Big Gay Picture Show

Taking a look at the world of film through gay eyes - news, reviews, trailers, gay film, queer cinema and more

Taking a look at the world of film through gay eyes - news, reviews, trailers, gay film, queer cinema & more

Last Knights (DVD Review)

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I won’t waste your time too much with this review, as I can sum up my thoughts in two word – don’t bother. This is a Czech and South Korean co-production, loosely based on an old Japanese movie, and with a multi-national cast all speaking English in various random accents – it is therefore perhaps not surprising that it is a bit confused as to what the hell it’s all about.

Set somewhere that’s sort of a fusion of Medieval Europe and Asia, but also with fantasy undertones (it should come as no surprise that Last Knights feels a little like a misguided Game Of Throne fan film), Clive Owen is a knight who finds himself cast into the wilderness after the fall of his master (Morgan Freeman), and must band together with a group of other knights – 47 Ronin style – to regain their honour. [Read more…]

Shadow Dancer (DVD)

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Shadow dancer is a good solid drama set in the early 1990s. Colette McVeigh is an active member of the IRA and is on a mission to commit an act of terrorism in London. Due to unknown reasons, she has last minute thoughts about the carnage she is about to cause, places the incendiary device in the place least likely to cause harm and to arouse the least suspicion from her IRA colleagues. She is subsequently caught and interrogated by MI5 and sent back to Ireland as a mole, using her son as collateral.

The ensuing drama that unfolds relates to relationships between Colette (played brilliantly by rising star Andrea Riseborough) and her MI5 agent Mac (played solidly by Clive Owen) and the friction between her, her family and other members of the IRA cell, as suspicions start to arise and questions are asked. There’s also double dealing with and distrust within MI5

This bleak drama is set in the often rainy backdrop of damp Belfast, which sets the mood for most of the scenes. One of the most interesting and accurate facts about the film is the technology the agents were using in the 1990s, with large, clumsy PCs taking up half the desk, which also reminds us how recent the volatile peace treaty was signed.

Where the film works is in the often fraught relationships between all the characters, where mistrust of everyone is apparent, as the IRA try to find their mole, tensions rise as does the relationship between Colette and Mac, as well as with Mac and his colleagues

The star of the film is Andrea Riseborough, it is not the dialogue that drives her performance but the angst and frustration shown by her very movements in every scene. The supporting cast are all excellent in their roles too including the ever reliable Gillian Anderson.

The Ledge Featurette – Patrick Wilson & Charlie Hunnam talk up the thriller

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If you like your thrillers with a bit of moral meat on them, The Ledge is a movie to look out for. It’s out on DVD on April 16th, but ahead of that Universal has provided up with a nice long featurette in which Charlie Hunnam (Sons Of Anarchy), Patrick Wilson (Watchmen) and Terrence Howard (Iron Man) discuss the movie. Irrespective of the film itself, that quite a trio of men, with Hunnam and Wilson particular favourites at BGPS, as we can’t forget them in Queer As Folk and Angels In America.

In The Ledge, Gavin (Hunnam) steps onto a 20 story ledge insisting he must jump to save a life. Meanwhile police negotiator Hollis (Howard), assigned to talk him down, is also having the worst day of his life after a visit to the doctor has revealed him to be infertile, making him wonder whose children he and his wife are raising. Gavin has just one short hour to make the choice between his own life or that of Shana (Liv Tyler), the married woman with whom he has been having an affair. As a test of faith, Joe (Wilson), a fundamentalist Christian and wronged husband of the beautiful Shana, has forced Gavin onto the ledge of a tall building to prove his love.

Find out a bit more about the film below in the fascinating featurette.

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Bent (1997)

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It amazes me how many gay people know a pink triangle is a gay symbol but they don’t know why. However as gay history isn’t taught in schools, many don’t realise there is a long and complex history of homosexuality that goes beyond Ancient Greece and Oscar Wilde. Bent is based Martin Sherman’s play and stars Clive Owen as Max, who lives a decadent gay life in 1930s Germany, not caring who he hurts and feeling his looks and charm will get him everything he wants.

However as the Nazis’ power increases, life gets increasingly difficult for gay people and the net closes in on Max, who eventually gets rounded up and sent to Dachau. Once there he denies he’s gay, preferring the yellow star of David saying he Jewish to the pink triangle admitting he’s gay, as he knows Jews are more likely to survive than homosexuals. There he meets Horst (Lothaire Bluteau), who isn’t ashamed of wearing his pink triangle, and despite the difficulties and torments of concentration camp life, the two men form a complex bond. [Read more…]

Clive Owen May Be Oldboy’s Villain

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If you’d been hoping Colin Firth would play the bad guy in Spike Lee’s reimagining of Oldboy, you’re out of luck, as while he was in talks for the role last month, he recently passed on the project, and now Twitch reports Lee has offered the role to Clive Owen instead.

Lee previously worked with Clive Owen on the 2006 heist thriller Inside Man, which may work in favour of the actor signing on, although there’s no info on how interested Clive is. Twitch, which seems to have the inside track on the production, also reports Mia Wasikowska has been offered the female lead in the movie.

Although many still feel it’s sacriledge to touch Park Chan Wook’s movie, it seems it’s going to happen anyway. The original followed a man seeking revenge against those who kept him in confinement for over 15 years.

General movie news courtesy of Movie Muser

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Clive Owen Set For Recall

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Although Clive Owen seems to like to see himself as an action star, the rest of the world doesn’t appear to be as convinced. That doesn’t mean he’s going to give up though, as he’s attached to Recall, based on a script by Taxi Driver writer, Paul Schrader.

Variety reports that the film is currently doing the rounds at the American Film Market, and will see Owen as an NSA agent involved in a botched hostage rescue situation. Afterwards he’s got a bit of amnesia, but as his memory begins to returns and he starts looking for the truth, he realises he can’t trust anyone, or even his own brain. Hmm, already sounds a bit cheesy, but we’ll give it the benefit of the doubt.

Harold Becker (Mercury Rising) is set to direct, with shooting planned for next March.

General movie news courtesy of Movie Muser

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Kirsten Dunst & Orlando Bloom Join Cities

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Kirsten Dunst and Orlando Bloom have joined Clive Owen and Anil Kapoor in director/writer Roger Donaldson’s (The Bank Job, Thirteen Days) next directing project, Cities, according to Variety.

Cities is described by the makers as ‘A cautionary tale about greed and ambition that takes place in the exuberant months leading up to the Dow Jones all-time stock market high. Fortunes, both big and small are put at risk as people around the globe gamble that the financial market’s meteoric rise will continue. In New York, a hedge fund manager (Owen) has everything he wants – money, sex and power, but he wants more. In London, a young couple just want to buy their first home, but it seems impossibly out of reach. In Mumbai, a cop fights against corruption between property speculators and his villainous colleague Seth (Kapoor). These stories will all dramatically collide in a world where the fortunes of individuals are interwoven with the lives of others across the globe they have never even met.’

It isn’t known exactly how Dunst and Bloom fit into this, although Kirsten will be playing somebody called Kate. The movie will reunite Dunst and Bloom, who first appeared together in Cameron Crowe’s Elizabethtown in 2005, but let’s hope this new movie is a lot better than that film. Shooting on Cities is set to start in the spring.

General movie news courtesy of Movie Muser

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