The Deer Hunter R/I (18)
The Deer Hunter R/I (18)
Dir: Michael Cimino
With: Robert De Niro, Meryl Streep
Runtime: 176 minutes
MICHAEL Cimino's 1979 masterpiece is given a timely reissue by Glasgow's Park Circus. As we follow the three steelworker pals (Robert De Niro, Christopher Walken, John Savage) from a wedding to Vietnam and back again, while Meryl Streep's character waits at home, the tragedy of that conflict, and too many others, is laid bare. Magnificent.
Filmhouse, Edinburgh, August 1-7; Glasgow Film Theatre, August 3-5.
Guardians of the Galaxy (12A)
Dir: James Gunn
With: Chris Pratt, Zoe Saldana, Dave Bautista
Runtime: 121mins
WHO could have predicted that a talking tree, a bad attitude raccoon and a mix-tape obsessed anti-hero would combine to create the coolest film of the summer? Guardians of the Galaxy may be yet another film in the endless line of superhero movies by Marvel but it's also the riskiest and, by extension, the freshest. It focuses on a rag-tag bunch of no-hopers, led by the human Peter Quill (Chris Pratt) and including Rocket the badass raccoon (voiced by Bradley Cooper) and Groot the tree (Vin Diesel, wooden but loving it), as they unwittingly become the galaxy's protectors from an explosive orb being sought by everyone. James Gunn's film, derived from a comic that first appeared in 1969, is certainly wacky but it intelligently subverts expectation and balances the emotional stuff with the fun.
Just occasionally, it gets a bit carried away but the overall experience is like watching Star Wars for the first time all over again.
Reviewed by Rob Carnevale
Mood Indigo (12A)
Dir: Michel Gondry
With: Romain Duris, Audrey Tautou
Runtime: 94 minutes
FRENCH director Michel Gondry (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind) was made to adapt Boris Vian's fantastical novel Froth on the Daydream. Whether the resulting 94 minutes is for you rather depends on your tolerance for whimsy combined with melancholia. Audrey Tautou and Romain Duris play Colin and Chloe, a cute couple who meet in Paris and fall in love. Their world bursts with all the delights the Gondry imagination can conjure, but then horrid old fate intervenes. Stunning imagery in parts, but the tweeness becomes tiresome very quickly.
Glasgow Film Theatre, August 1-14; Filmhouse, Edinburgh, August 15-21
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