This week on Built For Speed we feature new bands including The Corsairs, touring artists like the mysterious chanteuse Anna Calvi and a selection of classics from the greatest lyricist of all, Bob Dylan, who recently celebrated his 73rd birthday. On the movie front we look at two films that couldn’t be more different: special effects, action extravaganza X-Men: Days
Read moreBad Neighbours seems to have been spawned by a vaguely interesting idea, to mix Animal House-style frat boy comedy with the rambling, 30-something relationship comedy of Judd Apatow. Unfortunately, Bad Neighbours takes the worst aspects of both, namely the crass, juvenile gags of the frat boy movie and the unfocused momentum-free narrative of a Judd Apatow film to create a
Read moreFading Gigolo is the Woody Allen film you have when you don’t have a Woody Allen film. Apart from an appearance by Woody himself, the film features a romanticised upscale New York setting, Jewish humour and cultural insights and jaunty jazz music all built around a quirky yet moving romance. With its low-budget look and heavily filtered cinematography by Marco
Read moreDespite their serious artistic intentions Francois Ozon’s films, which often depict the sexual awakening of young women, can’t help but titillate the rain coat brigade. That will probably be the case with his latest film Young and Beautiful but it doesn’t diminish the fact that this is a sensitively acted, attractively shot exploration of the impact on a family of
Read moreThis week on Built For Speed there’s a feast on films to discuss with two related works in Francois Ozon’s Young and Beautiful and John Tuturro’s Fading Gigolo. We also look at the unlikely and mostly unwelcome pairing of Seth Rogen and Zac Efron in Bad Neighbours. There’s plenty of fine music with tracks from the latest Sebadoh album Defend
Read moreGiven its unusual mix of genres, namely, period film, biopic, race-relations story, political drama and romance, Belle had the potential to be a fascinating film. Somehow, the whole is less than the sum of the parts as Belle, while handsome and well-made, is not the compelling story it should have been. Belle is a true story based on the early life
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