Tag: Dustin Hoffman

Chef ***

This is the kind of film that should come with a warning: not just “eat beforehand” but “writer-director vanity project alert”. If you’ve never fancied Jon Favreau films, this one isn’t setting out to change your mind either. Chef is easily consumable though, and Favreau does have another competitor to contend with in each scene …

Straw Dogs ***

The British 1971 original by Sam Peckinpah both appalled and enthralled an unsuspecting audience, like an unwanted mirror held up to reflect some of the most primitive and raw human nature ever captured on screen when the chips are down. There was a distinct difference between the act of rape as one of empowerment, as …

Barney’s Version – 4*

Thankfully, Paul Giamatti won Best Actor Golden Globe for Barney’s Version, considering the shameful overlook at the Oscar nominations. ‘Best Achievement in Makeup’ nod for Adrien Morot perhaps, but Giamatti is pure dramedy gold as impulsive, self-depreciating and sarcastic love saboteur, Barney Panofsky. This film touches all the right notes and offers some highly animated …

Meet The Parents: Little Fockers – 3*

In-laws or ‘out-laws’, whatever you want to call them, are what make the silly season so interesting – and quite often volatile. So, releasing yet another in the Meet The Parents series seems like ideal pre-Christmas viewing, before spending enforced time with your own. We can all relate to the tight-lipped niceties and time-bomb tension, …