‘Holy Spider’

A compelling investigation into the murders of sex workers in the holy city of Mashhad in northern Iran as a female journalist struggles with what is seen by many as a religious quest.

Arriving in Mashhad from Tehran, journalist Arezoo Rahimi (Zar Amir Ebrahimi) is immediately confronted by the strict religious rules in the city. Other than from local colleague Sharifi (Arash Astiani), there’s little support or interest in her story as the number of women murdered increases. To many, the killer Saeed Azimi (Mehdi Bajestani) and labelled locally as the Holy Spider, is cleansing the city of sin. In her search for justice, Rahimi puts her life in serious jeopardy.

Based loosely on true events (the journalist is a fictional character), an essentially nocturnal Holy Spider is a dark, disturbing feature from Danish writer/director Ali Abbasi (and filmed in Jordan). In highlighting a society and regime so submerged in misogyny and religious fundamentalism, the basic tenets of humanitarianism are ignored by the police and the religious clerics. But equally disturbing is the support and endorsement of Azimi’s actions by his wife and young son along with the wider population.

Actress Zar Amir Ebrahimi was awarded best actress at the 2022 edition of the Cannes Film Festival.

Rating: 72%

Director: Ali Abbasi (Border, Shelley)

Writer: Ali Abbasi (Border, Shelley), Afshin Kamran Bahrami

Main cast: Zar Amir Ebrahimi (Shayda, Tatami), Mehdi Bajestani (Tatami, Sweet Taste of Imagination), Arash Astiani

‘A War’

Sensitive and thoughtful, a claustrophobic A War explores the accountability of decision making along with the impact of conflict in armed struggle.

The tensions of patrol in isolated provincial Afghanistan weigh heavy on the small Danish platoon. A close-knit team, the commander, Claus Michael Pedersen (a superb Pilou Asbæk – A Hijacking, TV’s Game of Thrones) goes out with his men more than is to be expected. At home, his wife Maria (Tuva Novotny – Borg vs McEnroe, Blindsone) is struggling with being left to manage three young children.

On one patrol, the men are caught in crossfire in a village compound. In the panic of the moment, Pedersen gives orders that result in the death of civilians. His men are saved but the commander is returned to Denmark to face criminal charges.

Written and directed by Tobias Lindholm (The Good Nurse, A Hijacking), A War quietly and unglamorously scrutinises the justifications of actions and decision making. The military prosecutor (Charlotte Munck – Headhunter, While We Live) firmly lays blame of the final outcome with Pedersen yet other military restrictions not facing trial have been shown to have equally devastating results.

Nominated for the 2016 best foreign language film Oscar.

Rating: 78%

‘The Look of Silence’

An extraordinarily confronting documentary, director Joshua Oppenheimer (The Act of Killing) continues his exploration of the 1965 Indonesian massacres and those responsible.

In a bold mise-en-scène, through optometrist Avi who lost a brother, murdered in the culling of ‘communists’, Oppenheimer interviews numerous men who ordered or carried out the mass killings. As Avi attempts to find out how a brother he never knew died, so current politicians and men of responsibility justify their actions. More than a million people were murdered: along with jokes, not one ounce of remorse or regret is present in the interviews.

As the horrors of reality and the acts of men are unveiled, a quietly restrained Avi gently probes and questions, looking for a flicker, a momentary realisation to no avail. Pauses, silences, reflection maybe but no regret – even to the brother of a murdered victim.

Nominated for the 2016 best documentary Oscar.

Rating: 63%

‘Flee’

Regarded as one of the best films of 2021, Flee is a harrowing tale humanely told through its richly animated visualisation as Afghani refugee Amin unburdens his past.

Having been granted Danish asylum as a teenage boy on the basis of having lost all his family fleeing Kabul, Amin has never revealed the full truth. Having fled the Afghan capital, he and his family initially settled in Moscow. Overstaying their visa, they lived in fear and isolation. With the help of a considerably older brother already living in Stockholm, many attempts to leave failed. Eventually, an alone Amin was able to find a way out. It’s this Amin needs, on the eve of his marriage to Kaspar, to reveal.

Making history in becoming the first film to be nominated for best documentary, best foreign language film and best animation,Jonas Poher Rasmussen’s Flee is powerful yet poetic, visceral yet matter-of-fact.

Nominated for 3 Oscars in 2022.

Rating: 79%

‘Winter Brothers’

Isolation and boredom leads to confrontation in a desolate, almost exclusively male, Danish limestone mining community.

Lonely and eccentric, Emil (Elliott Crosset Hove – Weak Days, TV’s The Bridge) lives with his brother, Johan (Simon Sears – Northern Lights, Baby Fever) and makes moonshine on the side. When a co-worker falls sick, Emil’s illicit alcohol is blamed with violence and ostracisation the result.

Director Hlynur Pálmason (Godland, A White White Day) lingers on the grunge of a mining lifestyle (supported by the industrial percussive soundtrack from Toke Brorson Odin) in creating a convincing backdrop to a less convicing narrative. In the study of masculinity at its rawest, Winter Brothers misses the visceral heart as it looks to the oddness of Emil and his coping of being alone among many.

Rating: 44%

‘Babette’s Feast’

A dour Danish religious community becomes the home of a French refugee in the late 1800s. Babette Hersant, wanting little, volunteers to become the servant to the ageing daughters of the village’s late pastor.

Fleeing Paris and the ravages of the Franco-Prussian War, Babette (Stéphane Audran – The Discrete Charm of the Bourgeoisie, Les biches) takes refuge in coastal Denmark and the home of Filippa and Martine. Both sisters had the opportunity of escaping the drudgery of denial and poverty, but each remained to support their father. Years after his death, Babette arrives – and remains. On the 100th anniversary of the pastor’s birth, Babette offers a meal, the likes of which have never been seen in the remote village.

A bleak meander of a narrative centred around worship and faith slowly builds to a delightful gastronomic blow-out from director Gabriel Axel (Den røde kappe, Christian), adapted from a short story by Karen Blixen. It takes it’s time, but once the few guests begin to arrive at the tiny cottage, Babette’s Feast and its celebration of creativity is a joy.

Winner of the 1988 Oscar for best foreign language film.

Rating: 71%

‘The Hunt’

Intense in its exploration of accusations of child sexual abuse, The Hunt sees the camaraderie and lives of a group of friends shattered by an innocent lie.

Coming to terms with divorce, loss of custody of his teenage son and with the local school having recently closed, former teacher Lucas (an extraordinary Mads Mikkelsen – Another Round, A Royal Affair) finds himself working at the kindergarten. A young, impressionable Klara accuses Lucas of abuse. A close-knit friendship group (Klara is the daughter of best friend Thomas Bo Larsen – Another Round, Festen) implodes and the town is swift in its condemnation.

A deep psychological thriller, Lucas fights to clear his name. It’s an almost impossible task – Klara herself tries to admit her lie but her parents refuse to accept a change in the story. With the innocence of Lucas known to the audience, Thomas Vinterberg’s The Hunt is a devastatingly hard watch. But the townsfolk with their vigilante-like attitude are not party to that knowledge….

Nominated for the best foreign language Oscar in 2014.

Rating: 91%

‘Another Round’ (Druk)

An experiment with blood alcohol levels in their everyday has massive repercussions for four middle-aged male friends.

In a rut at home and at school as a history teacher, Martin (Mads Mikkelsen) bands together with three long-term friends to see how daily consumption of a controlled amount of alcohol affects their social and professional lives. Recognising an immediate effect, the controlled amount is increased – and increased again, and again with devastating results.

Isolation and loneliness, repitition and limits of achievement, the four men are each at a stage of desperation and midlife crisis, married with children, divorced with no children, single. To cope, alcohol is seen as the answer.

In focussing on four separate friends, writer/director Thomas Vinterberg makes no moral judgement: each man responds differently, with different results. Anchored by a superb Mikkelsen, Another Round is a wry, deeply sad social commentary as much about friendship as it is about alcoholism.

Won the 2021 best foreign language film Oscar with Thomas Vinterberg nominated for best director.

Rating: 79%

Director: Thomas Vinterberg (Kursk, The Hunt)

Writer: Thomas Vinterberg (The Commune, The Hunt), Tobias Lindholm (A War, The Hunt)

Main cast: Mads Mikkelsen (The Hunt, Doctor Strange), Thomas Bo Larsen (The Celebration, The Hunt), Magnus Millang (The Commune, Heavy Load), Lars Ranthe (The Hunt, Adam’s Apples)

‘Queen of Hearts'(Dronningen)

With formidable and ever-growing tension, writer/director May el-Toukhy reveals the hypocrisy and manipulation within the homelife of a comfortable Danish family.

An idyllic home surrounded by woodland, happily married with twin daughters to Peter (Magnus Krepper) and success as a lawyer specialising in domestic abuse. Anne (an extraordinarily nuanced and award-winning performance from Trine Dyrholm) seems to have the perfect life. But the arrival of troubled 16 year-old stepson Gustav (Gustav Lindh) and the bond the two unexpectedly form threatens the stability of family.

Shot almost exclusively in the stark, contemporary home, Queen of Hearts is a slow, controlled unfolding, moment by moment of entitlement and abuse of power and position as Anne and Gustav find themselves on a path of no return and a way forward that will have devastating consequences.

Rating: 71%

Director: May el-Toukhy (Long Story Short, TV’s The Legacy)

Writer: May el-Toukhy (Long Story Short, TV’s The Legacy)

Main cast: Trine Dyrholm (The Commune, In a Better World), Magnus Krepper (A Cure For Wellness, The Girl Who Played With Fire), Gustav Lindh (Riders of Justice, Orca)

‘Europa’

An oddball confusion of a feature as director Lars von Trier, in (predominantly) stark black and white, presents a murky post-Second World War Germany of politics, corruption and greed.

Visually stylised (a singular character of soft colour picked out in a crowded station platform; collaged images; model buildings and trains), Europa sees Leopold Kessler (Jean-Marc Barr) travel from the States and, helped by his overly-efficious uncle, take a job on the German railways. Privately-owned by the Hartmann family, Zentropa Rail traverses the country where Kessler finds himself used and at the centre of too much political attention for his liking.

A noir tale, Europa is more pseud than profound, obscure rather than engaging, a Kafka-esque take that looks stunning but where even the seduction of Kessler by the Hartmann daughter (Barbara Sukowa) is pure artifice.

Rating: 41%

Director: Lars von Trier (Dancer in the Dark, Melancholia)

Writer: Lars von Trier (Dancer in the Dark, Melancholia), Niels Vørsel (The Element of Crime, Epidemic)

Main cast: Jean-Marc Barr (The Big Blue, Lovers), Barbara Sukowa (Hannah Arendt, Lola), Udo Kier (Soul Kitchen, Downsizing)