Reviews by Richard Mowe

Order by: Date, A–Z

• 
  After The Wedding (2019)

  Review preview for After The Wedding

  It’s all watchable enough if lacking real dramatic tension.

  When a woman seeking funds for an Indian orphanage heads to NYC to meet a wealthy benefactor, the past collides with the present.
• 
  Portrait Of A Lady On Fire (2019)

  Review preview for Portrait Of A Lady On Fire

  What could have been a traditionally lavish costume drama has been pared down to highlight the erotic tension and sensuality

  On an isolated island in Bretagne at the end of the 18th century, a female painter is obliged to paint a wedding portrait of a young woman.
• 
  The Best Years Of A Life (2019)

  Review preview for The Best Years Of A Life

  Dreams, memories and reality all intermingle to rather intoxicating effect

  A sequel, set decades later, to Un Homme Et Une Femme.
• 
  On A Magical Night (2019)

  Review preview for On A Magical Night

  Deliciously and deliberately theatrical

  After 20 years of marriage, Maria decides to leave her husband. She moves into room 212 at the hotel across the street, with a bird’s-eye view of her apartment, her husband and the life she shared with him.
• 
  Once Upon A Time ... In Hollywood (2019)

  Review preview for Once Upon A Time ... In Hollywood

  Tarantino's on good form but there are moments in the middle of the 165-minute marathon where it flags before mustering for its finale.

  TV star Rick Dalton and his longtime stunt double Cliff Booth make their way around an industry they hardly recognise any more.
• 
  Frankie (2019)

  Review preview for Frankie

  It is only sporadically involving with even the usually hypnotic Huppert struggling to make an impression.

  Three generations grappling with a life-changing experience during one day of a vacation in Sintra, Portugal, a historic town known for its dense gardens and fairy-tale villas and palaces.
• 
  Young Ahmed (2019)

  Review preview for Young Ahmed

  Their provision of few motivational details makes for an unsatisfactory narrative.

  A teenager becomes radicalised.
• 
  Port Authority (2019)

  Review preview for Port Authority

  Danielle Lessovitz’s first feature exudes a quiet confidence in her material.

  A love story about a Midwesterner and a trans woman, set in New York's Kiki ballroom scene.
• 
  A Hidden Life (2019)

  Review preview for A Hidden Life

  One of the flaws of Malick’s film is that the main character goes into introspective mode, thereby depriving us of any real insight in to his thoughts.

  The Austrian Franz Jägerstätter, a conscientious objector, refuses to fight for the Nazis in World War II.
• 
  Pain And Glory (2019)

  Review preview for Pain And Glory

  The tone is both bitter and sweet.

  A film director reflects on the choices he's made in life as past and present come crashing down around him.
• 
  The Climb (2019)

  Review preview for The Climb

  The acutely caught observational humour is what gives The Climb its motor.

  A look at the friendship between two guys that spans many years.
• 
  Sorry We Missed You (2019)

  Review preview for Sorry We Missed You

  A narrative that hits your emotional solar plexus with the raw power of the performances and the deceptive simplicity of the story.

  A hard-up delivery driver and his wife struggle to get by in modern-day England.
• 
  The Swallows Of Kabul (2019)

  Review preview for The Swallows Of Kabul

  Visually arresting and emotionally engaging.

  Summer 1998 - Kabul under Taliban rule. Zunaira and Mohsen are young and in love. Despite the daily violence and misery, they hope for a better future. One day, a foolish gesture causes life to take an irrevocable turn.
• 
  Beanpole (2019)

  Review preview for Beanpole

  The evocation of 1945 Leningrad is brilliantly captured with crumbling buildings and over-crowed trams but too often the dramatic set pieces fail to register

  Two young women search for meaning and hope in the struggle to rebuild their lives amongst the ruins of Leningrad after the Second World War.
• 
  Les Misérables (2019)

  Review preview for Les Misérables

  Ly wanted the people who have lived in these schemes to have the chance to tell their own stories, which gives Les Misérables an unerring sense of authenticity.

  A man joins an anti-crime brigade and rapidly discovers the tensions between the various neighbourhood groups.
• 
  The Dead Don't Die (2019)

  Review preview for The Dead Don't Die

  Jarmusch usually manages to invest his films with a quirky sense of humour, but here the lines fall decidedly flat.

  The peaceful town of Centerville finds itself battling a zombie horde as the dead start rising from their graves.
• 
  Yao (2018)

  Review preview for Yao

  There are times when Godeau seems to lose the way and the pace at such moments lacks drive, but then he’s back on track before long.

  A teenager in a Senegalese village will do anything to meet his hero.
• 
  The Fireflies Are Gone (2018)

  Review preview for The Fireflies Are Gone

  The film demands and receives a strong and forceful performance from Karelle Tremblay who is more than able to rise to the challenges.

  The sleepy town where Léo lives doesn’t offer her much chance of self-fulfilment. Extricating herself from her mother’s influence and her constricting environment isn’t easy for the frustrated young woman, yet happiness might be close at hand.
• 
  Sink Or Swim (2017)

  Review preview for Sink Or Swim

  The training sessions begin to pall - for the audience as much for the participants - but once the action moves to Norway, the pace and the scenery pick up considerably.

  A comedy drama about a male synchronised swimming team.
• 
  Shoplifters (2018)

  Review preview for Shoplifters

  Some may be dissuaded by the painstaking pace yet the tone manages to be both humorous and heart-rending at the same time.

  A family of small-time crooks take in a child they find on the street.
• 
  The Man Who Killed Don Quixote (2018)

  Review preview for The Man Who Killed Don Quixote

  Gilliam’s script cannot quite stand the excesses of his own imagination.

  A cynical advertising director finds himself trapped in the outrageous delusions of an old Spanish shoe-maker who believes himself to be Don Quixote.
• 
  Under The Silver Lake (2018)

  Review preview for Under The Silver Lake

  There are just too many movie references and homage to the likes of David Lynch in this noirish thriller to make it anything other than an over-derivative exercise in style over substance.

  A man becomes obsessed with the strange circumstances of a billionaire mogul's murder and the kidnapping of a girl.
• 
  The House That Jack Built (2018)

  Review preview for The House That Jack Built

  Dillon makes a fair fist of the role of Jack.

  A serial killer's life story is told through the murders that defined him.
• 
  BlacKkKlansman (2018)

  Review preview for BlacKkKlansman

  This emerges as a piece of bravura filmmaking that tackles huge themes with style and intelligence while providing a compelling narrative drive.

  Ron Stallworth, an African-American police officer from Colorado, successfully managed to infiltrate the local Ku Klux Klan and became the head of the local chapter.
• 
  Donbass (2018)

  Review preview for Donbass

  Each successive scene hits you over the head with the ferocity of the action.

  In the Donbass, a region of Eastern Ukraine, a hybrid war takes place, involving an open armed conflict alongside killings and robberies on a mass scale perpetrated by separatist gangs.
• 
  Girl (2018)

  Review preview for Girl

  Directed with admirable understatement and restraint.

  A teenage trans girl dreams of becoming a ballerina.
• 
  Border (2018)

  Review preview for Border

  An original and highly ambitious premise that maintains its grip your attention and imagination.

  When a border guard with a sixth sense for identifying smugglers encounters the first person she cannot prove is guilty, their relationship forces her to confront terrifying revelations about herself and humankind.
• 
  The Image Book (2018)

  Review preview for The Image Book

  Elusively impenetrable stuff that only loosely can be described as cinema.

  Nothing but silence. Nothing but a revolutionary song. A story in five chapters like the five fingers of a hand.
• 
  The Angel (2018)

  Review preview for The Angel

  It should come as no surprise, given the kitsch and extravagant props and costumes, that the film has been co-produced by Pedro Almodovar and his brother Augustin.

  The story of a real life teenage serial killer in Argentina.
• 
  Friend (2018)

  Review preview for Friend

  Touching and brave.

  When they fall in love, two girls from rival families must choose between being together and being safe.
• 
  Sextape (2018)

  Review preview for Sextape

  The exchanges all have the ring of truth.

  Two sisters plot blackmail.
• 
  Cold War (2018)

  Review preview for Cold War

  Beautifully shot and articulated.

  A passionate love story between two people of different backgrounds and temperaments, who are fatally mismatched and yet fatefully condemned to each other.
• 
  Sorry Angel (2018)

  Review preview for Sorry Angel

  Honoré handles the strands with considerable agility and admirable lack of cliché or sentimentality employing camerawork that is clean and uncluttered.

  Two gay men struggle with love in the shadow of mortality.
• 
  Everybody Knows (2018)

  Review preview for Everybody Knows

  While Farhadi certainly knows how to spin a web of intrigue, deceit and suspicion, the narrative has a tendency to leap from strand to strand, often leaving the audience stumbling in its wake.

  Secrets resurface after a woman returns to her family's village for a wedding.
• 
  Let The Sunshine In (2017)

  Review preview for Let The Sunshine In

  Denis and Binoche take a perceptive and light approach to what could have been hackneyed material.

  Isabelle, single mum, divorced artist with one child, is looking for love. True love at last.
• 
  Makala (2017)

  Review preview for Makala

  The way director Emmanuel Gras eases under the skin of his main subject makes for fascinating viewing.

  A young peasant makes a difficult journey in the hope of creating a better life for his loved ones.
• 
  Breaking News (2017)

  Review preview for Breaking News

  Deals with a human story rather than making political points.

  A TV reporter is tasked with painting memorial portrait for a coworker who died in a tragic accident that he survived. His colleague’s daughter becomes his guide.
• 
  The Cakemaker (2017)

  Review preview for The Cakemaker

  As a metaphor for the way the world views changing relationships and mores the film is affecting.

  After the death of his lover, Thomas heads to Israel – the birthplace of the man he adored. He becomes a pastry chef for the widow of the deceased.
• 
  A Ghost Story (2017)

  Review preview for A Ghost Story

  Reveals just enough in the sparse dialogue and long silences to keep us intrigued.

  This is the story of a ghost and the house he haunts.
• 
  Good Time (2017)

  Review preview for Good Time

  The Safdies invest their own knowledge of their home turf to give it all a frenetic and authentic sense of urgency.

  Crime caper sees a bank robber try to evade capture.
• 
  The Beguiled (2017)

  Review preview for The Beguiled

  Coppola’s desire for a new “soft” approach seems to have emasculated the original material while failing to engross our senses with her storytelling techniques.

  Civil War drama about an injured Yankee soldier who seeks refuge in girls' boarding school.
• 
  Barbara (2017)

  Review preview for Barbara

  The best way to get the most out of the film is to succumb completely to the singer’s breathless voice, sultry eyes and her volatile genius.

  Filmmaking and real life start to blur for a director making a biopic about female singer Barbara.
• 
  120 BPM (Beats Per Minute) (2017)

  Review preview for 120 BPM (Beats Per Minute)

  Campillo has a weakness in not knowing when to trim all the talking.

  Portrait of the ACT UP activist group, a direct action collective aiming to impact the lives of people with AIDS.
• 
  The Killing Of A Sacred Deer (2017)

  Review preview for The Killing Of A Sacred Deer

  Lanthimos confirms his reputation as one of contemporary cinema’s most original and unsettling directors

  A teenage boy tries to integrate a surgeon into his broken family but his motives become increasingly sinister.
• 
  Happy End (2017)

  Review preview for Happy End

  Haneke is a master of his material, revealing just enough to keep the viewer on tenterhooks but not enough to give an easy explanations.

  Story of a bourgeois family, set against the backdrop of the Calais refugee crisis.
• 
  Redoubtable (2017)

  Review preview for Redoubtable

  Hazanavicius directs with flair for the style and mood of the Sixties.

  Paris 1967. Jean-Luc Godard, the leading filmmaker of his generation, is shooting La Chinoise with the woman he loves, Anne Wiazemsky, 20 years his junior. They are happy, attractive, in love, they marry. But the film’s reception unleashes a profound self-examination in Jean-Luc.
• 
  The Meyerowitz Stories (New And Selected) (2017)

  Review preview for The Meyerowitz Stories (New And Selected)

  The film is structured as a series of stories with different characters predominating in each but this has the effect of making it seem more protracted than it should be.

  Comedy drama about a family who gather in New York to celebrate the work of their dad.
• 
  The Square (2017)

  Review preview for The Square

  While satirically entertaining in places it has too many threads competing for attention and ultimately runs out of steam.

  An art exhibit invites passers by to altruism, but things don't go as planned for its curator.
• 
  Okja (2017)

  Review preview for Okja

  Bong keeps it all on the move with immense visual flair, innumerable chases and excellent effects.

  Young girl Mija must risk everything to prevent a powerful, multi-national company from kidnapping her best friend - a massive animal named Okja.
• 
  Wonderstruck (2017)

  Review preview for Wonderstruck

  This creative and visually arresting adaptation of Brian Selznick’s critically acclaimed novel marks a filmmaker at the top of his game.

  Ben and Rose are children from two different eras who secretly wish their lives were different. Both set out on quests.