HILLBILLY ELEGY no stars

 The one thing you're guaranteed with a Ron Howard film is professionalism even if there may be a dearth of imagination. The lack of imagination in "Hillbilly Elegy" extends to the title which is one of the poorest of a mainstream film this year. It's another growing up and coming-of-age saga in, dare I say it, Hillbilly country and it's well enough made; beautifully photographed and designed, like so many Ron Howard films and equally lacking in imagination which isn't to say you might not enjoy it. For starters, Howard has cast two of the best actresses in America as leads; Amy Adams is the Po' White Trash Mamma, (she's old enough to take mother roles now), and Glenn Close is the Po' White Trash Grandma and they are both excellent in very conventional roles.

It's the biography of one, J.D. Vance, (Gabriel Basso as an adult and Owen Asztalos as the younger version), a Yale law graduate who manages to break free from his family but who is forced back when his mom od's on heroin and it's based on the book he wrote about his family. Even if you didn't know it, you could still guess this was a Ron Howard picture and that's not a recommendation. Howard's 'autership' means all his films look and sound alike in the way that Reader's Digest novels were all alike, aimed at people who didn't want to try the real thing. This movie is condescending in the extreme; Oscar-bait fare for Adams and Close and very typical of its director.

FATMAN no stars

 The "Fatman" of the title is Santa Claus; yes, the 'real' one but as played by Mel Gibson he's no 'Ho Ho Ho' jolly old man in a red suit but a gruff old businessman with money troubles and a concerned wife, (Marianne Jean-Baptiste), and when he needs to be he's pretty handy with a gun. This alleged black comedy is clearly aimed at people like me whose favourite Christmas movie is "Bad Santa" but whereas that gem was genuinely funny and done in the worst possible taste while still managing to be sweetly sentimental thanks to a terrific performance from young Brett Kelly. This, however, is seriously short on laughs. Worse, it's poorly scripted, directed, acted and very violent; this is a Christmas movie clearly not aimed at children.

The plot, for want of a better word, has obnoxious rich kid Chance Hurstfield hiring hitman Walton Goggins to kill Santa after he leaves him just a lump of coal at Christmas. Meanwhile Santa and his elfs find themselves making parts for the U.S. military to make ends meet. Done well, this could have been inspired instead of the under-cooked turkey it turns out to be. In fact, rather than watch this rubbish revisit "Bad Santa" or even watch "It's a Wonderful Life" for the 40th time or just go to bed early and hope that Santa brings you something more than a lump of coal.

THE DANCE OF REALITY *

 'Reality' is the one thing that is conspicuously absent from Alejandro Jodorowsky's "The Dance of Reality". He may be a revolutionary filmmaker but he is also an acquired taste. This one does have a plot of sorts involving Jodorowsky as a boy, (Jeremias Herskovits), growing up in a surreal seaside town in Chile populated by dwarfs, the armless, the legless, the naked and the dispossessed, (all typical Jodorowsky tropes), where nothing 'real' happens at all and everything plays out as if in a dream with the real Jodorowsky himself turning up every so often to guide as through this cinematic circus of his life. There is a parallel plot involving Jodorowsky's father, played by his son Brontis, (I hope you're getting this), that is less interesting than the one that opens the picture. It looks great, makes no real sense yet is quite easy to follow, will make no converts to the cult of Jodorowsky but which should please his fans no end.

TEN NORTH FREDERICK no stars

 A miscast Gary Cooper is the well-to-do lawyer and failed politician caught in an unhappy marriage who embarks on an affair with a younger woman, (Suzy Parker), in this rather average screen version of John O'Hara's novel, "Ten North Frederick". It's told in flashback on the day of Cooper's character's funeral, (Cooper himself was to be dead from cancer only two years later), as he's remembered by his daughter, (Diane Varsai). Geraldine Fitzgerald is the ambitious shrew of a wife who basically drives Cooper to drink and into Parker's arms.

The book was one of those typically scandalous O'Hara bestsellers and this was a fairly prestige production but Philip Dunne, who also wrote the screenplay, was a dull director and Cooper was already looking pretty frail while Varsai hadn't moved on from her Allison McKenzie character in "Peyton Place". Only Fitzgerald shows any real mettle though in a small, but showy, role as the trumpet player who gets Varsai pregnant, Stuart Whitman shows real promise. Watchable, then, but equally uninspired.

BECKY SHARP no stars

 Not Rouben Mamoulian's finest hour even if this first fully-fledged Technicolour movie is rather sumptuous to look at. In deference to its heroine, Thackeray's 'Vanity Fair' has been rechristened "Becky Sharp" and Mamoulian gallops through Thackeray's epic novel in under ninety minutes. So much has been left out, you might think you're watching something else entirely. It's also very badly cast. Alan Mowbray, of all people, is the 'dashing' Rawdon Crawley, Alison Skipworth is his dowager aunt and if Miriam Hopkins is a coquettish Becky she's closer to being a Manhattan hostess than a Napoleonic one. Had it been shot in black and white it would have been long forgotten by now but it's saved to a degree by Mamoulian's use of colour. Unfortunately, the dialogue sounds like it came from a dime-store novel rather than from one of the great works of English literature. If there's an audience for this movie today, I'd be very surprised.

MANK ***

 I'm sure "Mank" will find an audience among cineastes, especially those who love movies about the movies but despite all the craft on display I doubt very much if this will set the box-office on fire, (though David Fincher aficionados might give it a go out of curiosity). Mank, (not a good title, by the way), is Herman J. Mankiewicz, co-writer with Orson Welles, of "Citizen Kane", and this movie, written by Fincher's father, Jack, some years ago, posits the idea that the screenplay of "...Kane" was written by Mankiewicz and Mankiewicz alone.

This is a movie strong on name-dropping, (we are told who everyone is as soon as they appear), and it's definitely smart and, thanks to Erik Messerschmidt's stunning black and white cinematography, it looks incredible but it also has a strip-cartoon like quality giving it the feel of a potted history of Hollywood at a time when MGM had more stars than there were in the heavens. It is, in other words, a niche movie for a niche market.

Mank is Gary Oldman, (excellent in an Oscar-bait performance). Welles is British actor Tom Burke, a splendid Charles Dance is William Randolph Hearst and Amanda Seyfried is an outstanding Marion Davies and there are scenes in the movie as good as anything you will see this year. It's also very good on the 'Hearst is Kane' idea and if we have to have gossipy show-biz biopics then we can't complain if they all look and sound as good as "Mank". This is the kind of film, come Oscar time, I'm sure the Academy will honour in a self-congratulatory frame of mind as if finally honouring "Citizen Kane" itself. It may not be Fincher's masterpiece but it just might be the one that will finally win him that little gold-plated man we call Oscar.

BEN IS BACK no stars

 Despite excellent performances from Julia Roberts, (frantically worried mom), and Lucas Hedges, (drug-addicted son), "Ben is Back" is unlikely to be thought of as one of the better movies about addiction, opting for the thriller route rather than going down the social conscience road, (setting it over Christmas doesn't help either; sentimentality is never far away). It it, then, a reasonably thin piece written and directed by Hedges' father, Peter, presumably as a vehicle for his extremely talented son who doesn't disappoint. Indeed were it not for Hedges Jr. and Roberts this would be no better than a half-decent made-for-tv thriller. If they don't actually redeem the picture at least they give it a much needed lift. Still, only tolerable at best.

CREEPY ***

 You might ask yourself why the Japanese are so good at movies about killers, killing and horror in general. Without wanting to cast aspersions at my Japanese friends could it be something in their psyche? But then you might say, isn't the American cinema just as expert in the killing fields as anywhere and don't we judge a certain kind of cinema on a particular Hitchcock movie from 1960? Perhaps we should simply say the Japanese have honed this particular genre to perfection and that "Creepy" has all the makings of a classic of its kind.

It's a Kiyoshi Kurosawa film and Kurosawa's already built up something of a reputation as one of the best directors working in this genre but neither would it disgrace David Fincher's canon of work. Like Fincher, Kurosawa seems to be able to blend horror with a streak of very dark humour and to make somewhat convoluted plots believable.

Hidetoshi Nishijima is the police detective who, after failing to secure a serial killer who has escaped when in his custody, leaves the force, takes a job lecturing on crime and serial killers in particular and moves with his wife to a new neighbourhood. However, they soon discover their new neighbours are not only unfriendly but, to give the film its title, creepy. Things get even creepier, as well as a whole lot nastier, when he and a former colleague reopen an old missing persons case. Add a great Bernard Hermannesque score and you know you're in for a delightfully unsettling experience. One of the best chillers of its year.

SORRY, ANGEL *

 Fundamentally ordinary yet incredibly self-centred, the characters in Christophe Honore's "Sorry, Angel" are not easy people to like. They are mostly a group of gay and bisexual men with complicated lives who find that relationships aren't necessarily what they're good at; even having a job, earning a living or just being 'themselves' also seem to pose a problem. The two main characters are Jacques, a writer in his thirties, (Pierre Deladonchamps), and Arthur, (Vincent Lacoste), a younger student, who meet, have sex and then go about the business of falling in love but find 'happy ever after' something of a pipedream.

It's territory Honore has explored before and more explicitly but this well-crafted, if overtly cool, movie represents something of a step forward if only in terms of style. This is a more formal, less kinetic, Honore but one still unable to shake off that sense of ennui. The performances are excellent but the characters aren't engaging. Also setting it at a time when AIDS was more prevalent than it is now seems like an unnecessary plot device rather than an attempt to get us to understand or care more about the people we see. Throw in a girlfriend and Jacques' young son and you get the impression that Honore is going out of his way to be 'cool' as if making a gay epic but one without a centre. Add a load of references to cinema and literature and you know exactly who this is aimed at. One for the fans, I'm afraid.

THE FAN *

 Another psychopathic fan movie and another considerable waste of the talents of the great Maureen Stapleton. Here she's secretary to a 'big star' and she's terrific for the short time she appears in the movie. The star being psychopathically stalked is Lauren Bacall, who's actually quite good playing in full, imperious diva mode. The stalker is Michael Biehn, (excellent), and while the movie is trashy and often tasteless, (it's peculiarly homophobic), it's also surprisingly enjoyable in a bad movie kind of way. Unfortunately it's an ugly looking picture and the editing is somewhat perfunctory so points knocked off there. Otherwise, more than passable midnight movie fare.

THE VOICE OF THE MOON no stars

 Federico Fellini's virtually unknown final film is neither the almost total disaster many people claim it to be nor the late masterpiece it could have been. It is, however, typical Fellini, certainly typical of his work from the mid-sixties on, full of whimsical middle-aged men and large-breasted women. We could be back in the Rimini of "Amarcord" but instead we are in a mythical town where nothing seems real and with everything unfolding as if in a dream. It's certainly hugely self-indulgent while lead Roberto Benigni has always been an acquired taste. In its favour you might say that two minutes in and you know you are watching a Fellini film even if it's a bad one; his signature is in every frame. If, like me, you regard him as one of cinema's great visionaries you will be massively disappointed and if you've always thought of him as overrated you can safely say 'I told you so'. I wish I could simply chalk it down as an interesting failure but it's less than that; a sad end to a greatly distinguished career.

THE GOOD LIAR **

 Once upon a time it would have been unheard of for a movie to get off the ground on the strength of leads whose combined ages totalled one hundred and fifty nine. On the other hand, mention that those leads are Sir Ian McKellen and Dame Helen Mirren and you just might manage to sell it. In "The Good Liar" Sir Ian is an ageing con-man and Dame Helen potentially his next victim, whom he meets on an online dating site and one of the film's pleasures is watching these two great thespians act their little cotton socks off. 

The target audience may indeed be readers of 'The Oldie' but if you dismiss this simply as one for the wrinklies you'd be missing a very enjoyable old-school thriller. Russell Tovey is here to cater for the younger market though you might feel his character is a bit superfluous while director Bill Condon makes great use of locations both in London and Berlin. Unfortunately the plot goes a little off the rails at the end so marks knocked off for that but still nice to see something as old-fashioned as this in 2019.

CALL NORTHSIDE 777 *

 This movie about a piece of real-life investigative journalism was much lauded at the time of its release, mainly for being one of the first features to be filmed in the actual locations where the events took place. It's certainly a good-looking picture, well directed by Henry Hathaway in an unhurried, unsensational fashion and yet it's dull. This is the story of a man in prison for life for a murder he didn't commit and of one reporter's efforts to get him reprieved but there's no excitement, no sense of urgency; it's certainly not a whodunit.

"Call Northside 777" falls into that category of films you admire for the skill with which they're made but which don't engage you on an emotional level and given the subject, this one should. James Stewart is the reporter and he goes about his duties earnestly but without conviction, (it's one of his least interesting performances), and it's left to Richard Conte, the prisoner, to give the film whatever feeling it has. He's very good but it's a small role. The rest of a good cast are largely wasted and the real star of the picture is Joe MacDonald who did the superb location photography. It's not seen much these days and is hardly likely to hold an audience raised on the likes of "All the President's Men"