Favorite films

Recent reviews

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  Napoleon 2023

  ★★★ Watched 28 Nov 2023

  A belittlement of France’s Monarchy, a belittlement of the revolutionaries to bring it down, and a belittlement of the man himself, NAPOLEON, who brought it back up.

  Seen through Josephine’s eyes, his vulnerability is taken for weakness as Joaquín’s campish accent recites worshipful love-letters to his lover, undermining footage of transcendent accomplishment as he conquers Egyptian monuments. This unenthusiastic approach to history I’ve always found repulsive, particularly in academia as contracted teachers mumble over historical dates: Ridley’s approach felt like exactly that.…

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  Babylon 2022

  ★★★★ Watched 23 Feb 2023

  "You know she doesn't speak English?"

                                             "Neither does love."

  As cinema learns to speak English, will love translate? Hurwitz's score returns like love’s everlasting redolences, taking a new shape since La La Land. Letting out a jazzy roar of 1920's nightlife, his nocturnes fainten, as the MGM lion's roar strengthens, fed by musical cheques as they fatten. Chazelle explores a society…

Popular reviews

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  The Many Saints of Newark 2021

  ★★½ Watched 22 Sep 2021 4

  Sever the ties to my favourite show of all time and you have a sub-par mob flick, earnest of a ‘Netflix Original’ tag for it’s general dullness. Nevertheless I can’t hate hearing some Italian-American classics over some old-school violence.

  Harshly, while he can act, Michael Gandolfini doesn’t fit his fathers shoes and lacks the leadership T should extrude. The constant homages to the show and that caricature Silvio is exhausting, even the laughing hyenas in the cinema died down. The…

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  Dune 2021

  ★★★★½ Watched 25 Oct 2021 2

  A new age of sci-fi; cinema has reached a spike. From the cinemas left as quarantine-induced ghost town, then rejuvenated from the bustle of new releases, DUNE is the phoenix to rise from the ashes, courtesy of one of the most capable directors to be.

  Reading the fantastic original DUNE novel over the summer was a bitcoin-level investment. Only Denis could pass the test of leaving Frank Herbert’s vision undiluted, ‘Gom Jabbar’ style - minus the exclusion of Gurney’s baliset jams.

  The entire…