Favorite films

Pinned reviews

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  Muriel, or the Time of Return 1963

  ★★★★½ Watched 09 Sep 2024

  Every person is a world.

  In a scenario redolent of Akerman's Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles, Seyrig's Hélène lives with her dependant Son Bernard, (a troubled Stepson recently returned from military service in Algeria), running errands & chores. Their quiet, coastal town existence is disrupted by the arrival (return) of Hélène's first love, Alphonse accompanied by his niece.

  The setting for Muriel is Boulogne sur Mer, a town bombed out during WWII and this is apt, Muriel has…

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  The War Is Over 1966

  ★★★★½ Watched 02 Sep 2024

  Not so much a political thriller but a wander through the labyrinthine mind of Diego, a jaded but principled Spanish dissident, who in opposition to Franco's fascist rule is heavily involved with a resistance. A resistance, it seems, that is something of a relic in the eyes of the younger generation who are more inclined to take up arms in their righteous anger.

  Resnais fractures the linear story with imagery conjured from the mind of Diego, of plans gone awry,…

Recent reviews

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  Harlan County U.S.A. 1976

  ★★★★½ Rewatched 15 Mar 2025

  The Dignity of Labour (Pt 1).

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  Murder by Decree 1979

  ★★★ Watched 24 Feb 2025

  Fascinating premise. However, fogbound, egg bound, constipated.

Popular reviews

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  Humanité 1999

  ★★★★★ Watched 29 Nov 2019

  The World Is As Soft As Lace....

  Bruno Dumont's Police procedural that isn't a Police procedural.....but is.

  Set in the Northern French town of Bailleul, it stars Emmanuel Schotté as our protagonist (with a countenance straight out of 17th Century Flemish art *Rubens' Portrait of a Young Man*) Pharaon De Winter, a Police detective who is assigned to the case of the rape and murder of an 11 year old girl.

  Pharoan 'wasn't made for these times' let alone the…

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  Made in England: The Films of Powell and Pressburger 2024

  ★★★★★ Watched 10 May 2024

  All You Need Is Powell & Pressburger. Powell & Pressburger Is All You Need.

  A profoundly moving film in which a profoundly moved Scorsese charts his discovery and love (a liberally sprinkled noun in this documentary) for P&P, in one sequence early in the film a very Schoonmakeresque edit curtails what looked like Scorsese choking up. 

  Love is a recurring theme in The Archers canon but there was no stronger love, it seems, than the love between the men - love at…