One of the main criticisms I see of this film is that it is less succesful emotionally than it is technically and that it doesn't let us connect with its characters sufficiently. My main response to this criticism is, are you kidding me??? In two hours this film brings its protagonists to life more than most television shows manage to do in seventy hours. Tom Hanks has never been better than here, and quite probably neither has Paul Newman. The…
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You Only Live Twice 1967
Despite some iconic set design (Ken Adam's volcano base is truly amazing), a character-defining performance from Donald Pleasance as Blofeld, and some lovely location work, this is a step back from the stellar previous three entries in the Bond franchise. It has become fashionable to say that Sean Connery was 'phoning it in' and appeared disengaged and uninterested in this film, but frankly I blame the script, which gave him virtually nothing to work with as an actor. Most Bond…
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From Russia with Love 1963
The first great Bond film, and it frankly took the franchise a long time to make anything better than it. This is pure Fleming, a real espionage plot full of twists. I love that we spend the first 15 minutes with the villains before even meeting Bond - it has the effect of ratcheting up the tension, as instead of watching Bond try to figure things out, we must watch helplessly, wondering how he can avoid the trap waiting for…
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The Lives of Others 2006
A film of whispers in the dark - subtle, multitextured, oppressive, and utterly fascinating. The Lives of Others is the definitive film about what it was like to live behind the Iron Curtain, with a form of secret police that eschews more elaborate and heavy-handed means of torture in favour of slowly ruining its targets and driving them mad in a climate of suspicion and paranoia. The concept that totalitarian regimes survive by making everyone a little bit complicit is…
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