FILM & TV

*MILD SPOILER BELOW*
A capsule review of the Russo Brothers' EXTRACTION on Netflix would describe it as thrilling and kinetic, with a forward momentum and open depiction of violence that rivals the visceral bone-crunch of Gareth Evans' masterpiece, THE RAID.

It's not easy creating something fresh when making a new sci-fi series. There's so much heritage to draw from, sometimes deliberately, sometimes not. Creators can be so infected by ideas from the past that the new work can never quite shake off the limitations of the material that may have inspired it. 

Netflix’ new Original series. UNORTHODOX, subtitled The Scandalous Rejection Of My Hasidic Roots, based on Deborah Feldman's autobiographical book, is compelling and often astonishing.

If you put LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE, HUNT FOR THE WILDERPEOPLE and (Joe Johnston's undervalued) OCTOBER SKY into a blender, you'd arrive at TROOP ZERO. It's a homespun independent drama about a young misfit girl named Christmas Flint in rural Georgia dealing with the loss of her mother by attempting to communicate with her using a flashlight at night.

What to make of Amazon's HUNTERS? I can't be comfortable with it and yet find it compelling. However, no matter what the makers say, it represents the Tarantinisation of history and the fetishism of Nazism.

I'd had my doubts about Olivia Colman as HRH, partly because Claire Foy was so good, but also because Colman is not a natural “royal". That's a very working-class family name.

SPENSER CONFIDENTIAL is a Netflix Original Movie reboot of the popular television series, SPENSER: FOR HIRE, which ran in the mid-80s. That was based on a series of books written by Robert B Parker, an influential crime writer from Boston.

The downside first. Okay, let’s say it. Much of the movie is plain weird.

What makes it so? The two lead characters, elf brothers, go on a quest accompanied by their deceased father. However, pop has only half materialised, from the waist down.

Scuzzy, raw, impeccable, frenetic, kinetic, chaotic, sublime, masterly, uncomfortable, and wilfully awkward in places... you watch UNCUT GEMS and surrender to the flight of a character holding on by the skin of his (fake) teeth as he wheels around New York City doing his deals, making his wagers and last-minute trade-offs.

BIRDS OF PREY is brash, loud, violent, funny, and impeccably choreographed. It’s written by Christina Hodson, directed by Cathy Yan, and produced by its star, Margot Robbie. This can and must be celebrated. 

Bong Joon-Ho’s PARASITE deserves all the plaudits, it should win all the awards. It was a worthy winner of the Palme d’Or in Cannes this year.

JEWELL works so well because Eastwood, while denying the camera, cinematography, and editing the right to flourish, created an environment where his cast could. Sam Rockwell, Kathy Bates, John Hamm and Olivia Wilde are excellent, while the relatively unknown Paul Thomas Hauser as the title character gives a "performance of a lifetime."

In literary adaptations, Jo March is like Peter Parker or Dracula; you feel you don't need another interpretation, you already have plenty and are very fond of one from before, thank you very much, so why make another version? And then the film arrives and it lands perfectly and you find, after all, there is room in your heart and your life is changed.

Rian Johnson’s KNIVES OUT is a splendid return-to-form after the career mis-step of taking on STAR WARS: THE LAST JEDI. Don’t let that film put you off.