Miramax has made the brave decision of releasing a film version of Brideshead Revisited which takes a fair few liberties with Evelyn Waugh's novel. If you've read it (which I did for September's
PopUK Book Club) you may find the alterations distracting, but view the film as a separate entity and you can marvel at the acting and cinematography.
It tells the story of Charles Ryder (Matthew Goode) and his involvement with the aristocratic Flytes, from his Oxford days with Sebastian (Ben Whishaw) to his relationship with Julia (Hayley Atwell).
The biggest strength of Pineapple Express (out today in the UK) is the brilliant chemistry between Seth Rogen as stoner Dale Denton and the yummy James Franco as his dealer Saul Silver. I have fond memories of the two actors
working together when they were younger in one of my favourite TV shows
Freaks and Geeks, so seeing them reunited in this movie was fun on a couple of levels for me.
Both Dale and Saul are the typical emotionally-stunted guys you see in a Judd Apatow produced movie (see Forgetting Sarah Marshall, Knocked Up etc).
Keira Knightley's latest period offering,
The Duchess, is finally released at cinemas across the UK today. We've seen the stars at
the world premiere and attending
radio interviews, and now it's time to see if the film lives up to all the hype. Although the poster carries the famous Diana quote — "there were three people in her marriage" — the film has nothing to do with her (
as the cast and director told me when I met them recently) so that aspect of
the trailer is for marketing and doesn't reflect the content of the film.
Guy Ritchie has rolled out his tried and tested (and hugely enjoyable) gangster crime caper formula for his latest offering,
RocknRolla.
Like Lock Stock and Snatch before, RocknRolla brings the lives of London's criminals together in a funny, well-acted and entertaining action flick.
It's not just the capital's head mobster (Tom Wilkinson) and right hand man (Mark Strong) who take notice when a Russian billionaire (Karel Roden) arrives in town looking to make a big money land deal; a corrupt councillor (Jimi Mistry), plotting accountant (Thandie Newton), and underworld gang The Wild Bunch (Gerard Butler, Idris Elba and Tom Hardy) all want in on the big bucks too.
NB: I was lucky enough to catch a screening of this indie movie back in early June, and was so taken with it that I posted the preview for you back then. The movie's coming out this Friday, so here's a reminder / rundown of what I thought of it!
First things first:
The Wackness is dope.
