If there’s two things we do well in this country, it’s period dramas and swearing.
Our Jane Austen adaptations are the envy of the world, while our Oppenheimer-esque devotion to developing earth-scorching new variants of the f-bomb leaves other nations cowering in our wake.
Boasting the combined talents of Olivia Colman and Jessie Buckley and some of the saltiest insults since Peter Capaldi stalked the corridors of Westminster, 1920s-set comedy Wicked Little Letters promises picture postcard profanity of the highest order.
Prepare to be prouder than ever to be British…Elsewhere, Perfect Days gives us a schooling in Zen and the art of urinal maintenance, while Out of Darkness offers sinister Stone Age scares.
New releases
Wicked Little Letters
Jessie Buckley and Olivia Colman star in this scurrilous black comedy, based on the true story of a string of poison pen letters that sent shockwaves around an English seaside town in the 1920s.
In the picturesque environs of Littlehampton on the Sussex coast, the demure Edith Swan (Colman) is horrified to find herself the recipient of malicious missives containing language so vinegary they could be used as chip wrapping.
Her outspoken Irish neighbour Rose Gooding (Buckley) soon becomes the focal point of the community’s consternation as the likely culprit – can local PC Gladys Moss (Anjana Vasan, We Are Lady Parts) unmask the real wrong-doer and restore Rose’s good name?
| Cert 15, 100 mins | |
| Cineworld, City Screen, Everyman, Vue | |
| From Fri Feb 23 | |
| More details |
Perfect Days
If, like me, you have fond memories of the 2016 film Paterson (where Adam Driver played a bus driver who wrote poetry, drank beer and that was basically the whole plot) but thought it could have been improved with a greater emphasis on urinal cakes, then this acclaimed new drama will undoubtedly be your pick of the week.
The latest film from veteran director Wim Wenders (Wings of Desire), it follows Tokyo toilet cleaner Hirayama (Kōji Yakusho) as he goes about his daily rounds, indulging his passion for music, books and photography in his spare time.
It’s a set-up which makes sense when you discover that it started out as a commission Wenders received to make a film about a series of luxurious new public loos which had opened in the city – but the end result, a meditation on the comforts of routine and delight in simple pleasures, has had critics queuing up to spend a penny since its premiere at Cannes last year.
| Cert PG, 125 mins | |
| City Screen | |
| From Fri Feb 23 | |
| More details |
Out of Darkness
Six figures gather round a campfire, sheltering from the sinister sounds that echo in the surrounding darkness – it’s a familiar enough scene from many a horror film, but what makes Scottish director Andrew Cumming’s well-received debut feature stand out is that the action here takes place 45,000 years ago.
Set in the Stone Age, the story follows a tribe of early humans (led by The 100’s Chuku Modu) as they seek to make their home in a barren and inhospitable new land – but when one of their party is snatched by unseen yet terrifying nocturnal visitors, they find themselves in a fight for survival.
Teenage stray Beyah (Safia Oakley-Green, Sherwood) is blamed for the curse that has befallen the group – but she might be the only one who can keep them alive…
| Cert 15, 87 mins | |
| Vue | |
| From Fri Feb 23 | |
| More details |
Other screenings
Other new releases and previews
Mads Mikkelsen stars as an impoverished war hero leading a fightback against a vicious landowner in Nordic western The Promised Land, which has been picking up some impressive reviews (not least Time Out’s assertion that it’s ‘the most gripping film about potato farming since The Martian’) – mosey on down to City Screen from Fri 23rd.
The wait is nearly over for anime fans as Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba returns for its latest big screen outing this week: showing at Cineworld (daily), Vue (daily) and Everyman (Fri 23rd to Sun 25th and Weds 28th), To the Hashira Training combines a compilation of the third season of the hit TV show with the first chance to see material from the upcoming fourth series.
With Fri 23rd marking a sobering two years since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, City Screen are showing 20 Days in Mariupol to commemorate the occasion – Ukrainian filmmaker Mstyslav Chernov’s hard-hitting documentary looks unflinchingly at the death and destruction he and his fellow journalists witnessed during the siege of the city.
Showing at City Screen on Thurs 29th, docudrama Four Daughters explores why two young Tunisian woman left their family to join Islamic State, while on the same day, coming-of-age drama The Fish Tale tells the true story of a piscine-preoccupied Japanese TV personality; it’s the first of several selections from this year’s Japanese Foundation Touring Film Programme which you can catch over the next few weeks.
Over at Everyman on Tues 27th, Skepta Presents: Tribal Mark offers a chance to see the UK grime MC’s directorial debut about a Nigerian immigrant turned lethal hitman, followed by a recorded Q&A with the man himself.
Re-enter Sandman: you can be among the first to witness Timothée Chalamet’s return to Arrakis with a double bill of Dune Part One and Two showing at Everyman and Vue on Thurs 29th, ahead of the sci-fi sequel’s release next Friday.
And as ever, cinema continues to bring you the chance to sample the glittering delights of the London arts scene without the threat of getting stuck on a broken-down train carriage outside a Peterborough retail park: horticulture vultures will doubtless dig Painting the Modern Garden: Monet to Matisse (City Screen, Tues 27th), which brings the sell-out London arts exhibition to the big screen, while there are encore screenings of Andrew Scott’s one-man performance of Vanya at City Screen (Mon 26th, Thurs 29th), Everyman (Sun 25th, Weds 28th, Thurs 29th) and Vue (daily), plus a specially-filmed version of Hamlet at City Screen (Weds 28th) and Vue (Tues 27th), starring Ian McKellen as the Danish ditherer.
Family-friendly films
The DayGlo delights of Trolls Band Together are on offer at Cineworld (tickets £2.50) and Vue (£2.49) this weekend (Sat 24th/Sun 25th), while City Screen’s Kids’ Club hosts a screening of magical animated fantasy Song of the Sea on Sat 24th (£3.30).
Over at Everyman, Disney’s latest musical adventure Wish screens in the Toddler Club strand on Fri 23rd and Sat 24th (£6.25 child/£8.65 adult and toddler), while there’s also another chance to see last year’s web-slinging wonder Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse at Vue on Sat 24th (£6.99 – £9.99).
Cruise is a vamp from a book and Arnie’s tough as…er, nails: old favourites back on the big screen
Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt and a young Kirsten Dunst cavort through the centuries in Interview with the Vampire, director Neil Jordan’s stylish 1994 adaptation of Anne Rice’s bestselling novel, which returns to the cinema this week for its 30th anniversary – pull on your best frilly shirt and head down to Vue on Sat 24th, Mon 26th and Weds 28th.
There’s more bloodsucking action over at City Screen on Sun 25th as their Werner Herzog season continues with Nosferatu the Vampyre, the legendary German filmmaker’s 1979 remake of the iconic 1922 original – due to return to our screens again later this year in a new version from The Witch director Robert Eggers.
City Screen’s Powell and Pressburger season continues on Mon 26th with 1945’s Hebridean romance I Know Where I’m Going!, which sees a bride-to-be blown off course en route to her wedding in the remote Scottish locale; the same day also sees a Dementia-Friendly screening of P&P’s starry-eyed metaphysical love story A Matter of Life and Death.
Vue continue their Greta Gerwig mini-season with screenings of the director’s effervescent 2019 adaptation of Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women on Fri 23rd, Sat 24th and Thurs 29th, while Gerwig’s Barbie scene-stealer Ryan Gosling stars as Replicant Ken in Blade Runner 2049 at Cineworld on Mon 26th.
Matthew McConaughey blasts into space to seek out a new home for humankind in Interstellar at Vue (Sat 24th, Mon 26th, Weds 28th), while Arnold Schwarzenegger takes a rather less open-minded approach to encountering alien life in 80s action classic Predator, showing in Everyman’s Late Night strand on Fri 23rd.
Bravely Bold Sir Robin rides forth from Camelot once more in Monty Python and the Holy Grail at Cineworld (Sat 24th), City Screen (Sat 24th) and Everyman (Sun 25th, Tues 27th), while Vue are keeping the Valentine’s vibe going with a couple more screenings of 90s teen fave 10 Things I Hate About You on Fri 23rd and Sun 25th.
Speaking of which, here are the excellently named Letters to Cleo to sing us out over the film’s closing credits with I Want You to Want Me, performed live on a high school rooftop for reasons that make little to no narrative sense. They knew how to end films in the 90s…