On 24th January 1975, American jazz musician Keith Jarrett performed to a sell-out crowd at Köln’s Opera House whilst playing a broken piano. The recording has since become the best-selling solo jazz album of all time, and the gig almost didn’t go ahead. Written and directed by Ido Fluk, period drama Köln 75 tells the amazing true story of how the evening came to be – the ‘scaffolding’ supporting the masterpiece as it is put in the film’s introduction.
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After working mostly in television across her career, actor Leonie Benesch has garnered acclaim on the big screen of late with standout appearances in The Teachers’ Lounge and September 5 – both of which see her character’s work life take traumatic turns for the worse. Her latest portrayal is in another workplace thriller as she stars in Swiss-German feature Late Shift. Written and directed by Petra Volpe, the plot follows a hectic day in the life of surgical nurse Floria at a severely understaffed hospital ward. As problems mount from challenging patients and their family members, she comes under intense pressure.
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For over fifty years, Ken Loach’s films have become synonymous with working-class life in Britain, his important ‘kitchen-sink’ stories giving a cinematic voice to the undervalued. It would appear that he’s ready to call it a day, the veteran filmmaker stating that his 2023 drama The Old Oak would be his last.
The latest feature from his production company is On Falling, marking the debut of writer and director Laura Carreira. Set in and around Edinburgh, the social-realist plot follows the humdrum routine of Aurora (Joana Santos), a Portuguese migrant that works long hours as a warehouse picker for an unnamed conglomerate. Struggling to make ends meet, she becomes increasingly lonely and worn down by her daily grind.
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Set on the scorched island of Fuerteventura, mystery drama Islands marks the third feature from German writer and director Jan-Ole Gerster. The neo-noir plot follows washed-up tennis coach Tom (Sam Riley) who slipped through the net of turning professional, now working at a luxury resort. Spending his evenings raving in the local nightclub and his days nursing hangovers while showing tourists how to improve their forehand swing, his hedonistic lifestyle is interrupted when British couple Anne (Stacy Martin) and Dave (Jack Farthing) arrive and ask that he gives their young son Anton (Dylan Torrell) some private lessons.
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Based on his own short of the same name, indie thriller Sew Torn is the first feature from writer and director Freddy Macdonald. Set in a picturesque village nestled in the Alpine mountains, the plot follows seamstress Barbara (Eve Connolly) who is grieving her mother’s death whilst struggling to keep the family business afloat.
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From spaghetti westerns to blaxploitation flicks and martial arts action, iconic auteur Quentin Tarantino has made a habit of celebrating cinema within his own work. Carrying this on to a degree by paying homage to QT himself, writer and director Danny Turkiewicz presents Stealing Pulp Fiction.
Developed from his own 2020 short, the plot follows cinephile pals Jonathan (John Rudnitsky) and Steve (Karan Soni) as they attend a special screening of cult classic Pulp Fiction in Los Angeles. After they discover that the 35mm print they’re watching is the director’s personal copy, they hatch a plan to steal the reels.
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A gear shift from her mumblecore beginnings, writer and director Mary Bronstein has joined forces with the team behind the Safdie productions for her latest feature If I Had Legs I’d Kick You. An anxiety-horror of sorts, the plot follows psychotherapist Linda (Rose Byrne) whose life takes a turn when her ceiling caves in from a flood in the apartment above. With her husband out of town on a work trip, she and her sick daughter (Delaney Quinn) move into a shabby motel, and things go from bad to worse when her vulnerable patient Caroline (Danielle Macdonald) goes missing.
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The downtown scene of New York City in the 1970s was rich in culture, innovation and edge, with key figures such as Allen Ginsberg, Fran Lebowitz, and Andy Warhol pioneering an avant-garde community of creatives. Behind many of the iconic images of this time was photographer Peter Hujar, who mostly captured his subjects in a striking black and white. Inspired by a 2021 book of the same name, Peter Hujar’s Day is the latest piece from writer and director Ira Sachs that brings to life a tape recording that was discovered years later in amongst the archives of his work. Set entirely in his Manhattan apartment in December 1974, journalist Linda Rosenkrantz (Rebecca Hall) and Hujar (Ben Whishaw) have an in-depth conversation where he talks her through what he did the previous day.
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Cinema Perspective 