Poor Things ★★★★★
Directed by Yorgos Lanthimos. Starring Emma Stone, Mark Ruffalo, Willem Dafoe, Ramy Youssef, Kathryn Hunter, Christopher Abbott, Jerrod Carmichael, Hanna Schygulla, Margaret Qualley. 18 cert, gen release, 141 min
Stunning psycho-sexual feminist fantasy, adapted from an Alasdair Gray novel, featuring Emma Stone as a women reanimated by Willem Dafoe’s eccentric Victorian scientist. A dizzying feast of cinematic excess, but there is also intellectual traction and psychological grit. This is an essay on the politics of control expressed in the language of avant-garde circus. Though we are never more than seconds away from a good joke and though the film has its compass set for a hopeful destination, Poor Things is imbued with a constant worry about male control heightening into violent abuse. This is as serious as comedies get. Full review DC
The Beekeeper ★★★☆☆
Directed by David Ayer. Starring Jason Statham, Emmy Raver-Lampman, Josh Hutcherson, Bobby Naderi, Minnie Driver, Phylicia Rashad, Jeremy Irons. 15A cert, gen release, 105 min
Statham plugs the John Wick-sized hole at the centre of this hail of bullets. He plays “Mr Clay”, the apiarist of the title, who is spurred to vengeful action when his kindly neighbour dies by suicide after falling for a phishing scam. Dodgy accent aside - there’s some muttering that Statham’s American military retiree came from “the British Isles” - it’s a good fit for the action veteran, who strolls brusquely into armies of enemies with the air of a man taking out the bins. Fast cuts and more than 50 credited stuntmen and stuntwomen keep the octane high. Read the full review. TB
Freaks vs the Reich/Freaks Out ★★★☆☆
Directed by Gabriele Mainetti. Starring Claudio Santamaria, Pietro Castellitto, Giancarlo Martini, Aurora Giovinazzo, Giorgio Tirabassi, Max Mazzotta, Franz Rogowski. 16 cert, gen release, 141 min
Freaks vs the Reich, in which a 12-fingered Nazi pianist with the ability to see into the future pursues a circus troupe with superpowers during the second World War, reads like it could be an offering from the people who brought you Sharknado 5. Despite a scene that can only be described as “robust were-man and were-woman sex”, Gabriele Mainetti’s bouncy, carnivaliesque alt-history is closer in tone to Hellboy than throwaway Syfy channel Naziploitation. A big-hearted adventure in which the bad guy cribs Sweet Child O’Mine and Creep from his visions of the future. Read the full review. TB
Lift ★★★☆☆
Directed by F Gary Gray. Starring Kevin Hart, Vincent D’Onofrio, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Úrsula Corberó, Jean Reno. Netflix, 104 min
Interpol agent Mbatha-Raw persuades Hart’s criminal crew to, ahem, lift a large sum of gold from an aeroplane bound for evil Jean Reno’s vulgar mansion. The thing is far too reliant on boring CGI. Nobody has anything approaching a personality. The attempts to get us interested in fictional NFT art are no more successful than the international cabal of idiots’ efforts to draw us to the real thing. For all that, there is a sort of honest energy to Lift that deserves just a sliver of respect. Watch out for the scene filmed in Belfast’s Crown Liquor Saloon. Read the full review. DC
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