Sunday 5 March 2006

January film roundup

Kinsey *** - Biopic about the famous sex researcher, who starts off trying to educate the students at the university where he teaches entymology about sex and relationships, but ends up compiling the world's largest dataset on sexual behaviour in human beings. The film explores the man's own relationships as well as the examining the establishment's attitudes to his research. Interesting but not especially profound.

Following ** - Before Christopher Nolan made the brilliant Memento, he shot this short black & white feature about a man who decides, for his own self-amusement, to trail complete strangers. Perhaps the most common mistake that first-time writers/directors make (I know I've done the same) is to take a structural idea - in this case, the time frame jumps between several different sequences of events - and over-use it. Such is the case here, although it does help to disguise the fact that the plot is quite weak.

Etre Et Avoir **** - Fantastic documentary about the teacher and pupils of a rural French primary school. The teacher's dedication to his flock is genuinely moving.

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