The Duke Of Burgundy (2014)
★★★★☆
Evoking Lynch, Polanski and Buñuel, The Duke of Burgundy is a boldly unique film from an exciting British filmmaker; it’s quite mad, quite funny, and quite brilliant.
2014
Kumiko, The Treasure Hunter (2014)
★★★★☆
With a delicate, mesmerising performance from Rinko Kikuchi, Kumiko, The Treasure Hunter is a darkly comic tale of misadventure – tragic, odd and uplifting.
Maidan (2014)
★★☆☆☆
Uncompromising in its running time, Sergei Loznitsa’s sedate shooting style renders this potentially remarkable account of civil unrest quite the opposite.
Festival Review: Stories Of Our Lives (2014)
★★★☆☆
A beautifully monochromatic look at LGBT life in Kenya, the NEST Collective’s Stories Of Our Lives is an important history of fear.
Greenery Will Bloom Again / Torneranno i prati (2014)
★★★★☆
A stunning portrait of life in the trenches during the Great War, Ermanno Olmi’s Torneranno i prati is a handsome tribute to loneliness and fear.
Love Is Strange (2014)
★★★★★
A poignant New York story of love in a dark time, Ira Sachs’ Love Is Strange makes for a fine romance of the most human kind.
Snow In Paradise (2014)
★★★☆☆
Drugs and violent crime trigger a surprising religious conversion for a small-time gangster in London’s East End, in a story that reflects a changing urban society.
Festival Review: Gone With The Bullets (2014)
★☆☆☆☆
A carnival of singing, dancing, car chases and bullets, Wen Jiang’s Gone With The Bullets gets lost in an amorphous hall of mirrors.
Selma (2014)
★★★☆☆
A powerful dramatisation of Martin Luther King’s final battle, Ava DuVernay’s Selma is a moving account of the march on racism and the man behind the movement.
Amour Fou (2014)
★★☆☆☆
A sober portrait of the woman accompanying Heinrich von Kleist into the hereafter, Jessica Hausner’s Amour Fou isn’t quite as mad as it should be.
Son Of A Gun (2014)
★★★☆☆
Action-packed with prison getaways, bullion heists and criminal double-crossing, Son Of A Gun delivers a high-octane thriller. Just cut the monkey business.
Testament Of Youth (2014)
★★★★☆
A beautiful adaptation of Vera Brittain’s bestselling memoir, James Kent’s Testament Of Youth is a bitter tale of love in wartime for the 21st century.
Wild (2014)
★★★★☆
With a brilliant one-hander from Reese Witherspoon as Cheryl Strayed trekking the PCT, Jean-Marc Vallée’s Wild makes for rehydrated but beautiful soul food.
Whiplash (2014)
★★★★★
Ferocious, electric and unrelenting, Simmons and Teller never miss a beat in Damien Chazelle’s phenomenal second feature Whiplash.