Sunset Blvd – Review

It starts with just a street name and threatening ‘something has happened music’ We quickly learn it’s a murder. A man is floating in a swimming pool. We are promised the story of this man. The narrator knows it, fully. (Is this a hint […]

Subway (1985) – a Review

Helena (Isabelle Adjani) arrives, walking down a cold, hard, dirty metallic stair, dressed in exotic evening wear, her hair a perfect stylistic mess. This is how to make a film entrance. She is ready for her close-up, Mr Bresson.  (Later in the same scene […]

Review: Sapphire (1959) & Victim (1961)

Two films that have more in common than single words in their title. Both are criminal dramas, both directed by Basil Dearden and both use the format to address social issues. Sapphire starts as a simple mystery. A body of a female student has […]

Review: The Long Good Friday

The Long Good Friday is a British gangster film from the early 80s which combines some usual gangster film elements with some gritty British realism. It must be more than thirty years since I first saw it, and the first thing that struck me […]