DVD of the week: The Little Stranger
(12A) 111 mins, out January 14
A TANTALISING tale of loss and longing, a lament for things left behind disguised as a ghost story.
By turns hypnotic and jarring, it follows the return of Domhnall Gleeson’s Doctor Faraday to his childhood haunt of Hundreds Hall – an “uncanny” stately home being “pinned back together” by its owners, the Ayres family.
The characters are in need of similar retooling – most obviously in the case of Will Poulter’s wounded RAF pilot Roderick, displaying the physical and psychological scars of war.
The damage is subtler for Gleeson. His character’s name – evoking pioneering scientist Michael Faraday – is not a coincidence. He’s even called a “wizard” by Roderick’s sister Caroline (Ruth Wilson).
At the time, it’s meant as a compliment. But that increasingly seems misguided as the mystery spirals, nerves fray and blood is spilt.
“This house works on people,” muses Ayres matriarch Charlotte Rampling early on, signalling the supernatural intrigue that kicks in after a shocking, gory mishap.
Aside from the peerless Rampling, Wilson does the best job of disappearing into her character.
Despite a deliberately buttoned-up performance that only hints at his simmering rage, it is hard to shift the sense that Gleeson’s moustache is wearing him and not the other way round.
An intriguing, unsettling curio, based on Sarah Waters’ Booker-shortlisted novel, in which much is said in glances and still more left unsaid.
It’s a shame the largely redundant voiceover occasionally shakes us from this enigmatic slow-burner’s otherwise lyrical slumber.
★★★★☆
King Of Thieves
(15) 103 mins, out January 14
IN one early scene of this take on the 2015 Hatton Garden robbery, Michael Caine explains the elusive quality that makes a flawless diamond sparkle so brilliantly compared to more workaday stones. He might be talking about the film itself.
Caine, playing veteran tea-leaf Brian Reader, leads a stellar line-up of Ray Winstone, Paul Whitehouse, Jim Broadbent, Tom Courtenay and Michael Gambon as the doomed diamond wheezers.
The set-up is perfect movie fodder – and perhaps that’s the problem. Too often this coasts along, relying on the inherent comedy value of superannuated scoundrels effing and jeffing their way through an unlikely last job.
The script is very sweary but simply not sharp enough and while the cast are always watchable, they dazzle only briefly, bumbling gruffly through much of the running time.
The novelty eventually wears off of national treasures dropping C-bombs and moaning about the internet, leaving neither The Jewel Monty nor Reservoir Codgers – too mean-spirited for a comedy, lacking the suspense of a satisfying crime flick.
As rivalries seethe, the tone darkens. But rarely does director James Marsh (The Theory Of Everything) recapture the early pathos shared by Caine and screen wife Francesca Annis (disappointingly killed off in the first few minutes).
Like the 2016 Dad’s Army movie, this feels like a missed opportunity. At least all involved had a lovely time making it.
In one of the disc’s few bonus features, Courtenay gets rheumy-eyed about the priceless banter the cast shared between takes. Shame most of it ended up on the cutting-room floor.
★★★☆☆
The Nun
(15) 96 mins, out January 14
ENJOYABLY daft prequel that adds backstory, if few scares, to the popular Conjuring franchise.
A grisly suicide in a creepy Romanian convent kicks off this CG-dominated Fifties-set romp, in which “Blue Nun” is not a retro bottle of wine but a shrieking, hyperventilating portent of doom.
This might more accurately have been called Zombie Sisters Run Wild – and serious horror acolytes will dismiss this out of hand. Hereditary it ain’t, but neither is it boring.
The dialogue is risible and most of us saw scarier things in the mirror on the morning of New Year’s Day.
But there are some truly arresting images and the laughs, though largely accidental, come thick and fast.
A climactic Big Bad vaguely reminiscent of Danny Devito’s Penguin in Batman Returns ensures this goes out with a bang, not a wimple. Okay, a bit of both.
★★★☆☆
The House With A Clock In Its Walls
(12A) 102 mins, out January 14
JACK Black and Cate Blanchett bring serious star power to this uneven foray into family fare by horror auteur Eli Roth.
Their chemistry is the highlight in a chronicle of warring witches and warlocks that never quite takes flight.
For a tale about magic, it feels muddled and mechanical, at once both curiously insubstantial and leaden with backstory. (A neat trick, in its way.)
With some scares for younger viewers and a few wry laughs for grown-ups, there are worse ways to spend a January afternoon – and fans of the John Bellairs source novel may find it more rewarding.
Sadly, after a promising start, that ticking sound you could hear was me counting the minutes until the end.
★★☆☆☆
MOST READ IN FILM
Backtrace
(15) 92 mins, out January 14
IT’S a funny old time for Sylvester Stallone. As Creed 2 adds further prestige to his unkillable Rocky franchise, the Italian Stallion keeps cropping up in forgettable fodder like this.
Remember his 2013 jailbreak joint Escape Plan, which paired Sly with Arnie in what would have been The Biggest Thing Ever just 30 short years ago? Thought not.
Here, Stallone squares off with that other muscular colossus of action cinema, Matthew Modine, back in the public consciousness off the back of Stranger Things and slowly morphing, by the looks of it, into Harrison Ford’s non-union stunt double.
A botched robbery and hoaky hallucinogens set the stage for some shouting, some shooting and the occasional shoeing.
The action is rote, the look televisual – oddly juxtaposed with a trippy Jacob’s Ladder plot and portentous, synthy soundtrack that channels Vangelis doing Inception.
A couple of well-crafted lines bring unexpected chortles but most interest comes from gazing in wonderment at what surgery and seniority have done to Stallone’s agonised slab of a face.
Destined to sink without a Backtrace.
★★☆☆☆
Linkhttps://textbacklinkexchanges.com/check-out-this-weeks-top-picks-from-a-tantalising-tale-of-loss-and-longing-to-fun-family-fare-filled-with-magic/
News Pictures Check out this week’s top picks from a tantalising tale of loss and longing to fun family fare filled with magic
You don’t have to pack away your bikini just because you’re the wrong side of 20. These body-beautiful stars reveal their secrets to staying in shape and prove you can smoulder in a two-piece, whatever your age. Read on and be bikini inspired!
TEENS
Hayden Panettiere
Size: 8
Age: 18
Height: 5ft 1in
Weight: 8st
To achieve her kick-ass figure, Hayden – who plays cheerleader Claire Bennet in Heroes – follows the ‘quartering’ rule. She eats only a quarter of the food on her plate, then waits 20 minutes before deciding whether she needs to eat again.
Hayden says: “I don’t have a model’s body, but I’m not one of those crazy girls who thinks that they’re fat. I’m OK with what I have.”
Nicollette says: “I don’t like diets – I see it, I eat it! I believe in eating healthily with lots of protein, vegetables and carbs to give you energy.”
kim cattrall
Size: 10-12
Age: 52
Height: 5ft 8in
Weight: 9st 4lb
SATC star Kim swears by gym sessions with Russian kettle bells (traditional cast-iron weights) and the South Beach Diet to give her the body she wants. To avoid overeating, Kim has a radical diet trick – squirting lemon juice on her leftovers – so she won’t carry on picking.
Kim says: “I am no super-thin Hollywood actress. I am built for men who like women to look like women.”
https://www.thesun.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/NINTCHDBPICT000460994293.jpg?strip=all&w=685
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