Nuanced: George Clooney and Shailene Woodley in the Descendants

It has been seven years since Alexander Payne last donned his directorial hat for a major motion picture, namely the offbeat and existential yarn, Sideways. Payne received an Oscar for Sideways (it took home the gong for Best Adapted Screenplay) and seven years on, he has struck the right chord again with The Descendants, which is currently awash with awards and nominations.

If the film is going to spoil Oscar night for The Artist and turn Jean Dujardin’s expressive eyebrows into a frown, then it is likely to be in the Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role category. The Descendants is certainly a moving and often amusing movie, but it is George Clooney who elevates it to award-winning level.

This has been described as a role that Clooney was ‘born to play’, in which he delivers a ‘career-best’ performance. Suave quick-wittedness, tinged with quirky intensity, is the blueprint for what has made the 50-year-old one of the most consistently watchable actors in Hollywood and he has taken it all down a notch to serve up a world-weary version in his character Matt King, whose charm, energy and humour have been eroded by the life’s pressures.

We are introduced to Honolulu lawyer Matt as the sole trustee of a multi-million dollar plot of land – passed down by many generations linking back to an indigenous Hawaiian lady – the sale of which is up for tender and under-discussion amongst many family members, after long-running negotiations. However, the father-of-two is suffering huge emotional drain with his wife in coma after a speedboat accident and the backseat father is struggling to get to grips with the responsibility of looking after his two daughters; 10-year old Scottie (Amara Miller) and typically-troublesome teenager Alex (Shailene Woodley).

Aside from the obvious trauma involving the kids’ mother, Elizabeth (Patricia Hastie), the main premise of the film explores the notion that having assets, money and living in an idyllic setting does not directly equate to happiness. Life’s cruel afflictions and family matters can make or break an individual’s contentment in the blink of an eye.

It is implied that, before the accident, Elizabeth and Matt have drifted apart and pulled in different directions: her as the thrill-seeking woman with a lust for life and him with his head in his work and land renovation proposals, letting the Hawaiian paradise pass him by.

Coinciding with his wife’s condition reaching a sadly hopeless state, Matt finds out that she had been having an affair and the story accelerates as Matt’s eyes are finally open and the bigger picture becomes clearer to him, in regard to his kids, the condition of his pre-accident marriage and the land he is on the verge of selling. A mission to track down the man who had been sleeping with his wife ensues, giving him a purpose amidst the hopelessness and an anger-fuelled distraction from the sadness of his predicament.

With his two newly-supportive daughters and the elder’s bluntly-honest stoner friend, Sid (Nick Krause), in tow, the mission in not just a journey toward the painful truth of the affair and the man at the heart of it, but an awakening for Matt and a route to re-engaging with his daughters and finding contentment beyond the imminent grief.

Maybe the fact the Clooney does not have kids has helped the convincing awkwardness of his hapless, but quick-learning father character, but he nails it with subtle expressions, pauses and evocation of desperation. Woodley also deserves a mention for her emotive role portraying the temperamental older daughter, revelling in the new-found bond with her forlorn father.

The Descendants is an understated and perceptive piece of filmmaking, focusing the lens on the how people deal with events thrust upon them, rather than the events themselves, and demonstrating how quickly priorities change.

The Descendants (15)
Directed by Alexander Payne
Starring: George Clooney, Shailene Woodley, Beau Bridges, Judy Greer, Robert Forster, Amara Miller, Nick Crause, Patricia Hastie.
Running time: 115 minutes

The Descendants is showing at the Rio Cinema until Thursday 9 February and across London throughout February.

Deeply buried: Shame

London-born director/screenwriter Steve McQueen has followed up his debut feature – 2008’s Bafta-nominated Hunger – with another hard-hitting movie experience in this sexually-charged study of obsession.

If it wasn’t for the stiff competition this year, McQueen’s stark and moving film, Shame, about two very troubled siblings in New York, surely would have done more damage in this year’s award season. However, Michael Fassbender – who also stars in Hunger – did earn a Golden Globe nomination for his role as Brandon, a sex-addict and commitment-phobe whose unorthodox lifestyle is unsettled when his frantic and fragile sister, Sissy (Carey Mulligan), turns up at his flat uninvited and in need of a place to stay.

Combine two of Hollywood’s up-and-coming stars, in Fassbender and Mulligan, with an absorbing script and some daring (and often nude) performances and you have a compelling hour and a half of cinema.

If New York is the “city that never sleeps”, then these two young people are as restless as their surroundings. Part-time club singer Sissy is a free spirit, who seems to have moved from city to city since the pair last met. Meanwhile, Brandon has developed an obsessive and incessant no-strings-attached sexual appetite.

Despite his surface-level appearance as a successful young bachelor – he is good-looking, has a top city job and seems to possess a weirdly seductive charm – deeper down resides a desperate and anxious man, who for some reason is struggling to connect with women in a way that allows him to forge relationships.

Brandon spends an unhealthy amount of time gratifying his sexual needs by ordering call-girls to his flat, masturbating with a kaleidoscopic range of porn material (both at home and at work) and picking up loose women in bars for one-night stands.

However, his compulsion is at least self-contained – that is until his sister arrives. This is when the feeling of shame rears its ugly head and becomes a burden on him; something which he also believes his attention-seeking and self-harming sister to be.

Sissy is needy and in Brandon’s fury he is only too eager to point this out. She is indeed a girl in need, but as Brandon is trying to deal with his own problems, he is not ready to face his responsibilities to her and the emotional baggage she brings.

After initially seeing the glitz of the Big Apple, we soon see the less glamorous side of Manhattan, as both Brandon and Sissy are being sucking into its sewer and Sissy’s cry for help needs to be answered if she is to survive. It should serve as a wake-up call for Brandon, but he is reluctant to face up to reality.

It is implied that there is an unseen back-story that has led to the character defects that are eating away at our two protagonists, but we are essentially left guessing as to what this might be and whether they can ever get their lives back on track, but it is clear that they need to help each other before it is too late.

Fassbender and Mulligan are wholly convincing in their visceral roles – the former delivers an intense performance that recalls Christian Bale at his best – and McQueen deserves to be spoken about as one of the best new British filmmakers, alongside the likes of Duncan Jones (Moon and Source Code).

Shame (18)
Directed by Steve McQueen
Starring: Michael Fassbender, Carey Mulligan, James Badge Dale
Running time: 101 minutes

Shame is showing at the Rio Cinema until 26 Jan and at the Hackney Picturehouse and Rich Mix until 2 February.

Otherwordly: Patience (After Sebald). Photograph courtesy of Soda Pictures

“Right now I’m standing opposite Spitalfields Market. I’m looking at a site that is extremely old, and yet all those deeper layerings are obscured. You have to seek them out.”

Gareth Evans is not simply describing his surroundings to me. Instead the art curator is referring to his long-standing interest in the relationship between people and place.

It is a relationship he has explored in numerous projects through the organisation Artevents, culminating in the forthcoming film Patience (After Sebald).

Directed by Grant Gee and co-produced by Evans, the film is inspired by W.G.Sebald’s The Rings of Saturn, a book that shares his fascination with the link between man and his surroundings.

Both the book and the film trace Sebald’s journey by foot along the Suffolk coast. It is “a walk through all sorts of different themes that are prompted by the locations and encounters he has,” says Evans.

“What’s amazing about Sebald’s work is that you can move from a B&B in Lowestoft to the Belgian Congo, to the Voyager space probe in the space of couple of pages. Then you find yourself back in the B&B in Lowestoft.”

It is this sense of escapism via a stream of consciousness that makes the book uniquely un-filmable in one sense, and Evans admits that it was “very challenging conceptually to translate it into a moving image form.”

Despite these obstacles, Patience does an impressive job of capturing the spirit of the book by splicing footage of Gee re-tracing Sebald’s coastal footsteps alongside interviews with an array of artists and authors discussing its themes and continuing influence. The end result is “a hybrid work that sits between aspects of documentary and art film and an embodiment of the book” narrated by film buffs’ favourite, Jonathan Pryce.

For Sebald, identity was an uncomfortable issue and I wonder how far the film goes in shedding light on the writer as an individual. While Evans is keen to point out that the film is not intended as a straightforward biopic, “you can’t help but bring in aspects of the biography, specifically the move from Germany to England.”

He refers to the German author’s “self-imposed exile” from his motherland, an attempt to “find distance from a country where he found himself profoundly compromised in relation to its history. Not only to what it did during the second world war, but how it dealt with it afterwards.”

Like the book, Patience tackles such disparate themes as the holocaust, the legacy of slavery and the space race, all connected by the places that Sebald visits. It is this awareness of the significance of his surroundings that attracted Evans to the idea of making a film about the author.

What excites him about the concept of “place” is that “it’s not somewhere that stays on the page or on the screen, it really does spill out into the world. Everybody has their own story of place. Everyone has their own journey through the world.”

Evans’ own story of place is set in Hackney, a borough where has spent almost his whole life. “Hackney has always been an anchorage point for my relationship with the city, the country and beyond,” he says. “There’s no question there’s a huge energy in Hackney.”

From his base at the Whitechapel Gallery, Evans is perfectly positioned to continue to explore this energy through further films, and help us all find our own place in the world.

Patience (After Sebald) is released by Artevents on Friday 27 January

Perfect: Jean Dujardin and Bérénice Bejo as George and Peppy in The Artist. Photograph: Warner Bros

Showered with critical acclaim, nominated for the upcoming Golden Globe Awards (at time of writing) and tipped for Oscar success, The Artist hit the UK screens with a rush of hype – as do many films released in ‘award season’.

However, this is quite a feat for an almost exclusively silent picture in an age where CGI and 3D are continually breaking new ground and new box-office records. This nostalgic piece of work reminds the cinema-goer that what makes a truly inspiring film is one with honesty, chemistry, captivating performances and a story that makes you feel something.

The Artist is all that and more and is an extremely audacious picture to make – filmed entirely in black and white and sticking to the trademark use of wobbly subtitled shots cut within the action, as in the1920s silent classics.

Relative unknown (outside his country of birth) to the masses, French director Michel Hazanavicius more than compensated for the lack of voices, as his cast’s movement and expressions are electrifying.

The film is also driven by the glorious use of dramatic music from legendary composer Bernard Herrmann – famous for his scores in Hitchcock movies. In fact, since the release of The Artist, iconic actress Kim Novak has launched a scathing attack on the filmmakers for ‘stealing’ the music from Vertigo and ‘violating’ her ‘body of work’.

There is no crime in the use of Herrmann in this picture and it serves to build great suspense and drama, as well as letting the cast’s action really leap off the screen and it works perfectly in conjunction with the many raised-eyebrow stares and Hollywood smiles, most abundantly expressed by the captivating lead male, Jean Dujardin.

Dujardin – who won the Best Actor Award at last year’s Cannes film festival for this performance – plays silent-film superstar George Valentin, who can clearly sell The Kinograph studio’s various and frequent flicks by his pencil moustache and warm (but cheeky) Clark Gable-style smile alone.

He is loved and adored and appears to be a star burning brightly, without a care in the world. John Goodman is entertaining in the role of Al Zimmer, a larger-than-life and cigar-smoking movie director, who himself is even taken aback by some of the limelight-bathing antics of his big star.

But that is who George Valentin is in this film: a true movie star of his time. However, as the 20s come to an end and the 30s begin, Valentin’s world is soon turned upside by the arrival of cinema’s new technological age: the age of talking pictures.

Our star is not impressed by the emergence of the ‘talkies’ and turns his back on the new format, instead making it clear he is an ‘artist’ and that he doesn’t want to effectively sell-out. He stubbornly goes his own way, flying the flag for the non-speaking films, going against the grain and treading a lonely path, albeit with his regular canine co-star, his talented and loyal dog (played by the expertly-trained Uggie).

Inevitably, it is not long before he gets left behind and begins to enter an alcohol-infused and financially-crippling fall from grace. Is there hope for the master of a dying art?

This in itself is engaging viewing, but it is the subplot of the perfectly-opposing rise to fame of an actress and dancer called Peppy Miller (Bérénice Bejo), which fuses the film together to become something special. Miller is a serial co-star of Valentin’s at the height of his fame after she blagged her way into the Kinograph set-up after a chance meeting at one of his a premieres. She idealises him and is overwhelmed to be acting with such a man, even making several attempted passes at the (unhappily) married man.

If Miller is the youthful future of the studio, then Valentin is the dead wood waiting to make way for the new, but as the artist proudly stays true to his art, he is effectively holding a melting candle, as he claims no-one wants to hear his voice. But despite Miller enjoying her new-found fame and rising stock, she has not forgotten where she came from and who got her into the business and why. She is determined not to let Valentin’s flame burn out.

The Artist deserves all its plaudits for a wonderful throwback to a bygone era and there are laughs aplenty and moments of clever irony, playing on the themes of silence and voice, amidst the genuine empathy evoked by Peppy and George, plus there is some impressive scene-stealing by the dog star, who will get special mentions in most of the award ceremonies I am sure.

The Artist (PG)
Directed by Michel Hazanavicius
Starring: Jean Dujardin, Bérénice Bejo, John Goodman, James Cromwell.
Running time: 100 minutes

The Artist is showing at the Rio Cinema in Dalston until Thursday 19 January.

Owen Sheers (R) with Amit Gupta (L) the director of Resistance

Something is not right in the Olchon Valley. One morning in 1944, the inhabitants of a small village nestled in the ominous shadows of the Black Mountains wake up to find that all the menfolk have disappeared.

The assumption is that they have vanished into the hills to join ‘the resistance’, for this is 1944, the D-Day landings have failed and Wales has been occupied by Nazis. So begins Resistance – a recently released feature length film featuring Michael Sheen and adapted from the novel of the same name by Hackney-based writer Owen Sheers.

Resistance begins immediately after the women make their shocking discovery. They don’t have much time to digest the disappearance before a company of German troops arrives in the village. Snowy conditions force them to make camp, and what follows is an unsettling but moving study of the complex dynamics between the occupiers and the occupied.

The plot revolves largely around Sarah, mesmerisingly played by Andrea Riseborough, whose strong faith and devotion to her absent husband is challenged by head Nazi Albrecht (Tom Wlachiha) who is conflicted by the orders he is given and slowly becomes infatuated with Sarah. As Sheers points out, the resistance in question refers to the German soldiers as much as the villagers.

By no means is it an easy film to watch; like the book, it is a slow burner. One of the viewer’s first observations is the lack of much incidental music. It’s not an exaggeration to suggest that the howling wind could receive top billing on the sound credits.  This adds to the overbearing feeling of isolation and abandonment that the landscape evokes. It is the scenery of Sheers’ native land that is the star of the show and his inspiration.

“It was a story that grew out of the landscape more than anything else,” he explains over coffee at L’Eau à la Bouche café on Broadway Market. “The area has been used by many different characters over the years, from the 12th century monks that built an abbey there, romantic poets wanting to create their own Garden of Eden and artists forming communes. I’m fascinated about how certain geography allows people to live life on their own terms.”

Although he identifies with poetry first, Sheers has kept up a colourful and diverse body of work, aided by long sessions at the London Fields Lido. Past projects include The Dust Diaries, a reportage tracing his distant uncle’s missionary life in Rhodesia, and a documentary on unsung war poet Keith Douglas.

He is currently working with sick and wounded veterans to write and perform their own play in the West End. Most notably, Sheers also produced a 72-hour immersive theatre contemporary retelling of The Passion in Port Talbot.

“We have the last supper at the Sandfields Social and Labour Club, with the Manic Street Preachers playing live, then the police break it up, there is an angry mob, a trial and Jesus (Michael Sheen) is crucified on a roundabout. There were 12,000 people at the crucifixion and at one point the real police arrived and nobody could tell who were the actors. I thought to myself, ‘now this is a piece of theatre!’”

World War Two dramas all too often adopt the jingoism and triumphalism of the conqueror; they also tend to be set in mainland Europe. Watching depictions of fierce battles raging on distant battlefields is an experience entirely different from seeing German troops striding across familiar landscapes, acting like they own the place.

Resistance is bleak and dystopian and audiences may well be shocked when they are presented with a vivid, jarring tableau of an occupied Wales – one scene of a country show complete with marquees, sheep and swastikas, manages to be both eerie and amusing. Sheers’ piece, directed by Amit Gupta, provides food for thought on the topic of British military engagement around the world and portrays strong but troubled characters going through situations unimaginable to some but a fact of life for others.

Resistance is available on DVD from 19th March.

Arthur Christmas: a joyful, festive movie

The latest gem to come out of the much-loved Aardman stable is the fun-filled festive gift of Arthur Christmas 3D. Aardman Animations’ reputation precedes itself and has done ever since the endearing Wallace and Gromit saga began.

Apart from the ridiculously cute model characters, Wallace and Gromit’s appeal had a lot to do with the gadgets and inventions, created by the film’s protagonist, and Arthur Christmas is no different – except it cranks up the gadgetry a few notches.

The premise of Arthur Christmas is simple. Basically, the viewer gets to see into the world of the Claus family in their time to shine: Christmas Eve night. On their most important day of the year, we witness how Father Christmas performs the miracle that leaves every child in wonderment and we get the answer to the billion-dollar question of how Santa can deliver presents to households across the earth in just a sleigh pulled by reindeers and in just one night. The answer is with a LOT of help!

Modern-day present delivery from the Claus HQ involves a great number of well-trained backroom elf staff, battalions of S.W.A.T. style elves, hi-tech GPS devices and the whole operation is managed in a NASA-type mission centre. This hub is headed up by Santa’s right-hand man – his Bluetooth-wearing son Steve (Hugh Laurie) – who is the Santa-in-waiting and ready to fill the boots of the old man.

The North Pole HQ – the current residence of three generations of the Claus family tree – has seen many great men wear the famous red-and-white suit, but the current incarnation, (Jim Broadbent), is a bit of an old duffer and a mere “figurehead” for the Christmas miracle, while the hard graft is done by the elves and masterminded by the military precise Steve, who is also the captain of the new-wave sleigh, which is a colossus of a vehicle that resembles the Enterprise from Star Trek.

At the beginning of the film the amazing operation is in full flow, with the field agent elves showing off their spectacularly mobile and efficient delivery skills, using Mission Impossible-inspired wire-drop techniques and unloading their stocking-filler gift guns. Back at HQ the progress is monitored and it is soon announced that the night’s work has been a success. However, for all the seemingly full-proof efficiency, we then find out that something has slipped through the net and a present was missed –meaning that one child will wake up to nothing under the Christmas tree.

This disaster is played down by Steve, who uses data to argue that in the grand scheme of things, night’s work has been a near-flawless operation. Meanwhile, Santa and Mrs. Claus (Imelda Staunton) have retired to bed, without a worry. Sadly, somewhere along the line, with all the gizmo-driven science involved in the responsibility of continuing Saint Nicholas’ legacy, the spirit of Christmas has been suppressed. Enter our hero – and source of the film’s title – Arthur Christmas (James McAvoy).

Brother to the Santa-to-be Steve, Arthur is clearly seen as the inferior member of the Claus family, as he’s a little bit dozy, a bit of a clutz and his polite and child-like demeanour has earned him just a role in the Letters department; effectively an administrative position that keeps him out of harm’s way.

What it does gives him is the honour of reading the Christmas lists so eagerly penned to Santa by the kids across the world. He knows what Christmas means to these kids and is not prepared to let this one child (or tiny fraction) be left out. Cue a race against time to deliver a little girl’s bike halfway across the globe without the help of him brother and his many minions – or spacecraft!

This epic, but calamity-strewn journey echoes the likes of Paul, Due Date and the Pixar hit Up, as an unlikely bunch consisting of disgruntled Grandsanta [Bill Nighy], a wrapping-happy elf called Bryony (Ashley Jensen), and a knackered old sleigh and reindeers that had long since been retired.

There are plenty of laughs to be had – thanks to the great wit of cult comedy writer Peter Baynam driving the script – as the competiveness within the Claus family reaches breaking point, as well as the many barmy predicaments that Arthur and his curious gang get themselves into – especially one scene where they find themselves marooned in the desert with some hungry-looking lions!

Arthur Christmas 3D is a festive feel-good film that is impossible not to love, as one-lad’s intrinsic goodness battles against the technological age’s statistical disenchantment, which threaten to ruin Christmas. Ironically, the flaws in majority of the Claus family’s moral make-up and their self-centred nature make them distinctly unlikeable enough to almost derail the film, but loveable Arthur sweeps you up with his enthusiasm to save Christmas and his determination to do what is right.

Arthur Christmas 3D (U)
Directed by Sarah Smith
Starring: James McAvoy, Hugh Lawrie, Jim Broadbent, Ashley Jensen, Imelda Staunton
Running time: 97 minutes

Arthur Christmas 3D is showing at the Rio Cinema until Monday 2 January 2012 (daytime screenings).

Ghostbuster: Rebecca Hall in The Awakening

This atmospheric ghost story-meets-psychological thriller by British director Nick Murphy – best known for his TV work on the likes of Primeval – is set in post-war London in 1921 and is built around the idea that after the fallout of the First World War, the loss of lives on such a mass scale caused many of the survivors to put their faith in the existence of a life beyond death – maybe a comforting way of keeping their lost loved ones close. This was both in the form of religion and also in the belief in ghosts. For some, the idea of apparitions living on another plain of existence may have eased the grief and loss, for others the spectres haunted them to their core.

The Awakening is about a sceptic who sets out to dispel the ghost stories and so-called sightings in the city and show the supernatural to be nothing but folly or paranoia. This sceptic is a young author called Florence Cathcart (emotively played by Rebecca Hall), who has penned a book called Seeing through Ghosts and has become known as the go-to girl for finding the source and cause of ghostly hysteria.

The film begins with Cathcart rumbling some charlatans in a séance-type scene, where she unveils the charade’s tricks and sleight-of-hand, which had aimed to convince others of the presence an apparition. Soon after, Cathcart receives a visit from a well-informed and bluntly honest schoolmaster named Robert Mallory (Dominic West), from a nearby boys’ boarding school, who wants her to visit his school and put all the pupils’ fears to rest after claims of an alleged poltergeist, which has haunted the school since the recent death of a boy on the grounds.

Cathcart is apprehensive at first and dismissive of Mallory for his forthright approach and tone, but is soon drawn to this opportunity to alleviate the fear felt by the tormented children and bust this ghost as yet another hoax or case of misplaced hyperbole.

She is like a female version of the character Ichabod Crane from Sleepy Hollow, as she has a similar methodical approach to getting to the bottom of the mystery and a range of intriguing contraptions for measuring and detecting clues and evidence. Like Crane, she also packs an extensive amount of emotional baggage and childhood-related trauma, which becomes evident the deeper she delves into the “case”.

The gothic nature of this film has led to apt comparisons to such stories as Turn of the Screw and the beautifully shot scenes around the secluded school make this a tense and engaging affair. The big rooms and corridors of the grand building make for bags of tension, spookiness and bumps in the nights. Importantly, the impressive performances from the key cast members draw you into the heart of this story.

It is an impressive debut feature from Murphy, who has elevated The Awakening beyond the realms of ghostly period drama to something more substantial. A special mention must go to Rebecca Hall – in her first high-profile lead role – as she echoes the troubled lady act she portrayed so well in The Prestige. This performance goes deeper and both psychical and mental torment is etched on her expressions in every scene. High praise must also go to Imelda Staunton (award-winning stage and screen star of Vera Drake), who gives an unsettling turn as the obsessive house-keeper Maud, whose role in the film intensifies as the film unfolds.

However, the film has drawn both positive and negative comparisons with the work of M. Night Shyamalan – due to the big twist that turns the plot of the film on its head. Without inserting a spoiler, it is fair to say that the twist is dramatic and one that, although impressive and emotional, asks quite a lot of the viewer to be convinced and satisfied with the rapid unravelling revelation.

It is a powerful climactic punch from a slow-burning, subtly-pitched ghost story, but The Awakening is a thoroughly enjoyable watch, loaded with elements of romance, suspense, terror and psychological issues and it would be difficult not to be moved by the finale.

The Awakening (15)
Directed by Nick Murphy
Starring: Rebecca Hall, Dominic West, Imelda Staunton, Isaac Hempstead Wright, Richard Durden, Diana Kent.
Running time: 107 minutes

The Awakening is showing at the Rio Cinema in Dalston until Thursday 24 November 2011.

Hackney Picturehouse was host to the UK premiere of the Future Shorts Film Festival this week (Monday 14 November). The festival, produced by Gintare Karalyte,  is the first ever global pop-up festival, showcasing the best short films from around the world.

“The Future Shorts Film festival unites filmmakers and audiences allowing anyone anywhere to host their own screening and share ideas, creativity and stories from around the world,” says Fabien Riggall, founder and director of Future Shorts.

The Festival Team has put together an exciting selection, opening with a humorous reconstruction of a failed bank robbery in Stockholm, witnessed by a pair of film makers in 2006. Director Ruben Östlund’s Incident By A Bank is light-hearted, simple and effective. Shot in one take, this was filmed from a CCTV-like angle, far above the scene, and has a rather amateurish feel to it, accentuated by the relatively low picture quality.

Documenting the plight of a group of Russian men working on a submarine, Ariel Kleiman’s Sundance-winner Deeper Than Yesterday, the longest film at 20 minutes, shows how cabin fever rids the men of their inhibitions, as savage, brutal instincts emerge in this dark, realist film.

From dark realist to a darker surrealism, David O’Reilly’s film The External World is an animated, highly convoluted interpretation of modern society. Centred on a young person practising for a piano rehearsal, this film goes on a seemingly random journey through an imaginary world – the result is almost nightmare-like.

Luminaris, created by Juan Pablo Zaramella. This film – combining pixelation and stop-motion techniques – depicts a Buenos Aires in which light controls the movements of its inhabitants. We  follow the working day of a light bulb-maker who dreams of a grander life. There are some deep sociological themes but there really isn’t enough time to absorb them in the six minutes. On top of these, though, is a sweet, simple story of aspiration and love.

Back into the animated world with The Eagleman Stag, a poignant film which follows the life of a scientist haunted by an obsession with time and the discovery of an extraordinary beetle. Screened entirely in black and white, this film was created by local Hackney director Michael Please and won a BAFTA for Best Short Animation.

Please’s existentialist production has a the troubling storyline, but in spite of this the calm-voiced narration brings reassurance to this nine-minute short.

The final ‘f’ of the festival, set in New York, is Luke Matheny’s Oscar-winning, thought-provoking comedy God of Love. Matheny himself stars as the main character, a jazz singer who, after persistently praying to God, is presented with a way to make the girl of his infatuation fall in love with him.

God of Love is simply an excellent story. It’s not without its depth,  but is easy to follow, the themes digestible and the moral of the story pleasantly predictable and palatable.

All in all, the Future Shorts Festival is plenty of film for thought.

For more information on the full programme go to the Future Shorts Festival.

George Clooney has returned to the political genre in his latest directorial feature, The Ides of March, for which he also co-wrote the screenplay. Predictably, the acting and the action is as smooth and slick as the man himself, but intriguingly it is not Clooney who takes centre stage.

Although Clooney plays charismatic Governor Mike Morris – a man who looks like he is going to bring integrity and hope to the Democratic presidential candidate race – it is Morris’ aide and up-and-coming Junior Campaign Manager, Steven Meyers (Ryan Gosling), who is in the spotlight.

Gosling plays the confident, PR whizz, whose poise is matched by his sense of purpose and belief that Morris is really the right man to take the Democratic party forward and hopefully run the country. Morris is the underdog in the race – up against the more formal Senator Ted Pullman (Michael Mantell) – but his youthful aide is feeding him the magical lines and it hasn’t gone unnoticed by his rival – or more specifically Pullman’s Campaign Manager, Tom Duffy (Paul Giamatti).

Giamatti is electric as the vivacious Duffy, so too his opposite number (and fellow serial scene-stealer) Philip Seymour Hoffman, playing Stephen’s boss and mentor, Paul Zara. Zara is the brash but loyal crusader to Duffy’s win-by-any-means dirty trickster. And loyalty (or the lack of it) in the political arena is the overriding theme of this film, where loyalty and morality should be the foundation stones of society.

However, with such power and prestige involved in the American political system, personal ambition and ego muddy the waters and the make-up of a man in the pressure-cooker environment and the man becomes easily corruptible, despite every word uttered by the party figureheads being aimed at convincing the public of their incorruptibility and their unflinching moral vision for the greater good.

Amidst the enviable cast at Clooney’s disposal, is man-of-the-moment Ryan Gosling, who produces another captivating performance to follow up his impressive, ice-cold turn in the stunning Drive. In Drive, Gosling plays a quiet loner, whose inner darkness rears its head when provoked by a dangerous predicament and in The Ides of March – although the charming Stephen Meyers is anything but quiet – he too finds his dark side emerging when his lofty position suddenly heads south and Gosling is yet again pitch-perfect in depicting a man on the brink.

Stephen’s problems arise when he becomes romantically involved with an intern, Molly Stearns (Evan Rachel Wood) – who is the daughter of a senior Democratic figure, Jack Stearns (Gregory Itzin) – and also when he takes the ill-advised decision to meet competitor Duffy in a bar to chat; a meeting cheekily instigated by Duffy.

Things rapidly get complicated, especially with the influence of an aggressively ambitious New York Times journalist called Ida (Marisa Tomei) and Senator Thompson (Jeffrey Wright) – who is being used as a pawn to sway votes – and the competitors must think fast if they are to have a future at the top of the political pile. Throw into the mix a sudden, high-profile fatality and you have a big melting-pot of intrigue.

The knives are out for Meyers and as things intensify, he desperately tries to save his career and this means he must finally play the political game with the gloves off. Often in the game of Hollywood-portrayed politics, if you dig deep enough, you can find something to bring down even the squeakiest of the clean. By the end of the film, not many of the players are left untarnished.

The depiction of American presidential campaigning in the Ides of March may be embellished for the viewer’s pleasure, but this is a thrilling and convincing piece of drama that leaves you wondering by what degree.

The Ides of March (15)
Directed by George Clooney
Starring: George Clooney, Ryan Gosling, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Evan Rachel Wood, Paul Giamatti, Jeffrey Wright, Marisa Tomei, Max Minghella, Gregory Itzin, Michael Mantell.
Running time: 101 minutes

The Ides of March is showing at the Rio Cinema in Dalston until Thursday 10 November 2011.

Ra'nell (Malcolm Kamulete) in Channel 4's Top Boy. Photograph: Channel 4

Writer Ronan Bennett was reportedly concerned that comparisons of his uncompromising four-part drama Top Boy with acclaimed American TV series The Wire would overshadow the former, but he should have been more wary of another media obsession. Much has been made of the potential social implications of Bennett’s work, and its relation to the reality of life on Hackney’s estates, where the show’s ruthless gangs operate.

Yet whether or not Top Boy is an entirely accurate or indeed responsible representation of the sub-culture it depicts is ultimately of little consequence. For as a work of art, albeit a gruelling one, Bennett’s drama ticks all the boxes. Fiction, by definition, owes very little to fact, and Top Boy presents a narrative which captures the essence of a slice of London life in a manner rarely achieved by documentary.

The sense of entrapment in the estates and the lack of options available to its inhabitants is perhaps the most tragic aspect of the brutal world presented by this compelling drama. The characters’ diminished expectations are summed up best in the scene where Dushane tells drug kingpin Raines that he “wants a life”, to which the reply is: “you’re breathing ain’t you?”.

Top Boy abounds with wince-inducing gruesome violence: characters amputate rivals’ fingers and burn dissenters with irons, but nothing is more harrowing to watch than the relationship between 13 year-old Ra’Nell (Malcolm Kamelete) and his long-suffering, mentally-ill mother Lisa.

Played with touching tenderness by Sharon Duncan Brewster, Lisa seems to embody the ceaseless pain of existence in this tower block Inferno, and her helplessness represents the malady which effects all who surround her. Gangland heavyweights Dushane and Sully may be a boisterous duo, but they are ultimately being held captive in the same system as Lisa.

Judged purely as a piece of television, Top Boy sets a new high-mark for kitchen-sink drama. Bennett’s genius is in accentuating the human aspect of a community which, in some scenes, seems devoid of compassion and empathy. Loyalty, friendship and family turn out to be recognisably complicated and intricate in the value-system of these carefully crafted characters, who, at least in the context created, ring true.