Poker Face: Season Two (2025 Rhian Johnson)

The Game is a Foot. Cynthia Eribo (Widows, Bad Times at the El Royale) gets to plays five members of family, vying for inheritance of mother's estate. Great fun. Writers Laura Deeley, Teo Ho. Directed by Johnson.

Last Looks. Charlie befriends a woman (Katie Holmes) who's going to leave her husband, mortician Giancarlo Esposito. He uses a movie filming to cover his crime. Written by Natasha Lyonne (and directed by her also) and Alice Ju.

We both loved this shot

Whack-a-Mole. Crime boss Rhea Perlman catches up with Charlie and tries to get her to help with spies in the organization, leading to great line 'You want me to rat on my mole, like a snake?' Writers Wyatt Cain, Tea Ho. 

We love the character of Charlie and the way Natasha plays her.

The Taste of Human Blood. Mad episode featuring a friendly alligator, 'Daisy' (except when on meth). (It was only after that I remembered there is a film called An Alligator Named Daisy.) And Gaby Hoffmann. Wyatt Cain and Tea Ho wrote it.

Hometown Hero. Murder at the ball game. Carol Kane the only actor we recognised. After the alligator one, this features some very trippy material in animated form. Writers Tony Tost.

Sloppy Joseph. A very competitive girl in public school. Featuring David Krumholtz (who acted with Natasha in Slums of Beverley Hills) and Margo Martindale. Written by Kate Thulin.

The format seems to be - something happens, then we wind back and see how Charlie is involved.

Which is certainly the case in brilliant episode One Last Job written by Taofik Kolade, in which a writer Sam Richardson has written a great heist screenplay about a man who cracks the safe at work and steals the money, but the gang fall apart. To push him into becoming a professional writer, his boss Corey Hawkins fires him. Embittered, he joins up with dodgy James Ransone and they decide to commit the burglary for real. Then... And then, or rather before, Charlie turns up as an Indian takeaway deliverer and hooks up (eventually) with Hawkins.  The riffs on film vs reality climax in the action movie finale. Also a brilliant use of the Lady From Shanghai hall of mirrors scene projected over dozens of TV screens. It was directed by exec producer Adam Arkin.

However the normal format is disrupted in The Sleazy Georgian, when Charlie gets mixed up with a group of con men, written by Megan Amram - Melanie Lynskey (Heavenly Creatures) is the woman who gets sucked into the con game, John Cho the sucker. With Joel Marsh Garland.

And then Charlie interferes with the murder of Awkwafina by getting pushed out of a window in A New Lease on Death, with Alia Shawkat, written by Tea Ho and Wyatt Cain.

The Big Pump. Murder at gymnasium, where owner is dealing baby milk as a health supplement! Charlie tells new Patti Harrison her special powers under an amusing '23 seconds later' title.

I just looked up Natasha Lyonne - Wilder, has she been in a lot of things. And her debut, believe it or not, was in Heartburn! (Meryl Streep's niece.) We never did watch Russian Doll, which she co-created.

Code of Silence / Stupid Woman! (2025 Catherine Moulton)

Deaf kitchen worker Rose Ayling-Ellis is recruited by police to help them read lips of suspected violent robbery gang. She gets sucked in and starts doing stupid things right from the off - hence our alternative title. In somewhat unlikely circumstances, she falls for one of the gang, the hacker Kieron Moore. Her police mates comprise Charlotte Ritchie, Nathan Armarkwei Laryea and a grumpy Andrew Buchan. With Joe Absolom, Beth Goddard, Rold Choutan (ex).

A six part four and a half hour drama. I mean, we watched it.

Has a really really fucking annoying use of those lenses which leave some of the image out of focus, used especially badly when Rose is being interrogated by the police - it's so distracting and just wrong.

Mix Tape (2025 Jo Spain)

Jim Sturgess is a - actually I'm not sure what his job is, oh yes, he's a music writer - and he seems obsessed with a relationship he had as a teenager in the 1980s (cue inevitable miners' strike footage) with a young girl - they are played in flashback by Rory Walton-Smith and Florence Hunt. She has grown up to be writer Teresa Palmer and lives in Australia - they both came from Sheffield. She's also found out her teenager daughter is pregnant,

As their own relationships begin to crumble they inevitably steer a course towards one another, whilst the flashbacks continue - why did she leave Sheffield so suddenly, without warning, and why did he not reply to her letters.? It's very well handled and makes for a most satisfying romantic relationship story. Spain adapted it from Jane Sanderson's novel.

Apart from a wrong move from mother, his parents are terrific - Mark O'Halloran and who? whilst her mother is the disastrous drunk Helen Behan (The Virtues). Julia Savage is the daughter down under. There's a couple of extraneous children we don't even meet who might as well not be in it.

Heartburn (1986 Mike Nichols)

Nora Ephron got her own back on philandering husband by writing her 1983 novel, disguising the names but essentially writing a roman a clef about her marriage to journalist Carl Bernstein, who threatened to sue her but never did. She had co-written Silkwood in 1983, also directed by Nichols and starring Meryl Streep.

Photographed by Nestor Almendros and edited by Sam O'Steen. With Jeff Daniels, Maureen Stapleton Airport, Reds, Interiors, Cocoon, The Money Pit), Stockard Channing, Richard Masur, Milos Forman, Catherine O'Hara (recently seen in in The Studio and Away We Go - as John Krasinski's mum, Home Alone).

Amazingly coincidentally, it was Natasha Lyonne's debut! She appears uncredited as Meryl Streep's niece, and therefore I'm thinking this must be her:

Nicholson replaced Mandy Patinkin after one day's filming, but filming was hampered by script problems - Bernstein was threatening legal action so his character's part had to be toned down, not leaving Jack with that much to do.

Miss Marple: A Murder Is Announced (1985 David Giles)

I didn't cotton on until part 3 (3 x 50 minute episodes) that Alan Plater had adapted it. An interesting cast makes the most of Christie's 'locked room' type scenario, with Ursula Howells probably the stand-out. Her father Herbert wrote 'Hymnus Paradisi' after the death of her brother in 1935. She was a West End actress and appeared on TV in things like A Rather English Marriage.

Other cast: Renée Asherson, Sylvia Sims, Ralph Michael (thus somehow evoking The Way to the Stars, Ice Cold in Alex and Dead of Night!), Joan Sims, Samantha Bond, Joan Hickson, Simon Shepherd, John Castle as the investigating detective and Kevin Whately as his no. 2.

We're warming up to Hickson a bit but she does seem pretty much emotionless.

Karen Pirie - Season 2 (2025 Emer Kenny)

Adapted from Val McDermid novel 'A Darker Domain'. Lauren Lyle is back as our most engaging and plain-speaking detective, investigating a kidnapping / ransom from the 1980s, over three ninety minute instalments.

As in season 1, all episodes are directed by Gareth Bryn. The above image courtesy of Bjørn Stäle Bratberg.

The Birdcage (1996 Mike Nichols)

Elaine May has transplanted the original French gay comedy to South Beach, Miami. (The original is reportedly even funnier, though they both have the same IMDB rating.)

We have the delicious combination of Robin Williams and Nathan Lane, pitted against Gene Hackman and Dianne Wiest, with the children being Dan Futterman and Calista Flockhart.

The second of today's films directed by a theatre director, thus long confident takes and great performances. Also some very elegant camerawork from Emmanuel Lubezki.

And Hank Azaria is great as the very gay maid. With Christine Baranski.

Away We Go (2009 Sam Mendes)

Written by Dave Eggers and Vendela Vida. Very pregnant Maya Rudolph and not-husband John Krasinsky journey around America to find roots and meet an assortment of terrible or damaged people, the worst of which are Maggie Gyllenhaal and Josh Hamilton. In fact the only nice one is her sister, Carmen Ojogo. Allison Janney makes an impression as a deluded and unpleasant woman who doesn't care anything about her kids, husband Jim Gaffigan. John's parents also are unbelievable - Jeff Daniels and Catherine O'Hara.

Even a random kid they encounter talks of having tried to kill his baby sister.

She won't get married - ever. He keeps trying to shock her to get the baby's heart rate up. They're a lovely couple. A key moment is with his brother, whose wife has left and he's terrified that his daughter will never recover. They find a lovely house at the end and when Alexei Murdoch's chorus "If I should stumble" kicks in I could have burst into tears.

Photographed by Ellen Kuras (Eternal Sunshine, Be Kind Rewind, Blow) and edited by Sarah Flack (The Limey, Lost in Translation and other Sophia Coppola films, Dan in Real Life).

Le Coquille et le Clergyman (1928 Germaine Dulac)

Alex Allin, Lucien Bataille, Genica Athanasiou.

Dulac had been making films since 1915. This surreal study of male desire predates Un Chien Andalou by a year, and anticipates some of David Lynch's most out-there moments, as well as even animated works by the likes of Jan Svanmajer and the Quay brothers. It is also of course an important film in feminist cinema.

Antonin Artaud is the writer.

Opens with 'It is not a dream, but the mode of images itself leading the mind to where is never would have consented to go, the mechanism is within everyone's reach.' The way images are twisted and distorted, the complex overlays, abrupt cutting, interesting lighting and bizarre use of props is altogether a unique experience.

I saw the 2005 restoration which is on YouTube, running 40 minutes.

Bookish (2025 Mark Gatiss)

He also stars as Gabriel Book of Book's Books. With Polly Walker, Connor Finch, Elliot Levey, Buket Komur, Blake Harrison, Tim McInnerney, Danny Mays, Rosie Cavaliero.

It was filmed in Belgium, thus many Belgians in credits.

I found the sound design to be curiously overdone - too much traffic, bicycle bells when none needed, barking dog adding nothing. Curious.

Story two, which I can't even remember now, seemed less involving but the third concluding episode involving Russian princesses and a fading hotel, with the final emotional climax - after a Brief Encounter moment - between Book and Jack, is most successful.

Insomnia (2024 Sarah Pinborough)

Pinborough? Created for the Paramount network, Vicky McClure is the sleep-deprived and childhood nightmare sufferer, Leanne Best her sister. It's a preposterous tale, and ends up beyond nonsense (and then beyond nonsense again). With Tom Cullen, Lyndsey Marshal, Dominic Teghe, India Fowler and Smylie Bradwell.

Sirens (2025 Molly Smith Metzler)

A feisty and somewhat sex-hungry woman (Meghann Fahy, The White Lotus) travels to an island recluse where her sister (Milly Alcock) is the perfect assistant to nuts millionaire Julianne Moore. Who's a bit worried, because if her husband - dope smoking Kevin Bacon - leaves her, she'll be left with nothing. The head of security Felix Solis (Ozark, The Good Wife) proves to be a good and likable character. Bill Camp is the girls' demented father. Trevor Salter is the ship captain.

Liked the scene with Fahy being pursued down the beach by three paramours.

Engage brain power to low. Only five episodes, which is refreshing.

Dept Q (2025 Scott Frank, Chandni Lakhani)

They adapted Jussi Adler-Olson's novel 'The Keeper of Last Causes' and it's a bit of another Slow Horses. Burnt out copper Matthew Goode is assigned to the titular department in the cliche of the worst part of the building, where fellow outcasts Syrian Alexej Manvelov and Leah Byrne join the team. The interaction of these three damaged individuals is fun.

Meanwhile, the subject of their investigation, Chloe Pirrie is being held imprisoned in some sort of industrial tank, and it's very disturbing. And she's been there four years, which I can't really believe. I mean she'd either be dead or mad, surely? I must admit to not liking this aspect of the story and hats off to Pirrie for being so filthy and bedraggled.

It's a good cast all round. Steven Miller, Jamie Sives, Kelly Macdonald, Alison Peebles, Aaron McVeigh, Mark Bonnar, Sanjeev Kohli, Tom Bulpett the aphasic brother.

Clearly left open for another series.

Jaws @ 50: The Definitive Inside Story (2025 Laurent Bouzereau)

The 'definitive' story? Once again we get only about 60 seconds of the film's editor, Verna Fields. Plus, there's some quite interesting stuff missing. Despite the people of Martha's Vineyard being treated in a glowing light, the locals would also drive their boats into shot deliberately and demand payment to go away - a nice detail from Carl Gottlieb's 'The Jaws Log'.

Some nice contributors in the shape of Cameron Crowe, Emily Blunt, Guillermo del Toro, Steven Soderberg etc. Luckily they had (limited) interviews with the stars from contemporary filming and later interviews. Some fascinating footage of the mechanized shark in action.

We felt for Steven with his years of PTSD resulting from the never-ending shoot.

Cash on Demand (1961 Quentin Lawrence)

Lawrence, mainly a TV director, was assigned by Hammer to direct this adaptation of Jacques Gillies television play The Gold Inside, which he'd also directed and also had André Morell as the robber. The screenplay is by David Chantler and Lewis Greifer.

Peter Cushing is great as the draconian bank manager whose world falls apart when Morell threatens his wife and kid and forces him to help him rob the bank.

Richard Vernon is the very familiar face that bugged us, so familiar and on TV lots, but from what specifically I can't say. Duchess of Duke Street and The Camomile Lawn are two on his long CV.

Also with Norman Bird. Photographed by Arthur Grant. 

Too Much (2025 Lena Dunham & Luis Felber)

Ten part comedy drama. Despite going out with new boyfriend Will Sharpe, Megan Stalter (Hacks) cannot get over her former boyfriend. So when we get to that downer episode five, in which the former couple's relationship over the years is detailed, and we learn what an utter cunt he is, it suddenly makes no sense at all why she is still so obsessed by him. It's the anger she feels that is unexpiated.

With Michael Zegen, Richard E Grant, Rita Wilson, Lena Dunham, Andrew Rannells, Rhea Perlman, Prasanne Puwanarajah, Daisy Bevan, Dean-Charles Chapman, Janicza Bravo. And Rita Ora, Stephen Fry, Jennifer Saunders, Andrew Scott. Liked Oliver Nirenberg as the kid who is the only sane one in Stalter's family.

and Naomi Watts

Not sure taking too many drugs is funny any more, either. Was it ever? Ah, but it does fit in to the plot. So that makes sense.

I felt that there was too much dialogue in many episodes, extended talking, boring. Overall though it was reasonably good. From the 'aren't we all messed up for various reasons' school. And possibly English male Felber and American female Dunham are expressing themselves through the characters' relationship.

Pitfall (1948 André de Toth)

An independent Regal Films production. Bored insurance man Dick Powell has to reclaim stolen goods from model Lizabeth Scott, falls for her. But detective Raymond Burr has unhealthy desires for the girl too. meanwhile Powell's wife (Jane Wyatt) and kid are unaware... Burr is creepily intense. Conclusion is perhaps a little unsatisfactory, 'the wrong person is behind bars'.

Wyatt was in Lost Horizon, Boomerang, None But the Lonely Heart, then much on TV, still working in the 90s in her eighties

Written by Karl Kamb from Jay Dratler novel. Harry Wild shot it (Till the End of Time, Murder My Sweet, The Woman on the Beach, They Won't Believe Me, The Big Steal, 

Choreography in Billy Wilder

Kim Novak deftly avoiding getting her bum slapped twice in Kiss Me Deadly.

The way Audrey Hepburn manages to elude Gary Cooper in bedroom in The Ritz in Love in the Afternoon.

How a line of ballerinas is subtly replaced by a line of male dancers who think he's gay, in PLOSH.

Another dance, on a table, in One Two Three.

'I'm just meeting my date' Lemmon tells MacLaine in The Apartment, motioning across the foyer. As he walks towards her, so smoothly orchestrated, her real date enters stage right and they walk off and Lemmon ends up at the shop behind them.

More, I'm sure...

(Originally 19 October 2021.)

Here's another one. Ray Milland's at the hotel in The Lost Weekend and overhears his girlfriend's parents and realises he doesn't want to meet them. She turns up and he's stood with his back to them with a group of three chatting in between them. As the group breaks up each of the three go off in a different direction and Milland beautifully moves away with one of them as though he's been part of that group.

And another. Jack Lemmon's beautifully eloquent moves in electric wheelchair in The Fortune Cookie.

The Fortune Cookie (1966 Billy Wilder & co-scr)

Of course he co-wrote it, that's almost not worth even saying. It has all the perfect clockwork of any other great Wilder-Diamond screenplay.

It was an odd day, otherwise. We were suffering from Gilmore Girls withdrawal and started the new Sherman-Palladino thing Etoile and couldn't even finish it. Then  we saw an episode of Lina Dunham's Too Much which was quite a downer. While all this was going on, Alcaraz lost the Wimbledon final, and we spent several hours reliving Live Aid. The Fortune Cookie is like the solid rock in the centre of it all.

And although it's notable as being the first teaming of Lemmon and Matthau (and he won the Oscar), it is also very capably performed by Ron Rich, Judi West and Cliff Osmond.

"In the old days we used to do these things better. A man says he's paralysed, we simply throw him in the snake pit. If he climbs out, then we know he's lying."
"And if he doesn't climb out?"
"Then we have lost a patient, but we have found an honest man." (Sig Ruman.)

Photographed by Joseph LaShelle, using the widescreen well. Music by Andre Previn, production design Robert Luthardt. Editor Daniel Mandell.

Thunderball (1965 Terence Young)

Good plot and treatment - just the last half hour is boring, even though it's a big improvement on the novel's ending. Peter Hunt's editing is noticeable but less known is that he had to cut down the four and a half hour film without Young's involvement. This had a bigger budget then the previous three combined. 

The story came up between Kevin McGlory (who was fascinated by underwater stuff) and Fleming, and was later written as the screenplay Longitude 78 West by Jack Wittingham. Fleming then used this as the basis for the novel 'Thunderball'. McGlory quite rightly sued (although why wasn't it Whittingham?) and won the literary and screen rights. He was listed as producer of the Broccoli / Saltzman version to prevent him from making a rival version of his own - something he did later with Never Say Never Again.

Seen with a twenty-first century eye, there's some slightly kinky stuff going on. Bond fights a man in drag, then appears in a short pale blue towelling robe. He massages his masseuse with a mink glove and is strapped to an electronic rack (for 'stretching the spine').

The health spa opening is a terrific way of getting us into the plot and the actual hijacking of the Vulcan bomber is still beautifully done. Then we're off into sunny clear waters, scuba diving, mucking about in speed boats and other stuff that Hitch originated years before in To Catch a Thief.

With Connery: Claudine Auger (Domino), Adolfo Celi, Luciana Paluzzi, Rik Van Nutter, Guy Doleman, Molly Peters (her only significant film appearance, sadly), Martine Beswick (Bond's Nassau associate - this is the wrong move in the screenplay - Bond should have rescued her), Lee, Lleywelyn, Maxwell, Roland Culver, Paul Stassino, Reginald Beckwith and (uncredited) Philip Stone. Culver was still working up to his death in the / his eighties - The Missionary was one of his last appearances.

Photographed by Ted Moore. Score from John Barry (having once owned the soundtrack album it was very familiar). Ken Adam is the production designer.

Barry had recorded the title song 'Mr Kiss Kiss Bang Bang' with Dionne Warwick, on YouTube here. But at the last minute United Artists insisted the theme song should have the same title as the film and gave Barry four days to come up with 'Thunderball', lyrics by Don Black. Tom Jones recorded it in one take and held that last powerful note so long he blacked out.