Reviews by Angus Wolfe Murray

Order by: Date, A–Z

• 
  Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle (2003)

  Review preview for Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle

  As a visual piece of pop video-influenced whambammery, it is perfectly pitched.

  Sequel with Cameron Diaz, Drew Barrymore and Lucy Liu making mincemeat of bad guys.
• 
  Chicken Run (2000)

  Review preview for Chicken Run

  The beauty of Chicken Run is its refusal to accept modernity as having squatting rights in a Yorkshire state of mind. Park's heart is with the comics his dad read.

  Plucky chicken caper sees farm birds bid for freedom.
• 
  The Children Act (2017)

  Review preview for The Children Act

  Intelligent, disciplined, elegant and closely guarded in matters of privacy

  A high court lady judge has an agonising decision to make when a teenage boy refuses a life saving transfusion while at home her marriage is freezing over
• 
  Children Of Men (2006)

  Review preview for Children Of Men

  This is a film that takes no prisoners. It will live long in the memory.

  Conspiracy surrounds the birth of a child in an infertile post-apocalyptic world.
• 
  Chocolat (2000)

  Review preview for Chocolat

  The character is more sentimental, than exacting.

  Fairy story about a woman who provides a breath of fresh air to a small French town.
• 
  Chopper (2000)

  Review preview for Chopper

  As a portrait of a psycho, this is dangerously close to the bone.

  The autobiographical story of criminal Mark "Chopper" Read.
• 
  The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (2005)

  Review preview for The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe

  What is so clever about this adaptation of C S Lewis's classic children's book is the avoidance of Disneyfication, despite being a Disney film, and the refusal to overload with CGI effects.

  In a magic kingdom beyond the wardrobe four children, with a lion's army, do battle with a white witch.
• 
  La Ciénaga (2000)

  Review preview for La Ciénaga

  Lucrecia Martel's debut as writer/director captures the many layered character of the Argentinian upper-class so perfectly that explanatory scenes would appear bourgeois in their desire to tidy the place up a bit.

  A long hot summer on Argentinian estate for dysfunctional extended family.
• 
  City By The Sea (2002)

  Review preview for City By The Sea

  The thriller element is compromised by pot noodle psychology.

  Robert De Niro plays a Long Island cop investigating a murder in which his son is prime suspect.
• 
  City Of God (2002)

  Review preview for City Of God

  A living portrait of youth rage and criminality within an anarchic structure, where law is the enemy and corruption the currency. God doesn't live here; neither does hope.

  A gritty look at gang life in Rio De Janeiro.
• 
  The City Of Lost Children (1995)

  Review preview for The City Of Lost Children

  This is a work of originality without precedent, unique and unsafe.

  A fairground strongman searches for his brother in a grotesque world of artificial intelligence.
• 
  A Civil Action (1998)

  Review preview for A Civil Action

  The film is refreshingly cynical about a profession that, in cinematic terms, expects every lead actor to be Clarence Darrow.

  Courtroom drama about poisoned water.
• 
  Clerks (1994)

  Review preview for Clerks

  Viva slack!

  A day in the life of hysterically negative gutter-waged slackers in the debris district of New Jersey.
• 
  Climates (2006)

  Review preview for Climates

  The film is like a shout, dying in the throat, with the sound turned down, so that everything is expressed through the eyes and nothing is resolved, nor talked through, like it would be in a Bergman movie.

  Study of an emotional crisis within a fractured relationship in Istanbul.
• 
  A Clockwork Orange (1971)

  Review preview for A Clockwork Orange

  Does it survive the passage of time? Yes and no.

  Long-banned film about a future distopia.
• 
  Coach Carter (2005)

  Review preview for Coach Carter

  This could have been so preachy and political, but the performances from the young cast are excellent and Jackson has such natural authority he carries the audience with him.

  Authoritarian basketball coach is hired to pull a run down Californian high school team together.
• 
  Cockles And Muscles (2005)

  Review preview for Cockles And Muscles

  The film is oversexed and, like too much self-abuse, this affects its ability to see straight (no pun intended).

  Seaside family sex romp with gay/straight permutations.
• 
  A Cock And Bull Story (2005)

  Review preview for A Cock And Bull Story

  Essentially, however, it is Coogan's bluff.

  The difficulty of being Steve Coogan playing Tristram Shandy in a film directed by Jeremy Northam.
• 
  Collateral (2004)

  Review preview for Collateral

  Even the ending, which otherwise would be dismissed as inconclusive, feels valid and true, emphasising yet again the magic that is Mann.

  Hitman hires a taxi driver in L.A to drive him to his human targets.
• 
  Collateral Beauty (2016)

  Review preview for Collateral Beauty

  Is this a film about loss and how (not) to cope with it?

  Retreating from life after tragedy, a man questions the universe by writing to Love, Time and Death.
• 
  The Colour Of Lies (1998)

  Review preview for The Colour Of Lies

  Claude Chabrol's formula remains intact. And unchanging.

  A young girl is murdered in Breton fishing village after leaving the house of depressive artist.
• 
  The Commitments (1991)

  Review preview for The Commitments

  16-year-old Andrew Strong has a voice that blows your socks off

  The trials and tribulations of a budding working-class Dublin soul band.
• 
  The Commuter (2018)

  Review preview for The Commuter

  Intrigue peels away to reveal darker, deeper layers of complexity and corruption. The plot explodes.

  A man finds himself racing against time on a commuter train.
• 
  Confessions Of A Dangerous Mind (2002)

  Review preview for Confessions Of A Dangerous Mind

  This is Clooney's debut as a director and he does a terrific job.

  A game show host becomes a CIA hitman in his spare time.
• 
  Constantine (2005)

  Review preview for Constantine

  The film is a kaleidoscope of imagery, using CGI to best advantage, allowing Reeves and Weisz to slip effortlessly into the groove.

  The comic book adventures of a chain smoking paranormal gumshoe in post-apocalyptic LA.
• 
  The Constant Gardener (2005)

  Review preview for The Constant Gardener

  The choice of [director] Meirelles, who made City Of God with street children in Rio, was inspired.

  A diplomat uncovers a web of deceit as he investigates the death of his wife.
• 
  Contact (1997)

  Review preview for Contact

  Sentimentality washes over the cold, technical body of the screenplay.

  A radio ham finds proof of aliens.
• 
  The Cook, The Thief, His Wife And Her Lover (1989)

  Review preview for The Cook, The Thief, His Wife And Her Lover

  A work of brilliance, painful as a punctured lung, fierce, uncompromised, operatic, sexual, startlingly beautiful and yet poisoned with evil.

  Darkly comic horror about sex, murder and food.
• 
  The Core (2003)

  Review preview for The Core

  As an old-fashioned disaster movie, with state-of-the-art effects and a script that floats, The Core definitely does the business.

  Scientists and astronauts bore to the centre of the earth to repair faulty electro magnetic field.
• 
  Corpse Bride (2005)

  Review preview for Corpse Bride

  Corpse Bride is even better than The Nightmare Before Christmas. It displays the imagination of a man, haunted in childhood by the Brothers Grimm, with a twisted sense of humour, steeped in 19th century romanticism.

  Stop-motion love story sees a young man inadvertantly marry a dead woman.
• 
  The Cradle Will Rock (1999)

  Review preview for The Cradle Will Rock

  The performances reflect Robbins' upbeat approach and are as enjoyable as they are inspired.

  Art and politics in Depression era America.
• 
  Crank (2006)

  Review preview for Crank

  What keeps the film from imploding is its humour, intentional or not.

  A poisoned man must keep his heart rate high to stay alive as he hunts his killer.
• 
  The Crime Of Padre Amaro (2002)

  Review preview for The Crime Of Padre Amaro

  Simplistic moral answers to the question of Christianity are like flags of convenience.

  Gael Garcia Bernal is a priest in Mexico who falls in love with a beautiful teenager.
• 
  Criminal (2016)

  Review preview for Criminal

  There are two stories running side by side. When they reach the junction they collide. It's a Hollywood disaster

  The memories of a dead CIA operative are implanted in a dangerous convict.
• 
  Criminal Lovers (1999)

  Review preview for Criminal Lovers

  Although difficult to watch at times, the film contains a distinct energy that is both erotic and fearful.

  Teenage murderers are held prisoners by a cannibalistic hermit in the depths of a wood.
• 
  Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000)

  Mystical epic sees warriors go on quest to recover a stolen sword.
• 
  Croupier (2000)

  Review preview for Croupier

  The egocentric nature of the film cleverly disguises what else is going on outside Jack's head.

  A despondent novelist becomes hard-edged croupier in London casino.
• 
  Crowhurst (2017)

  Review preview for Crowhurst

  What the film achieves with very little money is the pathological journey from hope to hell.

  Story of the amateur sailor who tried to circumnavigate the globe.
• 
  Cry-Baby (1990)

  Review preview for Cry-Baby

  Waters can't keep a straight face. His drapes are freaks; his squares are pegs.

  Musical romance charting juvenile deliquency in the Fifties.
• 
  CSI Grave Danger (2005)

  Quentin Tarantino at the helm of this Vanishing kidnap mystery.
• 
  Cure (1997)

  A detective investigates a series of murders, trying to work out why, despite each having the same methodology, the perpatrators appear to be different.
• 
  The Curse Of La Llorona (2019)

  Review preview for The Curse Of La Llorona

  The complexity of this multigenerational chiller is difficult to follow and sinks into the darkness of the waves.

  A social worker and her family become the target of supernatural malevolence.
• 
  The Curse Of The Jade Scorpion (2001)

  Review preview for The Curse Of The Jade Scorpion

  The plot is borrowed from a Sexton Blake penny dreadful, with fresh gags and terrific performances.

  An insurance investigator and efficiency tsarina are hypnotised into a heist.
• 
  Cyrano de Bergerac (1990)

  Review preview for Cyrano de Bergerac

  Jean-Paul Rappeneau has taken the spirit of Edmond Rostand's play and filled it to overflowing with energy, rumbustiousness, eloquence and panache.

  Superior retelling - in verse - of the classic romance.
• 
  Cedar Boys (2009)

  Review preview for Cedar Boys

  The scale is smaller and more personal, which adds to it credibility.

  Crime is an irresistible temptation for first generation Lebanese Australians who want to rise above social racist barriers.
• 
  The Cell (2000)

  Jennifer Lopez enters the mind of a serial killer in scary scientific experiment.
• 
  The Centre Of The World (2001)

  A man pays a stripper to spend three days with him so that he can get to know her better.
• 
  C'est déjà l'été (2010)

  Review preview for C'est déjà l'été

  Watching this dysfunctional family implode is sobering, if not suicidal.

  Life without hope in a polluted Belgian town.
• 
  Change Of Address (2006)

  Review preview for Change Of Address

  The acting is poor... comedy feels forced and unrequited.

  Unrequited love in Paris.
• Charity (2003)

  Emotional blackmail from street charity vendors.