nigelgatherer

I didn't known the director Ry Russo-Young before watching "Before I Fell" (2017) recently, and I was very impressed. Like that film, "The Sun is Also a Star" is crafted extremely well, and it had me hooked early on. Russo-Young seems to be able to get the best from her lead actors, and manages to lay the story out with perfect pace. Yara Shahidi was a revelation to me, occupying her character fully, and just glowing in every scene. Charles Melton was just right in his role as well, in my opinion. The success of the movie, however, is its whole, from the cinematography, editing, acting, presence, and not least the wonderfully fitting score by Herdis Stefansdottir.

I can see that there are a few people who don't share my enthusiasm for "The Sun is Also a Star" which is a shame. Sure there are lots of coincidences, but we the audience REALLY want Tash and Daniel to get together! We're all different, and like different things, but if like me you can admire a simple love story told well, this one might be for you.

I enjoyed this film many, many times more than I expected to. For some reason, I didn't rate a movie with Goldie Hawn in it very highly, but she was one of the highlights; she was perfect as the aging rock chick looking up her groupie best friend from back in the day, and Susan Sarandon played well off her co-star. To me, the whole thing was well written, well acted, and well directed, and it gave me a good feeling. Incidentally, there were times near the start of the film when I thought that I was looking at (Hawn's daughter, actress) Kate Hudson, and that Goldie would appear later as a mother character - wow, they look so alike at times!

Oh, what a joy. The ever brilliant Lesley Manville shines in this wonderful film set in 1950s London and Paris. She's a hard working cleaner and seamstress with a heart of gold, and has a dream to buy a Christian Dior gown. The real story starts when she arrives in Paris and touches the lives of several people during her few days there. Far-fetched? Sure, but no more than most movies, and the beauty is in the journey, not the destination. Manville is supported well by the rest of the cast, especially, in my opinion, by Isabelle Huppert playing a harassed Dior employee committed to the idea of exclusivity, who looks without glee at ordinary Mrs Harris. I loved Mrs Harris Goes to Paris: its costumes, its music, its locations, its elegance. Merveilleux!

This film tells one of thousands - hundreds of thousands - of stories of injustices in 20th century America. A country with such a rich and fascinating mix of ethnicities, but such a deplorable record of dealing with it. The film is "based on a true story" - and a real person - but I imagine most of it is fiction. That's alright: it's a movie, after all, but the scenes portrayed really happened on a daily basis to many, many African Americans. Anybody who thought that San Francisco might be more enlightened on race issues than, say, the Deep South would do well to watch I'm Charlie Walker.

I enjoyed watching the film. Unlike another reviewer, I thought the acting was good, and the story unfolded well. Mike Colter was a good Charlie Walker and at the end, where we caught a short clip of the real Charlie, underlined why he was a good choice.

During the first five minutes I thought it was going to be a bad Alan Partridge/Shameless-type comedy. I was completely wrong, and it's not even a comedy at all. As time progresses the film gets better and better, and by the end I knew I'd watched something a bit special. The two leads are excellent, and there are some really good cameos. I would thoroughly recommend it.

At the time of writing, this movie is 45 years old, and the music, writing, characters and costumes are, naturally, very much of that period. However, one day someone will write something new which owes a lot to this style of film-making; they'll lovingly recreate the fashions, revive the music, expand it to a miniseries. I don't know, but I do know I enjoyed Between the Lines, and I'd love to see more of the same.

Low-budget yes, but I was interested in the story and its conclusion. I felt the direction was good, and the actors did their jobs well. There is a plot twist half way through, but really the film is half whodunnit, half straightforward thriller.

When i was a boy (many years ago) I used to go to the cinema every Saturday morning. We had old crackly serials, cartoons and a feature which would often be a bunch of kids getting into some adventure or another. We'd cheer the goodies and boo the baddies, and it was great fun. This film Twist was a bit like these old films, not to be taken seriously and certainly not to be seen at awards ceremonies. I can understand the bad reviews and low scores for Twist, BUT IT'S FOR KIDS! Think of it as an old fashioned children's movie and the scores might not be so mean.

This could be described as a slice of life. Nothing earth-shattering happens and some plot threads are not concluded. One example: a brilliant actor appears in the first ten minutes, and I kept expecting to see her character pop up again later in the film (she doesn't). You are left with questions after the film has finished.

None of that matters, because Mike Leigh and his cast have crafted a beautiful film that could serve as a lesson to any budding filmmakers. There are individual shots which are stunning (one of the allotment scenes in particular), but the overall quality of the film from start to finish could leave nobody unsatisfied.

As always in this director's films, the cast is first class. Jim Broadbent and Ruth Sheen at the centre hold everything together, but if there were a standout performance, in my opinion it would be Lesley Manville as Mary. She inhabits the character from the word go, and we see her developing over the next two hours into someone we've known for years.

Another Year is good example of why Mike Leigh is held in such high regard by so many people.

I was enthralled by the Tom Hardy movie Locke (2013) and fascinated how they pulled off a whole film with a single actor on screen. When I saw that The Landline Detective had a similar premise, I thought I'd give it a look, and I'm glad I did. There is nothing flashy about the film - no special effects, no big stars. It's a low budget production with all its strength in its idea: an ordinary man stumbles upon something related to the murder of his sister-in-law 30 years ago and, armed only with his landline telephone, sets out to investigate further. There is humour, tension and a plot twist, and yes, it keeps your interest till the end. Sure, you could find faults with the film, but giving it a chance might pay dividends. Just as a huge budget doesn't guarantee a good film, a small budget doesn't preclude it.

I enjoyed 23 Walks, perhaps because I'm now of the age of the lead characters who discover love against the odds. I became an admirer of Dave Johns in I, Daniel Blake, and in this film, in my opinion, he comes up trumps again, playing everyman to perfection. This is a slice of the lives of two ordinary people, dealing with ordinary situations in a natural, human way. I for one am glad that such films are being made.