Cinerama Capsule – quick read film reviews

Starring Hubert Milkowski, Karl Bekele Steinland, and Edyta Torhan, Norwegian Dream sees us travel to Norway, where we meet Robert, a young Polish immigrant who has just arrived to work for a fish factory in hopes of paying off his mother’s rising debts. Suppressing his true self to fit in with the other Poles at the factory, Robert develops feelings for Ivar, the out-and-proud son of the factory owner who also moonlights as a drag performer. As the two get to know each other, a worker’s strike breaks out, and Robert is forced to decide on his future: Will he choose financial stability or his community?

Bold, striking in its honesty and detailed in its exploration of class and culture, Hubert Milkowski’s central performance is one of power and control as this award-winning feature weaves its complex, delicate and enthralling tale.

Writer and director Sacha Polak is renowned for weaving lived experiences, natural performances, and artistic bravery into bold, raw, and brilliant stories of survival, rebirth, and challenge. In her 2020 film Dirty God, Polak explored the story of a young British woman recovering from an acid attack following domestic violence, as she introduced us to healthcare worker and part-time actor Vicky Knight from Essex, who suffered 30% burns at the age of seven in a pub fire. 

Silver Haze sees Knight and Polak reunite with a film built upon the foundations of Knight’s lived experience. But far from being a docudrama, Silver Haze, based initially on a mere twenty-page outline, allows the actors to build upon Knight’s experiences, weaving a powerful story of intergenerational trauma, female love, working-class struggle, and rebirth.

There are moments when Silver Haze often feels bloated as it attempts to explore multiple character journeys in a story that should have centred firmly on Franky and Florence and the shared traumas that serve as a platform for their uneasy love. Despite this weakness, it is raw, unrestrained, and unflinching female-led storytelling that shines with honesty and realism.

Martin Decker cares deeply about his online audience, but he loves his wife and kids more, longing for their return, with his recent family separation a raw, open wound. On first impressions, it would appear Cardiff’s latest YouTube phenomenon is happy as he shoots episodes of The Martin Decker Show in his bathroom, episodes ranging from cooking lessons to skits with his bearded dragon and discussions on long-lost Star Wars toys found in the attic of his mum’s home. But Martin isn’t happy; it’s all a facade.

The Martin Decker Show is a delightful, funny and emotional mockumentary about male mental health, online culture, escapism and uncertainty. It’s one man’s midlife crisis played out online for all to see through the beautiful performance of Keiron Self, the masterful direction of Bafta Cymru-winning film editor Kevin Jones, and the brilliant writing of this powerhouse Welsh partnership.

Out, proud and loud, Wesley Taylor and Alex Wyse’s gloriously camp horror Summoning Sylvia isn’t going to win any awards. But it will win over the hearts of those who love their comedy/horror coated in glitter.

Mixing the classic haunted house tale with meet-the-in-laws comedy and a tongue-in-cheek homage to The Conjuring franchise, Summoning Sylvia is best consumed with friends, nibbles and a few alcoholic beverages. By bringing together a truly delightful ensemble —including Travis Coles, Michael Urie, Frankie Grande, Noah J. Ricketts, Troy Iwata, and Nicholas Logan —for a bewildering bachelor party, Summoning Sylvia offers us a spooky, devilishly fun weekend getaway.

However, it’s not all camp conversations, horny pizza delivery guys, eyeliner and screams. In the background, the ghost story unfolds, revealing moments of emotion before culminating in its beautiful twist. There is much to love in Taylor and Wyse’s camp creation, and you won’t find a more entertaining queer Saturday night comedy/horror.  

Some documentaries are so personal, poetic and honest that they leave an indelible mark on all who watch them. Francesco Patierno’s documentary, based on the words of Fuani Marino, is one of those films. With a runtime of just over an hour, we are taken from Marino’s childhood to her twenties, motherhood and beyond as she explores her battle with mental health and the delicate nature of life and love.

Through her writing and diary entries, Marino challenges us to explore the uncomfortable realities of living with a mental health condition, including the actions and feelings people consider and enact as they navigate the world around them. Her words are accompanied by photos, home videos, and a stunning collection of images and film collated from the Instituto Luce film archive, all brought to life through Patierno’s exquisite and compelling style.

The intimacy on display in Wake Me Up Before Midnight is genuinely breathtaking as Marino shares her thoughts, battles and struggles through a film that shines a light on many of the uncomfortable realities of failing mental health while never losing sight of the importance of love and treatment in lighting the darkest corners of our complex minds.

In 1961, Ermanno Olmi’s Il Posto introduced us to a young Italian, Domenico, searching for a job for life. Watching Mattia Colombo and Gianluca Matarrese’s documentary ‘A Steady Job’, you could argue that little seems to have changed since 1961, particularly in Southern Italy. But the focus of Colombo and Matarrese’s lens is not the clerical world of Olmi’s film; it’s the public sector. Here, we meet the thousands of hopeful nurses bused in from across Southern Italy to take the examinations that all aspiring nurses and public-sector workers must pass to secure the steady job they dream of. However, this is no easy process for our hopeful job seekers, who compete for a limited number of positions among thousands of applicants.

Raffaele is our guide and the owner of a bus company that transports candidates between mass examinations, helping them avoid the need for expensive overnight accommodation. However, Raffaele, himself a trained nurse, is about to face his biggest challenge as the Pandemic hits and healthcare recruitment faces an unprecedented crisis. Il Posto is, at its heart, a profoundly personal road trip that explores and debates themes of opportunity, employment, inequality, and social policy in modern-day Italy.

Songs can unite us, divide us, offer us hope, allow us to dream and spark our most profound memories, happy or sad. Since the creation of the first musical instrument, possibly as long as 60,000 years ago, music has defined our hopes, dreams, aspirations, and sense of belonging and community. While some songs come and go with time, others last forever, reinventing themselves for every new generation; Bella Ciao is one of those songs.

Giulia Giapponesi’s fascinating documentary aims to uncover the hidden history behind a song that has become a powerful call for freedom and democracy, an anthem of protest and a reflection of Italian history and resistance. Bella Ciao takes us from the courage of young partisans during the Second World War to the music scene of the 1960s and the fight for freedom in Syria and Iraq as one song creates many stories. “Bella Ciao” is a call to action, a love letter to courage, a celebration of love, and a shining example of the intersection between music, song, and the fight for freedom. 

Ti West’s clever homage to the 60s and 70s origins of the slasher, X, paid tribute to The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Psycho, among others, as it explored the foundations and intersections of porn, horror and art. His prequel to X took a remarkably long time to reach British cinemas, mainly due to the pandemic, and sadly, this undoubtedly impacted its eventual release. But for those of us who patiently waited, Pearl is a blood-soaked, technicolour melodrama that has quickly earned a place in the Horror Hall of Fame.

Part homage to The Wizard of Oz and part love letter to melodramatic horror movies like Joan Crawford’s underrated Strait-Jacket, West’s clever dissection of Corn Belt American horror starring the indomitable Mia Goth and David Corenswet is just as intelligent in its narrative structure and artistic vision as his first outing, as he unpicks the relationship between melodrama, fantasy, rural America and horror.