It's time once again to visit the Church of Cinema, to sit with strangers in its hushed darkness, and to rejoice in the best that film has to offer...
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Thank Flickering Myth it's Friday...
Killing Them Softly
Andrew Dominik takes his time over things. This is only his third film since his debut, Chopper, in 2000. It took him seven years to complete his follow-up, one of the best films of the last decade (and longest named), The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford. Brad Pitt starred as the titular Jesse James in that one, and he rejoins Dominik for this year's Killing Them Softly.
It's adapted from George V Higgins' novel Coogan's Trade, following petty criminals and incompetent mob bosses after the former stick up a poker game. Apparently the only woman to open her mouth in the entire film is a prostitute (currently unsure in what manner), so the whole affair is a bit of a sausage fest. But in James Gandolfini, Richard Jenkins and Ray Liotta, the sausages are of the best meat around.
Dominik's projects appear diverse - an Australian biopic, a period Western and now an American caper - but they all have a common theme: crime, specifically the study of its male identity. Hopefully this one is worth the wait.
Killing Them Softly is out now.
House at the End of the Street
The title's enough to give you chills. It's the sort of childhood terror that Dr. Who used for half the series last year - what's under the bed? What's in the crack? What's in the wardrobe?
Everyone has one of those houses; one at the end of their street. They look as though a soul hasn't touched them in decades (well, not a living 'soul'), their lawns overgrown, their windows in disrepair. Scary stuff, but your house at the end of the street probably wasn't host to a double murder.
House at the End of the Street is, you guessed it, a haunted house horror. A teenage daughter and her mother move into a new place, to discover the property next door was the site of a gruesome killing.
The daughter is played by the excellent Jennifer Lawrence, of Winter's Bone and The Hunger Games, but beside from that, it looks like an average shockfest.
The House at the End of the Street is out now.
Savages
It's Oliver Stone's latest, and one of Sight and Sounds' 'Five Films to Watch this Month'. Perhaps those two accolades are more connected than you would want.
The film follows two Californian cannabis entrepreneurs, played by Aaron Johnson and Taylor Kitsch, who share the same woman - the recent Mrs Ryan Reynolds - Blake Lively. She gets kidnapped by Benicio Del Tori and Salma Hayek's (wearing her best Uma-Thurnam-in-Pulp-Fiction fringe) Mexican gangsters, and the two buddies venture to get her back. John Travolta's in there somewhere, too.
The reviews haven't been glowing, and it didn't do too well over the pond. But it's an Oliver Stone film, so, like Sight and Sound suggests, you should probably go see it anyway.
Savages is out now.
Enjoy the philms.
Oliver Davis![]()
Thank Flickering Myth it's Friday...
Killing Them Softly
Andrew Dominik takes his time over things. This is only his third film since his debut, Chopper, in 2000. It took him seven years to complete his follow-up, one of the best films of the last decade (and longest named), The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford. Brad Pitt starred as the titular Jesse James in that one, and he rejoins Dominik for this year's Killing Them Softly.
It's adapted from George V Higgins' novel Coogan's Trade, following petty criminals and incompetent mob bosses after the former stick up a poker game. Apparently the only woman to open her mouth in the entire film is a prostitute (currently unsure in what manner), so the whole affair is a bit of a sausage fest. But in James Gandolfini, Richard Jenkins and Ray Liotta, the sausages are of the best meat around.
Dominik's projects appear diverse - an Australian biopic, a period Western and now an American caper - but they all have a common theme: crime, specifically the study of its male identity. Hopefully this one is worth the wait.
Killing Them Softly is out now.
House at the End of the Street
The title's enough to give you chills. It's the sort of childhood terror that Dr. Who used for half the series last year - what's under the bed? What's in the crack? What's in the wardrobe?
Everyone has one of those houses; one at the end of their street. They look as though a soul hasn't touched them in decades (well, not a living 'soul'), their lawns overgrown, their windows in disrepair. Scary stuff, but your house at the end of the street probably wasn't host to a double murder.
House at the End of the Street is, you guessed it, a haunted house horror. A teenage daughter and her mother move into a new place, to discover the property next door was the site of a gruesome killing.
The daughter is played by the excellent Jennifer Lawrence, of Winter's Bone and The Hunger Games, but beside from that, it looks like an average shockfest.
The House at the End of the Street is out now.
Savages
It's Oliver Stone's latest, and one of Sight and Sounds' 'Five Films to Watch this Month'. Perhaps those two accolades are more connected than you would want.
The film follows two Californian cannabis entrepreneurs, played by Aaron Johnson and Taylor Kitsch, who share the same woman - the recent Mrs Ryan Reynolds - Blake Lively. She gets kidnapped by Benicio Del Tori and Salma Hayek's (wearing her best Uma-Thurnam-in-Pulp-Fiction fringe) Mexican gangsters, and the two buddies venture to get her back. John Travolta's in there somewhere, too.
The reviews haven't been glowing, and it didn't do too well over the pond. But it's an Oliver Stone film, so, like Sight and Sound suggests, you should probably go see it anyway.
Savages is out now.
Enjoy the philms.
Oliver Davis
