FILM reviews

Arts and Antiques Sale

Edinburgh

Phillips would like to introduce their regular. monthly sales of Arts and Antiques. the next will take place on Thursday 12th October at item.

This sale includes a variety of furniture, pictures, clocks, rugs, ceramics and collectables, silver and jewellery, all dating from the 19th and 20th centuries.

The sale is open to all and our friendly and knowledgeable staff will be happy to assist new buyers.

You can preview this sale on Tuesday tOth October from 9.30am 7pm and on Wednesday 11th October from 9.30am 4.30pm.

For further information please call Nick Burns or Clare Arbuthnott on

0131 225 2266.

Phillips Auctioneers 65 George Street Edinburgh

Scofland

EH2 2JL

www.phi|lips-auctions.com

Phillips

32 THE LIST 5 i9 Oct 2000

Titus

(18) 162 mins * t t

A colourful and appropriately gruesome adaptation of Shakespeare’s bloodiest play, Titus Andronicus. Roman general Titus (Anthony Hopkinsl returns home after conquering the Goths. But when playboy Emperor Saturninus (Alan Cummingl takes the surVivmg Goth queen, Tamora (Jessica Lange) as his wife, a series of tragic events are set in motion which wreaks havoc on the Andronicus lineage.

Titus Andronicus is a difficult and little-performed play, but first-time film director Julie Taymor producer of the highly successful Lion King stage adaptation makes a brave stab at it. Visuaily, the film looks great, though it tips rather crude Cinematic snooks at everything from The Cook, The Thief, His Wife And Her Lover through Romeo And Juliet and Miller’s Crossing to The Matrix. Despite this it remains very much a theatrical experience. Some nice anachronisms apart ta Rome based on mid 30s Berlin), this never really convmces as cellulOid reVisionism, unlike recent verSions of Richard III or Romeo And Juliet.

Still, Titus is well worth a look if only to watch Hopkins actually stretch himself for the first time in a decade it's a brilliant performance, spiralling into dark, broken-hearted madness. Strong support from all of the cast make this an absorbing, if derivative three-hour ride. (Paul Dale)

I GFT,‘ Glasgow, Film/rouse, Edinburgh from Fri 6 Oct. See prevrew

Sorted

(18) 99 mins a r 4r

The world of clubbing rarely fares well on the silver screen, but first-timer Alex Jovy has managed something of a coup by brilliantly evoking sweaty, Jam-packed dancefloors. Unfortunately, this knack for rendering the nation's favourite pastime is left on the back-burner for much of Sorted

Instead, there's a cartoon thriller with a labyrinthine plot centring around the death of Justin, a mild- mannered accOuntant by day, drug-hoover party bOy by night, played, bizarrely enough, by ex-Blue Peter presenter Tim Vincent. Justin’s untimely demise brings Carl (Mathew Rhysl to the big smoke from SCunthorpe, and, in the COUFSG of his investigations he falls for his dead brother’s ex, Sunny, and goes on a bender With his dead brother's unsavoury chums.

Rhys is competent in sweet~faced ingenue mode, while newcomer Sienna Guillory lonce the face of Hugo Bossl strugg!es as Sunny, but the film comes alive With its supporting cast. Tim Curry plays the oleaginous drug baron-cum—health shop iinpresario super-baddy to the hilt, spouting cod-Shakespeare as if he has been told to Out-camp all his preVious roles

Surprisingly enough, the court-sanctioned heterosexual Jason Donovan also steals his scenes as a cross-dressing gay DJ and Customs officer. In the end, Sorted is a lightweight knockabout bit of fluff, and thor0tighly enjoyable as such iJack Mottraml I Selected release from Fri 6 Oct.

Anachronistic Shakespeare adaptation

Enjoyable knockabout fluff

Romeo Must Die

(15) 115 mins £- *

Tagged as an urban Romeo And Juliet, here's Shakespeare as obscmed by hip hop and kung fu. When two warring crime families tone black, one Chinese) are hit by tragedy, the surViVing offspring (Jet Li and R&B star Aaliyah‘i team up to avenge their brothers' deaths.

Unsurprisingly, the film’s interpretation of kung fu is more ‘radical' than its Shakespeare, at one point it's fused wrth football. l\leanwhile, the overuse of CGI effects leaves no room for a sCience as basic as chemistry between the two leads, let alone anything as biological as an actual snog This is basically a martial arts display attached to a vaguely flirtatious friendship Lighter touches are added, however, these descend into awful silliness when a Villain’s trousers are whipped off inidfight. Comic efforts such as these do little to combat the laborious opening half hour, during which the most basic: of plots is far too convoluted

As actor, producer and director of films such as the Shao/in Temple and Once Upon A Time In China series, Li is a huge star in both China and Hong Kong it’s a shame, then, that his first starring role in an American film tfollowng a supporting part in Lethal Weapon 4i is so disappomting iJudith Hol Se/ec tecl release from Fri 13 Oct

Shakespeare. kung fu style