Coming Soon: June 2017

There are significantly more films on my 'to-watch' list this month than I anticipated, and as such narrowing it down to around 10 was pretty challenging... I've ignored most of the obvious ones and just highlighted those that may have slipped under your/my radar!

The Ciné File: May 2017

I feel like I haven't seen many films this month - including an entire week when I didn't see any at all - so the list of reviews isn't particularly long. However, I have managed to see most of the major new releases so it's not too bad!

Coming Soon: May 2017

May is a pretty interesting month for film, with small British independents dotted in amongst blockbusters, sci-fi, a reboot of Baywatch and the latest Studio Ghibli animation.

The Ciné File: April 2017

This month has consisted of yet more foreign films and all 8 Fast and Furious... It's been a mixed bunch!

Coming Soon: April 2017

Rather ridiculously, I thought that since awards season is over and it's the Easter holidays there would be a slight lull in cinemas as screens filled up with animations and family-friendly crowd pleasers. It turns out that this is not the case at all as April is full of foreign films, documentaries, a couple of horror films, British indies, and period pieces, alongside the latest instalments in huge blockbuster franchises.

It's a wonderfully mixed bunch with something for everyone: perfect for times when the weather can't decide what to do with itself and the best course of action is escaping it all in a cinema!

The Ciné File: March 2017

Finally: I'm actually seeing foreign films and documentaries as they're released and not years later!

Coming Soon: March 2017

Well, the Oscars last weekend were exciting weren't they?!

Given the hullabaloo surrounding the Best Picture mix up, you'd be forgiven for wanting to go and see La La Land and Moonlight again in March (particularly the latter: it's been rolled out to 200+ more screens this week as a result of the win, so you have no excuse to miss seeing this absolute masterpiece) rather than seeing something new. However, March is full of absolute corkers. Other Oscar nominees are finally hitting UK screens this month, in the form of Elle (Best Actress nominee, Isabelle Huppert) and The Salesman (Best Foreign Film winner). There are also highly anticipated blockbusters - Logan, Kong: Skull Island, and Beauty and the Beast - a horror film that's taken the US by storm, Get Out, and the latest movie from Ben Wheatley, Free Fire (which I saw at the London Film Festival and can confirm is rollicking good fun).

There's truly something for everyone this month, so start planning those cinema trips now...

The Ciné File: February 2017

I love the cinema during awards season.

Coming Soon: February 2017

Awards season is pretty spectacular and simultaneously really odd. The films on offer at the moment range from blatant Oscar-bait fully deserving of 5* reviews to awful sequels that really shouldn't have been green-lit for production. As such, cinemas are flooded with films at the moment, with many successful box office hits from January (see, for example: La La Land and Manchester by the Sea) still widely available. However, they'll have to make room for the constant barrage of excellent new content reaching audiences over the next month as February has plenty to offer in terms of astonishingly good new films.

I've already broken my 2017 rule of only highlighting 10 films each month as there are just too many unmissable films out over the next 28 days... oops!

The Ciné File: January 2017

In another effort to increase my film watching over the coming year, I've resurrected my previous long-standing series, The Ciné File! On the last Sunday of each month I will be doing mini reviews of the films I've seen over the past 30 days, from cinema trips to see new releases, classics on Netflix and Sky Cinema, and advance screenings. It'll depend on what I've seen throughout the month, but I'll try and review as much as I can, and hopefully it'll be pretty varied.

One of my vague New Years resolutions was to watch more films - particularly across lots of different genres and often out of my comfort zone - so hopefully this will help keep me on track! I've seen nearly everything on my Coming Soon list for January, plus lots more at home. I really want to try pushing my boundaries in 2017, so here goes...

Coming Soon: January 2017

Welcome back to Coming Soon!

Sadly these posts dropped off the radar in the middle of last year, but as I felt like I missed so many films in the latter part of 2016 that I wasn't aware of, I thought it would be a good idea to start compiling these monthly lists again. I like knowing what's coming up so I can plan my cinema trips accordingly, and I always found it helped to have a list of films to work with in order to ensure I don't let any slip through the net. I'm planning on venturing further afield this year if my local multiplex doesn't offer particular films, so I need to know in advance when the best ones are released!

As such, on the first Friday of each month I will be outlining the top 10 key films to try and catch throughout the month. I'll include release dates and trailers, so hopefully I won't be the only one inspired to head to the cinema multiple times!

Film Round-Up 2016

Under normal circumstances, this post is the easiest I have to write each year. 

Going to the pictures between 2-3 times a week and seeing virtually every new release my local cinema has to offer means I'm usually able to watch a wide variety of films and form an opinion on them accordingly at the end of the year. Throughout the twelve months I make a note of standout films and performances, scores that I love and cinematography that makes me swoon. As such, by the time December rolls around compiling my thoughts into a vague list of favourites is pretty simple. However, this year it's been extremely difficult and has taken ages for me to come to a final decision as there weren't many films - if any - that stood out to me in the way that the likes of Brooklyn and Carol did last year, or The Grand Budapest Hotel and Interstellar did back in 2014. 

I've gone through all of my ticket stubs for the last year, rewatched numerous trailers and finally narrowed down my choices for the best films of 2016. As ever, I've been pretty strict and only included films that I've actually seen, and that have a U.K. release date during 2016, which is annoying as the best films I've seen this year don't come out till January (Manchester by the Sea, La La Land, A Monster Calls...).

Coming Soon: May 2016

As ever, May's a bit of a mixed bunch film-wise!

There are comedies (Bad Neighbours 2 and Whiskey Tango Foxtrot); animated family-favourites (Angry Birds and Robinson Crusoe); biopics (I Saw the Light and Florence Foster Jenkins) and CGI filled IMAX blockbusters (X-Men: Apocalypse, Alice Through the Looking Glass, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows and Warcraft). Then there's the sort-of sequel to Dazed and Confused from acclaimed director Richard Linklater, Everybody Wants Some!!, a college comedy that has been met with multitudes of 5* reviews but left me cold as it reminded me of everything I detested about university...

Also of note is Patrick Stewart's villainous turn in violent drama Green Room; Jodie Foster's latest thriller featuring veterans George Clooney and Julia Roberts alongside 2014 golden-boy and up and coming star Jack O'Connell, Money Monster; Terrence Malick's bizarre-looking drama with an astonishing cast Knight of Cups; Jane Austen period drama Love and Friendship; and John le Carré espionage thriller Our Kind of Traitor.

While there might not be as many films opening this month as there have been previously this year, I think it's safe to say there'll be something for everyone!

Coming Soon: March & April 2016

Once again, my Coming Soon post is more of a 'what you could have seen this month' as it's so late... apologies! In an effort to make up for this, I've combined March and April, so you'll hopefully be able to catch a couple of films from March that are still in cinemas and mark your calendars for those up and coming in the next few weeks. May will be better, I promise!

March was packed with horror films - 10 Cloverfield Lane, The Boy, The Witch; sequels - The Divergent Series: Allegiant, My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2; and stunning animation, from family favourite Kung Fu Panda 3, to the astonishingly brilliant Anomalisa, and new Disney classic Zootropolis (I've already seen it twice and tell everyone I meet to head to a cinema immediately. The Breaking Bad joke in particular shouldn't be missed!). Then there was the latest Coen brothers' masterpiece in the form of Hail, Caesar!, Ben Wheatley's faithful adaptation of J.G. Ballard's dystopian novel, High-Rise, and the highly divisive - but no where near as bad as critics have declared - superhero behemoth Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice.

April, on the other hand, is a little more varied. It kicks off with British feel-good film Eddie the Eagle; showcases a couple of documentaries - I am Belfast, The Last Man on the Moon; and takes a historical turn with World War One drama The Man Who Knew Infinity, Cold War spy thriller Despite the Falling Snow and tales of tense Middle East drone warfare Eye in the Sky. There's the hotly anticipated live-action remake of The Jungle Book; Tina Fey's latest comedy Whiskey Tango Foxtrot; Miles Davies biopic Miles Ahead, directed by and staring Don Cheadle; intelligent and gripping sci-fi Midnight Special; and battle lines are drawn when Marvel's favourite superheroes clash in Captain America: Civil War. Perhaps most exciting of all are the foreign films making their way to cinemas in April: the winner of the Palm D'Or at Cannes, Dheepan, and Best Foreign Language film everywhere else including the Oscars, Son of Saul, finally come to the U.K., and given their rave reviews over the last few months it looks like they'd be well worth seeking out.

As ever, all synopsis, release dates and trailers are below, along with star ratings for the films I've already seen. Hopefully this will throw up a couple of films to seek out from March, and those to look out for in April!

Coming Soon: February 2016

Orange mocha frappuccino!

I am fully aware that this post is a million days late, but it's been sat almost-finished for the best part of a month so I thought I might as well post it just before February was up!

February's been a funny film month, with the remaining awards hopefuls opening in cinemas alongside a foul-mouthed fan-favourite superhero movie, numerous documentaries and the world's most popular ridiculously good looking male model.

As the Academy Awards roll into Los Angeles this evening, the season of serious dramas unsubtly vying for a shiny gold statue comes to an end. February opened with the successfully nominated Trumbo - Best Actor nomination: Byan Cranston - telling the tale of blacklisted Hollywood scriptwriter Dalton Trumbo who spent the large majority of his career ostracised due to his political beliefs, writing scripts in secret and even managing to win an Oscar for Roman Holiday despite no-one knowing it was him that really wrote the script. The rest of the month saw the unsuccessful, from the snubbed - Best Actor, Will Smith - in Concussion, to a film that failed to live up to its' excellent premise, Freehold. Expect both to be on severely limited release last month, so I wouldn't be surprised if you missed them (I did!).

The rest of the month featured no end of unrelated films. There were the half-term family friendly films of Goosebumps and Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Road Chip, and the more teenage-appropriate Pride and Prejudice and Zombies (totally bonkers but enormous fun if you're a fan of both the Jane Austen classic and zombies) and remake of Point Break. Ralph Fiennes and Tilda Swinton are on top form in the astonishingly good A Bigger Splash, Chris Pine embarks on a seemingly impossible true Coast Guard rescue mission in The Finest Hours (for someone scared of the ocean, seeing this in IMAX was a huge mistake), Sacha Baron Cohen's back on controversial form in Grimsby, and there are corrupt cops galore in mild thriller Triple 9. That's not forgetting the remake of Dad's Army and hilarious comedy preaching the virtues of singledom days after Valentine's Day in How to be Single.

The two most anticipated of February had to be Deadpool and Zoolander 2. Both made their way to screens mostly in part thanks to the fans: the reaction to leaked Deadpool test footage led to the studios finally giving the go ahead for the feature film; and the cult status of the first Zoolander prompted the sequel. They're both utterly ridiculous, but while Deadpool triumphs in its individuality, destruction of the fourth wall, fight scenes and vulgar humour, Zoolander 2 is just 100 minutes of insanity. I love blue steel as much as the next person, but it's a bad film...

Follow the link below for the round up of what you might have missed in February... Hopefully they'll all still be in cinemas!

Coming Soon: January 2016

Welcome to the first Coming Soon post of 2016!

January is jam-packed with astonishingly good films as awards season steps up a gear. Nominations have already been released for the Golden Globes, and as the BAFTAs and Academy Awards follow suit in the next few weeks cinemas are filled with award-worthy films. It's my favourite time of the movie calendar, so I fully expect to be spending the next four weeks practically camped out in my local cinema!

Kicking off the year is Tom Hooper's beautiful - if not a little bland - tale of transgender Danish artist Lili Elbe (Eddie Redmayne), The Danish Girl. While Redmayne may be the protagonist it's clearly Alicia Vikander's film as Lili's wife, Gerda Wegener: she effortlessly steals every scene she's in, which is no mean feat when competing with Redmayne's measured and delicate performance. Also opening this weekend is the latest collaboration between director David O'Russell and Jennifer Lawrence: Joy, the true story of the woman who invented the Miracle Mop. Reviews have been mixed so far, but it definitely looks well worth a watch.

Other must-watch films released this month are The Hateful Eight, Tarantino's Western; Creed, the sequel to the Rocky films that has Sylvester Stallone circling Supporting Actor nominations; and The Revenant, celebrated director Alejandro G. Iñárritu's extraordinary 1820s quest that will undoubtedly secure Leonardo Di Caprio an elusive Oscar, and wonderful cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki a third consecutive Oscar for a film that solely uses natural light - a genius and undoubtedly stunning effect. Then there's financial crisis comedy The Big Short; Cannes darling The Assassin; and the film that finally won Michael Caine a European Film Award, Youth.

Finally, January sees Room hitting cinemas. I saw it at an Odeon preview screening before Christmas and would have made it my film of 2015 had it not officially been released the following year. It is outstanding. It affected me much more than I anticipated it would, and genuinely had to pull my car over on the way home as I couldn't stop crying. As someone who struggles to show emotion in films, my heaving sobs really took me by surprise! Furthermore, hotly tipped to win all Best Picture awards is Spotlight. The trailer gives me goosebumps so I have high hopes for this film adaptation of the Boston Globe's true investigation into sexual abuse within the Catholic Church in Boston.

Film Round-Up 2015

It's been a pretty good year for film, yet again.

As I seem to have spent the majority of 2015 in the cinema, it seemed only appropriate to pull together a list of the good, the bad, and the ugly released in the U.K. in 2015.

I think I've covered everything, from my top 10 films of the year to mini-awards for 'The Film That Made the Best Over-Dramatic Use of a Waterfall'; 'The Film That I Wish I Could Experience For The First Time All Over Again' and 'The Film That Blew My Mind (and not at all in a good way)'.

I hope that these lists will provide you with inspiration for a cinema trip over the next few days, or give you some ideas for hidden gems to look for on Netflix and Sky Movies when they arrive next year. Make yourself a cup of tea: it's a long post!

The Ciné File Vol. 38

It's been an awfully long time since my last set of film reviews for The Ciné File, so this is a pretty long one I'm afraid!

Instead of full reviews I've grouped films together by their defining characteristics - be them strong central performances, cinematography or set design, for example - and made a brief comment on each. I felt that'd be much better than a never-ending list of reviews!

From Brooklyn to Burnt, The Intern to The Program, Anomalisa to Bridge of Spies, and Star Wars: The Force Awakens to Sicario I've seen a wide range of films over the last few months: so much so that it's pretty helpful to have them all finally written down!

Coming Soon: December 2015

How on earth is it December already?!

It's a funny month for film: we may be in prime territory for awards worthy films but as everyone's excited for Christmas and probably spending the majority of the month watching Elf on repeat, frantically doing last minute shopping, and indulging in Netflix binges indoors with a mince pie rather than heading to the cinema, the recently released films are a bit of a mixed bag.

Christmas films are in abundance, from the comedy-horror Krampus, to multi-generational family caper Christmas with the Coopers, to festive lad's night out The Night Before. I haven't seen Krampus - I still refuse to watch horror films - but I can say that although the other two are wholly unremarkable and will be forgotten as soon as the season ends, they're perfect if you've not quite embraced the festive spirit yet and need a nudge towards finding your Christmas jumper, decorating your tree, and singing Christmas songs extremely loudly in the car on your way to work (surely it's not just me that does that?!).

Angelina Jolie makes her bid for a spot in the awards conversation with By The Sea, written, produced and directed by her, filmed on her honeymoon and starring her and her husband Brad Pitt as a troubled couple. Unfortunately it's been met with mixed reviews so far, just like Ron Howard's epic In the Heart of the Sea. It's not all serious dramas though: Lily Tomlin is making waves in Grandma, Will Ferrell and Mark Wahlberg play warring fathers in Daddy's Home and the unrivalled duo of Tina Fey and Amy Poehler retain their crowns as the Queens of Comedy with Sisters. It's a hysterically funny film, with a scene featuring a misplaced ballerina figurine that made me cry laughing.

Oh, and there's a new Star Wars film out, not that anyone's noticed at this stage...

Coming Soon: November 2015

It's official: awards season is upon us. Brace yourself for the constant talk of Oscar winners, potential snubs, controversial campaigning and press tours that seem to last a decade...

Kicking off the month is the beautiful romantic drama Brooklyn. I saw it twice before it hit cinemas (thanks to the London Film Festival and a Times+ preview screening) and plan on seeing it again at the weekend: it's a truly lovely, funny and genuinely heartwarming film, and leading lady Saoirse Ronan deserves all of the praise - and future nominations - that are coming her way. Michael Fassbender shines in the electrifying Steve Jobs, and the eponymous biopic of the Apple founder boasts an astonishingly good script from Aaron Sorkin that ensures all 122 minutes race along with an enormous amount of sharp, cutting dialogue. The awards contenders don't stop there: later in the month Jonny Depp's comeback performance as notorious Boston gangster Whitey Bulger in Black Mass finally arrives, and while it's a pretty disappointing and largely messy film it's hard not to appreciate how intense Depp is as the violent crime kingpin. Steven Spielberg reunites with Tom Hanks in Cold War thriller Bridge of Spies, but from what I've read Mark Rylance is most impressive as the captured Soviet spy and could be a serious contender in the Supporting Actor categories. Finally, Carol - the achingly good 1950s romance that's been making waves at virtually every festival it's been featured at - is released. It's been met with widespread critical acclaim thus far, and while Rooney Mara won Best Actress at Cannes she'll be campaigning in the supporting category this season, leaving Lead Actress open for co-star Cate Blanchett. The trailer looks wonderful, and I think it's safe to say that this is one to mark in your calendars.

November also boasts a number of fascinating looking documentaries. Malala Yousafzai isn't given the film she deserves with He Named Me Malala, but it makes for interesting and vital viewing all the same. A Death Row inmate tells his story in The Fear of 13; the war in Afghanistan is told through the eyes of the Afghans living through it in Tell Spring Not to Come This Year; and Steve McQueen: The Man & Le Mans depicts the esteemed actor's attempts to make a movie about the 24-hour car race at Le Mans. Furthermore, What Our Fathers Did: A Nazi Legacy delves into lives of two men whose fathers were indicted as war criminals for their roles in World War II.

If documentaries and series dramas aren't really your thing then there's the Scouts Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse; horror The Hallows; disgraced rockstar chef comeback narrative in Burnt; Maggie Smith's turn as The Lady in the Van; and Pixar adventure The Good Dinosaur. Plus, concluding the ridiculously popular young adult series is The Hunger Games: Mockingjay - Part 2, with Katniss and co. going out with a bang.