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Cinema Film round-up with MARIA DUARTE: March 2, 2023

Reviews of Close, I'm fine (thanks for asking), Electric Malady and Creed III

Close (12A)
Directed by Lukas Dhont 
★★★★

Belgian film director Lukas Dhont follows up his haunting feature Girl with a coming of age story about childhood innocence lost, as the intense friendship between two boys is suddenly torn apart. It has been nominated for an Academy award.

Thirteen-year-old Leo (Eden Dambrine) and Remi (Gustav De Waele) are best friends living in each other’s pockets. Remi’s mother (Emilie Dequenne) declares Leo to be her second son. He and Remi do everything together including sleeping side by side in the same bed.
 
However when they start high school and a girl asks Leo if they are a couple he denies it vehemently and begins to pull away from Remi. He neglects his former friend and hangs  out with other boys and takes up ice hockey. His actions leave Remi at a loss and have a devastating effect on both of them. 

Co-written and directed by Dhont, this powerful and moving drama captures the intimate and beautiful friendship of two boys which is questioned by their peers who examine it through a sexual lens. It is anchored by powerhouse performances by newcomers Dambrine and De Waele, both naturals who light up the screen. 

Emotional highs and devastating lows are portrayed in all their rawness in this touching and nuanced study of the fragility of friendship and teenage masculinity. 

MD

Out in cinemas today 

 

I’m Fine (Thanks For Asking) 15 
Directed by Kelley Kali and Angelique Molina 
★★★

A recently widowed and homeless hairdresser spends a whole day roller-skating across town in southern California in order to raise enough money for an apartment for both her and her daughter in this haunting drama set and shot during the pandemic. 

Danny (a phenomenal Kelley Kali) has convinced her eight-year-old child Wes (Wesley Moss) that they are on a camping trip as she shields her from the harsh realities of their situation. 

Danny has a number of hairdressing jobs lined up which will provide her with enough cash for a deposit, but as the clients vanish she must race against time to put a roof over her child’s head. 

Co-written and directed by Kali and Angelique Molina, who also stars in the film, this is a tense yet insightful examination of homelessness during Covid and the lack of help and humanity for someone in Danny's position, in which many people found themselves at that time. 

It is driven home by heart-wrenching performances from Kali and Moss who steal your heart as mother and daughter. 

MD

Out in cinemas March 3

 

Electric Malady (12A)
Directed by Marie Lidén 
★★★

Electric Malady follows the story of William, a 31-year-old former Swedish librarian who, along with other colleagues, begins to suffer from an illness known as electro-sensitivity. 

Ten years later he is living off the grid in a tech-less cabin in the middle of nowhere, covered in a blanket with copper threads from head to toe, in a small enclosed room surrounded in foil. His parents visit him regularly to maintain a connection, celebrating Christmas and his 40th birthday, but he refuses to take the covering off as radiation from mobile phones and other modern technology make him severely ill. 

Marie Liden’s fascinating documentary, which was inspired by her mother who also had ES, takes a sensitive look at William’s controversial illness which isn’t taken seriously in certain quarters. Nevertheless, the World Health Organisation claims 3 per cent of the world’s population suffer from it. 

Interwoven with archive clips from William’s own private video diaries and family home movies, it shows a former life of a man who has lost the will to live: full of joy, with a girlfriend and a job he loved. 

It is a heartbreaking film about a man battling isolation and loneliness and the loving parents who are trying to save him. 

MD

Out in cinemas today

 

Creed III (12A)
Directed by Michael B Jordan
★★★


Michael B Jordan takes charge of the Creed franchise both in front of and behind the camera as this third film in the franchise establishes itself as a bona fide series independent of the Rocky films.

Jordan returns as Adonis Creed, a man enjoying family life and managing the next generation of fighters, until an old childhood friend and former boxing prodigy Damian (Jonathan Majors) turns up on his doorstep fresh from prison and (inevitably) asking for his own shot in the ring. 

The action flashes back and forth between 2002 and present-day Los Angeles, and you learn why Damian feels Creed does not deserve to be enjoying a lifestyle that was snatched away from him. The whole film heads with painful obviousness towards a showdown between the two men in the ring which isn’t as thrilling as billed. 

This is a solid directorial debut by Jordan in another predictable boxing film which only punches above its weight thanks to a knockout performance from Majors (Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania) whose star is currently on the rise. Sylvester Stallone, who produced the film, is sorely missed as Rocky. 

MD

Out in cinemas today

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