• The Thin Air’s Essential 25 Films of 2017

    December 22, 2017 - By 

    End of year rankings obscure as much as they reveal, so we’re keeping it loose for the film countdown. Each of our regular film writers submitted picks for the year’s best in cinema, as well as a ‘wildcard’ pick that deserved more attention. The resulting list of 25 films embraces the art-house and the blockbuster, showcasing stunning work from Ireland, the UK, America and elsewhere, across a healthy range of genres and styles. The films are unnumbered and presented in random order. This rundown only begins to capture the breadth of cinematic experiences offered by the year; please take it as an…

  • Star Wars: The Last Jedi

    December 14, 2017 - By 

    There’s a scene near the end of The Last Jedi, the second in Disney’s rejuvenated world-eating trilogy, when Kylo Ren (Adam Driver), the floppy-haired bastard prince whose crackling Oedipal resentment makes him the most fascinating of the new batch, has pretty much had enough of the whole Star Wars thing. Rey (Daisy Ridley), the heir apparent to the ways of the Light Side, is talking about The Resistance, but he cuts her off, launching into a speech of delicious, weary iconoclasm. The Jedi, the Sith, the rebels, Luke, Leia… he wants to torch the whole thing, this over-loaded mythology on…

  • Stronger

    December 14, 2017 - By 

    For most of its running, Stronger is a watchable if unremarkable disaster biopic, admirably uncomfortable with terrorist attack cliche. It traces the story of Jeff Bauman, played by Jake Gyllenhaal, had both legs amputated above the knee after being caught in the 2013 bombing of the Boston Marathon, where he was cheering for his on again, off again girlfriend Erin. This is the second film based on the Boston attack released this year, but whereas Peter Berg’s typically muscular Patriot’s Day tracked the manhunt for the bombers, Stronger keeps its focus on personal consequences, John Pollono’s script working off Bauman’s memoir…

  • The Disaster Artist

    December 7, 2017 - By 

    Oh, hi reader. You are quite possibly sick of hearing about The Room, marketed to irony-devouring film freaks as the ‘best bad movie ever made’. Released in 2007 and recouping practically zero of its — frankly unbelievable — $6 million budget, Tommy Wiseau’s great auteur debacle found resurrection as a quotable ‘so bad it’s amazing’ treasure. The catchphrases, rabid cult buzz and midnight screenings have clued a generation of fans in on the joke, and with saturation there is a dulling of the film’s weirdness. One of the pleasures of The Disaster Artist, the James Franco-directed origin story of The Room, is being offered a seat at…

  • Good Time

    November 30, 2017 - By 

    As titles go, it’s hard to think of one more misleading than Good Time since people went to see Eraserhead thinking it was about a teacher with a penchant for clean notebooks. No one is having a ‘good time’ in the Safdie brothers’ latest offering: not Robert Pattinson’s Connie; not his girlfriend Corey (Jennifer Jason Leigh); and certainly not the viewer. This is as intense a noir thriller as you’re likely to see. All the action takes place over a particularly manic 24 hours in New York. It starts with Connie and his mentally challenged brother Nick (Ben Safdie) attempting to…

  • Paddington 2

    November 30, 2017 - By 

    After a month when the media has been dominated by stories of bullies and predators, how refreshing it is to revel in a film whose central message is kindness, courtesy and respect for others. To some, the idea of an animated movie about an eternally polite and optimistic bear might sound cloying, the visual equivalent of peanut butter sticking to the roof of one’s mouth, yet Paddington 2, a rare instance of a warranted sequel, effortlessly strikes the right balance between gentle humour and warmhearted whimsy. The result is a film that not only recaptures the blithely anarchic spirit of the…

  • Battle of the Sexes

    November 24, 2017 - By 

    A gender wars back-and-forth with surprising emotional richness, Little Miss Sunshine directors Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris serve up an ace with Battle of the Sexes, a warm, solidly entertaining look at the 1973 tennis match between Billie Jean King, the top-ranked female player, and Bobby Riggs, an ex-World Champion hungry for the spotlight. Some of Little Miss Sunshine’s affection for misfits united by shared dysfunction is visible in Battle of the Sexes, Simon Beaufoy’s script framing Billie Jean (Emma Stone) and Bobby (Steve Carell) as a pair of almost-weirdos comparable in their compulsions. Billie Jean’s rebellion against tennis establishment…

  • Justice League

    November 21, 2017 - By 

    With a production plagued by many problems, including hugely expensive reshoots and, most notably, director Zack Snyder’s (Watchmen) departure due to personal tragedy, Justice League seemed to be fighting an uphill battle right from the get-go. But this is no excuse for this soulless abomination and the monumental waste of talent that has been churned out by DC/Warner Brothers; one that will more than likely set them back a lot after the success of the far superior Wonder Woman. After the death of Superman (Henry Cavill), Earth has been left vulnerable to an unknown evil that spurs Batman (Ben Affleck) into…

  • Outburst Queer Arts Festival 2017 Film Review

    November 17, 2017 - By 

    With the screening of Sebastián Lelio’s Chilean trans thriller A Fantastic Women cancelled due to a logistical hiccup, it was down to Signature Move to open the film programme for the 2017 Outburst Festival, an annual showcase of international queer arts and cinema, and the film wasn’t really up to the inaugural task. Soap operas feature heavily in Jennifer Reeder’s film as a way for expatriates to connect with their homeland. Thirty-something lesbian attorney Zaynab (Fawzia Mirza, who wrote the script with Lisa Donato), lives in Chicago with her mother, a Muslim conservative who spends her days in an armchair…

  • The Florida Project

    November 14, 2017 - By 

    When you’re a kid, almost anywhere can be the happiest place on earth. That’s the case for Moonee (Brooklyn Prince), the 6 year-old with weaponised precociousness at the centre of The Florida Project, enjoying a bright, aimless Orlando summer at the Magic Castle, a packed low-rent motel where she lives with her young, single mother Halley (Bria Vinaite). Perched on the fringes of Disneyland’s high-commerce funtopia— the helicopter blades of VIPs buzz overheard— the lurid purple paint of the Magic Castle could easily be mistaken for one of the resort’s attractions (Indeed, one Brazilian couple make the wrong booking for…