We didn't have to look into your souls, we had to see if you had souls at all.

Never Let Me Go

(2010)

Low key and extremely sensitively directed by Mark Romanek and with performances of the quality you'd expect from Carey Mulligan and Andrew Garfield. Keira Knightley – surprisingly - delivers an extremely astute performance, not so good that she can forget all the wood she's responsible for, but she holds her own against two young heavyweights.

What ultimately prevents the film from passing into greatness for me is the lack of any insight into the apparatus that has enabled their interior tale to occur. I'm sure some will argue that's the point, but we are cast a few scraps of glib social commentary by Charlotte Rampling that were probably not really worth the lack of effort.

Ultimately it fails to translate as a completely believable world because the glimpses out from their microcosm are unable justify the leap made by society at large (everyone accepts the state of affairs? the clones go freely in this world but the questioning of their cull-ability never develops?) It dangles too large a philosophical carrot, which it then refuses to bite into, to wholly satisfy.

****

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Do you know that the leading cause of death for beavers is falling trees?

The Interpreter (2005) Sydney Pollack’s final film returns to the conspiracy genre that served him well in both the 1970s ( Three Days of the Condor ) and the 1990s ( The Firm ). It also marks a return to Africa, but in a decidedly less romantic fashion than his 1985 Oscar winner. Unfortunately the result is a tepid, clichéd affair in which only the technical flourishes of its director have any merit. The film’s main claim to fame is that Universal received permission to film inside the United Nations headquarters. Accordingly, Pollack is predictably unquestioning in its admiration and respect for the organisation. It is no doubt also the reason that liberal crusader Sean Penn attached himself to what is otherwise a highly generic and non-Penn type of role. When it comes down to it, the argument rehearsed here of diplomacy over violent resolution is as banal as they come. That the UN is infallible moral arbiter of this process is never in any doubt. The cynicism

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Never underestimate the wiles of a crooked European state.

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Yes, exactly so. I’m a humbug.

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It’s always open season on princesses!

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Dad's wearing a bunch of hotdogs.

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Farewell, dear shithead, farewell.

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Have you betrayed us? Have you betrayed me?!

Blake's 7 4.13: Blake The best you can hope for the end of a series is that it leaves you wanting more. Blake certainly does that, so much so that I lapped up Tony Attwood’s Afterlife when it came out. I recall his speculation over who survived and who didn’t in his Programme Guide (curious that he thought Tarrant was unlikely to make it and then had him turn up in his continuation). Blake follows the template of previous season finales, piling incident upon incident until it reaches a crescendo.

Now In Full Color, with a Happier Ending

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