Category: DVD & Digital

Reviews of the latest UK DVD & Digital releases.

DVD & Digital

Film review: I Used to be Funny

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Known for her work on television shows such as Feel Good, The Great, and Shrill, writer and director Ally Pankiw has shifted to the big screen for her feature debut, I Used to be Funny. Set in Toronto, the comedy drama centres around twenty-something au pair and stand-up performer Sam (Rachel Sennott) who is suffering from PTSD and depression. When Brooke (Olga Petsa), the teenager she used to nanny goes missing, she takes it upon herself to track her down, and in doing so she revisits her trauma.

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DVD & Digital

Film review: Challengers

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Italian director Luca Guadagnino is well known for his sensual depictions of complex romantic relationships and has brought his distinctive brand of emotional messiness to the tennis court for his latest feature. Challengers revolves around player-turned-mentor Tashi Duncan (Zendaya) who, after being forced to retire early through injury, now coaches her husband Art (Mike Faist) on the circuit. Following a string of confidence-knocking defeats, she enters him into a lower-tier tournament to get his career back on track. Tensions run high when he is drawn against his old friend and doubles partner Patrick (Josh O’Connor), and the film then takes us back in time to explore the chequered history between the three main characters.

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DVD & Digital · GFF24 · Interviews

Jericho Ridge Interview: Will Gilbey & Chris Reilly – ‘I’d never worked on an independent film that got so much bang for its buck’.

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After working for years as an editor and a screenwriter, filmmaker Will Gilbey has sat in the director chair for his feature debut Jericho Ridge. An intense survival thriller, the film stars Nikki Amuka-Bird as police deputy Tabby Temple who comes under attack at a remote Sheriff’s office.

Ahead of its UK premiere at Glasgow Film Festival 2024, I sat down with Will Gilbey and supporting actor Chris Reilly to chat about their experience… (Mild spoiler alert towards the end for Slow Horses S3)

You’ve got huge experience in the industry as an editor and a writer. What was it about this script that made you think it was time to direct a feature?

WG – You’re always sort of trying to think when you’re trying to do a film. Your first one out the gate is going to be pretty low budget and you’re just looking for something which you can control. When you’re going to be in one place for as much as possible, you can spend time concentrating on shooting it as well as you can.

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DVD & Digital · GFF24

Film review: Opponent

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Writer-director Milad Alami grapples with heavyweight themes in his sophomore feature Opponent. The social-realist style thriller centres around mild-mannered Olympic wrestler Iman (Payman Maadi) who enjoys a quiet life his wife Maryam (Marall Nasiri) and their daughters Asal (Nicole Mehrbod) and Sahar (Diana Farzami). After he is outed as a homosexual by one of his close friends from the local gym, he is forced to flee his home. As this carries a penalty of execution in his native Iran, he desperately escapes to Scandinavia to start afresh, leaving his life behind and reluctantly turning his back on the sport. However, when it proves too difficult to seek asylum without the promise of a steady career, he returns to the ring to compete for the Swedish national team.

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DVD & Digital · GFF24

Film review: Disco Boy

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 German actor Franz Rogowski is a captivating on-screen presence and can impress with turns across many different languages, and his latest portrayal sees him take the lead in the feature debut from Italian director Giacomo Abbruzzese.  A war movie of sorts, Disco Boy is loosely inspired by real events and characters in the filmmaker’s life and tells the stories of troubled Foreign Legion combatant Aleksei (Rogowski) and fearless guerrilla warrior Jomo (Morr Ndiaye) as their paths intertwine by chance in battle.

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DVD & Digital

DVD review: Immaculate

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 Writer and director Michael Mohan was somewhat ahead of the curve in discovering the talent of Sydney Sweeney, having worked with her on Netflix series in Everything Sucks in 2018 and then casting her in his thriller The Voyeurs a few years later. Since then she has shot to stardom in hit television shows Euphoria and The White Lotus and is enjoying a purple patch on the big screen too, with the exception of the critically panned comic book flick Madame Web. In psychological horror Immaculate the filmmaker is working with his muse yet again, with Sweeney also serving as a producer on the piece.

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DVD & Digital

Film review: Silver Haze

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After collaborating on her English-language debut Dirty God a few years ago, director Sacha Polak has called upon actor Vicky Knight again to star in his latest feature and has loosely based the story on her lead’s own experience. A British-Dutch co-production, romantic drama Silver Haze follows young nurse Franky (Knight) who is restlessly seeking answers after a housefire left her with severe burns 15 years earlier. At the hospital where she works, she meets troubled teen Florence (Esmé Creed-Miles) who is recovering from a suicide attempt. Scarred both physically and psychologically by their pasts, the pair embark upon a relationship and help one another through their trauma.

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DVD & Digital · GFF24

Film review: Jericho Ridge

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British filmmaker Will Gilbey has taken his talents across the pond for survival thriller Jericho Ridge, marking his directorial debut after years in the industry as a screenwriter and editor. Set in a remote town within the mountainous landscape of Washington state, the plot follows Deputy Tabby Temple (Nikki Amuka-Bird) en route to start a graveyard shift at the local station with her teenage son Monty (Zack Morris) in tow.

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DVD & Digital · GFF24

Film review: Restore Point

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Taking us into a not-so-distant future where unnatural deaths can be cancelled out by innovative back-up hardware, ambitious sci-fi thriller Restore Point comes from Czech director Robert Hloz. The action follows detective Em Trochinowska (Andrea Mohylová) as she investigates the suspicious deaths of the David Kurlstat (Matej Hádek), who happens to be the developer of this restorative science, and his wife. Meanwhile, a mysterious organisation known as the River of Life are rebelling against the new technology by committing heinous acts of terrorism to bring about natural order.

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DVD & Digital · GFF24

Film review: Bleeding Love

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In the mid 1990s, Ewan McGregor burst onto the scene with iconic roles in Shallow Grave and Trainspotting and was the picture of fearless, reckless youth. Now, around thirty years on, his daughter Clara is following in his acting footsteps. In Bleeding Love, the feature debut from Dutch director Emma Westenberg, they star together as an estranged father and daughter en route to rehab after a near fatal overdose. Travelling through the American Southwest, they have various pitstops and attempt to mend their fractured relationship.

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