There’s something deeply appropriate -- and equally deeply stupid -- about IMDB’s Plot Synopsis for Down by Law. It reads: “This plot synopsis is empty. Add a synopsis.” And one is tempted, deeply tempted. But there’s no point, because plot is not the great driver of this wonderful movie. Indeed,...

Most film directors are content to signal boredom, tedium, ennui and the passage of time with a couple of yawns, maybe a fidget or two, and perhaps the chipmunk rotations of a speeded-up clock. (There are exceptions (http://comment.independent.co.uk/columnists_a_l/philip_hensher/article119385.ece)...

Maybe it was the setting. The Villa Medici, above Rome's Piazza del Popolo, is a wonderful building, sometimes open for art and music. This year, last week, they showed films in the courtyard. The theme was the dark side of Hollywood, and on Tueday that meant Mulholland Dr.. You're wondering, ho...

Another cliché fest, but this one is entirely enjoyable. Tea with Mussolini features English battle-ax, free-spirited artist, dyke archaeologist, fresh-faced boy, kindly grandmotherly type, Latin Lothario, Scotsmen, etc etc. And Cher, who really has made some rather good films (this, Moonstruck, M...

We saw The Lives of Others before Four Hours, and it may have been because it was so good that we were tempted to try another German film. But that’s besides the point. The film is full of wonderful little touches, like the reappearance of the junior Stasi officer who dared to make a joke about...