Film

Before I Go To Sleep is Rowan Joffe’s adaptation of S.J. Watson’s bestselling thriller of 2011, but whereas the book was smart, gripping, ingeniously plotted and had psychological depth — who are we, when we can’t remember who we are? — this is a disappointment on so many levels. It’s not as if it’s even set in Crouch End, north London, any more. According to my press notes, Crouch End was not deemed sufficiently ‘cinematic’, which has to be upsetting, if you live in Crouch End, as I do, and have always said to people, ‘Come on over. You’ll love it. It’s just so very cinematic round here’, but there

Strange things happen to Werner Herzog — almost as strange as the things that happen in his haunting, hypnotic films. In 1971, while making a movie in Peru, he was bumped off a flight that subsequently crashed into the jungle. Years later, he made a moving film about that disaster’s sole survivor. In 2006, while filming an interview with the BBC in Los Angeles, he was shot in the belly by some nutter with a small calibre rifle. Most film-makers would have been turned to jelly by this terrifying interruption; Herzog simply laughed it off, cheerfully dropping his trousers to reveal a bleeding bullet wound, and a natty pair of

So it turns out the revolution will be televised after all. ‘Brand’, a full length documentary about the comedian turned political activist Russell Brand, is heading our way next year. The multi-millionaire comedian—who is dating a scion of the Goldsmith family—used a recent appearance on Newsnight to call for the overthrow of the state, claiming ‘profit is a filthy word’. It sounds like we are in for a treat: ‘This feature documentary film promises to follow his spiritual and biographical journey from comedian turned film star, and husband of pop star, to his present incarnation, following his realisation that he had, in Russell’s own words, “embraced the superficial and doped

We may have had the verdicts and the sentences in the hacking trial, but the biggest question remains unanswered: who’s going to play everyone in the movie? There’s one clear and obvious frontrunner for the part of Rebekah Brooks: Bonnie Langford. Sadly, however, Ms Langford has heavy panto commitments and cannot be released for filming. So we’ll have to make do with a B-list purveyor of ginge instead – Nicole Kidman, perhaps, or Julianne Moore. (Cate Blanchett might have got a look-in if we’d avoided the temptation to base everything on the hair, but Brooks herself never did so why should we?) Andy Coulson should be played by Ewan McGregor,

Blue Ruin is a low-budget yet highly accomplished revenge thriller although whether you have the stomach for it is another matter. I do not have a strong stomach, as we know, and as I braced myself for the next startlingly bloody burst of violence, having yet to recover from the last startlingly bloody burst of bloody violence, I was often just longing for it all to be over. I like excellent film-making as much as the next person but, ideally, I would also like to be able to watch it. Stuff you don’t need to know but might like to: this has been a huge festival hit, winning several prizes,

The ancients thought that the seat of female hysteria was the womb. My theory (just as credible) is that male charisma resides in the neck. The most magnetic films stars have always had impressive upper spines. Marlon Brando’s neck was so thick it was simply a continuation of his temples with only a jutting chin to betray the difference. While James Dean’s sudden bare nook between hair and leather collar is the definition of sexy vulnerability. Tom Hardy, one of the most exciting actors of the moment, is just as well endowed. His neck, playing the serial killer in Nicolas Winding Refn’s Bronson and a charming forger in Christopher Nolan’s

It was early evening and I had not yet eaten, so I took a glass of wine and a packet of Haribos into the private screening of I Am Divine: the story of Divine. I touched neither, because early on in the film I felt a little sick. I’m unsure as to whether that queasiness was a result of the mention of dog excrement (more anon) or the scale of misogyny contained within its 90 minutes. Divine, aka Glenn Milstead, was an American actor, singer and drag queen who died in 1988 of a massive heart attack. Divine developed a name for himself as a female impersonator known for outrageous

‘I thought it was supposed to go on for another half hour!’ said a man in the foyer on the way out. ‘When the alien got burnt to death I thought thank fuck for that.’ Before you get annoyed with me for giving away the ending, let me explain that this is one of those films where plot takes a back seat. More than that, it’s been tied up, gagged and locked in the boot. I can’t stand it when people give away the ends of films, which is why I never read reviews before going to the cinema. Too many reviewers have no respect for plot. So I didn’t know that