HeyUGuys - UK Movie / Film Blog for News / Reviews / Interviews
UK Movie / Film Blog for News / Reviews
Craig is passionate about film and film criticism. Loving a wide range of films he is a keen film festival attendee, enjoying finding new and exciting films from film-makers across the world.
Homepage: http://www.HeyUGuys.co.uk
Martha Marcy May Marlene first premièred at Sundance in 2011 and finally arrives in UK cinemas this week. After receiving very positive reviews in Sundance the film has gone on to receive acclaim both for the assured and distinct direction and the excellent performances, especially from relative newcomer Elizabeth Olsen. Myself and three other journalists were lucky enough to [...]
[The following review features a number of spoilers] Rolling Thunder is the story of Major Charles Ranes (William Devane), a Vietnam vet who returns from years of imprisonment and torture in a Vietcong POW camp to his home in Texas. He and his prison mate Johnny (Tommy Lee Jones) are greeted at the airport with a heroes [...]
Currently playing in cinemas, Haywire is the latest film from the prolific and soon to be retired (allegedly) director Steven Soderbergh. I reviewed the film here and described it as smart, stylish and incredibly well crafted film. It is, but it’s also a rather interesting genre exercise from Soderbergh, in which he presents us with a particular kind of [...]
Into a quiet diner walks Mallory Kane (Gina Carano). Following shortly behind her is Aaron (Channing Tatum). Mallory is quick to see him arrive and we get the impression instantly that Mallory is a hyper alert character, Carano conveying this through small physical inflections. Aaron and Mallory clearly have history and as the two begin [...]
The Film The third in Shion Sono’s thematically linked ‘Hate Trilogy’ (following Love Exposure and Cold Fish), Guilty of Romance centres on a female protagonist, Izumi (Megumi Kagurazaka), who goes on an intense journey of liberation and destruction through sexual transgression. Izumi’s transformative adventure is set against the backdrop of a criminal investigation into the murder of [...]
Rabies has been described in a number of festival brochures and independent reviews as Israel’s first slasher film. The novelty of this statement is hard to resist and it’s certainly a selling point to those looking for something out of the ordinary. It’s also the case that when watching the film considering it placed within the [...]
Take Shelter, the latest pairing of director Jeff Nichols and actor Michael Shannon, arrives in UK Cinemas this week. The film is a fascinating and often moving story of a practical man, Curtis, going through an emotionally and psychologically difficult time. A large percentage of the film rests heavily on the shoulders of Michael Shannon in this central [...]
To describe the area in which director Shlomi Eldar treads with his documentary Precious Life difficult would be an understatement but moving within these difficult areas, both literally and figuratively, is perhaps the only way to really get to the heart of the complex and seemingly never-ending conflict currently going on in and around the Gaza [...]
Director Hong-jin Na made something of a splash with his début film, The Chaser, in 2008 and the film quickly brought him to the attention of Hollywood with Warner Brothers buying up the remake rights to The Chaser for $1 million. Hong-jin Na’s latest, The Yellow Sea, is also the first Korean film to receive investment from a major [...]
Snowtown finally makes its way onto UK cinema screens on the 18th of November following a release in Australia and a number of positive reactions from festivals worldwide. The film is a dark story of serial killers in small town Australia and one that is all the more harrowing due to it being based on a true story. [...]
Dispatched to the front line of the Korean civil war in January 1953, Kang Eun-pyo (Shin Ha-kyun) is on a mission to investigate the suspicious death of an officer and hunt out a potential communist spy. But as he begins to fight alongside the ‘Alligator’ unit his perception of the war and the divisions between the North [...]
Arrow, The Ultimate Weapon (also known by the title War of the Arrows and quite a few others) is set in Korea at the beginning of the 17th century and after a reasonably short preface that introduces us to the central protagonist escaping from death, Nam-yi (Park Hae-il), the film moves forward to 1636 and the invasion of Korea by the Manchurians. Nam-yi, [...]
Joyce McKinney is a woman with a lot of love to give and in 1977 she found a man to devote herself to completely. This man was Kirk Anderson and according to Joyce the two fell madly in love. The only problem was that Kirk Anderson was a Mormon and following their whirlwind romance Kirk [...]
The first entirely Claymation feature film, The Adventures of Mark Twain is a a rather stunning technical achievement from Will Vinton Productions and one that is unfortunately rather under-seen. Even if this wasn’t such a wonderfully entertaining and rather charming film this situation would be lamentable due to the film’s historical significance as a remarkable achievement [...]
With the release of OSS 117: Cairo, Nest of Spies in 2006 Michel Hazanavicius and the seemingly effortlessly charismatic Jean Dujardin looked set for global domination and a real crossover into the mainstream cinema-goer’s consciousness. Outside of France OSS 117: Cairo, Nest of Spies, and the equally smart and entertaining sequel OSS 117 – Lost [...]
In the 2010 fiction film Kick-Ass the titular character comments, following his defense of an unarmed man being beaten up outside a diner, “…three assholes, laying into one guy while everybody else watches? And you wanna know what’s wrong with me?”. This apathetic attitude and the desire to do something tangible about it is really [...]
Rivalry in the field of Talmudic studies may not seem like the most compelling premise for a feature film but perhaps the greatest surprise in Joseph Cedar’s Footnote is that the basics of the story, embittered personal politics and family divides amongst Talmudic scholars, is by far the film’s greatest strength. At the centre of the confusion [...]
Miss Bala opens on a static shot of a wall, a wall filled with cut out pictures of American female fashion icons – Madonna, Monroe, Audrey Hepburn – and a mirror. Reflected in the mirror we get a glimpse at our protagonist, Laura Guerrero (Stephanie Sigman), partially obscured as she busies herself around her room. The symbolic potency of this opening [...]
The release of a inmate from prison and their subsequent reintegration into ‘regular’ society is an area that is filled with potential for interesting drama. Ulu Grosbard’s under-seen and underrated 1978 film Straight Time (based on the equally excellent book No Beast So Fierce by Edward Bunker) uses this premise to explore the way in which the released inmate’s, played by Dustin Hoffman, life is [...]
