“Oh Cybertron!” (“Oh Cybertron”) “Is wonderful!” (“Is wonderful”) “Oh CyberTRON is won-DER-ful!”
Like tanked up football hooligans let loose on the streets of the World Cup host nation, the Transformers are back to trash our planet once again as their latest intergalactic fixture plays out in Rise of the Beasts.
If you’re looking for somewhere quiet to hide, then never fear – you can seek sanctuary in the altogether more genteel environs of period drama Chevalier, or head to the wide open plains of America with War Pony. Maybe just check your home insurance covers acts of Autobot before you go…
New releases
Transformers: Rise of the Beasts
They’re back, and this time they’re…gorillas? Serving as both sequel to the 80s-set Bumblebee and prequel to the original run of films, the latest entry in the long-running sci-fi franchise sees regular heroes the Autobots join forces with a new breed of animal-shaped robots, the Maximals.
Moving the action to Brooklyn in 1994, the story sees electronics whizz Noah (Anthony Ramos, In the Heights) and museum intern Elena (Dominique Fishback, Judas and the Black Messiah) get swept up in the Autobots’ quest to find the Transwarp Key, a mystical MacGuffin that will allow them to return to their home planet.
Unfortunately, it’s also being sought after by the dastardly Unicron – not, as you might suspect from the name, a Saltburn-based supplier of urinal cakes for the hospitality sector, but actually a super-sized planet-gobbling wrong’un who needs it to open a portal to Earth.
Help is at hand from the Maximals, a gang of robots disguised as, among other things, a giant gorilla (naturally voiced by Ron Perlman) and a fire-breathing peregrine falcon (equally naturally voiced by Michelle Yeoh).
Cert 12A, 128 mins | |
Cineworld, Everyman, Vue | |
From Fri Jun 9 | |
More details |
Chevalier
Opening with a feverish violin-off between its eponymous hero and Mozart himself, this acclaimed period drama looks to shine a light on an overlooked figure in classical music history – that of virtuoso violinist Joseph Bologne, the Chevalier de Saint-Georges.
Born in Guadeloupe to a French plantation owner and his Senegalese slave mistress, Bologne rose through the ranks of 18th-century France to become a celebrated composer and musician, even going on to teach Marie Antoinette – as well as having a reputation as a fearsome fencer to boot.
Kelvin Harrison Jr. (who played another musical legend, B.B. King, in last year’s Elvis) stars as Bologne, while Lucy Boynton (Bohemian Rhapsody) plays Marie Antoniette and Samara Weaving (Ready or Not) plays the married society lady to whom Bologne becomes dangerously close.
Cert 12A, 107 mins | |
City Screen, Everyman, Vue | |
From Fri Jun 9 | |
More details |
War Pony
Winner of the Camera d’Or for best first feature at last year’s Cannes Festival, this thoughtful slice-of-life drama following two young residents of the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota has drawn comparisons to the work of Nomadland director Chloé Zhao.
Like Zhao’s films, it’s a naturalistic drama developed in collaboration with the community it portrays, centring on Bill (Jojo Bapteise Whiting), a laid-back twentysomething drifting from one hustle to the next, and 12-year-old Matho (LaDainian Crazy Thunder), whose difficult relationship with his dad spurs him to make a series of destructive decisions.
The film marks the directorial debut of actor Riley Keough (star of streaming hit Daisy Jones & the Six) – co-directing here with her friend Gina Gammell – and began its journey to the screen after Keough met co-screenwriters Franklin Sioux Bob and Bill Reddy while starring in Andrea Arnold’s 2016 road movie American Honey, going on to develop the story with them based on some of the pair’s real life experiences.
Cert 15, 115 mins | |
City Screen | |
From Fri Jun 9 | |
More details |
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Other screenings
Q&A screening: There’s Another Country
In both its use of vintage filmmaking equipment and its politically-charged themes, there looks to be an echo of the work of Bait and Enys Men director Mark Jenkin in the trailer for this new work from Sussex filmmaker Martin Nichols, which finds him looking at post-Brexit Britain through the eyes of his father, Evan.
Shot entirely on Super 8 – the risks and rewards of which, Nichols explains, were part of the appeal – the film considers what Evan, a World War II veteran who enthusiastically voted for the Attlee government of 1945, would make of his country today.
Martin Nichols will host a Q&A session after the screening, which is taking place as part of the Hidden Treasures event for this year’s York Festival of Ideas.
Cert 15, 101 mins | |
City Screen | |
Sun Jun 11, 11am |
Other new releases and previews
It’s surprising it’s taken this long for it to happen, but Take That are set to have their Mamma Mia! moment next week as their hit jukebox stage musical gets a big screen reworking – and the boys themselves will be performing at the premiere of Greatest Days, which will be broadcast live at Cineworld, City Screen and Vue on Thurs 15th.
Transferring back from the screen to the stage on the same night is modern comedy classic Fleabag, with Phoebe Waller-Bridge’s smash hit 2019 revival of her original one-woman stage play returning to all four York cinemas as part of the regular NT Live screenings of specially-filmed productions of West End shows.
City Screen’s environmentally-themed Green Screen strand is marking this year’s Great Big Green Week with a screening of The Nettle Dress on Tues 13th – with the impact of ‘fast fashion’ ever more of an issue, this documentary combines environmental concerns with a moving personal story in its depiction of textile artist Allan Brown’s mission to make a naturally-sourced dress to honour the memory of his late wife.
Also on Tues 13th, Isabelle Huppert stars in a preview screening of upcoming French true-life thriller La Syndicaliste (City Screen), playing a nuclear industry whistleblower who is violently assaulted in her own house.
Dispatching Nazis with the casual aplomb of Indiana Jones – but with considerably more guts and gore – is the hero of the rather fun-looking new action romp Sisu, which sees a tough-as-nails Finnish gold prospector dish out all manner of pain to the goose-stepping goons who come between him and his stash; catch it daily at Vue and at City Screen on Fri 9th, Sat 10th and Mon 12th.
A more elegant evening’s entertainment, meanwhile, is assured over at Everyman on Mon 12th, where there’s a screening of new documentary Mad About the Boy: The Noel Coward Story.
Family-friendly screenings
The ever-popular How to Train Your Dragon is Cineworld’s headline budget offering this week, with recent ancient Egyptian caper Mummies bringing up the rear – both films show on Sat 10th and Sun 11th, tickets £2.50.
Over at Vue, a brave mouse and his four-legged friends scamper through Greek mythology in Epic Tails (Sat 10th, Sun 11th, £2.49), while hands-down winner this week is City Screen, where the Kids Club welcomes back Mike and Sully for a screening of Pixar classic Monsters, Inc. (Sat 10th £3.30).
Cult classics and Bill Murray all at sea: old favourites back on the big screen
They’re gonna learn how to fly – high! Leotards at the ready as the kids from Fame head back to school at City Screen on Sun 11th, as their new season celebrating dance at the movies continues.
There’s more singing and dancing at Everyman as The Rocky Horror Picture Show screens in their Throwback strand on Sun 11th and Tues 13th – while there’s another cult classic on offer over at Vue in the form of the original 1988 version of Hairspray (Sat 10th, Mon 12th), John Waters’ much-loved musical about a Baltimore teenager’s dreams of stardom, which marked the debut of future queen of chat Ricki Lake in the lead role.
With its interludes of Portuguese David Bowie covers, Wes Anderson’s The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou – starring Bill Murray as the eponymous marine explorer – is the closest the director has yet come to making his own musical; you can catch it at City Screen on Sun 11th in a double bill with The Grand Budapest Hotel, the closest he’s come to making a farce.
Cineworld are marking Pride Month with a series of LGBTQ+ classics, starting this week with 2017’s highly acclaimed West Yorkshire-set romance God’s Own Country, starring The Crown’s Josh O’Connor (in his breakthrough role) and Alec Secăreanu (who returned to the film’s locales more recently as Happy Valley’s villainous Darius Knezevic).
Christopher Reeve soars back into City Screen on Mon 12th for a 45th anniversary of his first outing as Superman in the 1978 Richard Donner classic.
And finally, switch out a cape and tights for a White Russian and a dressing gown and you’ve got a cinematic superhero of a very different stripe in the ever-chilled form of Jeff Bridges’ The Dude, who can be found celebrating The Big Lebowski‘s 25th anniversary at Cineworld on Weds 14th. You’ll believe a man can, like, you know, whatever, I guess…