Author: Alex Cole

A dark black and white tale, Tastes Like Medicine takes us through the mental breakdown and eventual split from reality of Kevin (Justin Walker Wright) as he faces his past, and questions himself at his ex-girlfriend’s baby shower.

Taste Like Medicine opens with a truly powerful scene as Walker Wright delivers a strong monologue coupled with slow motion movements of his ex-girlfriends face as she delivers the news and walks away. Steven Alexander Russell delivers gold in this scene, along with the excellent facial expressions of Marissa Rambaram (Alice).  Unfortunately, the power of scene is taken from with the next  ten minutes before a final scene showing  Kevin’s face during the same conversation re-delivers on this early excellence.

The central scenes of this film aren’t nearly as well delivered with much poorer acting, a confusing story line and an unlikable lead. I feel that Russell uses blank facial expressions and non-emotive delivery to try to display a break from reality as well as several monologue scenes. I can’t fault him for inventiveness and for direction in terms of background characters, but the break from reality itself is confusing and muddled without clarity in what is actually going on. Regretfully, Russell’s style just appears like bad acting and poor delivery, not delivering on an interesting plot-line.

Tastes Like Medicine has a lot of  thought behind it and is inventive in what it seeks to achieve. Unfortunately it didn’t deliver in entertainment and it was hard to stay in the moment. Russell has a future in film-making and the actors themselves have talent, but I wouldn’t put this down as a great display of either.

La La Land is described on IMDB with the tagline ‘A jazz pianist falls for an aspiring actress in Los Angeles.’  Rarely do I ever see a description of a film that does not do a film even the slightest bit of justice, and so over simplifies the content. Reading that line, and even the more in depth description featured on the site there’s absolutely no way I’d have gone to see this film. THANKFULLY I’m not the sort to choose on film on IMDB. For me, it’s posters, trailers, and the general feel around a film that directs me to the cinema and these were all beautiful. I was very grateful that my senses (and perhaps a little bit my girlfriend) had told me that I would enjoy this film. It was in the words of Bill and Ted…’Excellent’.

Factually, IMDB had it right, this is a film about a Jazz pianist who falls for an aspiring actress, but it is also so much more. It’s a truly modern musical and a truly modern love story with heartbreak, chills, bittersweet endings and a heartwarming sense of beauty that I feel is lost in a lot of modern film-making. There’s sadness without grit and depression and love without a focus on sex. It’s something different.

La La Land has gone down the route of musical, but without throwing it in your face. The opening scene makes you worry that this will be a complete throwback to the 1950’s; but the audience is soon relieved that it uses the medium sparingly and with a subtlety that adds to the growing on screen connection. Emma Stone and Ryan Gosling show the on-screen connection that proved such a success in Crazy Stupid Love and a truth that has made both their careers light up. The singing wasn’t perfect, and perhaps Emma Stone and Ryan Gosling’s voices weren’t quite up to the level you’d expect of  a stage actor or actress, but in a way it added a touch of realism and was unnoticeable for most of it.

I’m well aware La La Land won’t be for everyone, but if you love a touching love story, a bit of music or Jazz, or you’re simply in search of something unique the La La Land is for you, and as usual the Ryan Gosling and Emma Stone fan clubs won’t be disappointed. It may not win the BIG awards at The Oscars, I think La La Land will win it’s fair share.

Palace of Fun brings intrigue, betrayal and mystery to a family estate in Brighton as mysterious drifter Finn comes between a brother and sister as his secrets begin to control him.

After meeting Finn (Andrew Mullen) in a local nightclub, sensitive artist Lily (Phoebe Naughton) takes him into her parents home while  they holiday in Italy. Not to be  be outdone, jealous and vindictive brother Jamie (George Stocks) goes in search of leverage. Events take a darker turn when his secret is discovered as Jamie begins to toy with Finn, and his sister Lily.

Director Eadword Stocks,along with co-writer, brother and star George Stocks have created a poetic, quiet and melancholy piece with Palace of Fun never  quite hitting the energy levels of a typical crime thriller. This is  not to say this is a bad point. In fact, quite the opposite. The film powerfully portrays how normal life often exists alongside intrigues and secrets such as these. The Stocks Bros. should also be praised for dealing with highly dramatic incidents with poise, control and restraint; instead they’ve created mystery amongst trauma.

The level of restraint in Palace of Fun should be praised, but it does in some ways cause it to drag on in the middle and become slightly boring. I recommend not switching off if  you do feel like this as the end result is worth it. George Stocks gives a good performance as a spoilt ‘poshboy’ whilst Naughton portrays a plain well raised girl incredibly well (if that’s what she was going for) and Mullen produces an average performance as Finn. Stocks is most likely to light up the scene, but n the whole performances are average.

Palace of Fun goes down for me as an interesting and good film, well worth a watch if you have nothing in particular to watch, but if you’ve had a  film in your thought for a while, I’d go for that first.

Collecting a family member to identify a body is never a simple task; but in Leftovers, breaking news takes it from bad…to very much worse.

Leftovers is a a product of Angry Student Productions and Tofiq Rzayev, a talented young director and writer from Azerbaijan who’s been making exciting short films since 2011. Yet another example of Rzayev facing the things he fears through film, Leftovers is dark and traumatic, portraying a situation no sane person would want to encounter Unfortunately, short films require instant impact, with either a gripping story that takes you from the beginning or characters you can relate with instantly. For me, Leftovers had none of these. Unfortunately the acting was solid oak from the beginning and I couldn’t match any of the dialogue to the emotions on the characters faces. Perhaps this is a translation issue coupled with overly dramatic subtitles, but for me, I saw very little trauma on the faces of Kerza, Momar or Sancar.

The moral musings of the film, discussing hell, rape and wishing your pain on others was interesting and had great potential to really deliver something special. Yet, it came across more like a story written by a philosophy student whose intentions were as far from subtle as possible. It felt forced and unnecessary at times, with the actual story and events seemingly secondary to these philosophical discussions which ruined the feel of the piece and keeps the viewer distant and separate.

Leftovers had potential and though Rzayev’s talent for story telling is real, Leftovers is not the tale for me. Unfortunately I wouldn’t recommend giving this a look. Instead, I’d go check out The Girl in the Woods.

Leftovers is making the festival circuit in January, so at 12 minutes long, maybe you want to give it a go and prove me wrong! Or you can watch the short on the link below if you don’t feel like leaving the house!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0bH5eNu6CVE

Star Wars fans are a dedicated bunch of people, and most have probably countless documentaries about George Lucas, Harrison Ford and Mark Hamil, but few will have heard from the countless extras that helped  make Star Wars the  true classic that it is. Elstree 1976 solves this problem. Elstree 1976 brings together a group of extras who tour on the comic-con circuit and a few who don’t to tell us for the first time about their careers, and about the life of an extra and the battle between credited and uncredited stars.

Jon Spira delivers a well cut and well paced documentary that brings an in depth understanding  to its subject matter and goes from beginning to end with a good uninterrupted  flow. The only downside of Elstree 1976 is perhaps  its build up and premise. Opening with a lot,  and I mean a LOT of emphasis on Star Wars and marketing  itself pretty much  entirely asa picture about the franchise, much of the film it does dedicate quite a large portion of its time to their careers outside  of Star Wars near its start that often left me wondering when we would actually get to hear about their experiences on set. That being said, the discussion is interesting and keeps you watching, it just perhaps isn’t quite as advertised.

Elstree 1976 isn’t just for Star Wars fans, and in truth I think die hard Star Wars fans might not actually be happy. It is however, a film for avid and interested film fans. Elstree isn’t for your fair-weather film buff, but for  your true fanatic.