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Film
The Reader
Dir: Stephen Daldry
2hrs 3mins (15)
Controversial drama about
the legacy of Nazism
★★
Che: Part One
Dir: Steven Soderbergh
2hrs 6mins (15)
Biopic of the cult
revolutionary figure
★★
Australia
Dir: Baz Luhrmann
2hrs 45mins (12A)
Botched epic starring
Nicole Kidman
★
DVD to rent
Man on Wire (12A)
★★★★
An extraordinary film about
an extraordinary man. In
1974, the French high-wire
artist Philippe Petit, assisted
by a handful of friends,
walked along a length of
cable fixed between the two
towers of New York’s World
Trade Centre. James Marsh’s
documentary combines
footage of the period,
interviews with the principal
players and dramatised
reconstructions of the
operation; it does full justice
to Petit’s spectacular coup.
ARTS 23
Adapted from the bestselling novel by Bernhard
Schlink, The Reader stars Kate Winslet as a bus
conductor in 1950s Germany who embarks on a
passionate affair with a teenage boy (David Kross).
The film seems unsure whether it wants to be a
glossy “transatlantic prestige” movie with its eye on
the Oscars, or a more considered, art-house picture
about the guilt of Germany’s war generation, said
Jonathan Romney in The Independent on Sunday.
There are several fine moments, but you can feel
director Stephen Daldry straining not to alienate his
core, Oprah-watching audience with too many tough
moral questions. The film certainly left a sour taste in my mouth, said Peter Bradshaw in The
Guardian. This is a story about lies, Nazis and corrupted sexuality, but Daldry deals with these
highly sensitive issues in a way that’s “naive, glib and meretricious”. The Reader may be flawed,
but we should be grateful that films as intelligent and ambitious as this are still being made, said
Allan Hunter in the Daily Express. Daldry has given us an unarguably “thought-provoking”
picture, with Winslet surely on course to receive yet another Oscar nomination.
Steven Soderbergh’s marathon four-hour film about
the life of Che Guevara (Benicio Del Toro) has been
split into two parts, with the second instalment due
in British cinemas at the end of next month. Part
One is “a strong early candidate for the most
agonisingly tedious film of 2009”, said Chris Tookey
in the Daily Mail. “Che is represented throughout as
a secular saint, rather than the Stalin-worshipping,
mass-murdering communist who helped to destroy
industry, society and the rule of law in Cuba” that he
really was. Del Toro certainly plays Che as “an aloof
and reproving figure, rather than an inspirational
one”, said Tim Robey in The Daily Telegraph. For some reason, the actor appears to have lost the
“danger and charisma” of his early career, qualities which might have “illuminated Che the radical
pin-up and given the film some focus”. You must watch the entire thing fully to appreciate what
“an intelligent, fast-moving, well researched film” this is, said Philip French in The Observer. Seen
in its entirety, Soderbergh’s epic offers a rounded portrait “of a great and complex revolutionary”.
“There is only one rational explanation capable of
explaining the existence of Baz Luhrmann’s obese
outback epic Australia,” said Luke Buckmaster in
Film Australia. “It’s an elaborate joke. A ruse. A
gag.” Somebody must have challenged Luhrmann
to make “the most astonishingly bad Australian
film of all time”. The preposterous story revolves
around an English aristocrat (Nicole Kidman) who
falls in love with a rugged cattleman (Hugh Jackman)
while running a cattle station in the Northern
Territory. “I concede that Australia has many
flaws – sentimentality, silliness, bad dialogue, twodimensional characters – and that it goes on for ever,” said Cosmo Landesman in The Sunday
Times. However, it doesn’t deserve the critical mauling it has received. After all, said Anthony
Quinn in The Independent, what do people expect from Luhrmann, “cinema’s most exuberant
vulgarian”? Australia is exactly the kind of “kitsch mish-mash” on which he built his reputation.
The unknown 26-year-old taking over the Tardis
It was one of the most closely
“prominent black actor”, and even
guarded secrets in the history of
Catherine Zeta-Jones, had been
the BBC, said James Tapper in The
offered the part. Instead, the honour
Mail on Sunday. Prior to his
of “battling Daleks and Zygons” has
unveiling as the new Doctor Who,
fallen to the youngest actor in the
only a handful of people in the
show’s 45-year history. Smith, who
cosmos knew that 26-year-old Matt
appeared opposite Billy Piper in The
Smith had won the chance to take
Ruby in the Smoke two years ago,
over as the Time Lord from David
impressed the BBC hierarchy at his
Tennant. At his first photo shoot on
first audition. “The way he said the
Christmas Eve, “even the stylist
lines, the way he looked, the hair.
Smith:
“spot-on”
and photographer were not told
Everything was spot-on,” said
what the picture was about. The Tardis was
executive producer Steven Moffat.
digitally inserted in the background later on.”
However, Who fans will have to wait until
For many fans of the series, the choice of
October 2010 to catch their first glimpse of the
Smith came as something of a shock, said
new Doctor. David Tennant is slated to film four
Caroline Davies and David Smith in The
special episodes this year before handing over
Observer. There were strong rumours that a
the Sonic Screwdriver.
10 January 2009 THE WEEK