Four Weddings and a Funeral (1994 Mike Newell)

Even though we don't really like Andie MacDowall's character, this is a model in comedy / drama script-writing from opening pages which read 'Fuck' and 'Fuckity-fuck' for a while, until the choice 'Bugger' comes along. It's Curtis-land, full of recognisable types, but we love it. Carefully written, introducing plots ideas and characters early, sweet and emotional too.

My takeaway performances this time were Charlotte Coleman and Kristin Scott Thomas, who's absolutely marvellous. Also noticed a very fine score by Richard Rodney Bennett mixed rather low.

It had been five years since we watched The Shawshank Redemption, but the moment passed.

A Bigger Splash (2015 Luca Guadagnino)

Unnecessary remake of Deray's 1969 La Piscine with Delon and Romy Schneider. Ralph Fiennes funny as annoying record producer, who essentially invites himself to stay with 'daughter' (maybe) Dakota Johnson (daughter of Don Johnson and Melanie Griffith) at villa where mute Tilda Swinton (echoes there of Persona) and Matthias Schoenaerts are trying to relax. Unfortunately we don't like any of these characters and so don't really care what happens. Actions of young girl somewhat puzzling (presumably she had her first shag?) Image of dead Fiennes in pool is quite magnetizing.

Dakota has just starred in Guadagnino's Suspiria remake - yes another unnecessary remake - and is in 50 Shades films.

It was a surprise to hear incidental music from Aguirre Wrath of God in a couple of places, for no apparent reason.

Quite liked the sideline of immigrants being saved (official version on TV contrasted with reality of their treatment), Pantelleria island location interesting.

Shot by Yorick Le Saux (also Swimming Pool).

Florence Foster Jenkins (2016 Stephen Frears)

Meryl Streep (hilarious singing), Hugh Grant (so funny in opening monologue scene), Simon Helberg (a funny performance), Rebecca Ferguson, Nina Arianda (the feisty blonde), Stanley Townsend, David Haig, Allan Corduner.

Written by Nicholas Martin (previously TV), shot by Danny Cohen in Panavision, Valerio Bonelli edited (Philomena, Cemetery Junction), Alexandre Desplat music.

Most enjoyable.

Bleak House (2005 Justin Chadwick & Susanna White)

Andrew Davies cuts up Mr Dickens till he's all a-tumble - what larks! But the fiddly, whizzy, most alarmin' new fangle style of filming, that's a ne'er do well and puts the wind afirm in the East.

Anna Maxwell Martin, Denis Lawson, Charles Dance, Carey Mulligan, Gillian Anderson.

Timothy West, Ian Richardson, Pauline Collins, Alun Armstrong, Natalie Press, Alistair McGowan, Patrick Kennedy, Burn Gorman, Warren Clarke, Nathaniel Parker, Johnny Vegas, Hugo Speer. Special mention to Richard Cant as a slightly camp, full-of-attitude footman.

Good balance between gritty, cruel unhappiness and romance and humour, with a devastating black comedy twist.

The Fabulous Baker Boys (1989 Steve Kloves & scr)

Quality casting of brothers Jeff (very cool) and Beau Bridges as pianists who team up with singer Michelle Pfeiffer.

They get it right early when Beau says something like 'There's no call for two pianos these days' and Jeff replies 'There never was'. That's perhaps at the heart of this story in which the brothers are unnaturally bonded together by their craft and actually need to break free (in Kloves' wonderfully subtle screenplay, we see that Jeff is certainly the much more capable businessman; he's just let Beau have the role as something to do).

Don't understand why Bridges is so horrible to Pfeiffer after she quits, though ending is redemptive.

Good direction from Kloves - stays on performing and key acting where possible, unfussy set-ups, really gorgeously shot by Michael Ballhaus (Florian first assistant camera). Further subtlety evident in story of girl who Jeff looks out for.

Need now to catch up on Flesh and Bone (the only other film he also directed) and Racing with the Moon.

Splendor (1935 Elliott Nugent)

Extremely talky, sludgy melodrama, a Sam Goldwyn project with Gregg Toland again on camera. Impoverished Joel McCrea (difficult to take seriously as wannabe writer) marries Miriam Hopkins despite protests of horrible family headed by quintessential mother-dragon, theatre acting Helen Westley. Paul Cavanagh is the love rival with the charisma of a tree stump (perhaps unfair on the latter). Billie Burke shiny as gossipy socialite, David Niven feckless, gambling brother.

Dulcima (1971 Frank Nesbitt & scr)

Carol White is up to summink with scroogy farmer John Mills - turns out has her eye on gamekeeper Stuart Wilson too. Tragic ending is I suppose typical of its era, though H.E. Bates' 1953 novella had the same outcome - it's not one of his Darling Buds type fables.

Bernard Lee is a truly horrible old git so we completely feel for the girl, who ultimately makes the right decision but loses everything. He and Mills good as always, as is White. Film feels very farmy and rustic.

A Good Man in Africa (1993 Bruce Beresford)

Funny to see in the wake of Carlton-Browne of the F.O. as shares the same diplomat-abroad territory. William Boyd's comic novel excellently adapted by himself paints vivid picture of West Africa and the unlikeable Morgan Leafy (Colin Freils) and his collision with the Good Man Sean Connery - based on Will's own father (thus the moment when  the doctor introduces his son 'Will' our jaws dropped).

Good cast includes John Lithgow, Diana Rigg, Joanne Whalley-Kilmer, Louis Gossett Jr., Sarah-Jane Fenton & Maynard Eziashi. Dense photography from Andrzej Bartkowiak, edited by Jim Clark.

My only reservation is that you don't quite see Morgan turn into a 'good man' himself very clearly.

The Wedding Night (1935 King Vidor)

Author Gary Cooper (I know) hangs about with Polish Anna Sten (actually Ukranian-Swedish, star of Der Mörder Dimitri Karamasoff ) in Connecticut, who's engaged to oik Ralph Bellamy by strict father Sig Rumann; whilst wife Helen Vinson swans around back home. Otto Yamaoka isn't even credited, though gets far more screen time than last billed Walter Brennan.

Comedy turns tragedy - Edwin Knopf story, adapted by Edith Fitzgerlad, shot by Gregg Toland, scored by Lionel Newman

A Million Ways to Die in the West (2014 Seth MacFarlane & scr)

Sorry, Seth - stick to Family Guy. This just isn't funny. Plus the odd feeling you're looking at live action Brian. We only made 10 minutes. It was weirdly an unlucky day for films.

Carlton-Browne of the F.O. (1958 Roy Boulting & Jeffrey Dell & scr)

One of Mike Leigh's favourite films has some inspired scenes e.g. between Terry-Thomas and Thorley Walters as the Colonel.

"Tiger Lion Gore was talking about Gallardia in the club last night."
"Didn't he marry one of the Tonnington girls?"
"No that was Buster. Tiger married Cynthia Stoke-Furnace."

But it's all said so quickly you don't really notice it's beautifully made up bullshit.

Thorley Walters, Terry-Thomas

Loved that they are attacked by own troops, took control of wrong half of island etc.

Stirling cast includes Peter Sellars, Raymond Huntley, Miles Malleson, Luciana Paoluzzi, Ian Bannen, John le Mesurier, Kynaston Reeves, Nicholas Parsons and the indispensable Irene Handl doing one of her unforgettable turns (here a housewife who knows nothing about anything).

Music by John Addison, photographed by 'Max Greene' (Mutz Greenbaum). Edited by Anthony Harvey.

What Dreams May Come (1998 Vincent Ward)

...We'll never know, as couldn't go further than 48 minutes. Afterlife fantasy stuff, not for us, despite Eduardo Serra again on camera, creative stuff with paint.

Source novel was by Richard Matheson ... and you know I could make a case for a link to The Incredible Shrinking Man.

No.

What We Did on our Holiday (2014 Andy Hamilton, Guy Jenkin & scr)

This time, feels a bit engineered, like the improv has been supplanted on the plot. Still very funny. Rosamund Pike steals the adult acting.

The Missionary (1982 Richard Loncraine)

Written by and starring Michael Palin, a sort of extended 'Ripping Yarns', funny and affectionate. With Maggie Smith, Denholm Elliott, Michael Hordern, Trevor Howard, Graham Crowden, Phoebe Nicholls, Roland Culver, Timothy Spall, Sophie Thompson (spotted by eagle-eyes Q), Janine Duvitski, Anton Lesser.

Peter Hannan shot it in rich old tones. Handsome settings.

Map of the Human Heart (1992 Vincent Ward)

Ward wrote this original, unique story, screenwritten by Louis Lowra.

Fantastic natural performances from Robert Joamie and Annie Galipeau, and Jason Scott Lee and Anne Parillaud as their older selves.

Unforgettable images, shot by Eduardo Serra - the contrast between ice and fire.

"On Vincent Ward’s Map of the Human Heart (1992), Serra’s camera crew included a young loader named Seamus McGarvey... McGarvey recalls, “Seeing how Eduardo worked [with] his wonderful eye and sensibility showed me a whole different approach to lighting, one that technically — on the face of it — was very simple. He didn’t use a huge amount of light, but he used it very well, and I had never seen that degree of underexposure before. I was a young clapper loader coming out of film school, and his bravery with darkness was a revelation to me.” "

Broken Melody (1934 Bernard Vorhaus)

Made with the kinds of visual flourish you associate with Vorhaus at the time (aided by Jack Harris editing). Composer Jack Garrick - cast as much for his singing - ignores Merle Oberon in favour of opera star Margot Grahame to his regret, ends up in Devil's Island, where he befriends a monkey for one scene (it then disappears, presumably eaten). Quite lively tale ends with composer telling his own story through opera.

Strange that all this was going on in Twickenham.

Enchantment (1948 Irving Reis)

Curious title. John Patrick adapted Rumer Godden novel 'Take Three Tenses' (1945) - which gives more depth to behaviour of older sister? The time jumping - which is cinematically quite well done with tricks - is from the novel.

Sam Goldwyn produced. Gregg Toland on camera, Hugo Friedhofer music, Daniel Mandell editing.

David Niven rather good as his older self, Teresa Wright good as always (and Gigi Perreau as her younger self). With Evelyn Keyes as young ambulance driver falling in with Farley Granger, Jayne Meadows as unredeeming bitch, Leo G Carroll, Henry Stephenson.

Exciting climax in air raid. When Granger flings himself onto Keyes on the bridge to protect her, into my mind popped "And that's how you were conceived, son".

Take those opportunities, kids!

Someone to Watch Over Me (1987 Ridley Scott)

Howard Franklin script / Scott's direction more interested in style and suspense than characterisation or plot. Why would Tom Berenger be more interested in Mimi Rogers - whose idea of fun is to lie draped around a glass of wine listening to opera and looking vacuous - than Lorraine Bracco, who swears and is a lot more fun (and prettier to boot)? (Besides, everyone knows the way to listen to opera is full volume and cavorting on the grass.)

Plot is frequently daft (how does the bad guy think he will get away at the end?),  'he's 'protecting' her again' , Berenger ridiculously easily forgiven, etc. etc.

Liked scene with mirrors, even though it is lifted from Lady From Shanghai, suspenseful ending. Film does look a bit like a glossy commercial.

Never Been Kissed (1999 Raja Gosnell)

What do you call a romcom which isn't funny? A rom? This dumb film has journalist Drew Barrymore gurning around acting 17 after some non-existent high school story - film is an insult to the Chicago Sun-Times, which is the featured publisher. Wouldn't a story line involving the journalist using her adult power, knowledge and maturity to exploit the situation to her advantage have been more fun?

I like the way she keeps  correcting people's grammar, but that also could have been used more, as above.

Even features the cliché of the school nerd turning into a ravishing princess by removing her glasses. Can't help but enjoy the last 10 (completely predictable)  minutes.

David Arquette is the brother, Michael Varten the teacher, Molly Shannon and John C Reilly - and Garry Marshall, of all people, the editor.

Hail, Caesar! (2016 Joel & Ethan Coen)

Beautifully written, somehow missed all the awards (nominated for production design - Jess Gonchor and Nancy Haigh - by US and GB Academies only). Beautifully made, beautifully acted. Most respectful homage to Hollywood ever? And the most disrespectful? Even the 'non film' bits look really well like old movies e.g. submarine sequence.

"Would that it were so simple"!

Rendition (2007 Gavin Hood)

Hood made Tsotsi in 2005, Eye in the Sky in 2015. This - written by Kelley Sane - is a sneaky commentary on torture to extract information, and has a quite confusing structure in which a sub-plot involving Igal Naor (good, a sort of Telly Savalas figure - The Honorable Woman) and his daughter and her boyfriend which runs concurrently actually has happened before the film begins.

Reese Witherspoon, Peter Skarsgaard, Alan Arkin, Jake Gyllenhaal, Meryl Streep, J.K. Simmons.

Nicely shot by Dion Beebe.

Ordinary People (1980 Robert Redford)

Because Mary Tyler Moore just died. She's a cold woman in this. All acting good, never need an excuse to watch Donald Sutherland. Honours though to Timothy Hutton as disturbed kid, and Judd Hirsch as psychiatrist. And Elizabeth McGovern is girlfriend! Plus M Emmet Walsh.

Courtesy of 'The Week'

Endless replaying of endless Pachelbel is quite maddening. John Bailey's photography very good.

We were only just talking about actors turned directors and forgot Redford. He moves his camera around slowly.. gets great performances.

The Odd Couple (1968 Gene Saks)

Can't tire of Lemmon and Matthau in Neil Simon's screenplay.

Nicely lit (Robert Hauser).

Love, Rosie (2014 Christian Ditter)

Lily Collins and Sam Claflin are fine as the mis-timing couple in what we describe as a 'dumb-rom-not-com' in that they should have sorted it out a lot quicker, not gotten mixed up with clearly unsuitable partners and there might have been more (any) laughs.

Juliette Towhidi (Death Comes To Permberley, Calendar Girls) adapted Cecilia Ahern's novel.

With Jamie Winston, Christian Cooke, Suki Waterhouse, Tamsin Egerton, Lorcan Cranitch.

Is there something a bit annoying about it? But the appearance of Lily Allen's 'Fuck You' is both timely and welcome.

The Falling (2014 Carol Morley & scr)

Exceptional filming from Morley who elicits great material from young cast and shows certain looks and moments which it seems only women film directors do well. Material is certainly nutty and quite funny as girls faint all over the place to ultra-rapid editing (Chris Wyatt - Close to the Enemy, '71, Dancing on the Edge, Top Boy, Criminal Justice, This Is England, Dead Man's Shoes, Greenaway films). Has a certain resonance of Picnic at Hanging Rock and if it seems Roegy at times (I thought of Don't Look Now more than once) notice son Luc behind camera as a producer.

Shot by Agnes Godard (The Dream Life of Angels) with music by Tracey Thorn (Everything But the Girl).

Maisie Williams, Florence Pugh (coming over like a young Gillian Hills), Maxine Peake, Anna Burnett, Greta Scacchi, Rose Caton (the sensible one who doesn't faint), Monica Dolan, Mathew Baynton, Joe Cole.

Very interesting, but sort of didn't love it, though.

Monty Python's Life of Brian (1979 Terry Jones)

Or, 'Brian of Nazareth' as it was also known between the script-writing committee. This is probably their most cohesive film, taking pot shots at all sorts of things along the way, not just religion (unions, celebrity). Terry Jones does another of his great women, Eric Idle plays the cheery chappie beautifully, JC makes for a school-teachery centurion (the graffiti spelling lesson his own great idea), Gilliam always wonderful as a grotesque, Chapman steady as Brian, but Palin steals the show with several diverse characters of which the funniest is Pontius Pilate. With Kenneth Colley, Carol Cleveland, Sue Jones-Davies, Chris Langham, Spike Milligan.

Funny scene with John Young

Shot by Peter Biziou in Tunisia.

I think Fellini would have liked the ending.

The Bucket List (2007 Rob Reiner)

This film must be quite well directed, I mused, half way through it. There's nothing annoying about it, no tricky shots. That was before I realised it was Mr Reiner, who has taken the advice of the greats (perhaps his father being one of them). Justin Zackham screenplay is OK, nothing great. Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman are the bucketeers, with Sean Hayes (Will and Grace) in support. Rest of cast redundant.

Shot by John Schwartzman. You get the distinct feeling that none of the location shots are real.

Lady Luck (1946 Edwin L Marin)

Fluffy, fanciful tale with gambling theme, written by Lynn Root and Frank Fenton from Herbert Clyde Lewis story.

Who is Barbara Hale? Well, we just saw her in The Window, and was in Airport and Perry Mason a LOT. And Robert Young (Sitting Pretty, Secret Agent).

Good showdown between old pros Frank Morgan and James Gleason. With Don Rice, the irresistible Harry Davenport (here aged 80) and Lloyd Corrigan as the comedy relief. And uncredited Myrna Dell as blonde at bar (Bs and TVs).

Undistinguished RKO effort in camera or music departments, passes time easily enough.

Gleason, here a mere 64, was in Night of the Hunter, Arsenic and Old Lace, The Bishop's Wife, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, Tales of Manhattan, a couple of The Falcon films, Meet John Doe.

Blue in the Face (1995 Wayne Wang & Paul Auster)

Less successful follow-up to Smoke, with rather uncomfortably improvised scenes featuring Roseanne Barr, Mel Gorham, Madonna, Michael J Fox etc. But the monologues of Lou Reed and Jim Jarmusch work better, and there's interesting, ironic side stuff about Brooklyn (man who clears plastic bags out of trees, girl whose 18th birthday it is, and Jackie Robinson, the first black professional baseball player for the Brooklyn Dodgers).

Lily Tomlin is - of course - unrecognisable. With Jared Harris, Giancarlo Esposito, Malik Yoba (rapping watch man).

Auster is an acclaimed novelist - 'The New York Trilogy' etc.

The Girl on the Train (2016 Tate Taylor)

I guess Taylor got this on the back of The Help. Though Ems is great, the film doesn't exactly leap out at me - intriguing, builds up to a good climax, features one great irony (the glimpsed 'affair'). Paula Hawkins' novel adapted by Erin Cressida Wilson (previously co-wrote Jason Reitman's Men, Women and Children).

Hayley Bennett looks familiar, but isn't. Rebecca Ferguson (Swedish-English) doesn't look familiar, and isn't. Other unfamiliar people are Justin Theroux, Luke Evans and Edgar Ramirez - not a bad idea when you want to keep everyone guessing. Plus Alison Janney, Lisa Kudrow.

Photography by Charlotte Bruus Christensen (Far From the Madding Crowd). Music by Danny Elfman.

The Amazing Spider-Man 2 (2014 Marc Webb)

Appropriately named director made 500 Days of Summer; writers are numerous. Opening, irreverent style gets lost. Worth seeing only for Garfield and Stone (who gets unnecessarily killed). CGI is still just that. Great also to get Fel. But too much, too long, too loud etc. We couldn't even bring ourselves to finish it.

Jamie Foxx? Dane DeHaan, Paul Giamatti, Sally Field, Marton Csokas (OK, funny as 'Dr. Kafka').

Panavision cropped for ITV appearance - wouldst that we cared. Yawwwwwwwwn. Steve Ditko is still alive.

Dirty Rotten Scoundrels (1988 Frank Oz)

Written by Dale Launer and Stanley Shapiro & Paul Henning. Beaumont-sur-Mer is made up (actually Beaulieu-sur-Mer and the Hotel Cap Ferrat). This is a remake of Stanley & Paul's David Niven / Brando film called Bedtime Story (1964).

Glenne Headly, Anton Rogers, Barbara Harris, Ian McDiarmid. Michael Ballhaus shot it.

It's quite fun, Caine is as effortless as ever. Not especially funny, though.

On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1969 Peter Hunt)

Arguably the best of the Bond series, simply because it follows Fleming's decent plot in its entirety, (written by Richard Maibaum and Simon Raven) tweaked by the emotional resonance of Louis Armstrong's final performance to Barry's lush 'We Have All the Time in the World' - how's that for irony?

'He was the sweetest man you could ever meet,' says John, 'but because he'd been laid up ill for so long, he had very little energy left. He couldn't even play his trumpet, but he managed to sing our song, even if it was just one verse at a time. What I couldn't believe though was that at the end of the session, he came up to me and said, "Thank you for this job. Thank you for using me." I couldn't believe it. I should have been thanking him, and there he was, my hero, thanking me.'*

Series editor Peter Hunt puts in a lot of energy, though overlong (would have cut whole safe-cracking sequence). Lazenby is OK, Diana Rigg one of the best Bond girls. Cheesy quips should have been jettisoned. Fantastic skiing sequences are cut rather too much with studio stuff, but that is the nature of the beast (otherwise there's commendably little back projection). Telly Savalas a bad idea for Bond villain. But Gabriele Ferzetti (Once Upon a Time in the West) excellent as Draco, Ilse Steppat as Irma Bunt (great name!), Angela Scoular, Lois Maxwell, Bernard Lee, Joanna Lumley (fleetingly).

Frequently astonishing photography from Michael Reed (in Panavision) with a great second unit. John Glen edited and went on to become a Bond director himself.

*'A Sixties Theme' Eddi Feigel.

Smoke (1995 Wayne Wang)

An actor's delight, written by Paul Auster. If you need proof of how good Harvey Keitel is, this is a good indicator, memorably in crucial scene where he tells William Hurt the story of the blind old lady - the camera ever so subtly tracks in in one long brilliant take. That's Jared Harris as the slow man in the shop. Then Forest Whitaker, Harold Perrineau (so loved the scene where Hurt tells he's Perrineau's son we had to watch it three times - hilarious), Stockard Channing.

Shot by Adam Holender (Midnight Cowboy).

A little gem, mesmerizing. Wondered if it's called 'Smoke' because of the various deceptions throughout (is Keitel's story true?) Wonderful photos of street corner.

Bridget Jones's Baby (2016 Sharon Maguire)

Helen Fielding's belated sequel written by herself, Dan Mazer and Emma Thompson, who's film-stealing as a cynical doctor. Grant apparently voted himself out after seeing the original script, by Fielding and David Nicholls. Film is fairly predictable, fun.

Sally Phillips, Sarah Solemani, Jules R-T, Gemma Jones, Jim Broadbent, Shirley Henderson, Joanna Scanlan, Neil Pearson, Patrick Dempsey, Kate O'Flynn good as TV producer.

Shot by Andrew Dunn (who also operated) in Panavision. Edited by Melanie Oliver.

All This and Heaven Too (1940 Anatole Litvak)

In Casey Robinson's adaptation of Rachel Field's 1938 novel, governess Bette Davis accidentally starts the French Revolution, and Charles Boyer succumbs to poison rather than admits he loves her, both points with which I have some issue, but neither nearly so much as the ultra sicky, sentimental ending which would make a snake puke. Fortunately there's lots else to enjoy in 2 1/4 hour drama, in which Davis's perfect governess for Virginia Weidler (who Q correctly identified from The Philadelphia Story), June Lockhart, Ann Todd and Richard Nichols is constantly bedevilled by quite crazy wife Barbara O'Neil. Jeffrey Lynn is a well-meaning priest, Harry Davenport a mischievous caretaker, and didn't recognise either Walter Hampden or George Coulouris.

Creepy, Burtonish trees you get at Warner Bros.

Music by Max Steiner, shot by Ernie Haller, makeup by Perc Westmore, art direction by Carl Jules Weyl (German-born, orginally an architect in the US in the 1920s).