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This week, there are SIX new films out for you to choose from, led by Bohemian Rhapsody. Here are the titles, with more info below:
- Bohemian Rhapsody
Don’t Worry, He Won’t Get Far on Foot
Utøya: July 22
An Evening with Beverly Luff Linn
The Guilty
Bad Reputation
Bohemian Rhapsody traces the meteoric rise of the band Queen through their iconic songs and revolutionary sound, their near-implosion as Mercury’s lifestyle spirals out of control, and their triumphant reunion on the eve of Live Aid, where Mercury, facing a life-threatening illness, leads the band in one of the greatest performances in the history of rock music.
Mr Mercury is played by Rami Malek (above-left, and in Buster’s Mal Heart), and while he looks okay in this, my tip for the great singer was Assaad Bouab (above-right), who played Redouane Buzoni, one of the baddies in French heist drama, Braquo Season 4. As you can see, there, he is the spitting image of the man!
Still, if Hollywood doesn’t listen to me about putting The Age of Adaline‘s Anthony Ingruber as the young Han Solo in Solo: A Star Wars Story, then there’s no help for them.
All that said, the cast for this film includes Mike Myers, who famously was into the track in question in 1992’s Wayne’s World.
Plus, when it comes to the singing voice of Freddie, I don’t know whether Mr Malek can cut it, but this trailer is certainly using the real Freddie.
Jurassic Park‘s Joseph Mazzello, The Woman In White‘s Ben Hardy is drummer Roger Taylor, while Brian May is portrayed by A Song For Jenny‘s Gwilym Lee.
Directors: Dexter Fletcher, Bryan Singer
Writers: Anthony McCarten, Anthony McCarten, Peter Morgan
Also stars: Aidan Gillen, Lucy Boynton, Tom Hollander, Allen Leech, Ace Bhatti
Hit or Miss? Verdict: Hit!
Don’t Worry, He Won’t Get Far on Foot continues the wonderful tradition that streaming services Amazon and Netflix have managed which is making some of the most offbeat and original films around.
This one comes from Amazon and centres around John Callahan (Joaquin Phoenix), who became paralysed after a car accident at age 21, and turned to drawing as a form of therapy. Throw in a cast that includes Jonah Hill, Rooney Mara and Jack Black, all looking like they’re playing against type, and this looks fantastic.
It’s also written and directed by Gus Van Sant, based on a story by him, Callaghan, Jack Gibson and William Andrew Eatman, all based on Callahan’s novel, and also stars Beth Ditto, Olivia Hamilton, Udo Kier and Kim Gordon.
Hit or Miss? Verdict: Hit!
Utøya: July 22
On July 22, 2011 more than 500 youths attending a political summer camp on an island outside Oslo were attacked by an armed right-wing extremist. Earlier that day, he had bombed a Government building in Oslo before making his way to Utøya island.
In this first fictional movie about the attack, we get to know 18-year-old Kaja and her friends. Shocked by the bombing in Oslo, the youngsters are reassuring relatives that they are far away from the incident. Suddenly, the safe atmosphere on the island of Utøya is shattered when shots are heard. We then follow Kaja as she tries to survive, minute by minute.
This looks like a fascinating drama and I really want to see it.
Director: Erik Poppe
Stars: Andrea Berntzen, Aleksander Holmen, Solveig Koløen Birkeland
Hit or Miss? Verdict: Hit!
An Evening with Beverly Luff Linn
Lulu Danger’s (Aubrey Plaza) unsatisfying marriage takes a turn for the worse when a mysterious man from her past comes to town to perform an event called “An Evening With Beverly Luff Linn; For One Magical Night Only.”
Aubrey Plaza was the best thing about Dirty Grandpa and excelled in Ingrid Goes West, showing she could be a fantastic drama actress as well as doing comedy, and since this trailer left me laughing a lot, I’m really looking forward to it.
In fact, An Evening with Beverly Luff Linn was released on Tuesday this week, and is only getting a limited cinema run (usually one screen in London, which means that Mark Kermode et al will review it) before its DVD release next Monday.
Director: Jim Hosking
Writers: Jim Hosking, David Wike
Also stars: Jemaine Clement, Emile Hirsch
Hit or Miss? Verdict: Hit!
The Guilty
A police officer assigned alarm dispatch duty enters a race against time when he a nswers an emergency call from a kidnapped woman.
This does look a great drama, but given the way the trailer looks like it might be going, I hope it doesn’t branch out into stupidity if the lead ends up going outside to tackle the bad guys himself.
Plus, when he says that he promised a 6-year-old girl that she’d see her mum tonight, in reality, you really wouldn’t be dumb enough to make such promises as that leads you into soap opera territory.
Director: Gustav Möller
Writers: Gustav Möller, Emil Nygaard Albertsen
Stars: Jakob Cedergren, Jessica Dinnage, Omar Shargawi
Hit or Miss? Verdict: Hit!
Bad Reputation
Joan Jett is so much more than “I Love Rock ’n’ Roll.” It’s true, she became mega-famous from the number-one hit, and that fame intensified with the music video’s endless play on MTV. But that staple of popularity can’t properly define a musician. Jett put her hard work in long before the fame, ripping it up onstage as the backbone of the hard-rock legends The Runaways, influencing many musicians—both her cohort of punk rockers and generations of younger bands—with her no-bullshit style.
Bad Reputation gives you a wild ride as Jett and her close friends tell you how it really was in the burgeoning ’70s punk scene, and their interviews are laced with amazing archival footage. The theme is clear: even though people tried to define Jett and keep her stuck to one hit, she never compromised. She will kick your ass, and you’ll love her all the more for it.
Director: Kevin Kerslake
Writer: Joel Marcus
Stars: Eric Ambel, Billie Joe Armstrong, Gene Bau, Joan Jett and many more
Hit or Miss? Verdict: Maybe!
Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.