ANAÏS IN LOVE/LES AMOURS D’ANAÏS ★★★★☆
Directed by Charline Bourgeois-Tacquet. Starring Anaïs Demoustier, Valeria Bruni-Tedeschi, Denis Podalydès, Anne Canovas, Bruno Todeschini, Jean-Charles Clichet, Xavier Guelfi. Limited release, 98 min
Demoustier is brilliant as a selfish young woman who expects the world to tolerate her every careless whim. “You don’t realise what human interaction is,” Anaïs’s former partner says after she drops a bombshell with characteristic indifference. Yet somehow we understand why she is tolerated. Shot in a Paris that never seems sweaty and a countryside that abounds with the sort of water that post-impressionists enjoy, Bourgeois-Tacquet’s debut feature offers superficial reminders of Eric Rohmer, but the humour — and more serious juxtapositions — are closer in tone to Woody Allen at his best. Full review DC
MY OLD SCHOOL ★★★★☆
Directed by Jono McLeod. Featuring Alan Cumming, Clare Grogan, Lulu. Limited release, 115 min
Hugely entertaining documentary about “Brandon Lee” a man in his 30s who — for reasons that emerge only gradually — posed as a student at a Glasgow secondary school in the 1990s. Lee (who is not to be confused with the late star of The Crow) agreed to be profiled, but declined to appear on camera, leaving it to Alan Cumming to lip-sync what coalesces into a remarkable confession. Director McLeod has fun with contradictory accounts, tall tales, and faulty memories in a film that pulls the rug just as effectively as its subject and inscrutable star do. Full review TB
THE FEAST ★★★★☆
Directed by Lee Haven Jones. Starring Annes Elwym, Nia Roberts, Julian Lewis Jones. 16 cert, limited release, 93 min
Fine Welsh-language shocker concerning a posh family who get their comeuppance when a local girl comes to help out at a dinner party. Pitched somewhere between folk horror, ecological revenge and scathing class critique, The Feast is at its best during the elegantly atmospheric, nervy first hour, as cinematographer Bjørn Ståle Bratberg picks out ominous details. The baroque denouement splatters, both literally and narratively, as terrible secrets surface, maggots writhe in wounds, and - for good measure - a goddess rises. An impressive directorial debut. Full review TB
FREE CHOL SOO LEE ★★★★☆
Directed by Julie Ha, Eugene Yi. Featuring Chol Soo Lee, KW Lee, Jeff Adachi, Tony Serra. 15A cert, limited release, 86 min
Taut, lucid documentary on the campaign to free a Korean-American wrongly jailed in 1973 for the murder of a San Francisco crime boss. Working archival footage in with new interviews, Free Chol Soo Lee lays out how the battle helped bring Asian communities together and allowed them a collective voice. Among those documentaries that earns the backhanded compliment of feeling shorter than the subject deserves. The directors do good work in teasing out still extant racial tensions. One does, however, end up yearning to hear a little more about how the legal team went about their work. Full review DC
