy Bob Thornton). When Roger becomes Dr P's star pupil things become competitive between the two men. especially when love interest Amanda (Jacinda Barrett) enters the frame. Todd Phillips the man who gave us Road Trip, Old School and Starsky and Hutch writes and directs with all the subtlety of a cluster bomber. (Paul Dale) General release from Fri 23 Feb.
15 Feb—l Mar 2007 THE LIST 43