Original Broadcast: The Business Of Film
James Cameron-Wilson finds #3 The Sheep Detectives a bit of a curate's egg. An anthropomorphic fantasy, families will take the astonishingly animated sheep to their hearts in a plot worth of Agatha Christie but the acting is annoyingly hammy. Billie Eilish: Hit Me Hard & Soft is a concert film directed by James Cameron. Often hard to hear the lyrics, it is perhaps one for her fans. Out on Blu-Ray is Lynne Ramsay's Die My Love. Robert Pattinson is sidelined by Jennifer Lawrence's impressive performance as a depressive mother becoming increasingly irrational. An important film which juggles realism with the nightmarish, it is almost a character-based horror film.
Guests: James Cameron-Wilson
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Original Broadcast: The Business Of Film
James Cameron-Wilson says that #1 The Devil Wears Prada 2 has taken 85% of the first film's total in just 3 days. Meryl Streep, Stanley Tucci, Emily Blunt and Anne Hathaway have reunited, along with much of the behind-the-camera talent. It's a formulaic and superficial pleasure but has plenty of laughs. James thinks Primavera, about the composer Vivaldi, is one of the best films of the year: it is showing in select Picturehouse and Curzon hardtops. He feels everyone should watch Netflix's documentary The Plastic Detox, which he says has changed his life. It's full of good humour, despite its message about the toxic chemicals in plastics which alter our hormones. It's horrifying but educational and actually made a massive difference to six formerly childless couples who were the detox guinea pigs. He advises everybody to give a wide berth to the awful Greenland 2: Migration, an apocalyptic thriller with Gerard Butler.
Guests: James Cameron-Wilson
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James Cameron-Wilson says that Michael's £11.5m opening was 68% of the weekend take. It's the biggest opening for a musical biopic but, under Antoine Fuqua's direction, it's a hagiography telling only half of the Michael Jackson story. With his nephew in the starring role and six producers having the surname Jackson, perhaps that's not surprising. Overly affectionate, it doesn't feel real but that won't deter his fans. On Netflix, the survival thriller Apex stars Charlize Theron and Taron Egerton. It gripped James from the off. The less you know about the plot, the better. It delivers in spades as a thriller but it does go to some very dark places. Watch it if you dare. As for Roommates, also on Netflix, this is a crude college comedy which is offensive mechanical dross. The longer it went on, the more depressed James became.
Guests: James Cameron-Wilson
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Original Broadcast: The Business Of Film
Not a great week. James Cameron-Wilson found Lee Cronin’s 'The Mummy', #4, an OTT, grotesque blend of Egyptian frolics and Exorcist-like demonic possession, genuinely unpleasant. Not much better was the Kander & Ebb musical 'Kiss of the Spider Woman', #51, a downer set in a prison cell with Jennifer Lopez as the Spider Woman, at least in the fanciful dreams of Luis, an imprisoned homosexual in 1983 Argentina. On Netflix there wasn’t much relief, with 'Thrash', a disaster pic set during a category 5 hurricane which unleashes sharks into a small South Carolina community: implausible, very silly and unintentionally mirthful.
Guests: James Cameron-Wilson,Chad Kennerk
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Original Broadcast: The Business Of Film
James Cameron-Wilson found the romcom #7 You, Me & Tuscany implausible, clichéd and derivative dross. However, he adored #9 California Schemin', a true story directed by James McAvoy about a pair of Scottish wannabe rappers who pretend to be American to get noticed. Told with cinematic verve and with great performances, it's an extraordinary story which reminded him of Trainspotting. James found Keanu Reeves in Outcome, on Apple TV+, a story about a movie star worried about a bizarre video from his past, all rather too familiar and underwhelming. Directed and co-written by Jonah Hill, it's also terribly crude. He adored The President's Cake, an Iraqi film, again based on true events, made with non-actors. Heartbreaking and compelling, it's a small masterpiece, available on BFI Player and Amazon Prime.
Guests: James Cameron-Wilson
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Original Broadcast: The Business Of Film
James Cameron-Wilson says box office has jumped 113% with the release of Super Mario Galaxy Movie but he opted to go to #3 The Drama, with Robert Pattinson and Zendaya. It's a comedy of manners which is grown up, thought-provoking and enormously funny in a dark way, leading to an unusual post-movie discussion. James also caught #123 Two Women, a French-Canadian comedy of quiet suburban desperation. It's odd, amusing and unpredictable and will be appearing in various places over the coming months. He recommends steering clear of the Disney+ film online Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice, with Vince Vaughn playing himself twice in a dire shambles of a movie.
Guests: James Cameron-Wilson
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Original Broadcast: The Business Of Film
James Cameron-Wilson found #2, the Enid Blyton fantasy The Magic Faraway Tree, to be a charmless, farcical misfire. With Claire Foy and Andrew Garfield, it is full of shouty overacting, with music numbers crammed in and is a wasted opportunity. #7 They Will Kill You is a grotesque horror film about a New York highrise which is a temple to Satan. It's another with a surprising 15 certificate. Amazon documentary Man on the Run is about Paul McCartney, covering the breakup of The Beatles to the murder of John Lennon. On Amazon, it starts promisingly but, while there's plenty of home video, there's little that's new. After a dispiriting week, James watched the harrowing but brilliant The Killing Fields to cheer himself up. It's on C4 and Plex.
Guests: James Cameron-Wilson
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Original Broadcast: The Business Of Film
James Cameron-Wilson reports box office up 102% with #1 the Ryan Gosling sci-fi film Project Hail Mary. From the writers of The Martian, he plays a science teacher who wakes up from a coma in space. Like The Martian largely a one-person film, it is great fun early on but becomes self-indulgent, barmy and sentimental, with the trailer giving away a very late plot point. James was even less keen on the horror film Ready or Not 2: Here I Come. It is ludicrous drivel which is neither scary nor funny and is dreadfully edited. He was amazed at its 15 certificate. On Netflix is the feature film Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man starring Cillian Murphy, as in the TV series. It's part ghost story, part war movie and part gangster epic. It looks terrific but it has too many flashbacks and set pieces and they can't disguise that there is very little story or narrative drive. James was actually glad when it ended.
Guests: James Cameron-Wilson
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Original Broadcast: The Business Of Film
James Cameron-Wilson laments box office down 32%. #2 Reminders of Him, a Colleen Hoover adaptation, is complete trash and yet, predictable though it is, it has relatable characters and is hard to dislike. #3 How to Make a Killing is an adaptation of the famous Ealing comedy, Kind Hearts and Coronets. Sadly, this lacks the wit or appeal of the original and is to be avoided at all cost. As ever, James was excited by the Oscars, with most of his predictions coming good. It was, he says, the most predictable ceremony for a long time. Although One Battle After Another won Best Picture, it was really the year of the horror film, which has perhaps become respectable again. One of the highlights was the great speech given by Jessie Buckley.
Guests: James Cameron-Wilson
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Original Broadcast: The Business Of Film
James Cameron-Wilson is delighted by #1 Hoppers from Pixar. A sci-fi film with a theme of connectivity to the natural world, it's vastly entertaining and imaginative, with plenty of comic business, even if it becomes a bit complicated at times. #4 is The Bride!, written and directed by Maggie Gyllenhaal. It's the nearest any Frankenstein adaptation has come to being a romcom. Starring Christian Bale and Jessie Buckley, who gives a no-holds-barred erotic turn, it's an homage to the movies which gets better and better as you think about it afterwards. Streaming on BBC iPlayer is another Oscar-nominated documentary, Mr. Nobody Against Putin. James found this story of a schoolteacher in the Urals objecting to the militarisation of schools after the invasion of Ukraine highly impressive.
Guests: James Cameron-Wilson
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