195 Best Movies From United Kingdom On Itunes Australia (Page 9)

Genre: Animation, Drama

Actor: Didier Gustin, Eilidh Rankin, Jacques Tati, Jean-Claude Donda, Jil Aigrot

Director: Sylvain Chomet

Rating: PG

Far from feeling like English literature homework, this version of Shakespeare’s romantic comedy of errors fizzes with vitality and wit. Kenneth Branagh directs and stars in his own sumptuous adaptation, which also features a banquet of dashing talent in their prime, including Emma Thompson and a winning Denzel Washington.

Even amongst the film’s superlative ensemble (which also features a melodramatically villainous Keanu Reeves and Michael Keaton as a farcically inept policeman), Thompson stands out for her instinctive grasp of Shakespeare’s genius and easy ability to lift it off the page and give it sparkling life. As Beatrice, she deals out wry cut-downs of Branagh’s vain Benedick, all while trying to suppress the roiling romantic tension that nevertheless persists between them. It might not be set to the music of ABBA, but with Patrick Doyle’s radiant score, an intoxicatingly beautiful Tuscan setting, and an infectious, non-stop party vibe, the joyous Much Ado About Nothing feels more akin to Mamma Mia than any of cinema’s other Shakespeare adaptations.

Genre: Comedy, Drama, Romance

Actor: Alex Lowe, Andy Hockley, Ben Elton, Brian Blessed, Chris Barnes, Conrad Nelson, Denzel Washington, Edward Jewesbury, Emma Thompson, Gerard Horan, Imelda Staunton, Jimmy Yuill, Kate Beckinsale, Keanu Reeves, Kenneth Branagh, Michael Keaton, Patrick Doyle, Phyllida Law, Richard Briers, Richard Clifford, Robert Sean Leonard

Director: Kenneth Branagh

In Last Night in Soho, director Edgar Wright has so much to play with. The old lady character serves an unexpected role, while Ellie (Thomasin McKenzie) faces an interesting morality crisis as she tries to decide who to help at the end of the film. Just as fascinating is the film’s Ghibli-esque premise: we follow a hero going on an adventure far away from home and into a world where it's unclear where reality ends and fantasy begins. However, a lot of the time, it feels like the film was made to serve a big twist that doesn't have enough weight to it. The fantasy is far more intriguing than any tame interaction the film has to offer, so it doesn't feel like it lives up to its potential. But there is one obvious exception: Anya Taylor-Joy’s magnetic presence as Sandie—it’s a presence powerful enough to hold a film together.

Genre: Horror, Mystery, Thriller

Actor: Al Roberts, Alan Ruscoe, Andrew Bicknell, Anya Taylor-Joy, Celeste Dring, Colin Mace, Derek Lea, Diana Rigg, Elizabeth Berrington, Jacqui-Lee Pryce, James Phelps, Jessie Mei Li, Josh Zaré, Kassius Nelson, Katrina Vasilieva, Lati Gbaja, Lisa McGrillis, Margaret Nolan, Matt Smith, Michael Ajao, Michael Jibson, Michael Mears, Oliver Phelps, Paul Brightwell, Pauline McLynn, Rita Tushingham, Sam Claflin, Sam Parks, Synnøve Karlsen, Terence Stamp, Thomasin McKenzie

Director: Edgar Wright

Rating: R

Fighting with My Family manages to pull off a respectable pro wrestling movie with a lighthearted teen drama slant — a nice change of pace and a victory in itself. Saraya (Florence Pugh) and her family paint the movie with dorky crass jokes, but the film doesn’t seem to tread that line masterfully enough to where we look past her family’s obnoxiousness and find it purely charming instead. But there is more to like here than not: Vince Vaughn as levelheaded NXT coach Hutch Morgan, Dwayne Johnson as himself, and even the blonde girls posse were a little more than just clichés and added a sense of maturity to the portrayal of modern WWE.

Genre: Comedy

Actor: Adam Maxted, Aqueela Zoll, Ashley Darkwood, Bobbi Tyler, Brendon Burns, Charlie Sterling, Chloe Csengery, Christine Ozanne, Chuey Okoye, Ciaran Dowd, David Minton, Dwayne Johnson, Ellie Gonsalves, Elroy Powell, Florence Pugh, Hannah Dodd, Hannah Rae, Jack Gouldbourne, Jack Lowden, James Burrows, Jerome Fleisch, Jerry Lawler, John Cena, John Layfield, Jonathan Jules, Josh Myers, Julia Davis, Julia Hamer-Bevis, Justin Sysum, Kim Matula, Leah Harvey, Lena Headey, Michael Coulthard, Mike Mizanin, Mohammad Amiri, Nick Frost, Olivia Bernstone, Paul Robinson, Paul Wight, Rishi Ghosh, Rod Zapata, Roy Bevis, Samantha Allen, Samantha Alleyne, Saraya-Jade Bevis, Simon Kippen, Simon Musk, Stephen Farrelly, Stephen Merchant, Thea Trinidad, Thomas Whilley, Tori Ellen Ross, Vince Vaughn

Director: Stephen Merchant

Rating: PG-13

Even if it seems like nothing really "happens" for much of The Secret Garden, its characters paint quite the moving picture of neglected children and their indomitable capacity to find hope in the world. Director Agnieszka Holland tells this story with just the right amount of whimsy: at times it's spooky and magical, but everything is grounded in the charming performances of the film's young actors, who are allowed to be difficult, smart, and sorrowful whenever they need to be. It may be old-fashioned, but watching it in this new decade—when we're all trying to guard our kids from sickness and death—makes it feel all the more relevant.

Genre: Drama, Family, Fantasy

Actor: Andrea Pickering, Andrew Knott, Arthur Spreckley, Colin Bruce, David Stoll, Eileen Page, Heydon Prowse, Irène Jacob, John Lynch, Kate Maberly, Laura Crossley, Maggie Smith, Peter Moreton, Walter Sparrow

Director: Agnieszka Holland

Rating: G

Featuring cannily edited filmography excerpts and interviews with friends and ex-lovers of Rock Hudson — the Golden Age matinee idol who became the first major celebrity to die of AIDS — this documentary lifts the lid on the closeted gay star’s double life. Though its first third draws chiefly on biographers to paint a serviceable picture of the homophobic context Hudson rose to fame in, it’s in later interviews with members of his inner circle that the film comes to life. These contributors give us a more closely informed picture of Hudson, who seemed to accept Hollywood’s compromise: he could live out his professional dreams so long as he didn’t rock the boat.

Some aspects of the film’s approach do raise an eyebrow, such as a risqué conversation that seems to have been surreptitiously recorded. These inclusions lend the film a tabloid scoop’s salaciousness in places, but, thanks to its final third, it’s largely a touching testament to Hudson. As it movingly argues, however reluctant he was to disclose his diagnosis (and, in doing so, his sexuality), he played a pivotal role in changing the tide of public attitudes towards AIDS, and thus to fundraising efforts — making him an unwitting LGBTQ+ hero.

Genre: Documentary

Actor: Allison Anders, Armistead Maupin, Bea Arthur, Burt Lancaster, Doris Day, Douglas Sirk, Elizabeth Taylor, Esther Shapiro, Howard McGillin, Illeana Douglas, James Dean, Joan Rivers, Kathleen Hughes, Lee Garlington, Linda Evans, Lucille Ball, Peter Kevoian, Piper Laurie, Richard Hodge, Rock Hudson, Tim Turner

Director: Stephen Kijak

Rating: PG-13

This gripping legal drama is based on a case we still don’t know the truth of — which might make it seem like a pointless exercise, were it not for the fact that it’s infectiously fascinated by greater questions than whether wealthy socialite Claus von Bülow (Jeremy Irons) really did attempt to kill wife Sunny (Glenn Close), who was left comatose by the mysterious event. After being convicted, Claus recruited for his appeal then-hotshot lawyer Alan Dershowitz (Ron Silver), now better known for personal allegations and his defense of men even more nefarious than Claus. Reversal follows the tricky legal argument-crafting process, embedding us with Dershowitz’s elite team as they meticulously comb through the prosecution’s theory to find the hairline crack they need to break the case open.

But why go to all this effort to exonerate an unlikeable and frustratingly enigmatic man like Claus, whom Dershowitz apparently doesn’t even believe himself? While we’re morbidly fascinated by unknowable cases like this, it’s the passion of the defense that’s really puzzling — something Reversal shrewdly gets as it wrestles with the ethical arguments for and against Dershowitz’s involvement, making for a pre-courtroom drama whose power extends beyond that of the particular case it documents.

Genre: Drama

Actor: Alan Pottinger, Annabella Sciorra, Bill Camp, Brian Delate, Bruno Eyron, Christine Baranski, Christine Dunford, Constance Shulman, Edwin McDonough, Ericka Klein, Felicity Huffman, Fisher Stevens, Frank Stellato, Frederick Neumann, Glenn Close, Gordon Joseph Weiss, Jack Gilpin, Jad Mager, JD Cullum, Jeremy Irons, Jessika Cardinahl, Johann Carlo, Julie Hagerty, Keith Reddin, Larry Sherman, Leo Leyden, LisaGay Hamilton, Malachy McCourt, Mitchell Whitfield, Redman Maxfield, Ron Silver, Stephen Mailer, Tom Wright, Uta Hagen

Director: Barbet Schroeder