FACT Film Reviews

The FACT centre in Wood Street has recently celebrated its 500,000th visitor. Showing an impressive variety of exhibitions and films, it is bringing alternative cinema to a new Liverpool audience. Here is a selection from our reviews of the best films shown during the last few months:

A VERY LONG ENGAGEMENT
Convicted of self-mutilation, teenage soldier Manech (Gaspard Ulleil) is sent over the top to be gunned down by the Germans. Despite the weight of seemingly overwhelming evidence, his young fiancée Mathilde (Tautou) refuses to give up hope, maintaining that she 'would know' if he had died. On the basis of this impulse, she begins a long and complicated search for a truth she can believe in, dredging through the muddy misery of the trench known as 'Bingo- Crepuscule'. DVD released on 26th May.

ENDURING LOVE
Joe (Daniel Craig) is a reasonably successful writer and lecturer in philosophy. He lives with his long-term girlfriend Claire (Samantha Morton), a reasonably successful sculptor. One sunlit day they spread out their picnic in an idyllic country field. As Joe pops open the wine bottle, a hot air balloon drifts into view. In that instant, the quiet tranquillity of the couple's lives is shattered, and seemingly minor details of the afternoon will be magnified to incredibly disturbing levels, bringing catastrophe beyond anyone's imagination. This is one to watch through nail-bitten fingers, perched on the very edge of your seat. DVD released on 11th April.

KONTROLL
Bulcsú (Sándor Csányi) is the brooding leader of a gang of 'controllers' - a rag-tag group of misfits who are part ticket collector and part wardens of the underground system. When a spate of apparent suicides break out it surprises no-one, given the ominous surroundings, but it adds watching for people jumping under trains to the controllers' already nightmarish drudgery. But they can always distract themselves with gallows humour, games of chicken with the midnight express, and observation of the numerous eccentrics who ride the lines and attempt to dodge fares. It's enough to make someone lose control. Combining a riveting plot with magnetic performances from a superb cast, and an electro-industrial soundtrack that pushes the film along in the all the right places, this is a prodigious effort from Antal. DVD released on 11th April.

SIDEWAYS
A groom and his best man set off for a bachelor's party/ holiday in California. One wants to sample the local vineyards and play golf, the other only wants to have a "last taste of freedom" before his marriage. What follows is a subtely gentle comedy with more than just a fluttering of middle-aged angst. While it may not quite be a classic, it's definitely more of a pinot noir than a second cheapest down the offy. DVD released on 2nd May.

LOVE ME IF YOU DARE
As the film begins, Julien (Thibault Verhaeghe) and Sophie (Josephine Lebas-Joly) are two inseparable eight-year-olds, sharing mischievous dares and a private world of fantasy only they understand. As time moves on, the games become more disturbing than playful and the duo (now played by Guillaume Canet and Marion Cotillard) are separated by circumstances and their own adolescent petulance. But of course I'm not spoiling too much by saying that is not the end of the story...Disarmingly charming and funny this is a genuinely life-affirming fairytale. DVD released on 7th February.