www.list.co.uk/film
of course contain our favourite nostalgia icon in full flow. Cameo, Edinburgh. The Return of the Idiot (E) (Sasa Gedeon, Czech Republic/Germany, 2000) Pavel Liska, Anna Geislerová, Tatiana Vilhelmová. 100min. Frantisek (Liska) returns from a period in psychiatric care and struggles to adjust to family life and relationships. Part of Czech Film Festival. Gilmorehill G12, Glasgow. The Ride (PG) ●●●●● (Jan Sverák, Czech Republic, 1994) Anna Geislerová, Radek Pastrnak, Filip Renc. 95min. Central European road movie about two young men touring around the hot south of the Czech Republic. But their holiday is disrupted when they pick up a charming hitchhiker named Ana (Geislerová) who is being followed by a jealous boyfriend. Part of Winter Festival of Central and East European Film. Filmhouse, Edinburgh. Rivals (15) ●●●●● (Jacques Maillot, France, 2008) Francois Cluzet, Guillaume Canet, Marie Denarnaud. 107min. See review, page 44. Filmhouse, Edinburgh. The Road to Guantanamo (15) ●●●●● (Michael Winterbottom, UK, 2006) Riz Ahmed, Farhad Harun, Arfan Usman. 95min. Winterbottom and writer Mat Whitecross’ depressing, worrying and defiantly one-sided film is structured around the testimonials of Asif, Shafiq and Ruhal, the so-called Tipton Three who, in 2002, found themselves early guests of the newly- appointed torture chambers of the Cuban army base. See picture, page 56. Part of Universal Declaration of Human Rights Film Series. Filmhouse, Edinburgh.
✽ Sanrizuka – Heta Village (12A) ●●●●● (Shinsuke Ogawa, Japan,
1973) 146min. Documentary set in Sanrizuka, the Japanese site of the conflict between police and anti-airport protestors, which at once chronicles epic civil disobedience, landscape and memory. Part of Illuminations festival. See preview, page 43. Filmhouse, Edinburgh. Santa vs The Snowman 3D (PG) (Various, US, 2002) 32min. IMAX big screen presentation telling the story of a lonely snowman who’s swept away by the magical wonders of Santa’s village. IMAX Theatre, Glasgow. Saw V (18) ●●●●● (David Hackl, US, 2008) Tobin Bell, Julie Benz, Costas Mandylor. 92min. Hoffman (Mandylor) carries Jigsaw’s legacy in this fifth installment of the horror franchise, but when his secret is threatened, Hoffman must go on the hunt. Cineworld Renfrew Street, Glasgow. Scar 3D (18) ●●●●● (Jed Wintrob, US, 2008) Angela Bettis, Brittney Wilson, Kirby Bliss Blanton. 90min. A psycho torturer starts killing again 16 years after his last victim thought she had stopped him in his tracks. Commendably nasty addition to the torture porn canon with the added incentive of three- dimensional technology. Odeon: Braehead, Renfrew. The Secret Life of Bees (12A) ●●●●● (Gina Prince-Bythewood, US, 2008) Dakota Fanning, Jennifer Hudson, Queen Latifah, Alicia Keys, Sophie Okonedo. 109min. See Also Released, page 46. General release from Fri 5 Dec. Secrets (E) (Alice Nellis, Czech Republic, 2007) Karel Roden, Natálie Drabiscáková, Iva Bittová. 93min. An upper-middle-class, middle-aged Czech woman suddenly faces existential disintegration. Part of Czech Film Festival. Gilmorehill G12, Glasgow. Skins (E) (Chris Eyre, US, 2002) Eric Schweig, Graham Greene, Noah Watts. 84min. Details the relationship between two Sioux Indian brothers living on the Pine Ridge Indian reservation. Edinburgh Film Guild, Edinburgh. Somers Town (12A) ●●●●● (Shane Meadows, UK, 2008) Piotr Jagiello, Thomas Turgoose, Ireneusz Czop. 77min. Originally financed by Eurostar as a short film to promote the service’s new terminus at St Pancras, Meadows’ has expanded his brief to tell a vividly drawn story of childhood friendship and to paint a vibrant portrait of a part of the big smoke that’s in all likelihood soon to gentrified out of existence. Odeon At The Quay, Glasgow. Something Like Happiness (15) (Bohden Sláma, Czech Republic/Germany,
2005) Tatiana Vihelmová, Pavel Liska, Anna Geislerová. 100min. Three childhood friends grow up in a run-down Czech industrial town together and become dangerously embroiled in each other’s lives. A gently funny and moving portrait of complex and passionate friendships. Part of Czech Film Festival. Gilmorehill G12, Glasgow. The Sorrow and The Pity Part 2 (12A) ●●●●● (Marcel Ophuls, France, 1969) 128min. Second part of Ophüls’ brilliant, probing and patient documentary that investigates the level of Nazi collaboration in a part of Vichy France in WWII. Unmissable. Edinburgh Film Guild, Edinburgh. Space Chimps (U) ●●●●● (Kirk De Micco, US, 2008) Voices of Andy Samber, Cheryl Hines, Jeff Daniels. 80min. On the whim of a sinister senator (Tucci), Ham III (Samberg) - the circus performer grandson of one of the first chimpanzees in space is sent into orbit to retrieve a missing satellite. With endless monkey and banana puns and bog- standard animation, Space Chimps is strictly for easily pleased little monkeys. Cineworld Parkhead, Glasgow; Cineworld Edinburgh, Edinburgh. Speed Racer (PG) ●●●●● (Andy Wachowski/Larry Wachowski, US, 2008) Emile Hirsch, Nicholas Elia, Susan Sarandon. 134min. A live action though CG- heavy adaptation of a 1960s Japanese television anime about a futuristic family of racecar designer-drivers who are pitted against a corporate fat cat. The film’s message is: business bad, family good, winning best of all. Not that this matters in a film with migraine-inducing race sequences and stomach-churning thrill-rides. Grosvenor, Glasgow. A Streetcar Named Desire (15) ●●●●● (Elia Kazan, US, 1951) Vivien Leigh, Marlon Brando, Kim Hunter. 125min. Brando takes the acting honours and, with this film, sets the style for method acting for years to come. Tennessee Williams’ steamy sex romp seems a little tame by today’s standards, but the realism of the drama remains intact and the performances are to be savoured. New print. Glasgow Film Theatre, Glasgow; Filmhouse, Edinburgh.
✽ Summer (15) ●●●●● (Kenny Glenaan, UK, 2008) Robert Carlyle,
Steve Evets, Rachel Blake. 82min. See review, page 45 and interview at www.list.co.uk. Glasgow Film Theatre, Glasgow. The South Bank Show - Gerhard Richter (E) (Gerald Fox, UK, 2003) Melvyn Bragg, Gerhard Richter. 53min. A profile of the influential German pop artist, in which he talks about growing up in East Germany, attending Dresden Art Academy and escaping to the west just before the Berlin Wall was built. Weston Link, Edinburgh. La Terra (The Earth) (15) (Sergio Rubini, Italy, 2006) Fabrizio Bentivoglio, Paolo Briguglia, Massimo Venturiello. 112min. In this gangster comedy, Luigi Di Santo (Bentivoglio) returns home to the Southern Italian region of Puglia and his Mafia heritage. Glasgow Film Theatre, Glasgow.
✽ Three Miles North of Molkom (15) ●●●●● (Robert Cannan/Corinna
Villari-McFarlane, UK, 2007) 114min. Humourous documentary about the No Mind festival in Sweden that attracts new-age therapy devotees who participate in fire- walking, Shamanism and tree-hugging. Part of Illuminations festival. See preview, page 43. Filmhouse, Edinburgh. Tony Takitani (U) ●●●●● (Jun Ichiwkawa, Japan, 2004) Issei Ogata, Rie Miyazawa, Shinohara Takahumi. 76min. Death, jazz and loneliness have always been constants in Tony Takitani’s life. Writer/director Ichikawa imbues his film with all the quiet reserve, short focus muted browns, and passion for the minute that he can muster. The result is as off kilter and as unforgettable as Murikami’s fiction. Ichiwkawa memorial screening. Filmhouse, Edinburgh. Transition, Transition, Transition (15) (Various) 90min. Camcorder Guerillas, Towards Transition Glasgow and the Scottish Climate Change campaign present a selection
of international short films, talks from climate campaigns and initiatives, and an open discussion. Featuring Precious Productions’ An Introduction to Transition in Scotland, Tanya Curnow’s Eat the Suburbs and an extract from The Power of Community – How Cuba survived Peak Oil. CCA, Glasgow. Transporter 3 (15) ●●●●● (Olivier Megaton, US, 2008) Jason Statham, Natalya Rudakova, François Berléand. 103min. See Also Released, page 46. General release from Fri 5 Dec. Trouble Sleeping (12A) ●●●●● (Robert Rae, UK, 2008) Hassan Naama, Alia Alzougbi, Waseem Uboaklain. 102min. The first feature film from Edinburgh Theatre Workshop chronicles Halla (Naama), who has put her life in Palestine behind her and forged a new one in Edinburgh. Things become complicated when a figure from her past reappears. Part of Universal Declaration of Human Rights Film Series. Glasgow Film Theatre, Glasgow; Filmhouse, Edinburgh. W (15) ●●●●● (Oliver Stone, US, 2008) Josh Brolin, James Cromwell, Elizabeth Banks. 129min. The American aphorism that suggests ‘any boy can grow up to be president’ is blandly dramatised in Stone’s outrageously timed and puffed-up film, the first biopic to consider the life story of a sitting US president. Brolin plays George W Bush Jr, a hard-drinking fratboy who, after flirtations with sporting goods and the oil business, somehow ends up leading his country into a war in a bid to appease his father. Selected release. WALL-E (U) ●●●●● (Andrew Stanton, US, 2008) Voices of Fred Willard, Jeff Garlin, Ben Burtt. 103min. Inspired by sci-fi classics from the 1960s and 70s, Pixar have created a post-apocalyptic story set in a future in which the Earth has been abandoned by humankind, where a solitary robot named WALL-E executes his now pointless trash collecting programme. At its heart this is a very sweet romantic comedy, and that’s what provides the emotional clout. Cineworld
Index Film
Parkhead, Glasgow; Cineworld Edinburgh, Edinburgh.
✽ Waltz with Bashir (18) ●●●●● (Ari Folman, Israel/Germany/France,
2008) Voices of Ron Ben-Yishai, Ronny Dayag, Ari Folman. 90min. This animated feature about war, selective amnesia and the hideous genocide committed by Christian militiamen on Palestinian refugee camps in Sabra and Shatila during the 1982 Lebanese War is more optimistic than it sounds. Eliciting rare and painful truths, Folman’s illustrated memoir makes for a brave, damning and riveting piece of cinema. Selected release. What Just Happened? (15) ●●●●● (Barry Levinson, US, 2008) Robert De Niro, Bruce Willis, Stanley Tucci. 102min. See Also Released, page 46. General release. White Christmas (PG) ●●●●● (Michael Curtiz, US, 1954) Bing Crosby, Danny Kaye, Rosemary Clooney, Vera-Ellen. 120min. After leaving the army following WWII Bob (Crosby) and Phil (Kaye) team up to become a top song-and-dance act. They team up with a pair of beautiful sisters (Clooney and Ellen) but when the latter travel to a Vermont lodge to perform a Christmas show, the boys follow in jealousy, only to find their former commander, General Waverly (Dean Jagger), is the lodge owner. A series of romantic mix-ups ensue as the performers try to help the General. Saccharine but totally festive musical fare for the uncynical of heart. Scotsman Screening Room, Edinburgh. Zack and Miri Make a Porno (18) ●●●●● (Kevin Smith, US, 2008) Elizabeth Banks, Seth Rogan, Craig Robinson. 101min. Rogan and Banks give ebullient performances as the auteur lovers of the title who’ve been best friends since school, but their shifts in a local café aren’t paying the bills. They’re inspired by a former classmate and a YouTube escapade to try porn with hilarious results. Great dialogue, real emotions and laugh-out-loud adult humour. General release.
Decadence, love, despair. Everyone sees something different.
Opera. It’s what you make it. La traviata Oct-Nov 2008
Get £10 tix if you’re under 26. Any seat. Any performance.
scottishoperau26.org.uk
Registered in Scotland Number SCO37531 Scottish Charity Number SCO19787 Registered Office: 39 Elmbank Crescent, Glasgow G2 4PT
27 Nov–11 Dec 2008 THE LIST 51