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

Carol (Blu-ray Review)

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Todd Haynes 2002 movies Far From Heaven was a very deliberate homage to the ‘women’s films’ of the 1950s made by the likes of Douglas Sirk. As with his HBO mini-series Mildred Pierce, Carol is set in decades past, but eschews the high gloss of Far From Heaven, instead being more interested in looking at how society was through the eyes of society today, but done in a style as if you really were there.

The film follows Carol Aird (Cate Blanchett), whose marriage is in the process of imploding when she meets charming shop assistant Therese (Rooney Mara) in a Department Store. They both sense a connection which slowly builds as they meet for lunch and then Carol invites Therese to spend the day with her in her country house. [Read more…]

The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 2 (Blu-ray Review)

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The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 1 was an entertaining movie but there’s no doubt that it largely felt like it was laying the groundwork and building us up for Part 2. Now that film is coming to Blu-ray, so that those who didn’t catch it in cinemas can find out how the struggle between the Districts and the Capitol ends.

Panem is now in full-scale Civil War, with Katniss (Jennifer Lawrence) having been enrolled as the Mockingjay, a figurehead that District 13 President Alma Coin (Julianne Moore) wants to use for propaganda purposes. However, all Katniss really wants is to kill President Snow (Donald Sutherland) in the hope it will bring everything to an end. She also becomes increasingly suspicious of Coin, concerned that if she takes control after the Capitol collapses, they could be simply replacing one despot with another. [Read more…]

Black Mass (Blu-ray Review)

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At the beginning of Black Mass I was worried that the whole thing was going to be spoiled by Johnny Depp’s makeup, or more particularly the ridiculously blue contact lenses he wears as part of his efforts to make himself look like the real James ‘Whitey’ Bulger. Thankfully, relatively quickly you get used to it, helped by the fact this is the best performance Depp has given in years.

The movie tells the real-life tale of Bulger, who grew up on the tough streets of South Boston before becoming a gangster and the leader of the vicious Winter Hill Gang. His childhood friend, John Connolly (Joes Edgerton), is now an FBI agent, who comes up with a plan he thinks can help the feds take down the Mafia and other parts of Boston’s organised crime. He wants to get Bulger to turn informant, in return for the FBI turning a blind eye to his gang’s activities. [Read more…]

Steve Jobs (DVD Review)

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I’m starting to think that screenwriter Aaron Sorkin has decided he’s a complete prick, and so has set out to write things that suggest that being the best and being an ass go hand-in-hand. The likes of The Social Network, Steve Jobs and, to some extent, The Newsroom and Studio 60 On Sunset Strip have all forwarded this agenda. Rumours suggest Sorkin can be incredibly demanding and difficult to work with (stories of how tough it was in the writer’s room of The West Wing and how little he listened to other peoples’ ideas are legendary), and it’s oddly interesting how so many of his projects seem to be about his own issues with this.

What he never quite addresses though is something he puts in the mouth of Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak in Steven Jobs, who tells the demanding and difficult Steve that being talented and being a decent person are not mutually exclusive. However, in the world of Aaron Sorkin, it often feels like they are. [Read more…]