Raoul Peck’s riveting, urgent and impossibly ambitious documentary Orwell: 2+2=5 scrutinises the authoritarian practices and tendencies of our times, with George Orwell as his guide. Jerry Whyte scans Peck’s busy collage of the dangers we face and probes the gaps in his account of Orwell’s life and work.
Two 1970s horror titles – gothic thriller Madhouse and creature feature Empire of the Ants – are making their UK Blu-ray debut from Eureka in June.
recent reviews, articles and blogs
The sixth Children’s Film Foundation Bumper Box, a three-disc DVD release from the BFI, includes nine films from 1954 to 1980. Review by Gary Couzens.
At last, a mainstream movie with no antecedents (OK, OK, it was adapted from a novel by Andy Weir, author of The Martian) or affiliation with any known and probably exhausted intellectual properties, an original film to enjoy on its own merits. With only one tiny caveat, Camus is greatly entertained by Project Hail Mary…
A struggling artist buys a talisman that transforms his fortune without realising the true nature of the deal he has struck in the fascinating horror-tinged Faustian drama from 1943, The Devil’s Hand [La Main du diable]. Slarek keeps an appointment with a bureaucratic Old Nick with Eureka’s typically fine new Blu-ray.
Erotic gameplaying with Peter McEnery, Diane Cilento and Glenda Jackson in Negatives, the debut feature of Peter Medak, made in 1968. The BFI have released it on Blu-ray as Flipside number 53. Review by Gary Couzens.
A mild-mannered bookkeeper steals a valuable gem and is pursued across Europe by professional investigator Milo March in The Man Inside, director John Gilling’s adaptation of the novel of the same name by M.E. Chaber. Slarek finds himself in two minds about the film but has no such qualms about Indicator’s typically strong Blu-ray.
Being a film music aficionado can sometimes introduce you to some intriguing, never before heard of films. On Camus’ watchlist for decades was an oddly titled 1963 curio, scored by Jerry Goldsmith, called The List of Adrian Messenger directed by John Huston. Camus finally caught up with it… Release the hounds!