ALSO SHOWING
The Current War (12A)
Dramatising the literal and figurative power struggle that surged between Thomas Edison (Benedict Cumberbatch), George Westinghouse (Michael Shannon) and Nikola Tesla (Nicholas Hoult) as they battled to supply America with electricity, this film generates a few sparks but very little dramatic juice as it debates the merits of AC or DC. Beginning shortly after Edison’s invention of the light bulb lit up humanity’s future, the film zeroes in on the early days of the race to make this future a reality by focusing on the enmity between Edison, the egotistical genius, and Westinghouse, the pragmatic industrialist, with the former’s snub of the latter transforming what should have been a mutually advantageous enterprise for the good of the country into an increasingly bitter battle to secure their respective legacies while the fate of the Serbianborn Tesla – the most visionary of the three – becomes a heavy-handed allegory for the careless disregard of immigrants in America. Directed by Alfonso Gomez-rejon, the film plays like a Frankensteined amalgam of The Prestige (which also touched on this story), The Social Network and Steve Jobs, with the lumbering, indistinct results failing to bring the proto-tech giants at its centre to life in any meaningful way.
Of Fish and Foe (12A)
This documentary portrait of the last family in Scotland to practice wild salmon netting reveals an uncomfortable culture clash taking place within the country. Spending much of the first half focusing on their clash with animal rights activists intent on stopping them exerting their legal right to cull seals to protect their nets, director Andy Heathcote draws on the wealth of surveillance footage each side shoots of the other to provide a somewhat balanced view of the brewing melée. True to this approach, neither side comes off well, but as the film develops, it darkens in mood as it probes the complex and murky role class plays in how a country represents itself to the world.
Marianne & Leonard: Words of Love (12A)
Documentarian Nick Broomfield has made a career out of placing himself in the stories he’s investigating, but in this film about Leonard Cohen and his muse and lover Marianne Ihlen (whom Cohen immortalised in the song So Long Marianne), Broomfield reveals early on that not only were he and Marianne lovers too, but that she was something of a muse for him also – inspiring and encouraging him to make his first documentary. This fact doesn’t add much to our understanding of Marianne herself, but it does contribute to the overall theme of a film that seems quite enamoured with the whole artist/ muse relationship, particularly all the great work that an untameable artistic genius can finally get done when he has an alluring, enigmatic and compliant figure to worship at his feet. Though intended as a celebratory tribute to Marianne, it’s rather better as a profile of Cohen.
Horrible Histories: The Movie – Rotten Romans (PG)
Designed to bring history to life for British school kids who like their facts couched in fart gags, this follows the template of the books and TV shows from which it has been adapted and promptly exposes the limits of applying sketch-show thinking to a movie. Rather than using its Roman Empire setting to make a slyly anarchic, Monty-python-esque adventure for kids, it’s overly reliant on embarrassing, running-timepadding musical numbers. In fact, it’s the sort of cringe-worthy British kids’ films that will have its target audience running back to the comfort of Pixar and Marvel. ■