Gallivant (I5) (Andrew Koning. UK. I996) Gladys Morris. Eden Kbtting. 605 mins. Director Kotting takes his grandmother and daughter around the entire coast of mainline Britain. catching various eccentrics en route and charting a growing relationshp across the generation gap. Villages and seascapes whizz by at high speed as Kotting concentrates on the mundane and the incidental. but allows a delicious sense of silliness to perk up interest. See preview and review. .Edinburgh: Filmhouse.
The Game (IS) (David Fincher. US. 1997) Michael Douglas, Sean Penn. Deborah Kara Unger. I28 mins. Fincher‘s follow-up to Seven is a psychological thriller with more twists than a helter-skelter. Douglas plays a lonely investment banker whose wastrel brother presents him with a gift certificate for a shadowy company that tailors personalised life games for its clients. Soon Douglas finds himself being sucked deeper into a vortex of fear as every certainty in his life is stripped away. An intriguing Chinese puzzle of a movie that teases and taunts the viewer almost as much as its hapless hero. Glasgow: Odeon Quay. Edinburgh: Cameo. Gamera: Guardian Of The Universe (PG) (Shusuke Kaneko. Japan. 1995) 96 mins. A $20 million dollar budget pits superhero turtle Gamera against winged monsters. the Gyaos. Just like in the old Godzilla movies. Tokyo is professionally trashed by the combatants. although here there's some enhanced computer effects to add to the action. With the chainsaw attack of Massive Attack‘s video for Risingsun. Edinburgh: Filmhouse.
G.l. Jane (l5) (Ridley Scott. US. I997) Demi Moore. Viggo Mortensen. Anne Bancroft. 125 mins. Tough. smart Jordan O‘Neil (Moore) becomes the first woman to be accepted for training by the US military‘s elite commando unit. the Navy SEALs. but her arrival at camp is met with barely concealed hostility. Scott's overwrought movie purports to show that women have as much right as men to be dehumanised by the
military and turned into killing machines. What it doesn‘t question is why anyone — male or female - should want to do so. See feature and review. General release. GoodFellas (18) (Martin Scorsese. US. I990) Robert De Niro. Ray Liotta. Joe Pesci. Lorraine Braco. Paul Sorvino. I45 mins. Liotta plays Henry Hill. a real-life mafloso. with De Niro as his mentor in crime. And while the bullets. fists and carving knives fly. Scorsese brings us back to that unavoidable question — yes. it‘s glamorous and lucrative to live this way. but can anyone really live with the consequences? Glasgow: GET.
Grosse Pointe Blank (15) (George Armitage. US. I996) John Cusack. Minnie Driver. Alan Arkin. 108 mins. Depressed freelance hitman Martin Q. Blank (Cusack) returns to his home town for a high-school reunion. but finds his past private life and current profession are about to overlap. Armitage turns in a fair post-Woo action sequence here and there. while Cusack positiver inhabits Martin. switching from comic/romantic lead to focused killer effortlessly and believably. Edinburgh: Cameo. Filmhouse.
Hercules (U) (John Musker & Ron Clements. US. I997) With the voices of Tate Donovan. James Woods. Danny DeVito. 91 mins. British cartoonist (Jerald Scarfe‘s designs marry his customary grotesquery with Uncle Walt's softer characterisations. Hades (a magnificently splenetic James Woods) wants to exact revenge on Zeus by destroying his son Hercules. but luckily our hero has Pegasus as his steed and Phil the grumpy satyr (Danny DeVito) as his coach. Classical purists might grumble. but this is one of the studio‘s most dynamic and entertaining features. General release. House Of America (I5) (Marc Evans. UK. I997) Stephen Mackintosh. Lisa Palfrey. Sian Phillips. 96 mins. Welsh brother and sister Sid and Gwennie are obsessed by America. convinced their errant father is waiting for them across the Atlantic. As they
retreat further into an increasingly incestuous fantasy. the film avoids obvious kitchen sink realism and in its place finds a sour poetry. powered by potent performances. A little too claustrophobic. however. East Kilbride: Arts Centre. Hunger (PG) (Henning Carlsen. Norway. I966) Ill mins. The book that proved to be Norwegian author Knut Hamsun‘s breakthrough in I890 becomes a halluncinatory film following an unnamed protagonist’s miserable efforts to sell his work to magazine publishers. Seen in retrospect. the character is the prototype of the 20th century outsider. Glasgow: GFI‘. Edinburgh: Filmhouse.
Karmina (IS) (Gabriel Pelletier. Canada. I996) I06 mins. In order to avoid an arranged marriage to a 'l‘ransylvanian vampire. young Karmina flees to America where she lives with her aunt and falls in love with a musician. But Vlad‘s not happy at being left at the altar. A touch of romance is added to the vampire genre in a movie that has met with a warm reception on the festival circuit. including the Audience Prize at Brussels. With Marilyn Manson's theatre- of-the-bizarre video for Beautiful People. Edinburgh: Filmhouse.
The Kill-Off (I8) (Maggie Greenwald. US. I989) Loretta Gross. Jackson Sims. Steve Monroe. 92 mins. Maggie Greenwald’s second feature stays relatively faithful to Jim Thompson‘s typically downbeat novel. In a dying beach resort. life is made hell by the bed-ridden demon Luane Devore. whose control over people‘s lives turns her into a telephone torturer. Influenced by Scorsese and the Coen Brothers' 810ml Simple. the film's unconventional storytelling is emphasised by stark photography and makes for hypnotic viewing. Edinburgh: Cameo. Kiss Me Deadly (18) (Robert Aldrich. US. I955) Ralph Meeker. Al Dekker. Maxine Cooper. l05 mins. A savage critique of Cold War paranoia that has become one of the key films of 50‘s consciousness. Although the Spillane brutality is well in evidence.
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Meeker as Hammer gives his roughness a kind of honesty as he doggedly persists without regard to the consequences. Brilliantly characterised. and directed with baroque ferocity. it remains a superb example of American nm'r. Edinburgh: Cameo.
LA. Confidential (18) (Curtis Hanson. US. I997) Kevin Spacey. Guy Pearce. Russell Crowe. Kim Basinger. I35 mins. Adapted from James Ellroy's neo-noir novel. the best American film of I997 evokes a glitzy post- WW2 Los Angeles underpinned by an all- pervasive. festering corruption. An intricate. drop-dead brilliant plot links bent cops. good cops. Hollywood star lookalike prostitutes and the mob. The dialogue crackles and the actors burn up the screen: one of the few films one would dare mention in the same breath as the definitive Chinatown. General release.
Last Tango in Paris ( I 8) (Bernardo Bertolucci. France/Italy. I973) Marlon Brando. Maria Schneider. 130 mins. A young Parisienne meets a middle-aged man with whom she develops an increasingly violent and purely sexual relationship. One of the key films of its decade. Bertolucci's powerful drama is a meditation on the expression and communication of personal identity through intense sexual contact. Glasgow: OFT.
Leaving Las Vegas (l8) (Mike Figgis. US. I995) Nicolas Cage. Elisabeth Shue. Julian Sands. I l0 mins. Sacked from his job. Ben (Cage) drives to Las Vegas with the sole intention of drinking himself to death. but during his descent comes across hooker Sera (Shue). another lost soul. Figgis's neon- drenched movie captures the irresponsible euphoria and mental pain of alcoholism from a subjective viewpoint. while the astonishing performances by the leads help it transcend the surface tawdriness and delve deep into underlying emotions. Edinburgh: Filmhouse.
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