Film Reviews by Alphaville

A short, snappy film, hard to categorise and full of tangential delights. The French title, poorly served by its English translation, roughly means The Uncultivated Head. This refers to the uneducated Gerard Depardieu, who meets an old lady who teaches him about words and literature. Sounds like a yawn but it's anything but. Director Jean Becker populates the picture with a host of entertaining characters and Depardieu's struggle with both dictionaries and life is totally engrossing. As warm-hearted a film as only the French seem able to make, you'll be rooting for happy endings for everyone.

Available at last, this cult classic comedy from 1970. The talented Elaine May writes, directs and stars as the hapless millionairess courted for her wealth by hopeless down-on-his-luck millionaire Walter Matthau. A sweet, funny, perfectly-cast treat that wears its age as a badge of honour. Puts to shame modern gross-out humour. Stand-out scene: Matthau's bumbling attempts to help May sort her nightgown's head-hole from her arm-hole. Silly, funny, warm and memorable.

This is Mission Impossible by numbers. Where are de Palma or Abrams when you need them behind the camera? Clichéd fight in theatre. Tick. Motor bike chase. Tick (and yes, some market stalls are overturned). Underwhelming set-pieces, an even more underwhelming villain, intricate plotting rendered banal by barrel-loads of boring exposition, risible dialogue, baddies who can't shoot straight as soon as the Cruise-man is in their sights. Pity especially poor Alec Baldwin, who has to call Tom Cruise 'the living embodiment of destiny'. Yes, really. All to a generic muzak snatched from the juvenile Marvel franchise. MI 1 & 3 are great, 2 & 4 not so much. Let's hope 5's a good 'un.

Praised as 'compelling' with 'superb performances', you know what to expect. A funereally paced plodder that's a tough watch unless you like watching medium-shot stills of talking heads. The film's subject is done scant justice and if you hope to wallow in Left Bank existentialism you'll be doubly disappointed. A simple narrative stretched beyond patience with all the cinematic life squeezed out of it.

Grossly overrated Oscar winner that's something of a plodder unless you're in a forgiving mood. However, if you get tired of all the chat, fast-forward an hour in for a jaw-dropping shot that almost redeems the whole thing. Out of the blue comes a 5minute, gravity-defying masterpiece of camerawork that begins as an aerial shot and evolves into a hand-held chase through the back alleys of a football stadium. Pure, mind-boggling cinema, only replicated with cgi in the Hollywood remake, that unfortunately shows up the rest of the film for the slow-burning talkie it is.

Poorly acted, poorly directed, amateurish, shaky-cam nonsense. Waving the camera around silly fight scenes merely enhances their lack of believability (as Greengrass continues to prove). Those who rated this film 'dazzling' and 'amazing' must have owed the producer a favour.

An awful film about clichéd gung-ho GIs in the Middle East. You know the sort. They party with hookers, pour beer over their heads and shout Whoo Whoo when they kill someone. And these are our heroes we're supposed to care about? You'll soon be on fast forward. The whole film leaves a sour taste in the mouth. One star for an occasional passing CGI monster, but the only real monsters here are the protagonists.