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CINEMA
REVIEWS
35
ALSO SCREENING
IN NOVEMBER
The title will bring a smile to the face of longtime
Bond fans – it's the nefarious organisation run by
Ernst Stavro Blofeld that featured in the 007 films
of the 1960s. So, will Daniel Craig's encounter in
the 24th Bond film be worth the wait? With
Skyfall
director Sam Mendes back calling the shots, Monica
Bellucci as a Bond girl, Christoph Waltz as the villain,
and Grammy-winner Sam Smith crooning the theme
song, the writing's on the wall.
Nov 12
.
SPECTRE
Vin Diesel is the immortal of the title, tasked
with destroying a coven in modern day New
York. And Michael Caine is in it! So is Ygritte
from
Game of Thrones
. The hunt begins
Oct 29
.
THE LAST WITCH HUNTER
This time it's war! In the final chapter of the
YA series, Katniss Everdeen brings the fight to
President Snow's doorstep in the Capitol – and
it's going to be epic. Let's hope the odds be
ever in her favour on
Nov 19
.
THE HUNGER GAMES:
MOCKINGJAY – PART 2
Rocky: The Next Generation. In this franchise
spin-off, Sly's iconic boxer trains the son of former
rival Apollo Creed, Adonis Johnson (Michael B.
Jordan). Lace up the gloves on
Nov 26
CREED
W
hen his long gestating H.P. Lovecraft
passion project,
At the Mountains of
Madness
, was shelved once again,
visionary director Guillermo del Toro threw himself
into this lavish period ghost story, and the result
is a ravishing fusion of pure gothic melodrama,
romance and haunted house horrors. Think
Jane
Eyre
goes to Hell.
“Ghosts are real. This much I know.” says Edith
Cushing (Mia Wasikowska), who as a little girl
received a cryptic warning from her dead mother's
spirit to "beware of Crimson Peak". 14 years later
the meaning becomes apparent when she's swept
off her feet by charming Brit Thomas Sharpe (Tom
Hiddleston), becomes his bride, and is taken to
live in his crumbling family estate – a cavernous
mansion located atop a mine filled with scarlet clay
that regularly oozes through the floor and walls.
The decaying Allerdale Hall (which makes Hill
House look cosy) is filled with snow flurries,
enormous moths and ghosts of the past; it's also
home to Sharpe's frosty sister Lucille (a terrific
Jessica Chastain) and sinister family secrets which
Edith must uncover if she's going to make it out
alive.
Don't enter
Crimson Peak
expecting a
conventional haunted house movie like the
overrated
The Conjuring
: the ghosts are largely
incidental to a plot – which pays homage to M.R.
James, Daphne du Maurier's
Rebecca
, Hammer
Horror and the
giallo
thrillers of Mario Bava –
grounded in an era when candelabra-wielding
damsels in distress fled down dark corridors in
their nightgowns.
Art directed to the max, this is a truly gorgeous
looking movie, drenched in primary colours (notably
red) and the meticulous attention to detail that is
del Toro's forte. There's no doubt whatsoever this
is a GDT film, with his signature
flourishes all present and correct:
elaborate production design,
wispy apparitions, black umbrellas,
steampunk machinery, and bursts of
graphic bloodshed.
Today's audiences, force-fed a diet
of disposable, formula spookshows
from Blumhouse productions, will
probably find this far too quaint for
their taste, but fans of measured, old
school ghost stories will love every
sumptuous frame.
Scott Hocking
FURTHER VIEWING:
The Haunting
(1963),
The Devil's Backbone
At the mansion of madness.
crimson peak
RELEASED:
Now Showing
DIRECTOR:
Guillermo del Toro
CAST:
Mia Wasikowska, Jessica
Chastain, Tom Hiddleston
RATING:
R16