Mass in
Motion
The Swimmer
Film
Skool
Director Adam Kalderon dives into the pervasive homophobia in elite sports, with his poignant coming of age tale, The Swimmer.
Erez (Omer Perelman Striks) finds himself under pressure from all sides: parental expectation, competition from his peers, bigoted Russian trainer Dima (Igal Reznik) - and his feelings for teammate Nevo (Asaf Jonas).
Athletic male bodies in tiny speedos glisten under the hot Israeli son, as the pressure on Erez builds. Perelman Striks gives an intense, and occasionally unhinged, performance as a young sportsman coming to terms with his sexuality. Everything culminates with a surreal musical number that put me in mind of Tsai Ming-Liang's The Wayward Cloud.
The Swimmer hasn't been without controversy, with the Melbourne Queer Film Festival accused of pinkwashing ("a term used to describe the action of using LGBTIAQ+ issues in positive ways in order to distract attention from negative actions by an organization, country, or government") and subject to boycotts. KAOS
Dodsworth
Film
Skool
Based on the long running Broadway hit , it starred Oscar Nominated Walter Huston and was directed by William Wyler. Huston, is joined by Ruth Chatterton, Mary Astor, Paul Lukas and David Niven. Rounding out the cast are newcomer and Broadway veteran, Maria Ouspenskaya of the Moscow Art Theatre ( Oscar Nominee), Spring Byington and John Payne. It’s unforgettable and as relevant today as the day it was released. Steve Hayes
Dodsworth, a film by William Wyler.
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A Simple Plan
Film
Skool
What would you do if you stumbled across a small fortune? Hand it in to the police - or hold on to it, and live with the consequences?
This is the dilemma faced by family man Hank (Bill Paxton), his simpleton brother Jacob (Billy Bob Thornton), and his roughneck friend Lou (Brent Briscoe), in this taught and blackly comic neo-noir crime thriller in which a simple plan rapidly - and spectacularly - unravels.
Directed by Sam Raimi, and based on a book by Scott B. Smith, A Simple Plan is strongly reminiscent of Fargo; all blood in the snow and small-town claustrophobia. Not so much the American dream, as the American nightmare.
So Dark The Night
Film
Skool
A film noir set in the French countryside, with an avuncular Parisian detective (Steven Geray) in the lead role: sounds too cute for its own good, right? Wrong.
Director Joseph H. Lewis' (The Big Combo, My Name Is Julia Ross) picture starts off seemingly as one thing, before turning on a dime, and revealing a dark - and frightening - underbelly. Initially I was thrown by the seemingly twee tone, creaky script, and jolly score - until the killing started. The twist, when revealed, is startling.
At around seventy minutes in length, So Dark The Night is short and sweet; an average script saved by Lewis' direction.
Culture Beat
Beats,
Rhymes
& Life
Rewound: 1995
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Battle of the Bulge
Film
Skool
There are great war movies (The Bridge on the River Kwai, Apocalypse Now, The Great Escape), terrible war movies (Pearl Harbor, Alexander), and there are movies like Battle of the Bulge, which are just... meh.
Directed by Ken Annakin - whose resume includes the likes of Swiss Family Robinson (1960) and The Call of the Wild (1972) - delivers a disappointingly flat depiction of the Ardennes Offensive.
It's nearly three hours long, and feels it. The set piece battles don't make up for long stretches of talking. I can do long stretches of talking. I can watch Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf over and over again, and that's essentially people talking to each other (well, yelling at each other, mostly) for over two hours.
Ideal, perhaps, for nodding off to on a lazy Sunday afternoon, but otherwise, a stodgy misfire.
George and Mildred
TV
Times
The interview is preceded by a blurred clip from the film, so skip the first minute.
Yootha was admitted to hospital soon after and died just over a month later on the 24th August 1980.
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Santino Le Saint
Beats,
Rhymes
& Life
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Doctor Who
TV
Times
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Chris Garneau
BOAH ROBIN!
Isak Danielson
Beats,
Rhymes
& Life
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In The Woods We Can Be Together
Film
Skool
In The Woods We Can Be Together, a film by Ryan Schneider.
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My Ex-Husband Married My Brother
Film
Skool
My Ex-Husband Married My Brother, a film by Tré Melvin.
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Julian King
