Tag Archives: Ralph Fiennes

The Report/Official Secrets reviews — Procedural thrillers work similar themes

December 14, 2019 flawintheiris

Reviews from the Vault Vol. 8 — Comedies

August 28, 2019 flawintheiris

From 2005 to 2009 I was a programmer on CKDU 88.1 FM in Halifax, every Sunday morning hosting The Love & Hate Movie Show. I talked about what I was seeing and revisited some of my favourite films of old, pretty much what I do now here on FITI. I still have a lot of… Read More

Reviews from the Vault Vol. 7 — Big-Budget Fantasy

August 25, 2019 flawintheiris

A Brief History of Spy Movies: Part Three

June 29, 2019 flawintheiris

THE LE CARRÉ ADAPTATIONS In the past two posts I review Harry Palmer movies and a dozen spy pictures from 1966 to 2006. This post is devoted to the film adaptations of the godfather of spy novels. Roger Ebert described John Le Carré’s novels as “chess problems in which one solution is elegant and all… Read More

The White Crow review — Nureyev biopic achieves rare grace

May 24, 2019 flawintheiris

Directed by Ralph Fiennes | Written by David Hare, adapting a biography by Julie Kavanagh | 132 min | Crave Plus and Hoopla What a challenge this must've been, to find the actor who could dance anything like Rudolf Nureyev, but also provide the dramatic chops to believably convey his haughty, charismatic persona. Full marks,… Read More

Now on Canadian Netflix: Spring 2018

May 10, 2018 flawintheiris

Mute (2018) A sci-fi thriller half a mess and half an interesting exercise in style. That it comes from Duncan Jones, the filmmaker responsible for Moon, Source Code, and, yes, Warcraft, hopes were high this would be a strong genre entry, but Mute never hits above its pulpy elements. We're in future Berlin, which looks… Read More

The Lego Batman Movie review — An annoying feature-length commercial

March 6, 2017 flawintheiris

Directed by Chris McKay | Written by Seth Grahame-Smith, Chris McKenna, Erik Sommers, Jared Stern, and John Whittington | 104 min I saw The Lego Movie for the first time back in 2014 at a 3D screening, and I didn't much enjoy it. I recognized its cleverness, but couldn't see past the hyper-caffeinated pace and editing, compounded… Read More

Kubo and the Two Strings review — Sad Son of the Samurai

August 28, 2016 flawintheiris

Directed by Travis Knight | Written by Marc Haimes, Chris Butler and Shannon Tindle | 101 min | Amazon Prime The three or four trailers before this gorgeous animated feature (from the Portland-based Laika studio that produced Coraline) were your typical, caffeinated, hyper-edited kiddie chum animation. In comparison to those, Kubo and the Two Strings is a breath of… Read More

A Bigger Splash review — Trashy times in the sun

June 1, 2016 flawintheiris

Directed by Luca Guadagnino | Written by David Kajganich and Alain Page, inspired by the film La Piscine | 125 min | ▲▲▲△△ Marianne Lane (Tilda Swinton) is a rock star, an aesthetic cross between Chrissie Hynde and David Bowie. She's just had surgery on her voice, and her doctors insist she shouldn't speak. She and… Read More

Hail, Caesar! review — Drop By The Coens’ Hollywood party

February 8, 2016 flawintheiris

Written and directed by Joel & Ethan Coen | 106 min | ▲▲▲▲△ Once again the Coen Brothers celebrate their love of Hollywood's golden age with a knowing comedy in the spirit of The Hudsucker Proxy and Barton Fink, though lighter and sillier than both. Set largely at Fink's Capitol Pictures studio in the early 1950s—complete… Read More