THE SAVAGES. Dir Tamara Jenkins. 2007

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Pitch perfect. Laura Linney and Philip Seymour Hoffman play a brother and sister (Wendy and Jon) with some distance between them. Both writers, he is a college professor specializing in Brecht, she is an aspiring playwright. Both are uneasy about their childhood and have put it behind them, until a crisis recalls them to their estranged father. They have to care for him when he had never cared much for them.

Seen from Wendy's viewpoint, she reacts emotionally, tries to do the right thing and feels guilty, while Jon takes a practical line, refusing to make a fuss about any of it, which she misinterprets as a callous attitude. It reveals an interesting difference in approaches to the elderly, and his calm, reasoned approach seems the more effective. When Wendy agonizes about how to ask their father what they should do in the event of his unconsciousness or 'possible' death, their father shouts 'Pull the plug! Bury me!' as though they are idiots.

Now and again, brother and sister regress into competitive bickering which is funny and excruciating at the same time and, for a moment, the viewpoint switches into that of their father, giving a sense of his desire to escape from them. From the dessicated and claustrophobic retirement village 'Sun City' to the messy apartments and slightly messy lives of the siblings, the whole film is excellent, realistic and funny.

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GLORIOUS 39. Dir Stephen Poliakoff. 2009

Glorious 39 strips away illusions. Poliakoff presents the apparent idyll of an English aristocratic family headed by genteel patriarch Lord Keyes (Bill Nighy). He presides over a country estate in Norfolk and his elegant townhouse in London – a world of golden light, romantic ruins, servants, house parties and happy children. But this is 1939, a mere 21 years since the Great War, the war to end all wars, in which millions died, Britain was crippled with war debt, and the English country house system which he so values was almost annihilated. There are many references to the ancientness of his family and tradition, but now, few male servants remained alive or unmaimed to work the English landscape or to be in service to the old families. Fearing domestic and political upheaval, appeasers such as Keyes sought to prevent Churchill leading the country and taking Britan to war, and to buy off Hitler to preserve British cultural and national identity. Nighty is excellent, contro...

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HARRIET. Dir. Kasi Lemmons. 2019

Astonishing true story of early freedom fighter, Harriet Tubman, enslaved in the Southern states of America. Despite her marriage to a freeborn African-American, she was unable to protect any of their hoped-for children from being born into that same slavery, and being owned by the farm proprietor. Her overpowering sense of injustice compelled her to act. She escapes, and eventually becomes one of America’s great heroes. Her audacity is astonishing, the level of courage she sustained, her extraordinary tenacity and physical endurance, not to mention cunning and excellent planning. One of those qualities would be worthy of high praise but she is exceptional for having all of them, created by her determination to rescue her family and then other captives. She was responsible for the escape of almost 300 slaves Her religious faith was absolute and she felt guided by God to help others, aided by Abolitionists and free African-Americans. Filmed in glorious colour, with deft...

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