LICORICE PIZZA ****

 Who would have guessed it; Paul Thomas Anderson has made the best romantic comedy in years but then, this being a Paul Thomas Anderson film, where's the surprise. Perhaps it's in the setting, (LA in the seventies, a world of film, television and waterbeds), if not in the treatment which is as idiosyncratic as ever. Firstly, take the ages of the young lovers; he's 15 and she's 25 and it's an on-again-off-again romance that's never really a romance but a friendship as sweet as any in the movies. This is Anderson's most accessible film as well as the funniest but again, this being a Paul Thomas Anderson film, it's not without its dark side but that move in and out of darkness is flawlessly done.

Of course, how much of this is autobiographical I haven't the faintest idea. Let's just say it's about a boy coming of age in California in the 1970's where Anderson himself was born in 1970, too young to be the film's hero but old enough to remember the movie brats of whom Anderson is perhaps the youngest and possibly the most talented but unlike Tarantino, Anderson doesn't people his film with 'real-life' cameos, (witht the exception of Jon Peters, one-time 'Mr. Barbra Streisand'), but some nicely disguised portraits like Jack Holden, (think William, with a dash of Steven McQueen; a terrific Sean Penn) and Lucy Doollittle, (think 'Ricardo',circa "Yours, Mine and Ours").

But then all of this is just window dressing, if brilliant window dressing, to the movie's main love story that is carried along by two truly wonderful performances from Cooper Hoffman, (son of Philip Semour with both the looks and talent of his dad), and newcomer Alana Haim. They are unknown now but their futures are assured; these are two of the best performances of 2021 though Bradley Cooper does his best to upstage them as Peters.

Yes, Anderson may fill his film with crowd-pleasing cameos, (Harriet Sansom Harris is another gem), but he saves the best moments for Hoffman and Haim; a silent phone call that speaks volumes, an initial meeting in high school grounds that is one of the sweetest getting-to-know-you moments in movies, running towards each other during various stages of their relationship as if fate really had decreed that these two people should be together.

In its way, this is Anderson's love letter to the movies, the ones we pay our money to see in the multiplexes, but it's equally Anderson having the time of his life and passing it on. "Licorice Pizza" is easily the sweetest movie of the year and almost certainly the best.

THE FUGITIVE no stars

 Not John Ford's finest hour. "The Fugitive" was his 1947 adaptation of Graham Greene's "The Power and the Glory" and like "The Informer" it suffers from a heavy dose of Expressionism and worse, 'religiosity'; this is enough to turn the best Catholic to paganism. Filmed in Mexico and, presumably, set there, though the opening narration informs us it's a 'nameless state'. It's about a place where religion is banned and where priests must hide out and become fugitives.

Henry Fonda is 'the fugitive' of the title, a priest trying to keep one step ahead of the law, represented here by Pedro Armendariz. No-one is given a name but simply a title, 'a figitive', 'an Indian woman' (that's Dolores del Rio), 'a Lieutenant of Police' and so on. Symbolism is the order of the day and Fonda's priest is decidedly Christ-like, (we also have a Judas, a Magdalene, a Barabbas etc.), and for a country where religion is banned on pain of death the peasants seem to embrace it and to burst into song at every opportunity. The superb black and white cinematography of Gabriel Figueroa is the only plus.

VOYAGE OF TIME **

  Not short enough to be a short and not long enough to be a feature, Terrence Malick's "Voyage of Time", (subtitled, 'The IMAX Experience' to give you an idea what kind of screen you should see it on), is like an extended sequence from "The Tree of Life" or outtakes from "2001; A Space Odyssey" and is visually superb as we might expect from Malick but it's hardly informative and even at 46 minutes is just as likely to bore as to enthrall.

Brad Pitt is the narrator who asks us do we ever wonder where we came from when we look at the stars or when did dust become life. Malick doesn't tell us and you will almost certainly get more information from a David Attenborough documentary than from this. That said, it looks amazing in ways that even Attenborough can't match and to Malick's credit he does ponder 'big' questions as if the asking itself is enough to satisfy the lack of an answer and anyone remotely interested in the visual power of cinema won't want to miss it and yes, see it on the biggest screen possible. There's also a 90 minute version, narrated by Cate Blanchet, and still awaiting a release.

VIVARIUM no stars

 If you're wondering what it takes to get a movie made just look at the number of executive producers and production companies behind "Vivarium". Fundamentally, it's an Irish film but with input from Belgium and Denmark as well. The setting, of course, is everywhere and nowhere since "Vivarium" is a horror-cum-sci-fi picture and its appalling Yonder, where every house and every street is identical, could be anywhere or nowhere. Stepford, perhaps?

Gemma and Tom are the young couple in search of their first home and Martin is the deeply weird, almost not quite human, estate agent who shows them around 'Number 9'. The thing is they don't like the house, the area or Martin but when they try to leave they find they can't. Lorcan Finnegan's movie is a fantasy that's grounded in a kind of reality thanks only to the lived-in performances of Imogen Poots and Jesse Eisenberg as the young couple trapped in a nightmare from which there is no escape and things get even weirder, if that's possible, when a baby turns up on the doorstep of the house they thought they had just burned down and grows up into a strapping, screaming broth of a boy almost overnight.

The problem with "Vivarium" is that there is enough material here for maybe a decent episode of "The Twilight Zone" that's now been stretched to over ninety minutes and despite Poots and Eisenberg's best efforts it gets boring very quickly and it didn't take me long to figure out why it took so many people to get this misbegotten project off the ground. Let's just say "Vivarium" is a hard-sell. On the plus side Senan Jennings is very good as the child from hell before he grows up to be Eanna Hardwicke.

tick, tick...BOOM! *

 Jonathan Larson, in case you don't know, was the guy who wrote that mega and award-winning hit "Rent" but who was already dead from a brain aneurysm before the opening night. You might call it a tragic success story since Larson never lived long enough to know how much he was appreciated though if Lin-Manuel Miranda's film "tick, tick...BOOM!" is anything to go by Larson always knew just how good he was. He may never have been a 'success' during his lifetime but he was clearly gifted, (Sondheim was a fan), and not lacking in self-confidence.

The movie itself is based on Larson's less well known musical autobiography, a kind of one-man show complete with backing singers and band and Miranda opens it out very nicely so we aren't stuck watching a guy performing in a theatre and as rock-cum-broadway showtunes musicals go, it isn't half bad.

Larson, himself, is played by Andrew Garfield, a remarkably talented actor who can now add a fine singing voice to his CV. Unfortunately, he is also extremely annoying. If this was what Larson was really like let's say I find his brand of chutzpah very grating and Garfield lays it on with a trowel. Yes, it's nice his story is finally being told but I just wish I could have liked him more.

BEING THE RICARDOS ***

 The Ricardos, in case you don't know, were Desi Arnaz and Lucille Ball, probably the hottest married couple in America in the '50's and certainly the hottest married couple on television and Aaron Sorkin's excellent new film, "Being the Ricardos" is about one week in their lives, a week that began when Walter Winchell announced that Ball was a member of the Communist Party, (and this was during the blacklist), so Sorkin's film isn't a comedy, (though it is often funny), but another political picture from one of America's prime specialists in political pictures.

It's also a memory piece as a few of Lucy and Desi's collaborators in the present look back, not just at the week in question, but further back into the lives of the couple. We see their meeting and follow Ball's career; some of these flashbacks work and some don't. There is, of course, the potential for mawkishness but Sorkin is much too acerbic and canny a writer for that and, as he showed in "The Trial of the Chicago Seven", he's a fine director of actors. Nicole Kidman, in particular, is outstanding as Ball, sometimes bearing an uncanny resemblance to the Lucy I remember from television and while Javier Bardem may not look much like Arnaz he turns in yet another fine performance though it is Nina Arianda as Vivian Vance who almost walks off with the picture.

The period detail, too, is perfectly realised and there are brilliant recreations of some of the television shows that made Desi and Lucy, (and the fictional Ricardos),that most beloved of couples. Unfortunately, while the film is clearly a labour of love for Sorkin is it enough to ensure its success at the box-office? It's certainly relevant; the scars that America suffered during Trump's presidency haven't really healed and much of what's happening in America and American show-biz today, bears a disturbing similarity to the age of McCarthyism. At least Ball and Arnaz challenged the conventions of the time and won and Sorkin's heartfelt film is a tribute to their tenacity. Sadly, what they couldn't heal was the minefield that was their marriage and they divorced shortly after the events displayed but this isn't a sad movie; on the contrary, this pertinent film has its own sense of uplift and is a credit to Sorkin, Kidman, Bardem and all concerned.

LA RELIGIEUSE ****

 I'm not quite sure how seriiously Diderot meant his text to be taken when he wrote his novel "La Religieuse"; it's certainly anti-clerical and it did provoke a scandal. Here was a tale of savagery and what was perceived as sexual perversity within the Catholic Church and amongst nuns no less and, of course, the story told in "La Religieuse" can shock us even now even if we are a little more sophisticated.

Jacques Rivete filmed Diderot's "La Religieuse", (English title, "The Nun"), in 1966 and it's a classic, certainly one of the key French films of the period. It's the story of a young 19th century French girl with no prospects of marriage put, like so many of her contemporaries, into a convent. However, Susanne, (a never better Anna Karina), is a rebel and her rebellion takes the form of a lawsuit against her convent so that she can renounce her vows and go back into the world. However, the nuns have other ideas and she is subjected to all the horrors they can inflict on her.

When she loses her case she is transferred to a, let's call it a more 'open prison', where the nuns gambol and frolic like gay versions of the sisters in "The Sound of Music" and where the Mother Superior takes a more than motherly interest in Susanne and where even the local priest takes a less than religious fancy to her. The contrast to her former convent is deliciously perverse; religion is scorned and debauchary championed and poor Susanne is torn between the devil and the deep.

Rivette, of coursem films all this in his typrically austere style drawing excellent performances from his largely female cast and certainly giving it 'the look' of a proper period piece. It's also one of his most accessible films though it was never likely to pack the local cinema on a Saturday night. This is art-house fare of the best kind; intelligent and gripping and its reputation is richly deserved.

FEAR STRIKES OUT **

 "Fear Strikes Out" was both a sports film and a film about mental illness, topics that were fashionable when the film was made. It was also director Robert Mulligan's first film and it gave Anthony Perkins his first starring role. It could just as easily have been called 'The Jim Piersall Story' as it deals with the early career of the Red Sox player who fought mental illness for a good part of his life and the film makes no qualms about laying the blame at the feet of his domineering father, played by Karl Malden.

Knowing nothing about the real Jim Piersall I can't say how accurately Perkins embodies the role. He does seem a somewhat awkward athlete but is often superb in his more psychotic moments. Perkins was always a somewhat unlikely star; tall, gangly, good-looking and at least bisexual. I'm sure the studios must have wondered what to do with him and it took Hitchcock to find the perfect part. Unfortunately, after "Psycho" he was basically Norman Bates for the rest of his career. Mulligan, fresh from television, handles the fairly obvious material with some skill and did at least secure a nomination from the Director's Guild. Minor, perhaps, but still worth seeing.

SPENCER ****

The first thing you have to get your head around is that Pablo Larrain's new film "Spencer" isn't 'about' Princess Diana, at least not in any literal sense, although Diana herself is never off the screen. Perhaps a title at the beginning, 'a fable based on a true tragedy', is the clue. This is a fantasy or maybe simply a tragedy, (of the Shakespearean variety), in which everything is filtered through the gaze and the mind of a mad Princess of Wales, (Hamlet and the Court at Elsinore as imagined, rather than actually seen, by Ophelia). Larrain and screenwriter Steven Knight's Diana may as well be a fictional character since nothing we see is 'real' even if some of it may be true.

It's set over the three days of Christmas at Sandringham, presumably after Charles and Diana have separated and Diana has returned for the holidays. In this version of events, that clearly never happened, she is already deeply disturbed, blaming the Royal Family and Charles' affair with Camilla for everything. The only affection she gets is from her two sons and her servants, particularly her dresser, (a superb Sally Hawkins). Her in-laws hover in the background like zombies ready to devour her and like zombies are mostly silent with only Charles and the Queen, (as well as William and Harry), given anything to say, (Charles tries to be sympathetic, the Queen doesn't). "The Crown" this isn't. Knight has no sympathy for any of them though it's never clear if he believes that they were responsible for Diana's supposed breakdown, Only dresser Maggie, (Hawkins), head chef Darren, (Sean Harris), and senior equerry Major Gregory. (a brilliant Timothy Spall), are prepared to indulge her and let her go her own way.

Of course, none of it is true. This could be any woman having a serious mental breakdown anywhere and at anytime and stylistically this is a tour-de-force built around a phenomenal performance by Kristin Stewart as Diana. Yes, she captures the mannerisms perfectly but is there any evidence that Diana was as off-the-rails as she's presented as being here and while the Royal Family are certainly as dysfunctional as any dysfunctional family could be, I've never for a moment believed they were ever this cold, (this is the chilliest Christmas of any screen Christmas I've seen), but this is not the point.

The fault lines governing relationships and the fragility of human behaviour is what has always interested Larrain and this film is no different. Despite streaks of humour this is far from comfortable viewing and it's unlikely it will prove popular at the box-office. Stewart's Oscar, however, is virtually guaranteed; this is as fine a piece of acting as I've ever seen and other Oscar contenders such as Jessica Chastain and Lady Gaga will have to resign themselves that 2021 just wasn't their year.

 

UNHINGED **

 The title says it all and with Russell Crowe in the lead you really should know what you've let yourself in for. He's the one who's "Unhinged", taking a very bad case of road rage out on poor Caren Pistorious. Mr Crowe has come a long way in his career and it's been mostly downhill, both in the looks department and in the acting stakes. Ok, so he was never Larry Olivier but back in the day old Russell had been known to carry a movie, even managing to pick up an Oscar along the way and to his credit he does bring a kind of Old Testament fury to his role as the mad motorist.

Derrick Borte's film kicks off in fine fashion. The pre-credit sequence shows just how unhinged Russell is while the credits themselves, a melange of violent, mostly road-rage incidents, sets the tone for what follows and as dumb, crazy psycho-killer movies go this piece of schlock-horror isn't at all bad. At least it does what it says on the tin and at under ninety minutes it never outstays its welcome. Check your brains at the door and there's a very good chance you'll actually enjoy this.

THE FRENCH DISPATCH **

 It's being described as the most "Andersonian', (am I making these words up just the way Wes does), of Wes Anderson's films and yes, "The French Dispatch" really is the synthesis of everything that's come before but rather than his masterpiece it looks like he may finally have run out of ideas. It's certainly his most visually striking film; image after image dazzles the eye and the technique is typically sublime but this most overt homage to 'The New Yorker' and its ilk is seriously short on substance.

We're meant to be somewhere within the pages of the magazine known as 'The French Dispatch' and yes, this originally based Kansas publication is now situated in the city of Ennui-sur-Blase, (so Wes can pay homage to Tati). What we get is an obituary, a brief travel guide and three stories. The obituary is for the editor, (Bill Murray, one of the few performers in a massively starry cast to actually make an impression), and the stories are taken from various sections of the magazine.

The first one, about a painter, (Benicio Del Toro), incarcerated in an asylum for the criminally insane, is a visual treat and is 'narrated' by its author, (a sublime Tilda Swinton). The bits with Tilda are in colour, the rest in black and white but the tale itself is even more inconsequential than what we're used to from Anderson. It's followed by a piece by Frances McDormand based around student revolt and starring a dull and seemingly disinterested Timothee Chalamet. I wasn't quite sure how long this story lasted but I was seriously bored by the end.

The third, (and best), is the work of a James Baldwinesque writer, very nicely played by Jeffrey Wright and is both the most frivolous and the most complex of the three stories with Anderson making brilliant use of animation to bolster the visual effect. There are moments here worth the price of admission; indeed there are moments scattered through this most Andersonian of films as good as anything in his canon but ultimately this is a film to look at rather than listen to. It would make a great coffee-table book as the covers of 'The French Dispatch' which accompany the end credits clearly shows. As for the movie itself, it certainly scores an A for effort but for everything else I'm afraid it's only a C+ this time round.

HOLY MATRIMONY **

 John M. Stahl's "Holy Matrimony" isn't much of a movie but it's a great vehicle for its stars, Monty Woolley and Gracie Fields. Based on Arnold Bennett's novel "Buried Alive" it's a comedy of mistaken identity. When his butler dies, painter Woolley allows everyone to think that it was he who died and when the butler is buried in Westminster Abbey Woolley assumes his identity and later marries the widow, (a splendid Fields), the butler was courting by correspondence. It's very funny in its daft way and is splendidly cast throughout. Nunnally Johnson was the producer and wrote the screenplay and does a very good job on both accounts. Minor it may be but it's very likeable.

LIMBO ****

 Ben Sharrock's absolutely superb new movie "Limbo" manages to be politically prescient while still channelling all the attributes of an Ealing comedy. The setting is a fictional Scottish island, as remote as they come, where asylum seekers wait, in a kind of limbo, to find out if their applications to come to live in the UK are successful. It's hero is Omar, (Amir El-Masry, excellent), a young Syrian who finds his new, hopefully temporary Scottish home, a place as alien as any on the planet. His loneliness is alleviated when he falls in with three other asylum seekers. He also has a gift for music, (he plays the oud), and it is this that finally sustains him and lifts him beyond the bleakness of a Scottish winter and the situation he finds himself in.

This is definitely a minimalist movie, a throwback in its way to the days of Bill Forsyth, and it certainly won't make anyone rush off to visit the islands of North and South Uist, Berneray and Benbecula, (whatever beauties they may have are hidden in the mist, the rain, the snow and the sea-spray). It's also very funny at times in its surreal fashion as well as heartbreakingly sad and it's superbly shot in the Academy ratio which gives the enclosed, claustrophobic feelings of its characters room to breathe but exploding, magnificently, into widescreen at a crucial moment and is further proof, should you need it, that British cinema is alive and kicking.