Tag Archives: Kenneth Branagh

A Haunting In Venice review — Scares don’t make you care

November 4, 2023 flawintheiris

Directed by Kenneth Branagh | Written by Michael Green, adapting the book Hallowe'en Party by Agatha Christie | 103 min | ▲▲△△△ | Disney+ The wild success of this franchise never ceases to surprise, what with director-star Branagh the unlikely lead, his outreaaagous Belgian accent and even more outreaaagous moustache. This, his third movie featuring… Read More

Death on the Nile (1978, 2022) review — It’s worth booking passage on Branagh’s boat, but Peter Ustinov will always be the best

February 20, 2022 flawintheiris

Death on the Nile (1978) | Directed by John Guillermin | Written by Anthony Shaffer from the novel by Agatha Christie | 140 min | ▲▲▲▲△| Criterion Channel As I mentioned back when I reviewed Ken Branagh's take on Murder On The Orient Express in 2017, it was Guillermin's Death on the Nile that introduced… Read More

Academy Award Nominations #Reaction

February 9, 2022 flawintheiris

The nominations for the '22 Academy Awards dropped on Tuesday morning, and as with every Hollywood awards season there were expectations met and expectations dashed. There's also the few naysayers who took to social media to say these awards are antiquated and irrelevant. They groused. They whined. They said, "Who cares?" That question's been asked… Read More

Belfast review — Kenneth Branagh’s sweet reminiscence

November 16, 2021 flawintheiris

Written and Directed by Kenneth Branagh | 98 minutes | Crave Belfast purports to provide a snapshot of actor-auteur Branagh's youth in working-class Belfast, beginning in the summer of 1969 and the months following when sectarian violence exploded in his neighbourhood. I couldn't help but think of the parallels with the film I watched this… Read More

Tenet review — Nolan’s time-travel spy thriller almost too complex

August 27, 2020 flawintheiris

Written and Directed by Christopher Nolan | 150 min | Netflix Christopher Nolan's enormous, brilliant movies are never less than ambitious, and the best of them find a balance between the kinetic, the cerebral, and the passionate — I'm thinking of Memento, Inception, Interstellar, and Dunkirk, even his Dark Knight trilogy. His newest blockbuster nails… Read More

Murder On The Orient Express (2017) review — One-track movie-going

November 13, 2017 flawintheiris

Directed by Kenneth Branagh | Written by Michael Green, from the novel by Agatha Christie | 114 min The Agatha Christie adaptation I grew up with was Death On The Nile. For some reason I'd seen that film three or four times as a kid, and Belgian detective Hercule Poirot is forever embodied in my heart… Read More

Dunkirk review — Massive war picture delivers suspense, awe

July 21, 2017 flawintheiris

Written and directed by Christopher Nolan | 106 min Film writers like me have tended to toss around terms like 'bombastic' when discussing Christopher Nolan's films, but he's the blockbuster filmmaker whose grand-scale work is never less than thoughtful. He tells stories with the confident hand of a master craftsman, exploring intimate themes of identity,… Read More

The Jack Ryan Franchise: An Accidental Secret Agent

December 1, 2014 flawintheiris

Jack Ryan has lived many lives. A character who originated in a series of popular Tom Clancy novels, he's kept coming back to the movies in a series from Paramount Studios — played by four actors in five pictures released over 24 years, with Ryan repositioned through shifting political eras with varying degrees of success.… Read More

Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit review

February 6, 2014 flawintheiris

Directed by Kenneth BranaghWritten by Adam Cozad and David Koepp, based on characters created by Tom ClancyIt's a very rotten spy thriller that I'll pan. I just love the genre. I enjoy the twisty plots, the suspense and the international locations. But I can't say too much about Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit impressed me.This is… Read More

Thor review

May 7, 2011 flawintheiris

Directed by Kenneth Branagh Screenplay by Ashley Miller, Zach Stentz and Don Payne, story by Michael J. Straczynski and Mark Protosevich I've always enjoyed the first weekend in May, when Hollywood traditionally launches its summer blockbuster season. The LA dream-factory does its best to hit the ground running, as it did back on May 2,… Read More