Neil Fox on film: Headhunters, The Cold Light Of Day

The Cold Light Of Day

Oh, you tried to sneak this past me, didn’t you? But you couldn’t.

You thought no TV adverts, no advance press shows and no coverage anywhere meant I wasn’t going to pass judgement didn’t you? Well sorry about that.

First up, let’s talk about what happened to Sigourney Weaver. Once one of the strongest, most fiercely independent of Hollywood actresses, reduced to an utter laughing stock in Avatar and now this. So sad.

Bruce Willis? He must have a Nicolas Cage-esque tax bill or there’s a producer with some very incriminating photos because here he just looks sad.

Three trailers, all telling the same story. Stock thriller trash as a hot young man discovers his family is not the shiny happy unit he thought, and his father (Willis) is a CIA agent.

Cue cross and double cross, yawn and fall asleep. Zero imagination or interest. I may be wrong, of course, but somehow, I don’t think I am.

Headhunters

The rise of Nordic crime fiction continues apace with this adaptation of Jo Nesbo’s popular book.

On the heels of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo and The Killing, this latest addition is prefaced with the author’s name above the title of the film. A strange honour usually reserved for Dickens or Shakespeare, and all the more telling because of that.

The film is a slick, smart mainstream thriller that just happens to be in Norweigan.

The film follows the tale of an arrogant businessman who steals art to keep up his expensive lifestyle. Spotting a chance at one big, last score he goes for it, only for his mark to reveal himself as also something of a game player.

Classic pulp stuff, with the glacial, pulsating Scandinavian sheen we have come to expect.

La Grande Illusion

It’s sad that the best film out this week is 75 years old, but Jean Renoir’s classic war film is back in a beautifully restored version and holds up aesthetically and emotionally.

It tells the story of two French soldiers captured behind enemy lines and their attempts to escape the camps they are held in.

Renoir takes time within the camps to look at the vagaries and intricacies of life as a soldier and an officer and the film is as thrilling and important as ever.

Wondrous cinema. Funny, gorgeous-looking and compelling. Modern and electric.

Titanic 3D

Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear. To spend time on this review would make me angry and send my blood pressure sky high. We don’t need this film re-released.

Seeing it in post-converted 3D will tell us nothing new, do nothing new. The film will still be a technically incredible but narratively vacant monolith of cliché.

Cameron and Lucas want to line their pockets and the sheep will happily hand over their hard-earned gold never once saying: Hang on, we deserve better. That’s sad. Stop exploiting us!

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