Silkwood (1983)

Superb drama about true-life events. 

Karen Silkwood (Meryl Streep) works at the Kerr-McGee Cimarron Fuel Fabrication Site in Oklahoma with her lover Drew (Kurt Russell) and their friend Dolly (Cher). Making fuel rods for nuclear reactors, she is exposed to radiation owing to the company cutting corners on safety standards. She alerts the Atomic Energy Commission and helps them investigate, with significant consequences. 

Although it’s a biographical story with political elements, it works especially well as a domestic narrative. I really like the scenes between Karen, Drew and Dolly, who all live together. The human drama of their developing relationships seems very real and I’d have been happy to watch an entire film focusing on that. The fact that there’s a whole additional narrative is just a bonus. 

I could finally see what all the fuss was about regarding Streep. She’s riveting and hugely charismatic. Kurt Russell is also strong, once again taking on a somewhat sulky role. Cher is terrific too: in her role as a downbeat, almost monosyllabic lesbian she’s the opposite of what you’d expect based on her glitzy showbiz profule.

Directed by Mike Nichols and with a screenplay by Nora Ephron, this could hardly fail to be enthralling. Sure enough, it ends up being one of the best films I’ve ever seen.

The Whistle Blower (1986)

Spy thriller. Michael Caine stars as a retired naval officer and Korean War veteran. Nigel Havers is his son, a linguist working for GCHQ who is compromised after finding out too much about the true workings of the British establishment. 

The plot can be complex and difficult to follow. Still not sure why the Russian spy was held in a fake hotel constructed in an aircraft hangar, but all of this probably makes more sense in the original novel by John Hale. 

Caine is absolutely excellent, showing more diversity and range in his acting than he’s often credited for. Havers is likeable, too, despite his years of TV overexposure. There are also parts for James Fox and John Gielgud. 

It’s a consistently engrossing low-budget English drama that’s worth seeing if only for the scene in which Michael Caine gets his friend (Barry Foster) drunk on vodka while concealing his own sobriety.

Kes (1969)

This drama directed by Ken Loach (adapted from Barry Hines’ novel A Kestrel for a Knave) is the saddest film I’ve ever seen. 

Billy is growing up in Barnsley, Yorkshire, where he lives with his unkind brother and distant mother. His school is a seemingly barbaric, uncaring place, and he appears to have little future beyond a job in the local coal mine. His life changes when he finds a kestrel. He starts to feed and train the bird, which gives his life purpose and meaning and soon becomes the focal point of his existence. His love of Kes offers him a form of freedom and hope, but this hope is tragically short-lived. 

David Bradley is absolutely remarkable in the lead role as Billy. He has you absolutely rooting for him from the very beginning. He’s gentle but tough. And his wise, sad, hugely expressive face is heartbreaking to watch. Amazingly, he had never acted before. 

The soundtrack by John Cameron is beautiful – a sort of pastoral English folk music. 

The ending is absolutely devastating. But before this, there are moments of humour and shrewd social observation. 

A masterpiece.

Senna (2010)

Brilliant documentary about Brazilian Formula One driver Ayrton Senna. It’s assembled entirely from footage of the time, so there are no retrospective talking heads or other such elements. As such, it’s pretty intense. We see his rise to prominence, his rivalry with McLaren teammate Alain Prost and his becoming a national hero for Brazil. Unfortunately, we also get to see the 1994 crash that killed him. 

If there’s a criticism, it’s that we learn very little of his personal life. The focus is entirely on his career, but that’s still more than enough of a story to make this a dynamic experience.

Backdraft (1991)

Chicago in 1971. Two brothers lose their fireman father when he is killed on duty. Twenty years later they are both firemen too and find themselves working within the same division, as resentful older brother Stephen (Kurt Russell) starts to train younger brother Brian (William Baldwin). 

Robert De Niro plays the Inspector of Fire Investigation. Donald Sutherland is a serial arsonist who wants to burn down the entire world. Jennifer Jason Leigh plays Brian’s former girlfriend (it seems inappropriate to write “old flame”). And Rebecca De Mornay is Stephen’s estranged wife. 

Ron Howard’s film has plenty of drama, and the fire scenes are scary. It’s a tale of two brothers that sometimes suffers from the fact that neither is especially likeable. In fact – with the possible exception of De Niro – that goes for everyone in it.

When a Man Loves a Woman (1994)

Meg Ryan plays a mother of two who descends into the horror of alcohol addiction. Andy Garcia plays the loving airline-pilot husband who wants to save her but ends up stifling her in the process.

It’s an extremely well-written drama that avoids cliché. Cleverly, it evolves from a film about a drink problem into a film about a marital problem. And it presents the couple’s situation from multiple angles so that it’s difficult to “take sides”.

The two child roles are brilliantly acted by Tina Majorino and Mae Whitman, revealing real sensitivity in their restrained but heartbreaking performances. Philip Seymour Hoffman plays a friend from Alcoholics Anonymous, who oddly drops out of the narrative without explanation – the only real flaw.

The songs on the soundtrack can be a little intrusive, but they don’t spoil the film. I was fearing a simplistic “happy” or “sad” ending, but it wisely avoids that and finds its way to a more satisfying conclusion. It’s emotional and powerful.

Waterworld (1995)

A very strange epic. With a budget of $172–175 million, was the most expensive film ever at the time it was made.

It’s the future. The ice caps have melted and the old civilisations are now underwater graveyards. A few humans survive as nomads and warriors in battered boats and makeshift floating villages. 

The Deacon (Dennis Hopper) is a crazed leader seeking to capture a little girl named Enola (Tina Majorino), who has a map of the mythical “Dryland” tattooed on her back. Jeanne Tripplehorn is Enola’s guardian. And Kevin Costner is the monosyllabic “mariner” who reluctantly becomes their protector.

It’s a technically impressive film that’s also quite daft in many ways. The slight pantomime quality actually works: the world has become more extreme and absurd, and people have degenerated as a result. I was frequently reminded of recent American political rallies, and the villain at the centre of them – an orange, deranged monster – is very reminiscent of someone else in US politics.

It’s such an unusual film. There are hints of Apocalypse Now, Flash Gordon, Mad Max, Raiders of the Lost Ark and Return of the Jedi, but it has a peculiar tone and feel of its own. A few things keep greatness at bay:
• Why has Costner evolved to have gills and webbed feet so quickly? It’s described as a “mutation”, but no more detail is given.
• Cheery “adventure” music undercuts the drama – what I think of as the “Spielberg Syndrome”.
• The lighting is all over the place. Bright studio lights come and go with little relation to the weather or environment.

Hugely enjoyable, though.

Desperately Seeking Susan (1985)

I had wanted to see this film for 35 years, but unfortunately it turned out to be a bit of a disappointment. 

Roberta (Rosanna Arquette) is a bored housewife who becomes obsessed with the personal ads in her newspaper – particularly those between a couple called Susan and Jim. Her life changes when she starts stalking Susan (played by Madonna) around the streets of New York and becomes accidentally involved in a crime involving a pair of stolen Egyptian earrings. Then Roberta has a bump on the head and can’t even remember her own name. She’s forced to begin a new life with a new identity, while simultaneously being pursued by a killer.

Not funny enough to work as a comedy nor exciting enough to work as a drama, the story often falls flat. It tries to become a sort of farce but then misses opportunities to squeeze comedy out of absurd situations. Compare it to What’s Up, Doc? to see how it could have been done so much better. 

Arquette is fairly sweet as the lead character. Madonna is pretty good, too, largely because she barely speaks. Roberta’s husband (Mark Blum), sister-in-law (Laurie Metcalf) and new boyfriend (Aidan Quinn) are merely so-so, largely because of the average script. Deadpan comedian Steven Wright is also present, but criminally underused. 

The soundtrack is bizarrely inappropriate, with clanking synths and drums almost drowning out everything else. Only Madonna’s “Into the Groove” and a burst of Iggy Pop’s “Lust for Life” redeem it. 

As it lumbers towards a laboured conclusion, you realise that the “Egyptian earrings” plot is one thread too many. It could have been ditched entirely to keep the focus on the various relationships, as there’s enough going on already with the strands about memory loss and mistaken identity. It’s far from a terrible film – just a bit of a mess.

Gorillas in the Mist (1988)

Sigourney Weaver plays naturalist Dian Fossey, who worked to monitor and protect the mountain gorillas of Rwanda from 1966 until her murder in 1985. 

Directed by Michael Apted and adapted from Fossey’s own memoir, this (sort-of) biopic is remarkable for its close-ups of the gorillas seeming to interact directly with Weaver. It’s not clear how that was achieved, and I’m not sure I want to know, but the effect of seeing her living so closely with the animals is powerful indeed.

There’s a strong empathy for these critically endangered creatures and there are heartbreaking scenes showing the impact of the poachers. 

Weaver gives the performance of a lifetime, expressing great tenderness with the gorillas (and briefly with Bob Campbell, her photographer lover played by Bryan Brown) alongside her increasingly fierce determination to protect the species (going so far as to mimic a witch to scare the locals) – whatever the cost. 

It’s both tragic and uplifting. Fossey paid the ultimate price for her commitment, but was able to raise enough awareness to ensure that the gorillas remain protected to this day.

Memoirs of an Invisible Man (1992)

John Carpenter's clever, funny adaptation of the excellent novel by H.F. Saint is a real treat. Chevy Chase plays a man accidentally turned invisible by an accident in a scientific research institute. Instead of wanting to help him, the people responsible attempt to capture and exploit him for his unusual condition.

Some of the “invisible” scenes are ingenious, such as when the invisible man holds a gun against the head of the villain (played by Sam Neill). You see Neill dragged across a room with the weapon apparently stuck to his head.

Daryl Hannah offers an above-par performance as the girlfriend, seeming more engaged than she usually does. 

The film received generally poor reviews but I can’t understand why. It’s hugely entertaining. Maybe people didn’t like the fact that it so effortlessly crosses and combines genres (crime thriller, romance, sci-fi, comedy). That sort of freedom doesn’t seem to be encouraged: maybe films can’t be marketed as easily if they evade a simplistic genre categorisation. But it makes for something very refreshing to watch.

The Sting (1973)

Classic caper set in Chicago in 1936. 

Johnny Hooker (Robert Redford) is a petty criminal whose conman partner is murdered by Doyle Lonnegan (Robert Shaw), a much more powerful criminal. Hooker seeks his revenge and teams up with Henry Gondorff (Paul Newman) to trick Lonnegan out of his money. 

The twists and turns of the plot are complex, so you really need to pay attention. In a couple of places I found it too far-fetched, but wasn’t going to let that spoil it.

The chemistry of the two leads is clearly evident, with Redford in particular exuding magnetism, but I still preferred seeing their interplay in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969).

Robert Shaw is brilliant as the brooding villain who walks with a slight limp.

Scott Joplin’s ragtime piano music adds a playful, colourful quality to the action, neatly framing this somewhere between crime film and comedy-drama.

Ender’s Game (2013)

A sci-fi saga presumably aimed at 12-year-old boys, this version of Orson Scott Card's 1985 novel is entertaining and races along in an exciting way.

Ender Wiggin (Asa Butterfield) is an unusually talented child selected to join an orbiting military academy. He is one of many young people being trained to lead Earth’s defence against invading aliens named the Formic. Harrison Ford plays his mentor, Colonel Hyrum Graff, while Ben Kingsley is Mazer Rackham, a war hero from the aliens’ first attack.

For some reason the training segments of the film – complete with drill instructor – seem to deliberately pay homage to those in Full Metal Jacket, a film that the young audience won’t even be aware of.

The visuals are often remarkable, with seamless zero-gravity CGI and impressive videogame-like effects. 

In places it can all seem a little silly – a bunch of kids taking everything very seriously indeed – and although it attempts to introduce moral issues, these aren’t explored in great depth.

But ultimately it’s a well-paced romp, and the double twist of the ending certainly wasn’t predictable.

Heat and Dust (1983)

Strangely tepid Merchant Ivory adaptation of Ruth Prawer Jhabvala’s Booker Prize-winning novel of 1975. 

In the 1980s, Anne (Julie Christie) travels from England to India to find out what happened to her great-aunt Olivia (Greta Scacchi) in the 1920s. The story splits so that we switch between both timelines. Olivia, we learn via extensive flashbacks, was married to a civil servant in the British Raj, Douglas Rivers (Christopher Cazenove), but caused scandal when she became involved with an Indian prince. 

The material is potentially interesting, but the treatment is leaden and stilted, despite the best efforts of Scacchi and Christie – who are the best thing about the film by some distance. The thread about civil unrest is not satisfactorily resolved. 

Slow and ponderous scenes lack vitality. Quite a few of them could have been trimmed or cut entirely. Ultimately, not a great deal happens and the drama that we do see is oddly underplayed. For example, we never get to find out how Douglas feels about his wife’s behaviour. In fact, we don't even learn how she feels about it herself. 

Maybe the novel is more exciting, but you’d never know it from sitting through these turgid 133 minutes.

The End of the Affair (1955)

Adaptation of Graham Greene’s classic 1951 novel. During World War II, writer Maurice Bendrix (Van Johnson) goes to the party of London civil servant Henry Miles (Peter Cushing) and soon after begins an affair with his wife Sarah (Deborah Kerr). But when Bendrix is injured in a bombing, Sarah mysteriously removes herself from his life. 

This clever melodrama toys with becoming a noirish, Hitchcockian thriller – there’s an endearingly silly detective played by John Mills – but is really a film about religious faith and morality. 

A few things stand out as odd:

• The couple seem to go from meeting to being obsessively in love in no time at all, and yet there’s no real chemistry between them. What do they have in common? It’s as if a scene or two is missing, as their apparent attraction is never explained.
• When Bendrix first sees Sarah, she’s kissing another man. Who is he and why is this additional affair not explored further? Was it simply there to indicate that she was unhappily married?
• If Bendrix is American, why is he writing a book about the English civil service?

It was remade in 1999, with Ralph Fiennes and Julianne Moore in the lead roles.