Gilles Paquet-Brenner‘s take on Agatha Christie’s novel Crooked House with a script by Julian Fellows (Downton Abbey) and a rather wonderfully starry cast with some campy performances, and filmed on location in the stately Hughenden Manor, had all the ingredients for being a far better movie than it was. Despite all these elements it had … Continue reading
The American Academy of Motion Pictures may want to think about adding another category for the Oscars this year for best prosthetics. Following hot on the heels of Woody Harrelson’s latex face as LBJ, we now have Gary Oldman’s face totally submerged under Kazuhiro Tsuji’s masterful make up as Winston Churchill. Whatever happened to the … Continue reading
This is the work of the two Terences. The auteur filmmaker Terence Davies who’s uncompromising style has greatly restricted his output to just five features films sporadically over 23 years has put his own take on Terence Rattigan’s acclaimed post-WW2 play that hit a raw nerve when it was first staged in London in the … Continue reading
The failed marriage of John Ruskin one of England’s celebrated Art Critic was one of biggest sex scandals of the Victorian era. Although in this instance the public embarrassment was for a change actually about the lack of sex! Effie Gray his very young virgin bride took the unprecedented step of suing her husband for … Continue reading
When the French Peasants stormed the Bastille in Paris on July 14th 1789, their Queen Marie-Antoinette was holding Court elsewhere in the country at the Palace in Versailles. This rather resplendent and engaging costume drama follows the doomed Dauphine’s next three days fuelled by courtier’s gossip as all their lives start to fall apart. The … Continue reading