Florian Zeller: the name might not be familiar in the world of cinema. But watch this space.
Whether he’s making documentaries or dramas, director Kevin Macdonald has an eye for the bleak moments in our history, and a dynamic way of recreating them, from the Oscar-winning doc Four Days in September, about the Munich massacre, to the fictionalised account of the Ugandan dictator Idi Amin, The Last King of Scotland, which at times played like a horror film.
Hot on the heels of her 2019 triumph Portrait of a Lady on Fire, Céline Sciamma’s fifth feature continues a perfect track record; this is yet another gorgeous and perceptive film, told from a determinedly female perspective but with a wisdom that is all-embracing.
One of the sadnesses of covid is that films like Judas and the Black Messiah have been held over for release in the hope that cinemas will reopen. Immersive, intense features like this deserve to be seen in a darkened theatre with no distractions. But as the pandemic drags on in the UK, distributors are forced to debut big films on the small screen and it’s a real shame in this instance.
Do you want to spend 105 minutes trapped in a house with two people arguing, or do you already feel that your life under lockdown is quite quarrelsome and claustrophobic enough? If your answer is the former, then Malcolm & Marie is the perfect movie for you. Everyone else might be happier escaping elsewhere (I’d recommend Call My Agent if you want to enjoy actors talking about their trade. At least you get some exterior Paris scenes and lashings of wit).
The Sutton Hoo burial site in Suffolk has proved to be one of the most valuable archaeological finds ever made in Britain, shedding priceless light on the Anglo-Saxon period of the 6th and 7th Centuries.
This is an odd film, made even odder by a caption near the beginning, which claims it is "inspired by true events" but doesn’t elaborate. Produced in Belarus, it’s a Holocaust drama based on a novella by the veteran East German screenwriter/director Wolfgang Kohlhaase but made by the Ukrainian director Vadim Perelman.
In 1964, Cassius Clay, NFL superstar Jim Nathaniel Brown, soul legend Sam Cooke and political firebrand Malcolm X gathered for one night in a dingy room at the Hampton Motel. It was a meeting that became a symbol of hope for black Americans. A photo, taken by Malcolm X would make the moment iconic, marking a shift away from the horrors of Jim Crow America to the passing of the Civil Rights Act.
It all started so promisingly. Parasite's triumph at the Oscars was a resounding response to 2019's saccharine and problematic Green Book. Art house was in and here to stay. And in some ways, this came to pass - with cinemas caught in a cycle of opening and closing, the blockbusters were nowhere to be seen.