Category: DVD & Digital

Reviews of the latest UK DVD & Digital releases.

DVD & Digital

Film review: Blue Sun Palace

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 In recent years we’ve seen a surge in cinema that has tapped into emotional aspects of Asian-American culture and identity, with the likes of Lulu Wang’s poignant comedy The Farewell, Lee Isaac Chung’s family tale Minari, and Celine Song’s complex romance Past Lives. An arthouse entry into this niche space is Blue Sun Palace, a social-realist drama from writer and director Constance Tsang. Taking place within the Chinese community of Queen’s, New York, the story follows Didi (Haipeng Xu), Amy (Ke-Xi Wu), and Cheung (Kang-sheng Lee) as they navigate life, love, and loss.

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DVD & Digital · EIFF24 · Interviews

The Outrun Interview: Saoirse Ronan, Nora Fingscheidt & Amy Liptrot – ‘It was important to make Rona an evolution of the three of us’.

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After a period of disruption which threatened an uncertain future, the Edinburgh International Film Festival (EIFF) finds itself on more solid footing for its 77th edition this year. At its new home of the Cameo Cinema, the relaunch was marked by an Opening Gala UK premiere of German director Nora Fingscheidt’s latest film The Outrun. Based on Amy Liptrot’s bestselling memoir of the same name, the drama follows biologist Rona (Saoirse Ronan, who also co-produced alongside her husband Jack Lowden) as she returns to her hometown in the Orkney Islands following a stint at rehab for alcoholism. I was fortunate enough to attend the screening and chat with the team on the red carpet.

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DVD & Digital · EIFF24

Film review: Black Dog

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 A household name and noughties heartthrob in his native Taiwan, the latest leading role for actor and singer Eddie Peng marks a departure from his usual line of work. An arthouse crime drama of sorts, Black Dog is written and directed by acclaimed Chinese filmmaker Guan Hu and takes place in the remarkable but desolate fringes of the Gobi desert.

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DVD & Digital · GFF24

Film review: About Dry Grasses

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 With many films that have garnered critical acclaim across the span of his thirty year career, Turkish writer-director Nuri Bilge Ceylan can be considered a contemporary auteur due to his distinctive longform storytelling. About Dry Grasses is his latest effort, an epic drama which centres around art teacher Samet (Deniz Celiloğlu) who is on a placement in a remote village in Eastern Anatolia. After returning to work following the winter break, he is dismayed to learn that students Sevim (Ece Bağcı) and Aylin (Birsen Sürme) have accused him and his colleague Kenan (Musab Ekici) of inappropriate behaviour.

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DVD & Digital

Film review: Longlegs

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 As the son of the Anthony Perkins who played the iconic Norman Bates in Alfred Hitchcock’s classic Psycho, you could argue that writer and director Osgood Perkins has horror films in his DNA. His latest picture is serial killer thriller Longlegs which follows rookie FBI agent Lee Harker (Maika Monroe) as she investigates a series of homicide-suicides where families are massacred in their homes and cryptic notes are left behind. Following the clues, she finds that she has a strange flair for clairvoyance and soon suspects that she might have an eerie personal connection to the man behind the murders.

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DVD & Digital

Film review: Kinds of Kindness

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Greek writer-director Yorgos Lanthimos made a name for himself with his unique brand of absurdist black comedy, breaking through with indie hits Dogtooth and The Lobster before shifting into slightly more commercial territory and enjoying award-winning successes with The Favourite and Poor Things.

 His latest piece sees the auteur return to his deadpan roots, reuniting with screenwriter Efthimis Filippou with whom he collaborated on the earlier work. Structured as an anthology, Kinds of Kindness follows Jesse Plemons and Emma Stone in three separate chapters: first as troubled souls with something unusual in common, then as husband and wife in a strained marriage, and lastly as members of the same supernatural cult.

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DVD & Digital

Film review: Hundreds of Beavers

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Taking inspiration from the slapstick brilliance of the silent-era of cinema, filmmaking friends Mike Cheslik and Ryland Brickson Cole Tews came up with the concept for their surrealist comedy Hundreds of Beavers whilst, unsurprisingly, at a bar. With the former directing, editing, and on visual effects duty and the latter acting in the leading role, the pair wrote and produced the DIY passion project together.

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DVD & Digital

Film review: The Bikeriders

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 A student of the ‘gonzo’ approach to journalism pioneered by Hunter S. Thompson, photographer Danny Lyon immersed himself into the notoriously non-conformist motorcycle subculture in the 1960s and even became a fully-fledged member of a Midwestern gang for a couple of years. His findings were published in a photo-book that has been adapted for the screen by writer and director Jeff Nichols.

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DVD & Digital · GFF24

Film review: The Dead Don’t Hurt

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 Almost as old as cinema itself, the classic Western has evolved over the years into its own subgenres and many styles. The latest take on the Wild West comes from actor-turned-filmmaker Viggo Mortensen who not only directs but has written the screenplay, composed the score, and starred in his latest work. The Dead Don’t Hurt is set in the 1860s and follows Vivienne Le Coudy (Vicky Krieps) who falls in love with Holger Olsen (Mortensen), a Danish immigrant plying his trade as a carpenter. Much to her dismay, her husband leaves their Nevada home to fight in the American Civil War while she gets a job behind the bar of a saloon.

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