Chris At The Pictures

This week sees the release of Yesterday, the new film and first collaboration from director Danny Boyle and writer Richard Curtis. The film (a light-hearted comedy about a man who wakes up one day in a world without The Beatles) is Boyle’s first since T2 Trainspotting. Even without the next James Bond picture (now directed by Cary Fukunaga and shooting amidst endless production problems) to his name, the Manchester-born filmmaker is a legendary...

Hailee Steinfeld in BUMBLEBEE (Paramount Pictures (c), photo by Enrique Chediak) ★ ★ ★ ½ ☆ p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'} p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; min-height: 14.0px} Well, here’s a Christmas miracle: after a decade of increasingly puerile cruelty, the Bay/Spielberg Transformers franchise finds a heart. Hailee Steinfeld leads this 80s-set prequel as Charlie,...

Jason Momoa as Arthur Curry in AQUAMAN (Warner Bros. (c), still photo by Mark Rogers) ★ ★ ☆ ☆ ☆ Jason Momoa’s effortless charisma and a rich score from Rupert Gregson-Williams are all that prevent the DC universe’s latest voyage from totally capsizing. In all fairness, neither Aquaman or its leading man can be blamed for the reverse-engineered structure of Warner’s answer to the MCU - our protagonist has already appeared in two previous instalments...

Rami Malek as Freddie Mercury in Bohemian Rhapsody (Twentieth Century Fox (c), still photo by Nick Delaney) ★ ½ ☆ ☆ ☆ There’s a moment approximately two thirds into Bohemian Rhapsody, Bryan Singer’s long-gestating biopic of rock legend Freddie Mercury, when its tawdry by-the-numbers biopic act slips, revealing the dormant hatchet job beneath. Mercury’s (Rami Malek) bandmates confront their unruly figurehead about his recent spate of drug-fuelled...

Welcome to this first edition of The Streaming Pile; my excuse to use a good pun thinly disguised as a monthly column discussing the latest crop of Netflix', er, 'cinematic' content. This month saw the release of three fairly high-profile films (as opposed to the usual strain of Friday night horror dreck): Operation Finale, 22 July, and Apostle. Chris Weitz (directing for the first time since 2011's A Better Life) oversees Operation Finale,...

Ryan Gosling in FIRST MAN (Universal (c), still photo by Daniel McFadden) ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ Damien Chazelle makes the hat-trick with this extraordinary film that, appropriately, puts the man first. Ostensibly depicting the trials and tribulations of NASA’s Gemini and Apollo programs, First Man reveals itself to actually be about those of Neil Armstrong, in a refreshing break from space films that are less concerned - thematically, at least - with...

“Two for the...uh...that one with...” the middle-aged gentleman stood across the till from me turned desperately to his partner, who returned his blank look. I waited. The silence stretched. The queue fidgeted. “Oh, bloody hell, what’s it called again?” he gesticulated to no-one in particular, before clapping a hand to his forehead. Sighing internally, I scanned my screen for the list of possible titles. “Insidious 3?” “No.” “Three Billboards?” “No.” “Darkest...