Oscars 2008 - is it boring when they get it right?

Posted by Andy Kelly on February 26, 2008 10:58 AM

IT’S boring when they get it right. Right?

It was billed as a classic year for the film industry and in those circumstances, cream will normally rise to the top, and so it proved.

The easiest decision of the night was surely Daniel Day-Lewis as Best Actor. I dropped in on Fact in Liverpool on Sunday morning (bloody freezing and how can you watch a three hour film when our moronic city leaders insist you can only pay and display for two?) to catch There Will be Blood.

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ANNA M

Posted by Andy Kelly on February 23, 2008 11:30 PM

BEWARE a woman scorned is the old phrase, but what about a woman whom you’ve had absolutely nothing to do with?

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THE HOAX

Posted by Andy Kelly on February 23, 2008 11:28 PM

BASED on a true story, Richard Gere is Clifford Irving, an American author living on past glories who is desperate for another hit. After his latest book is rejected, he embarks on an ingenious plan to pull off the century’s biggest literary con trick.

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EVENING

Posted by Andy Kelly on February 23, 2008 11:26 PM

AS FEMALE casts go, you don’t get much better than this. Claire Danes, Meryl Streep, Glenn Close, Vanessa Redgrave, Natasha Richardson and Toni Collette – beat that lot if you can. Evening sees a dying woman, Ann Lord (Redgrave) look back on her life, particularly at a weekend when she attended the wedding of her best friend, rich American socialite Lila.

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ELIZABETH: THE GOLDEN AGE (12)

Posted by me on February 23, 2008 11:22 PM

PERIOD drama is my one weakness, as Dorcas might say in Lark Rise to Candleford, so this sequel to Elizabeth I was already preaching to the converted.

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ROCCO AND HIS BROTHERS (PG)

Posted by me on February 23, 2008 11:18 PM

SET in Milan and originally released in 1960, director Luchino Visconti’s “Rocco� is often cited as an influence on The Godfather and Raging Bull.

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ONCE (15)

Posted by me on February 23, 2008 11:13 PM

THIS low-budget Irish release has won awards all over the place for its touching tale of a Dublin busker who falls for a Czech immigrant through their mutual love of music.

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A Mighty Heart (15)

Posted by Andy Kelly on February 3, 2008 11:00 PM

THERE’S a problem when you look like Angelina Jolie, that body, that mouth, that partner. People can forget you’re a damn fine actress who has taken a few chances in your career and deserves some credit for it.

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The Street (complete series 2)

Posted by Andy Kelly on February 3, 2008 10:57 PM

TELEVISION drama just doesn’t get much better than this.

Building on an impressive and Emmy-winning first series, The Street has that most reliable of writing yardsticks, Jimmy McGovern, at its helm but with a number of local writers responsible for individual episodes.

The premise is one street in northern England and the lives of the people who live there.

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Atonement (15)

Posted by Andy Kelly on February 3, 2008 10:53 PM

IF YOU missed this at the cinema, you’ve already rather missed out because it really does look spectacular on the big screen. Thank god for widescreen then.

James McAvoy and Keira Knightley play a pair of young lovers in 1930s Britain separated by class and upbringing who are ripped asunder by false accusations made against him. After his release from prison, they are briefly reunited before he is called to war in the killing fields of France.

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