The Queen (2006)

Drama directed by Stephen Frears about the Queen’s reaction to the death of Princess Diana in 1997, and the new Prime Minister’s role in her subsequent actions. 

Helen Mirren plays the monarch. Martin Sheen plays Tony Blair, brilliantly capturing something of his personality. 

It’s subtle and surprisingly funny, working as social history, gentle satire and an insightful character study.

Of course we’ll never know how accurate it is in terms of the private conversations within the palace, but the general trend of events is backed up by actual news footage (as well as our memories of living through that remarkable period).

The Departed (2006)

Directed by Martin Scorsese, this remarkable crime thriller is as good as any. 

In Boston. Irish Mob boss Frank Costello (Jack Nicholson) places Colin Sullivan (Matt Damon) as a spy within the police force. Sullivan quickly rises up the ranks, becoming a highly respected detective, and protects Costello by feeding him information. Meanwhile, the police assign undercover agent Billy Costigan (Leonardo DiCaprio) to infiltrate Costello’s criminal gang. And both of them end up dating the same police psychologist (Vera Farmiga as Dr. Madolyn Madden). 

It’s incredibly clever. The plot moves fast enough to make your head spin, but Scorsese’s storytelling gifts are such that it works. 

The all-star cast also includes Alec Baldwin, Martin Sheen, Ray Winstone and Mark Wahlberg. The soundtrack is terrific, although a repeat use of the intro to “Gimme Shelter” by the Rolling Stones in the same scene seems like an error. 

As usual with Scorsese, you get everything – a masterclass in film-making. The characters are richly fleshed out. It’s thrilling. It looks visually stunning. And the script is really sharp.

The American President (1995)

Directed by Rob Reiner, this is a charming film about the US President (Michael Douglas) attempting to balance the challenges of his job and his personal life. Annette Bening plays an environmental lobbyist who he falls in love with. Martin Sheen and Michael J. Fox play members of the presidential staff. And Richard Dreyfuss is the political opponent who tries to build a scandal around the new couple and their unexpected relationship. 

It works as drama and romance, with flashes of comedy. It’s also gently political and makes you wish that politics was that simple and idealistic today. 

All of the leads are on top form, and Douglas demonstrates once again that he's more versatile than people might think.

Seeking a Friend for the End of the World (2012)

This was critically savaged and/or ignored at the time of release. In his one-star Guardian review, Peter Bradshaw wrote: “You will have had handfuls of wet sand in your swimsuit less irritating than this supremely irritating romantic dramedy.” But I liked the title and the concept – in three weeks the Earth will be destroyed by an asteroid. As society breaks down, everyone has to address the question of how they use the time they have left.

Penny (Keira Knightley) and Dodge (Steve Carell) are neighbours in the same apartment block. When looting and rioting hits their street, they take off together on what turns out to be a sort of road trip. They are opposites in many ways – she’s English, he’s American; she’s 28, he’s middle-aged; she’s giddily naive, he’s reliable, worldly and wise – but inevitably they begin to fall for each other as their time runs out. The blossoming love story points at bigger questions: what really matters in these extreme circumstances? Why does it matter? Who should you spend your last few hours with? Friends and family? A lover? Or a random stranger in the new climate of anything-goes lawlessness?

I can see why Peter Bradshaw was irritated, but I think Keira Knightley’s scatty, free-spirited persona is deliberately annoying. She needs to be, initially, because the film is partly about her character’s progression to maturity as she finally meets someone she really cares about.

One thing fails to ring true, though. She’s supposed to be a music fan and she saves a selection of records from her apartment during the riot. (There are prominent displays of LPs by Herb Alpert, John Cale, Leonard Cohen, Lou Reed and Scott Walker at various points in the film.) But there’s something oddly unconvincing about K.K. as a record buyer, even given the faddishness of vinyl in younger consumers. She even self-consciously says: “I love records. You really have to take care of vinyl.”

It’s not a masterpiece – it could certainly have been funnier, and some of the scenes could have worked better – but it seems more relevant than ever during these dark times of a global pandemic. And despite the unevenness, I was both moved and amused.

Wall Street (1987)

There’s something not quite right about Oliver Stone’s stock-market thriller. Michael Douglas is actually fairly compelling as the corrupt Gordon Gecko and his much-discussed “Greed is good” speech remains an iconic bit of cinema. But Charlie Sheen is woeful as the young upstart who initially wants to be Gecko and ultimately wants to ruin him. Can Charlie Sheen act? Seemingly charmless, humourless and lacking emotional range, he’s almost exactly the same here as he was in Platoon. He simply does not convince and it's unclear whether or not you are meant to be on his side.

Daryl Hannah is oddly underwritten as Sheen’s interior-designer girlfriend. James Spader isn’t given enough of a role, either. He would have been a better choice for the main part. But the script is slightly clichéd all round.

The best things about the film are Martin Sheen, the on-screen and real-life father of Charlie, and the New York skylines and scenery. Terence Stamp is OK, but – absurdly – he’s made to say “mate” and “bloke” to accentuate his Englishness.

There’s a good film in there somewhere, but Oliver Stone – as usual, intent on making a Big Statement – cannot tease it out.

Apocalypse Now Redux (2001)

Francis Ford Coppola’s astonishing film deserves all the acclaim it has received. Set during the Vietnam War, but not really about the conflict as such, it details a mission by Captain Benjamin L. Willard (Martin Sheen) to locate and kill a rogue officer named Colonel Walter E. Kurtz (Marlon Brando). Kurtz has built an entire religion around himself and is seen as a threat to US forces. The story picks up on Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad.

It’s a stunning piece of cinema. The visuals are remarkable – again and again I was left wondering how something was filmed and how it could look so realistic.

The acting is terrific. Sheen is great as the troubled captain becoming obsessed with tracking down Kurtz. Robert Duvall is fascinatingly bonkers as the lieutenant colonel who just wants to go surfing, despite the explosions going off around him that he doesn’t even seem to notice. His scenes have rightly become iconic, from “I love the smell of napalm in the morning” to the moments when his men blast out Wagner’s “Ride of the Valkyries” from their helicopters as they invade the Viet Cong.

The soundtrack is also remarkable: I love the spooky electronic sounds that so perfectly set the ominous tone of the trip upriver.

You get to see a young Harrison Ford as Colonel G. Lucas – a nod to George Lucas, who nearly ended up directing the film. Thank goodness he didn’t. And Dennis Hopper plays a photojournalist who has been inducted into Kurtz’s cult.

I haven’t seen the original 1979 edit of the film so I can’t tell how different the Redux version is. But you can see that certain scenes – such as meeting the French colonials – weren’t needed for narrative purposes. That said, I do like the way they further enrich the experience of the film. It’s so rich and compelling that there’s space for additional material.

Certainly the best war film I have seen. It hammers home the point that no one is left undamaged by conflict.