Assassin’s Creed: bored game

It’s clear that Justin Kurtzel, director of Assassin’s Creed, didn’t want to make just any old video-game movie. In fact, it seems clear that he didn’t really want to make a video-game adaptation at all.

Indeed, that’s just about the only thing that is clear in this adaptation of the long-running Ubisoft franchise, which manages to drain all the fun from the premise.…

My 10 Worst Films of 2016

It’s already become a cliche: the extent to which 2016 has notoriously not been a good year for humanity.

That said, it’s been at least a decent year for film – minus the deaths of various beloved cinema icons (UPDATE: since my writing this, Carrie Fisher has sadly passed away).…

REVIEW: Jackie reveals what we will do to put a mask on ambition & grief

Blackness. Orchestral strings rise up magisterially but sink almost immediately into discord; the wooziest of dying falls.

A beautiful woman, resplendent in pink, with jet-black bouffant hair, porcelain hair, and cheekbones to shame Bette Davis, coolly applies her makeup in an airplane mirror.…

My 16 Best Films of 2016

Releasing your film as close as you can to the Oscar deadline may keep it fresh in the mind of Academy voters, but it does make it tricky to keep a track of for your more casual viewer.

Throw in the time delay between US and UK releases and even the most fervent cineaste could be forgiven for forgetting exactly when their favorite film was released.…

Fantastic Beasts… (Electric Shadows podcast)

Robs Daniel & Wallis do a late night review of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, having just watched the movie. Slightly tired (and punchy), the two embark on a spellbinding odyssey that covers inter-species coupling, the right way to cast spells, Eddie Redmayne’s fictitiously Batesian relationship with his mum and comparing King Kong to Sonny Corleone.

Allied, or They Don’t Make ‘Em Like They Used To

Allied is an injection-filled wartime romance in the classic mold that can’t help but feel like a loving but noticeably artificial knock-off.

Maybe its the CG-augmented opening shot of a rolling desert, straight out of Lawrence of Arabia, or the cinematically-significant setting — Casablanca no less, known equally for the city and the film that inspired the name of this very site — that director Robert Zemeckis shoots sweepingly but without particular character.…

Free Fire (LFF Day 10)

Say what you want about overvaulting cinematic ambitions – I’m looking at you, Terrence – it’s sometimes refreshing to see a talented filmmaker take on a simple concept and carry it off with flair and aplomb.

In the case of Free Fire, the latest from British auteur Ben Wheatley, the concept is this: the third-act shootout, with which any self-respecting crime thriller must surely culminate, instead kicks off less than twenty minutes in and occupies the rest of its ninety-minute run-time.…