Snatched (15)
Three stars
Dir: Jonathan Levine
With: Amy Schumer, Goldie Hawn
Runtime: 90 minutes
ON its release in the US, this tale of a mother and daughter being kidnapped in South America took the usual pasting reserved for any comedy that dares to have women in the lead (in this case Goldie Hawn, Amy Schumer), or be written by a woman (Katie Dippold, Parks and Recreation). Pay no heed. Certainly, you are more likely to smirk than laugh out loud with Jonathan Levine’s road trip movie, and the film’s occasional need to fall in with the current trend for gross-out comedy, to out-lad the lads, is disappointing. But come on – Schumer has genuinely funny bones, and who doesn’t like Goldie Hawn in anything?
Machines (12A)
Three stars
Dir: Rahul Jain
Runtime: 71 minutes
THOUGH filmed in Gujarat, India, in the present day, Rahul Jain’s slow-burn but fascinating documentary calls to mind the Victorian London of Dickens. The workers, young and old, in the garment dyeing factory make beautiful things, in sharp contrast to the conditions in which they work. Jain has an eye for finding the glorious image amid the grind, sweat and steam, but this is balanced with interviews with workers and management about the reality of work there. Many of the toilers are farmers forced to move to the cities after their crops failed. “Nobody does anything to help us,” says one. The poor are always with us indeed.
GFT, May 19-21; Filmhouse, Edinburgh, June 2-8
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