Milk

Sean Penn is a revelation as gay political activist - assassinated 30 years ago. Harvey Milk arrives in San Francisco shortly after his 40th birthday from New York feeling he had done nothing of imprtance up until then, and had lived too long in the closet. In the next eight years he helped to transform the status of gay people through political activitism. He formed a gay businesses group, and gay people gathered in the Castro Disrtrict of San Francisco initially for protection from the violence of police and everyone else, then as a statement of their existence. Milk is elected to the City Board of Supervisors but makes enemies and comes up against the campaigning zeal of Anita Bryant and religious groups determined to remove all homosexuals from the public service - especially schools. Josh Brolin plays a fellow Supervisor who becomes embittered by Milk and his success on the Board. Milk always said he would never reach 50, and this prophecy comes true when the Brolin character arrives one morning and shoots both the Mayor and Milk in City Hall. How do we know all this? Harvey Milk left tapes only to be heard in the event of his assassination. The film is not melodramatic nor mawkish, and effectively intercut with period footage. Sean Penn's performance is superb, neither too over the top nor stereotypical, and yet the film manages to give the feeling for the gay lifestyle - somehow normal and yet different. Rating 9/10

The Duchess

More melodrama than drama - this tale of Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire married at 17 to a man who only wanted her to provide him with an heir. (Something she lamentably fails to do for some considerable time). Perhaps she might have had a hint of what married life might be like when the Duke presents Georgiana with a daughter from a prior liaison and informs her that she is to take the girl in as though she was a their child. Keira Knightley acted this role with far too many nods at another member of the Spencer family the late Diana of Wales, and Ralph Fiennes as her cold hearted husband is taciturn to the point of becoming mute. The film rattles on as a hectic pace - perhaps the Duchess had too full a life - characters are zipped in and out without much historical explanation - Fox, Sheridan, are wheeled out to represent her interest in politics - and into their joint lives comes Bess Foster whose husband has taken her children away from her. She is first Georgiana's friend, then the Duke's mistress and they bizarrely become a menage a trois. Unsurprisingly the Duchess becomes a gambling, drink and drug addict (although like everything else this film skims over these aspects of her life) and then scandalously takes up with Charles Grey, living with him openly. As you might expect it all ends in tears. A bit unsatisfactory in many ways, and failing to do justice to Amanda Foreman's biography. Rating 6/10

Slumdog Millionaire

The tale of Jamal Patel who enters India's version of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire and knows the answers to some very obscure questions despite being an orphan of the Bombay (Mumbai) slums He is suspected of cheating but under pretty severe interrogation he reveals that all the answers have come from incidents from this life of appalling poverty. It is almost Dickensian in its degradation - there is a Fagin type character that he and his brother Salim falls in with, but while Jamal escapes to a reasonable life - obsessed though he is with fellow street urchin Latika, Salim becomes a gangster. Jamal is an outsider in all kinds of ways - a Muslim, an orphan, a char wallah at a call centre - less than nothing, but driven by the love of a beautiful woman. The film is all the more remarkable for the acting of the children who play the younger versions of the three central characters. For once the violence depicted seem not to be gratuitous - but necessary to emphasise the appalling nature of these children's lives - the by products of a City being transformed into a capitalist power house.

The Reader

A truly remarkable film starring Bruno Ganz, Kate Winslet and Ralph Fiennes.

It is a bit difficult to write about the plot without giving too much away - but in outline Bruno Ganz plays a 15 year old Michael Berg who meets tram conductor Hannah Schmidt as he falls ill from scarlet fever. She helps him to get home and when four months later (after he has recovered) he returns to offer her thanks and they begin an affair, despite their great age difference. Between torrid sex sessions Michael reads to Hannah - anything he happens to be studying at school. Hannah suddenly disappears, and years later Michael as a law student attends a trial where Hannah is accused of a terrible crime. Michael realises he knows a secret about Hannah that could throw a whole new light on the evidence being presented against her. He fails to reveal it - and she is too ashamed to admit it too. This bears upon Michael throughout his life - and effectively ruins his relationships with his family, wife and daughter. There are wonderful performances from Kate Winslet and in particular Bruno Ganz who manages to be both a believable 15 year old and a more mature man. It is so well observed and the emotions described so excellently, dealing with powerful and repellent behaviour with remarkable sensitivity. A rating of 9/10

La Boheme - a film of the opera

Dean Spanley

Che (Parts I & II)

One of my great heroes, so I was looking forward to this new study of the life of the hero of 'the

armed struggle'. There are two films here - the first begins with Che Guevara's meeting with Fidel Castro in Mexico City and ends with the successful overthrow of the Batista regime in 1959. Part II traces Che's arrival in Bolivia as part of the Cuban campaign for world revolution and a United Socialist Latin America, and culminates with his execution by government forces. Now many will find thew approach of these films unsatisfactory - it is nor your standard Hollywood biopic, it is a factual drama documentary seen entirely from Che's perspective - but this doesn't mean it shows him without flaws or a military genius. I found it fascinating, especially the second part where the realisation begins to dawn in Che that his brand of socialism and his revolution is not welcomed with joy by the Bolivian working classes who fail to flock to his insurrection. All the previous methods - free medicine, indoctrination, propaganda, finance and guerrilla warfare fail comprehensively - even to the point where an ordinary soldier almost begs to be the man to act as his executioner. I was impressed by the way I managed to get a far better understanding of the man through these two films - Rating 8/10