The new British film Living, has followed quite a quite remarkable cultural pathway before arriving on our screens. Directed by a South African, Oliver Hermanus, it’s an adaption of Akira Kurosawa’s 1952 film Ikiru which was itself based on Tolstoy’s novella The Death of Ivan Ilyich. Despite a fairly slender plot and some pretty obvious religious references, Living slowly seduces
Read moreJane Austen’s comedy of manners, Emma set the template for today’s romantic comedy/dramas and even inspired teen films like Clueless. The latest cinema adaptation of Austen’s much-loved 1815 novel, starring Anna Taylor-Joy, Johnny Flynn and Bill Nighy, is an enjoyably spirited romp that again reveals why Emma is such an enduring story. Emma Woodhouse is introduced as ‘handsome, clever and
Read morePride, which explores the hitherto unlikely partnership of striking coal miners and the gay rights movement in 1980’s Britain, is a highly enjoyable nineties-style feel-good British working class comedy/drama in the vein of The full Monty, Brassed Off and Billy Elliot. The film returns us to Margaret Thatcher’s Britain of the mid-80’s where economic rationalist policies were putting the squeeze
Read moreMary Shelley’s classic novel Frankenstein introduced the notion of the modern Prometheus and of man attempting to play God by fashioning a living being from the remnants of the dead. It explored themes such as the power and danger of science posed when combined with man’s hubris. Some scholars have also theorised that Dr. Frankenstein’s unnamed monster represents the anonymous
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