The title Robust refers to the character of its female lead as much as her physicality. Deborah Lukumuena plays Aissa, a security guard assigned to look after a famous movie star whose regular handler is on leave. The famous movie star in question is Gérard Depardieu, who plays (*checks notes*) George. Barely a pseudonym, George…
A beautifully satirical political drama focusing on the assassination of a pacifist politician. With the tone of something like Doctor Strangelove, it unfortunately remains strikingly relevant today. The film starts with the armed forces of the state sitting around talking about how to get rid of the corrupting influence of this increasingly popular politician who…
I fell in love with the very first shot. The cinematography is so gorgeous, I was like, literally wherever this movie goes, I am in. Neighbours tells the story of Sero’s first year of school. Set in Syria in the 80s, Sero is a 6-years-old Kurdish boy. We see the world through his eyes, as…
The World Without You tells the story of a family coming together over a weekend for the one year anniversary memorial for their son who was slain overseas. The son, Leo, was a war reporter who was killed in Iraq. The grief has caused his parents’ marriage to disintegrate, and they are now considering divorce.…
I need to stop greeting at these films. Sacha: A Child Of Chernobyl is a short documentary following up with the children who were taken to Cuba for medical treatment after exposure to radiation following the Chernobyl disaster. When Chernobyl exploded, becoming history’s greatest radiation disaster, the resultant fallout produced illnesses and cancers of all…
I went into this film knowing nothing and the last thing I expected to see was Kai Winn. Louise Fletcher is in this, as a good guy for once, and she’s great as always. Rod Steiger also appears as a Nazi colonel, bringing his signature moral ambivalence to the role. And Brett Marx, the kid…
Nora is a middle-aged granny on an estate, staying in her small flat with her 20-something weans, and wee granweans. She works two jobs to keep a roof over their heads, getting up at the crack of dawn to take buses to the airport, then as a home help looking after an elderly neighbour who…
There is a stereotype that the British view the French as over-sexed. So far in the French Film Festival I’m realising that is not a stereotype. The Comparative Literature lecturer in this hands out the course text of poetry and tells the class to really “savour the eroticism”. You do that in Glasgow, the whole…
Wow. Final Account is an incredible documentary, interviewing the last remaining Nazis. And these are not, ‘I had to be a Nazi to keep my job as a paralegal’ kinda Nazis. We’re talking Waffen SS, the Death’s Head squad. We’re talking camp guards, people who were right in the thick of it. My first thought…
Hope Dies Last is a documentary profiling young climate change activists in Poland. It shows the firece drive and motivation they share, a single purpose no less important than the survival of their species. When folk ask why weans these days are all cracking up, show them this film. The activists range from 16 to…