Film reviews

An archive of The Medium is Not Enough’s film reviews

Movies you should own

Movies you should own: Martha, Meet Frank, Daniel & Laurence

8 March 2008 Natalia Romanova 11 Comments

From the 17th March, Film4 are going to have a new range of budget DVD titles. The RRP is £6.99 and the films being released are:

  • The Yards
  • My Beautiful Launderette
  • She’s All That
  • Bostonians
  • Martha, Meet Frank, Daniel & Laurence
  • Raining Stones
  • Another Country
  • Maurice
  • Monsoon Wedding
  • Life is Sweet
  • Sexy Beast
  • Bread and Roses
  • Dogma
  • Buffalo Soldiers
  • My Name is Joe
  • Riff Raff
  • Heat and Dust
  • Europeans
  • Blue Juice
  • Gangster No. 1

I’ve just checked Amazon and they’re listing them at £15.99 discounted to £11.99, so I’d advise buying them in shops while the initial discount campaign is running at least.

Anyway, since I’m very partial to Monica Potter, Rufus Sewell and Ray Winstone, and don’t mind Tom Hollander (shame about Joseph Fiennes though), I ordered up a nice review copy of Martha, Meet Frank, Daniel & Laurence as a sample of the range.

They sent me 10.

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Movies you should own: The Satan Bug

28 February 2008 Natalia Romanova 9 Comments

One of my favourite genres is the “killer virus” milieu. Let’s face it, there’s nothing quite as scary as a disease that kills lots and lots of people, even if it can be stopped by Dustin Hoffman (Outbreak), immunity among the upper middle classes (Survivors) or talking to it (The Burning Zone).

Just have a think about their close cousin, the zombie movie, even the funny ones (Shaun of the Dead, Zombi Holocaust), and it won’t be long before the idea of some tiny little thing inside you that you can’t do anything to stop from killing you really does start to get upsetting.

So, for this and because it’s going to take me a while to scribble up lots and lots about Manhunter, I’m starting the long-promised “movies you should own” (aka “I’ve got it on DVD and you should to”) feature of this ‘ere blog with a shortish chat about The Satan Bug, probably the first proper entry in the killer virus canon.

Here are the creepy opening titles:

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Film reviews

Review: The Prestige

20 November 2006 Natalia Romanova 2 Comments

The Prestige

So in a fit of Daniel Craig-inspired self-loathing, I spent a few hours down the gym on Saturday. Now my normal Daniel Craig-esque physique is restored. Phew. But since my wife wanted me out the house for a while more – she works hard, she does, and I’m somewhat distracting, thanks to my aforementioned Daniel Craig-esque physique – I went to see The Prestige, a tale of two Victorian conjurors trying to kill each other.

The trouble with The Prestige is that it revolves around a single magic trick, done in three different ways. If you can guess two of them, it’s not a great movie but it’s still very interesting and fun; if you can’t, you’ll feel cheated when you hear how they’re done, but it’ll have been worth watching.

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Film reviews

Review: Superman Returns (IMAX 3D version)

2 August 2006 Natalia Romanova 3 Comments

Superman Returns

I don’t review movies much these days. That’s mainly because it normally takes me a couple of weeks to see anything that’s in the cinema (it’s not like I get to go to the premiere parties or anything), by which point the review’s kind of pointless. Plus I don’t see as many films as I used to, either.

But, I did see Superman Returns on Monday, down at the London IMAX, so I thought I’d let you know my thoughts, both about the movie and the IMAX 3D aspects of it.

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