Editorial
The summer issue of Sight and Sound is all about science fiction in films. Mike Williams name-checks too many to mention. He says, "We are already living in the future."
Opening Scenes
Nick Bradshaw's article "On Thin Ice" is all about a new film from Sara Dosa called Time and Water that is all about Iceland's melting glaciers.
Editor's Choice
Bristol's Cinema Rediscovered Festival (22-26 July) includes Whistle Down The Wind (1961) and an exhibition from their local heroes: 50 Years of Aardman.
In Production
The director of some fairly recent movies, Brad Bird, has released an animation for adults. Ray Gunn is, apparently, a futuristic sci-fi but with the inspiration of 1940's private detective thrillers. On Netflix in the autumn.
In Conversation
The director/writer Imran Perretta talks about his new film Ish. It's about two Muslim boys growing up in Luton.
Under the Influence
The new black comedy Rosebush Pruning (maybe get some tips) is from director Karim Ainouz. He tells Hope Rangaswani about seven films as influences. But only Pedro Almodóvar's early films struck a chord.
News in Brief
Nothing of interest.
Mean Sheets
The hand-painted posters by Tony Stella include that superb illustration for La Chimera. (See my review).
Reader's Letters
Some interesting items for a change. Stephen Ames remembers Tony Stella with a tribute. Neil Sinyard extols the virtues of Patricia Rozema's Mansfied Park (1999) as the best adaptation of a Jane Austen novel. Terry Hanstock cannot stand the violation of end credits of films on iPlayer, and Peter Jones laments the loss of film studies courses, except for De Montfort University's degree.
The Long Take
Pamela Hutchinson tells us about her love for screwball comedies. (Screwball is slang for a kook, the way baseball player Carl Hubbell started throwing pitches at the end of the 1930s). Anyway, these films are being shown in a season at the Garden Cinema in London. Pamela runs through a history of some of the best of the genre. Including She Done Him Wrong, starring Mae West, might be a controversial choice from 1933. Then that Marilyn Monroe season at BFI Southbank that includes Monkey Business (1952) with Cary Grant and Ginger Rogers. Apparently "these films consoled and distracted audiences through the great deprivations of the 1930s and war years. Then on to more modern creations, including the award-winning Anora (2024) and soon-to-be-released One Night Only.
Flick Lit
Nicole Flattery tells us about the new book London Falling that is by New Yorker journalist Patrick Radden Keefe. His previous books are not what I would ever read, nor is this one. Nicole quotes, 'London, a city seemingly sustained by empty promises of wealth and luxury". What nonsense, when the story is about "a liar, capable of inventing different personalities", who plunged to his death from a high-rise balcony. Keefe seems to just write about sensational stories. I'm surprised at Nicole for picking this book.
TV Eye
Andrew Male asks why dramas set in Liverpool are only about crime. As one writer puts it, "only what I'm allowed to write". A six-part series starring Sheridan Smith called The Cage is exactly that. Andrew asks if Liverpool is "a metaphor for present-day Britain itself". I was just going to mention Z-Cars (1962–1978), but Andrew gets in first. Back to The Cage, Tony Schumacher "cannot help but reinforce age-old cliches about his home city". This is, apparently, a "bleakly witty state of the nation drama". On BBC1.
Cannes Bulletin
Sixteen pages, but why start with Ken Russell's The Devils (1971) – "the screening not to miss" – when I thought this festival was about new movies? But if, according to Isabel Stevens, this was the highlight, I worry about what is to come. However, there was that best director win for Pavel Pawlikowski's German feature Fatherland that sounds interesting, especially as it stars Sandra Huller who talks to Nicolas Rapolo.
There follow reviews of twenty-six films, including Hamaguchi Ryusuke's All of a Sudden, which sounds interesting. Then Parallel Tales, directed by Asghar Farhadi, which stars Isabelle Huppert. But well over two hours long. Fyord won the Palme d'Or but was controversial and not for me. An American film from James Gray called Paper Tiger stars Miles Teller, Scarlett Johanson and Adam Driver. Then Pedro Almodóvar's *Bitter Christmas* sounds just right for me. Then Her Private Hell is the new film from Nicolas Winding Refn, but it might not even be released in the UK.
However, I'm not at all interested in Mark Cousins' The Story of Documentary Film: The 1970's or Stephen Soderbergh's John Lennon: The Last Interview or Emmanuel Marre's A Man of His Time, where France is revisiting World War 2. Discoveries include eleven films that the Sight and Sound critics liked, but nothing there for me. There is a documentary from Bruce Dern called Dernsie: The Amazing Life of Bruce Dern, but here he talks to Nicolas Rapolo about his career.
Then I nearly missed a single column, a minor conversation piece that has five marvellous quotes from Peter Jackson (who won an honorary Palme d'Or), Demi Moore (on the jury), Emanuele Marre (best screenplay for A Man of His Time), Andrey Zvyagintsev (director of the Grand Prix-winning Minotaur) and Park Chan-wook (jury president).
21st Century Sci-Fi Cinema
Here are sixty pages of groundbreaking films for each year from 2000 to 2026. The feature starts with a long introductory article by Michael Atkinson. But his is just a list of movies strung together with the odd note. But I did like the first full page still from Snowpiercer, starring John Hurt. But what is next is mainly a rehash of articles from previous issues of Sight and Sound. Those movies that interested me are the following:
2001 Donnie Darko. (Is this actually sci-fi? It's definitely weird).
2002 Minority Report. A proper sci-fi Steven Speilberg blockbuster.
2009 Avatar. Not for me.
2010 Monsters. Gareth Edwards's debut, a low-budget success.
2012 Resident Evil: Retribution. Paul W S Anderson's guilty pleasure.
2013 Under the Skin. Jonathon Glazer's memorable weirdness. (That long article from April 2014).
2016 Arrival. Dennis Villeneuve directed Amy Adams in another memorable alien visitation.
2018 High Life. Claire Dennis directs a starry cast of Robert Pattinson and Juliette Binoche.
2019 Add Astra. James gray directed Brad Pitt as the astronaut.
2022 NOPE. Jordan Peele's excellent blockbuster starring Daniel Kalunya.
2026 Synthetic Sincerity. Out in July.
Reality Tech
Seven talking points about artificial intelligence in relation to movies. But none were that interesting.
Then Kim Newman's quiz for a sci-fi movie set in every year from 2001 to 2050.
There is a newly restored film of The Girls from the 1978 London Film Festival in cinemas. Here is the interview with Sri Lankan director Sumitra Peries by Mark Cousins.
Reviews: Films
Rosebush Pruning. That great cast, but maybe not for me.
Backrooms. See my review 11th June 2026. Kim Newman explains how director Kane Parsons first created those shorts on YouTube from 2022 that were the inspiration for this feature. (I also recognised the dangerous doppelganger from Clark's TV adverts who was the protagonist at the end). However, it was only the casting of Chiewetel Ejiofor and Renate Reinsve that encouraged me to see the film. Kim liked the set that is a character in itself. "The third significant explorer of this closed universe is .... the viewer. "And that is unsettling.
The Invite. I have seen the trailer a couple of times, and it looks interesting. Nicolas Rapolo tells us about this four-hander that I think looks quite theatrical. This is director Olivia Wilde's third feature after Booksmart (2019) and Don't Worry Darling (2022). This is the classic dinner party, but they don't really know their guests. *Not an entirely predictable story", but obviously very wordy by Rashida Jones and Will McCormack. And I always want to see a film with Penelope Cruz.
Koln 75. Leigh Singer reviews this film based on Keith Jarrett's legendary actual "landmark hour-long solo improvised concert". (Watch it on YouTube, especially the comments that explain everything.) He is played by John Magaro. Vera Brandes (played by Mala Emde) is the precocious eighteen-year-old promoter. We are in West Germany in the 1970s, and it looks like it. Showing at The Rex, Berkhamsted, but I missed it.
The Last Viking. A Danish film that looks pretty bonkers from the trailers. But it could be interesting and on at Cineworld and The Rex. A mixed bag of characters at a family summer house, including the search for some buried loot from a fifteen-year-old heist.
Virginia Woolf's Night and Day. Kit Francis Bradbury Rance reviews this adaptation of one of Woolf's more accessible stories. Just looking at the cast for this period drama set in 1920, you know it will be fine. Haley Bennett plays Katherine (Kit) Hilbery, a young woman from a well-off family whose passion is astronomy. There is a supporting cast to die for: her parents played by Timothy Spall and Jennifer Saunders ("on exceptional form"), as well as Sally Phillips and Jack Whitehall. The list goes on. Tina Gharavi directs.
Relegated to the bottom of the smallest column possible is The Devil Wears Prada 2. I'm surprised it even got a mention.
DVD and BLU-RAY
Gilda. The 1946 movie has a brand new restoration complete with interviews, etc. It starred Rita Hayworth and Glenn Ford. Michael Atkinson reviews the film's background and tells us, "Charles Vidor's film is easily his most famous and distinctive. " And "Hayworth's Gilda is an open flame every man and woman would stick their hand into." (Lots more like that). Such as "It's hothouse danger was a fever that left America's immune systems permanently compromised."
Crucible of Horror. I might have missed this on first release in 1971. A Hammer horror drama starring Michael Gough.
It's a long time since I watched Leaving Las Vegas, which starred Nicolas Cage and Elizabeth Shue. Great casting of the former as the "suicidally alchoholic screenwriter". Directed by Mike Figgis.
Hammer Volume Seven: Shiops and Giggles. I don't remember having read about these Hammer box sets from Powerhouse Indicator. This volume of four films is basically their "uncelebrated comedy output". Maybe not.
The Cars That Eat Paris. Sounds familiar but not when I read the review. Peter Weir's directing debut.
Insomnia. The Norwegian original from 1997, remade by Christopher Nolan in 2002 with Al Pacino and Robin Willaims.
Five Easy Pieces. Pamela Hutchinson says, "Jack Nicholson has never been better than in Bob Rafelson's manic, mournful 1970 drama". Here is an outstanding new 4K restoration.
Books
A Sudden Flicker of Light: A Revisionist History of Movies by David Thomson. One to add to my eight volumes of his meaty books on film. When I first skipped through this edition of Sight and Sound, I wondered if there was enough to keep me interested in keeping up the subscription. Then I find here, very close to the end of this edition, a full-page review of Thomson's latest book that goes straight onto my Christmas list. John Bleasedale takes us through "so many revelations" and "so many insights". Yes, it's another history of movies, but this time Thomson "charts a decline" with a worry "that something was wrong from the get-go". But for someone who has made a fruitful career from writing about films, is this a strange or just a provocative look at our obsession with the medium? Just look at that still from Sunset Boulevard (1950) and Gloria Swanson's crazed face.
Jane Fonda by Marilyn S. Greenwald. A book not just about her films but also about her career as an activist, her childhood, three marriages and children.
From the Archive
Here we have the full article by David Robinson from the Spring 1966 edition of Sight and Sound. All six pages, including photos, are about "A Close Encounter with Stanley Kubrick". But not close enough to get an interview! He visits the studio making 2001: A Space Odyssey. (Of course, this was selected for this sci-fi issue). What I didn't remember was that Kubrick wrote the screenplay (such as it is) with Arthur C. Clarke. I vividly remember seeing this film at the Odeon Leicester Square soon after it opened in 1968. (As apparently did Christopher Nolan).
This Month in ..... 1992
On the cover was Sigourney Weaver's Ripley for the first of the Alien movies. Reviews included those for Robert Altman's The Player and Bille August's Palme d'Or-winning The Best Intentions.
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