LONDON FILM FESTIVAL REVIEW - GRAVITY

GRAVITY
Sponsored by ST. ERMIN'S HOTEL, LONDON

Release Date: 8 November 2013 (UK)

Director: Alfonso Cuaron

Running Time: 91 Minutes

Starring: Sandra Bullock, George Clooney, Ed Harris (voice)

Screening Reviewed: London Film Festival American Airlines Gala Press Screening

Reviewed by Kyle Pedley

It’s difficult when reaching for superlatives to describe the impact and majesty of viewing Gravity and not default for the predictable, trite, tabloid-friendly puns. ‘Out of this world’, ‘stellar’ and the like seem tailor-made for trashier film critiquing of Alfonso Cuaron’s 3D galactic drama, and yet despite this, as plaudits go they are entirely accurate and appropriate - there has been nothing quite like Gravity, and if even for the technical wonderment alone it comes as a must-see experience surpassing even the likes of Avatar and Prometheus as an exercise in aesthetic immersion and awe. At a time where 3D as a buzz word has seemingly had its heyday and some would say is hovering on the verge of Chapter 11, the past few years have nonetheless each seemed to offer a critical and commercial darling. After the initial Avatar surge, 2011 saw Martin Scorsese bring Hugo to cinemas, reaping a slew of Oscar nominations and wins in the process, and last year Ang Lee picked up his second Best Director golden guy for his stunning Life of Pi. Gravity is not only inarguably this years 3D offering of choice, but also very possibly the finest of the bunch, and will undoubtedly and deservedly attract similar awards notice come February.

DOCTOR WHO: ASYLUM OF THE DALEKS - TV REVIEW

DOCTOR WHO SERIES 7: EPISODE 1 - ASYLUM OF THE DALEKS

Air Date: Saturday 1 September **
Channel: BBC One (UK), BBC America (US)
Starring: Matt Smith, Karen Gillan, Arthur Darvill

Reviewed by Helen Henderson

The Doctor, Amy and Rory are surrounded by Daleks but is everything what it seems?

With the previous Doctor Who episode, Christmas special The Doctor, the Widow and the Wardrobe, coming off as a tad disappointing, all eyes were on Steven Moffat and the team to bring something epic to the table for the start of this new series of Who. Thankfully with season opener Asylum of the Daleks they have done exactly that. With the recent release of movie-style posters for each of the episodes by the BBC it seems clear the mantra behind this series is to be big, bold, Hollywood-esque. Asylum was a sprawling tale that was concise without coming across as rushed, featuring the Doctor’s greatest and most prolific foes, Daleks, and the reintroduction of the Ponds for whom this is the beginning of the end – and not just because the episode began by introducing us to their getting divorced.

PROMETHEUS: MOVIE REVIEW

PROMETHEUS

Release Date: 1st June (UK)

Director: Ridley Scott

Running Time: 124 Minutes

Starring: Noomi Rapace, Michael Fassbender, Charlize Theron, Guy Pearce, Idris Elba

Screening Reviewed: UK FDA Press Screening (BFI IMAX 3D)

Reviewed by Kyle Pedley

Our Exclusive Prometheus Video Review is now available on Youtube!

To broker the most common concern surrounding Prometheus, it is clear from the first few moments of the film that this is very consciously and deliberately a different entity from the Alien franchise with which it shares both its universe and director. Whereas Ridley Scott’s 1979 seminal sci-fi masterpiece opened with the isolation, silence and cold of space, Prometheus begins with stunning sweeping vistas and panoramas, the sterility of the stars now replaced with roaring waterfalls and aggressive natural majesty. This juxtaposition is in many ways perfectly symbolic of how very different the two films really are, for where Alien was a masterclass of subtlety, prolonged silence and measured cutting, Scott’s latest outing is a far more visceral, bombastic, and even noisy, affair.