World Cinema Saturday (27/8)   21:05    Talking Pictures   The Pianist (2002). An family of artistic and intellectual Polish Jews falls foul of the Nazi occupiers during WW2. The eldest son, a talented pianist, played by Adrian Brody, is separated from the family, so forced to survive in isolation. The film pays tribute to the quiet… [continues]

World Cinema Saturday (4/6)       21:00    BBC4             Lullaby (2019). Sorry, I’ve drawn a blank. It could be Chicheka Lullaby, from Iran. Or it could be Perfect Nanny aka Lullaby, from France. Or it could be Lullaby (2014) from the USA, but that wouldn’t count as World Cinema, the… [continues]

Sadly, it took me so long to push this through this week that you’ll have to seek out some these films on catch-up. No reflection on my able helpers, who all did brilliantly and on time. World Cinema Saturday (21/5)        02:00   Film4           Why Don’t You Just Die (2018)… [continues]

World Cinema Sunday (15/5)  01:00   BBC2  Piranhas (2019). Drama based on La Paranza dei Bambini (literally ’The Trawler of Children’), written by Roberto Saviano (Gomorrah) and directed by Claudio Giovannesi, about a group of teenage boys in Naples, beginning to make their way in the world of organised crime. Did well at the 69th Berlin… [continues]

World Cinema Saturday (30/4)    21:00    BBC4       By the Grace of God (2018). Writer-director François Ozon crafts a meticulous and quietly forceful fact-based drama recounting the shocking career of Bernard Preynat, Catholic Priest and serial child abuser, and the courageous campaign by a group of his male victims 30 years on to… [continues]

World Cinema Saturday (23/4) 01:35   Film4    The Guilty (2018). This Danish thriller, directed by debutant Gustav Möller, is basically a one-hander. Jakob Cedergren plays Asger, a Copenhagen police officer handling emergency calls while he awaits trial for shooting dead a 19-year-old man. He takes a call from a woman named Iben (Jessica Dinnage) who appears to… [continues]

World Cinema  Sunday (10/4)       22:30    BBC4     Yuli (2018) .This is billed as a biopic of the Cuban ballet dancer Carlos Acosta, but as a film it is much more than that. It is directed by the renowned Spanish actress, writer and director Iciar Bollain, and co-written, with Acosta himself, by Paul Laverty, long-time screenwriter for… [continues]

World Cinema Saturday (19/3)        22:00   BBC4       Burning (2018). Mesmerising mystery-thriller from South Korean director Lee Chang-dong. A struggling young man meets a mysterious woman he used to know. She asks him to look after her cat, then introduces him to a richer rival with a dangerous preoccupation. A 148-minute dreamscape,… [continues]