NOCTURNAL ANIMALS ****
Dir: Tom Ford (15, 115 mins)
A superb meta-thriller that keeps you both guessing and invested in two separate narratives throughout, Tom Ford’s follow up to the handsome if thin A Single Man is a much meatier affair. Based on Austin Wright’s novel Tony and Susan, the film adaptation written by Ford has Amy Adams as a successful gallery owner, specialising in shocking artworks, her money comes from successful businessman husband Armie Hammer. Her world is shattered however when she receives a manuscript of a novel from her first husband, played by Jake Gyllenhaal whose heart she broke when she both left him and criticised his writing talents. Something darker lurks in their past though. She starts to read the novel, which we also see being played out, a Texan noir with a family man, Gyllenhaal again she imagines being terrorised by rednecks led by Aaron Taylor Johnson and aided by a Sheriff played by the ever great Michael Shannon. The novel is a weapon of revenge, it is dark and horrifying and pointedly aimed at Adams. Gyllenhaal’s vengeance on his ‘nocturnal animal’ is full of rage and causes Adams to rethink her past. Ford keeps both narratives equally engaging, Adams is excellent as are the rest of the cast and the meta-plot grips as it maliciously twists and turns. A thriller for grownups.
Opens Nov 4
FANTASTIC BEASTS AND WHERE TO FIND THEM ****
Dir: David Yates (12A, 130 mins)
70 years before Harry Potter there was… Newt Scamander! Yes, the Potterverse is plumbed once more in this new apparent trilogy written for the screen by J.K. Rowling herself, and based on the scantest of texts created for 2001’s Comic Relief. Eddie Redmayne, still doing that coy look thing, plays Scamander, a wizard who travels the world collecting creatures and putting them in his Tardis-like magical case. He finds himself abroad in New York and after new friend Jacob (Dan Fogle) accidentally sets a plethora of magical beasts loose. Wizards and witches in America don’t really mix with Nomags, or Muggles as we call them, humans are after all the most dangerous creatures on the planet and the creatures have to be recaptured before a war between humans and the magical world begins. Aiding Newt is sassy Katherine Waterston, getting in his way are baddies Colin Farrell and Samantha Morton. Director of four of the last Potter films David Yates makes sure that this will be another wand wave of trademark magic with a whole new raft of characters and creatures to enjoy. The world of Harry Potter continues to enchant, but freed of its source material and having to slavishly adhere to established books, this could offer a larger cinematic wizarding universe.
Opens Nov 17
THE LIGHT BETWEEN OCEANS ***
Dir: Derek Cianfrance (12A, 133 mins)
Adapted from M.L. Stedman’s novel, Blue Valentine director Derek Cianfrance returns with another sombre examination of relationships and parenthood. Michael Fassbender plays a WW1 veteran desperate for solitude, taking a job as a lighthouse keeper on the beautiful, lonely island of Janus. Going along with him is Alicia Vikander who, intrigued by Fassbender, has married to him so she can accompany him to the lighthouse. Once there they struggle to have a child but to no avail, until one day a baby comes ashore on a rowing boat, Moses like, with its dead father presumably alongside it. They raise the girl as their own, until a chance encounter on the mainland reveals the truth of the baby’s origins. Fassbender and Vikander’s lives and values are thrown into disarray with very dark results. Well-acted but ultimately not as absorbing as it should be and sometimes too heavy handed for its own good, this is a grim art house weepie.
Opens Nov 4
THE ACCOUNTANT ***
Dir: Gavin O’Connor (15, 128 mins)
Ben Affleck puts down the Batcape for a minute to play an autistic accountant with a sideline in death dealing in Gavin O’Connor’s competent thriller. Affleck is Christian Wolff, talented with numbers from an early age, not so good with people. He cooks the books for various high profile criminals, but the Treasury department in the shape of J.K. Simmons is closing in. So he takes a job for a legitimate firm, a robotics company and there encounters fell accountant, chirpy Anna Kendrick, who has uncovered some dodgy dealings of her own at the firm. Pretty soon they are both in danger and Afflecks’ other non maths based set of skills comes out. A classy supporting cast that features Transparent’s Jeffrey Tambor and Punisher Jon Bernthal along with a script from Bill Dubuque, who gave us Robert Downey Jnr’s underrated The Judge, should ensure this isn’t as bad as Batman vs Superman.
Out Nov 4
PATERSON ****
Dir: Jim Jarmusch (15, 113 mins)
A gentle beguiling film about ordinary life, Paterson charms and enlightens without resorting to histrionics and is Jarmusch on humanist form. Adam Driver plays Paterson, a bus driver who lives in Paterson, he also writes poems and is happily married to wife Golshifteh Farahani, another quiet artist. We follow him through his apparently banal but enchanting daily routine over the course of a week. Chatting to various people around the town, watching him write his not terrible but not earth shattering poetry, walking his bulldog Marvin. Jarmusch is presenting a slice of life, there’s little in the way of massive incident, but Driver imbues Paterson with something else, a melancholy we never truly can grip. All the characters are exceptionally good company, Driver and Farahani particularly endearing. The film will not set the world alight but it is quietly wondrous.
Opens Nov 25
ALLIED ***
Dir: Robert Zemeckis (12A, 120 mins)
In the wake of the Brangelina split, a romance starring Brad Pitt could be rather compromised despite its handsome production values and co-star Marion Cotillard. Set in 1942, Pitt plays special ops agent Max Vatan paired with Cotillard’s French resistance fighter Marianne Beausejour to assassinate a high ranking German officer. The two of them have to make a convincing couple to get close to their prey, so Pitt poses as her husband and inevitably the pair of spies fall in love. Based on fact Robert Zemeckis’ film follows the lovers as they carry out their mission and when they return to London, its aftermath proving just as dangerous. Perhaps Cotillard isn’t all she appears to be. An epic love story with predictably strong set pieces from Forest Gump and back to the Future director Zemeckis, this also has a sterling supporting cast including Lizzy Caplan as Pitt’s sibling and Jared Harris and Matthew Goode on stiff upper lip duty. No doubt this will be a handsome romance, especially with Pitt and Cotillard as the central couple, Zemeckis can certainly deal with the action and the drama, although a tabloid storm could weather its’ box office prospects.
Opens Nov 25
ARRIVAL ****
Dir: Denis Villeneuve (12A, 116 mins)
Sophisticated sci-fi after the brainless Independence Day: Resurgence, as more aliens visit the planet but with cryptic intentions in this rewarding drama from Sicario and Blade Runner 2 director Villeneuve. Amy Adams plays a professor of comparative linguistics who is drafted in by military man Forest Whitaker to help communicate with aliens after 12 giant spaceships land throughout the globe. Paired with fellow scientist Jeremy Renner, she is charged with cracking the code that will enable us to talk to the extraterrestrial visitors. The humans at times seem potentially more deadly than the aliens as the political intrigue deepens with Adams caught in the middle of it. Seemingly aloof and alone, Adams’ own personal tragedy rises to the surface as she tries to make contact with some disturbing looking creatures. Like Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Arrival makes us wonder at the other and the different, it’s eerie, tense and moving. It also posits a mostly realistic take on what would happen if aliens actually visited us. Adams and Renner leap over the occasional plot misfires and Villeneuve holds back on the special effects, so that story and character wins through, creating an intelligent, thrilling drama with ambition.
Opens Nov 11
BAD SANTA 2 ****
Dir: Mark Waters (15, 87 mins)
The worst Father Christmas ever returns for another sweary Yuletide as Billy Bob Thornton dons the red suit for more malicious mayhem that amidst the coarseness still has a heart. Coaxed by elf, Marcus, played by the caustic Tony Todd to do another job, this time robbing a charity of millions of dollars on Christmas Eve. Joining them for the fun this time are Kathy Bates as Billy Bob’s mother, from whom he obviously got most of his misanthropy and Brett Kelly returning as the grown up man child Thurman Merman. Mark Waters, director of Mean Girls takes over the helm and ensures that the lack of Christmas spirit still abounds. Christina Hendricks becomes the object of Thornton’s Santa lust and the verbal violence and literal violence between the main characters is winningly repellent. Many ho-ho-hos amidst the ho-ho-hos.
Opens Nov 23
AMERICAN PASTORAL **
Dir: Ewan McGregor (15, 126 mins)
Ewan McGregor makes an ambitious directorial debut in this adaptation of Philip Roth’s Pulitzer Prizewinning novel, but alas despite the best efforts of all involved, it’s somewhat of a focusless affair. McGregor also stars as Swede, a high school golden boy with an apparently perfect life. Married to Jennifer Connelly’s Dawn with daughter Dakota Fanning, who unaccountably in the late 1960s becomes embroiled in a terrorist group and blows up a post office. The fall out for the family is huge. Unfortunately, the film itself is a touch on the dull side. Roth’s work is hard to translate to the screen and despite his best efforts McGregor has to rely on clichés amidst interesting if brief moments as the plot meanders along with his accent. The scope of the novel and all its many philosophical musings do not lend themselves well to the screen leaving American Pastoral a somewhat empty, frustrating two hours.
Opens Nov 11
A UNITED KINGDOM ****
Dir: Amma Assante (12A, 111 mins
Based on a true story, A United Kingdom tells earnestly and powerfully a tale of shameful imperialism from our collective past. David Oyelowo plays Seretse Khama, who in 1947 London is studying law despite being Prince of Bechuanaland, today’s Botswana. He falls passionately in love with Rosamunde Pike’s Ruth Williams, an awkward typist, and they return to his homeland much to the chagrin of his country, suspicious of this white woman to rule over them. The UK government is also none too pleased, afraid that such a pairing will endanger their colonial interests in South Africa and do all they can to thwart it, via the smug machinations of Jack Davenport and Tom Felton. Kept apart, Pike in Africa, Oyelowo in London, to stop South Africa crying foul, the pair have to overcome tremendous political obstacles in the cause of love. The central pairing are superb, Assante’s direction sure and pointed and the story told is gripping, shameful and romantic. Love it seems can eventually change the world.
Opens Nov 25
ALSO RELEASED NOVEMBER 2016
A STREETCAR NAMED BOB (12A) Based on fact, this has a cat helping save the life of a drug addict and busker played by Luke Treadaway. Uplifting. Unless you’re a dog person.
RUPTURE (15) Very unpleasant tale of a single mother, Noomi Rapace, kidnapped by a cult who proceed to torture her and play on her deepest fears, like being tied down as spiders and snakes crawling and slithering over you. Bit like I’m a Celebrity…
100 STREETS (15) Three stories, three dramas played out within 100 streets in London. Idris Elba, Gemma Arterton and Welsh boy Tom Cullen star.
DOG EAT DOG (18) Nicolas Cage and Willem Defoe have a blast in this bonkers crime thriller directed by Paul Schrader, the man who wrote Taxi Driver. Funny, scary and unnerving. Cage – good crazy.
INDIGNATION (15) Another Philip Roth novel gets adapted with considerable success as Logan Lerman struggles with his sexuality in a repressed school in 1950s America.
ALMOST CHRISTMAS (12A) Heartwarming Thanksgiving set sassy slush as a family gathers together after their mother has died. Danny Glover stars.
THE EDGE OF SEVENTEEN (15) High school comedy drama as Hailee Steinfield plays a girl whose best friend starts dating her brother, with awkward results.
CREEPY (18) Slow burn Japanese serial killer horror that certainly ups the gore in its latter half. Squeamish need not apply.
THE INNOCENTS (15) Harrowing film based on true events as a Red Cross worker goes to Poland in the aftermath of WWII and stumbles upon a convent where many of the nuns have been raped and are now pregnant. How to deal with the births and babies?
words KEIRON SELF