The Secret Agent ★★★★☆
Directed by Kleber Mendonça Filho. Starring Wagner Moura, Carlos Francisco, Tânia Maria, Robério Diógenes, Alice Carvalho, Isabél Zuaa, Udo Kier. 15A cert, gen release, 161 min
Moura plays an enigmatic widowed academic forced, during the Brazilian military dictatorship of the 1970s, into hiding after a clash with a corrupt federal official eager to appropriate his research. Despite Mendonça Filho’s languid pacing, the film evokes conspiracy chillers of the 1970s such as Three Days of the Condor and The Parallax View. The director loosens and unpicks these genre strictures with eruptions of the surreal. In Filho’s slippery moral universe, revelation offers neither catharsis nor closure, only the squeamish knowledge that some nightmares end, and others are obscured by history. Deserved Oscar nominee in best picture. Full review TB
If I Had Legs I’d Kick You ★★★★★
Directed by Mary Bronstein. Starring Rose Byrne, Conan O’Brien, Danielle Macdonald, Delaney Quinn, Christian Slater, A$AP Rocky. 15A, gen release, 114 min
Incredibly stressful drama featuring Byrne as single mother to a chronically ill child. Things are already grim enough before a hole opens in her ceiling and the two are forced to move to a motel. Chris Messina’s camera rarely pulls back, pinning Byrne (Oscar-nominated against Jessie Buckley for best actress) in suffocating close-up, so that we experience events as she does: breathless, cornered. Authority figures begin to question her account of her daughter’s medical needs, nudging the film further into ambiguity. Along the way, we are asked to examine the elasticity of our own empathy. Full review TB
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The Testament of Ann Lee ★★★★★
Directed by Mona Fastvold. Starring Amanda Seyfried, Lewis Pullman, Christopher Abbott, Tim Blake Nelson, Thomasin McKenzie, Stacy Martin, Matthew Beard. 15A cert, limited release, 136 min
Astonishing musical featuring a never-better Seyfried as the titular founder of the Shaker sect in Manchester and then in pre-revolutionary America. Ann Lee is a political film. It is about one version of a good America. It hardly needs to be said it touches on religion. But, from the spooky opening shots, looking forward to melodic ceremonies within looming New World trees, the film also operates at a mythical level beyond everyday concerns. Like the ecstasies depicted, it pulls you out the everyday and propels you into spiritual nowhere. There has (as even its detractors will admit) been nothing else much like it. Full review DC
The Moment ★★★☆☆
Directed by Aidan Zamiri. Starring Charli xcx, Alexander Skarsgård, Rosanna Arquette, Kate Berlant, Jamie Demetriou, Hailey Gates, Arielle Dombasle, Kylie Jenner. 15A cert, gen release, 103 min
Tolerable mockumentary detailing a fictionalised version of what happened to Charli xcx after the Brat summer. Sadly, the film’s sardonic edge is dulled by a reliance on stereotypical depictions of philistine self-interest. Who would dream that music-industry hangers on would be up-speaking solipsists? Well, almost everybody. There are few jokes here that weren’t made as well in Absolutely Fabulous 30 years ago. Still, The Moment passes the time well enough. Charli is quietly effective as an experienced musician confronted with overwhelming degrees of unexpected attention. Skarsgård is odious as a manipulative film director. Full review DC
