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| Toxic. Saulė Bliuvaitė says they chose a young cast 'because this film tackles the topic of adolescent bodies and girls who are not yet experiencing the changes of their body, they're still children and sexuality is projected on them' Photo: Akis Bado |
The winner of the Golden Leopard at last year’s Locarno Film Festival is a raw coming-of-age tale that unfolds against the backdrop of a depressed Lithuanian industrial town. Marija (Vesta Matulyte) is new to the neighbourhood but after unexpectedly making friends with local hard as nails teen Kristina (Ieva Rupeikaite) the pair join every other youngster in the district in trying to pursue their dream of modelling. The toxic label of the title applies to everything from the modelling firm’s expectations to the thought processes of teenagers that view eating tapeworm and cotton wool as a means to an end. Writer/director Saulė Bliuvaitė drew on her own experience for this and it shows in her clear-sighted and studiously non-voyeuristic portrayal of the challenges the teens face but also in the surprising warmth she finds in unexpected places. Bliuvaitė told us “People who exoticise things, that happens when you actually don't personally know this kind of environment, so you watch it like an outsider and exotify it. But I come from humble beginnings and I really feel for people who struggle day by day to sustain an adequate lifestyle and to provide for themselves and their children.”
Invasion Of The Body Snatchers, streaming for free now on Pluto.tv
Jennie Kermode writes: One of few 20th Century stories to achieve truly mythic status, embedding itself in the popular consciousness, Jack Finney's 1955 novel The Body Snatchers has spawned a host of adaptations, including Philip Kaufman's popular 1978 take with Donald Sutherland, 2007 version The Invasion with Nicole Kidman, high school-set reworking The Faculty, teen drama Assimilate and The Changed with Clare Foley - but this film, made just one year after the release of the book, remains the definitive take. It's one of the masterpieces of US Cold War paranoia cinema, with an unabashed comparison to the perceived Communist threat in its story of mysterious pods from which clones of people emerge, gradually replacing the real thing. As Kevin McCarthy's small town doctor determines, the only sure way to avoid being copied is to resist going to sleep – but the longer he does so, the harder he finds it to think straight, and as it's impossible for him to know who he can trust, escape seems ever more unlikely. Gorgeously shot, it has a sequence near the end which is simply unforgettable.
Everything Everywhere All At Once, 9pm, Film4, Tuesday, July 29
This multiverse-hopping slice of fun sees Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert blend humour and action with a tale of familial love. The unlikely set-up centres on a launderette owner (Michelle Yeoh) who, while grappling with filing her taxes, is unexpectedly enlisted into a world-saving mission by a man who looks like, but is not, her husband (Ke Huy Quan). It’s a challenge that needs to be done in a lot more than triplicate. While craftily using the idea of parallel universes to further the plot, the Daniels also have a hell of a lot of fun - which is nothing if not infectious. It might be slightly flattered by its seven-Oscar haul but this is a solid slice of inventive popcorn entertainment with lovely central performances from Yeoh and Quan.
Master Gardener, 9pm, Great Movies, Thursday, July 31
Jennie Kermode writes: In order to perfect the art of gardening, an individual must be prepared to look beyond their own lifetime, to invest in something bigger than themselves. That awareness underlies every aspect of Paul Schrader’s story about a former far right agitator (Joel Edgerton) who has submitted himself to cultivation (in more than one way) by Sigourney Weaver’s sharp-eyed, old-moneyed landowner, as he tends her family garden. Their thriving arrangement runs into predictable trouble when she asks him to take on her mixed-race niece as an apprentice, and the slow development of US society also comes under the microscope. A character study, revenge story and examination of troubled masculinity this doesn’t always hang together, but incorporates some impressive work and will intrigue Weaver fans.
Sweat, 1.40am, Film 4, Friday, August 1
The interior world of a social media influencer bends and flexes beneath the surface of Magnus von Horn's determinedly ambiguous satire. You might ask who exactly is influencing whom after spending three days in the fastidiously documented world of Sylwia (Magalena Kolesnik). She documents every inch of her day for her 600,000 followers but she finds herself emotionally rocked after a video goes viral. This is a film that questions where performances like this begin and end and to what extent laying your life out for the world paradoxically means battening your emotions in. Magalena Kolesnik is pitch perfect in the central role keeping her character's warring feelings within touching distance.
Stand by Me , 12.05am, Channel 4, Saturday, August 2
Adrian Lynne was originally intended as the director of this film and given his more hard-edged approach to stories we should probably be grateful that it was Rob Reiner who ended up bringing it to the screen. He crafts a moving drama of friendship in small-town America that has lost none of its charm in the 30 or so years since Raynold Gideon did what many have failed to do and successfully adapted a Stephen King novella. This coming-of-age drama is one of that small subset of films that is about children but not for them as it explores the emotions that come to light when a group of kids set out to look for a missing boy's body. The performances – from Corey Feldman, Kiefer Sutherland and River Phoenix among others – never miss an emotional beat. Fact fans might like to know that the famous vomit scene was created using a mix of a large curd cottage cheese and blueberry pie filling.
The Fire Within – aka The Fire Of Love – streaming now on BBC iPlayer
I have a feeling I missed highlighting this when it screened at some point on BBC4 because they sneakily changed its name. Still, this is a fairly dull week for films on telly, so what better time to recommend you catch up with this if you’ve not seen it. Sara Dosa hits the archive footage jackpot with the films she discovered that were shot by husband and wife team Maurice and Katia Kraft. The scientists shared a love of volcanoes – and an apparent fearlessness when it came to getting up close and personal with them – which put them in the vanguard of vulcanology in the 1970s. Dosa could have shot a straightforward documentary, instead, she adopts a quirkier approach, with Miranda July's narration often taking a tangent to consider the nature of the pair's relationship. "We erupt often," the pixieish Maurice tells one interviewer when asked about his marriage. By revealing the Krafts lost their lives to an eruption right near the start, there's also a doomed love element to this, although Dosa and her co-writers also smuggle in a surprising amount of educational information about the way volcanoes work along the way. While the film is never less than spectacular visually, it is also a moving tribute to the pair's own documentary skills and their dedication to helping people in areas threatened by volcanoes to live a safer life.
You’ll have to pop over to Youtube to watch this week’s short. The Vibrant Village is a wonderfully quirky bitesize doc that takes you to the small Hungarian town of Börcs, which has a surprising manufacturing hub at its heart.
