Category: DVD & Digital

Reviews of the latest UK DVD & Digital releases.

DVD & Digital

Film review: Joker: Folie à Deux

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Following on from the awards success and critical acclaim of 2019’s psychological thriller Joker, director Todd Phillips is back with a second chapter on DC Comic’s iconic villain. Joker: Folie à Deux picks up the story two years on, with Arthur Fleck (Joaquin Phoenix) incarcerated in Arkham Asylum and awaiting trial after his killing spree. At a therapy session, he meets troubled inmate Lee Quinzel (Lady Gaga) and the pair form a bond which is explored through fantastical jukebox musical interludes.

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DVD & Digital · EIFF24

Film review: To Kill a Wolf

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Many of our favourite fairy tales date back to pre-17th-century Europe and the stories have been continually revised, reimagined and reinterpreted over hundreds of years. The debut feature of writer and director Kelsey Taylor is a contemporary take on Little Red Riding Hood. Set in the Oregon’s beautiful, wooded wilderness, the drama follows teenager Dani (Maddison Brown) who is discovered sleeping rough in the forest by a bearded man played by Ivan Martin, credited only as The Woodsman. He takes her in, providing food and shelter, and we soon come to learn of the fraught situation she is running away from.

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DVD & Digital

Film review: Lee

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With a background that includes fiction pieces, documentaries, commercials, and music videos, cinematographer Ellen Kuras turns her experienced hand to directing with historical drama Lee, marking her feature debut. Based on the 1985 biography The Lives of Lee Miller by Antony Penrose, the plot follows American journalist Lee Miller (Kate Winslet) through various stages of her fascinating life, from her time as a Vogue fashion model to enlisting as a war correspondent during World War II. Through her marriage to British artist Roland (Alexander Skarsgård) and her working relationships with editor Audrey (Andrea Riseborough) and fellow photographer David Scherman (Andy Samberg), the film provides an insight to the woman behind the iconic images she took.

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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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