Sunset Song, The Lesson, Krampus The Film Review

performance data -- release, and the latest from UK snooker. Now on BBC

News, time for the film review. Bigwig, Sunset Song, the new film by

Terence Davies. -- big week. From Bulgaria, tense drama, The Lesson.

And something different for Christmas, Krampus! I have not seen

Sunset Song but I really want to like it, I hope you will say good

thing. I went into it inking the same thing, very long awaited

adaptation of the Lewis Grassic Gibbon novel, 15 years to get to the

screen, first tried to do it in the wake of the house of mirth, that was

2000, long time to get this done. The story follows Chris Guthrie,

growing up in north-east Scotland, early 20th century, discovering her

identity. -- The House of Mirth. Formed between the land and

education, which may take her away from the land, between a brutal

father, and her growing love for the young Euan, all overshadowed by the

gathering clouds of the Great War. What does it mean? They send white

feathers to the Coward. All of them government men, ready to die for

their kin, any day of the week. Twice on Sundays (!) they say that

Parliament will pass the conscription act. That means if we

do not volunteer, they will make us go anyway. Well, what will we do

then (!) will we both be taken? Yes, yes... But you have been excused

before! They do not take folk who farmed their online! -- farm their

own homeland. -- own land. What is interesting, how it are themes that

recur throughout his cinema, autobiographical films, the trilogy,

Long Day closes, Distant Voices, Still Lives that kind of thing.

First, you can tell that he has been working on this for a long time and

loves the source material, the second thing, the performances are

very strong, Agyness Deyn, we talked about her in Electricity, really

good. Terrific. Holding her own against Kevin Guthrie and Peter

Mullan, very accomplished screen performers, she does a very good

job. What makes this sing is the cinematography, it is a mixture of

digital for the interiors, the interiors sometimes have the tone of

a Vermeer and these last six to celluloid exteriors, which have a

kind of Terrence Malick sweep, there's so much of the source

material is about the land, and when you are making this kind of film,

you have got to have that sense of the rapture, the wonder of the land.

You can smell the cows (!) when we be talking about the most recent

adaptation of far madding crowd, we said there was not enough dirt under

its fingernails, this does, this film is not scared of silence or

song, somebody is in love with the source material, but also understand

how to make it brought to a cinematic audience. I think Terence

Davies is one of the greatest auteurs we have in this country, it

was in 2008 that his career was restarted, with Of Time and the City

in 2008, and I think that he has another one in the can,, a quiet

passion, and it is great. Very strange Bulgarian movie, lending

social unit realism of the Dardenne brothers with a jet black streak of

comedy, centring on a schoolteacher, schoolteacher at the beginning, we

see her lecturing the class on the morale at the thieving, turns out

her house is in danger, a reckless husband has squandered the money she

should have been using. -- morality of thieving. She is torn between

employers who will not pay back pay, unsharp adventures -- pay back pay,

loan sharks, thanks. It is described as a quiet rebellion of the little

person, and absolutely you are centred on her as a character, you

see somebody who is very controlling, whose life is

descending into chaos, and you are with her. I thought it was a very

fine piece of work, it is something that you need to know and understand

and care about the character and you really do. I thought

gripping. You have got to seek it out, it is not a wide release, The

Lesson, check it out. And also, a lot of great films coming out of

post coming as to Eastern Europe, the obvious comment to make. Only

enough, quite a lot of films around at Christmas which are not just what

you would expect from the Christmas festive season. Not a lot of

yo-ho-ho! Krampus is the antidote, this is yo-ho-horror! Christmas with

the Coopers, the night before, this is the antidote! This is based on

the ancient legend of the shadow of Saint Nicholas, the dark side, we

begin by meeting a family who have lost the Christmas spirit, they

think it is a time for giving... Up! All of them are sick of the site

of each other! Here is a clip. Merry Christmas! Merry Christmas... Gosh,

I am so glad you could make it. You have no idea, accidents all over the

freeway... Six hours... We brought you a little taste of home... Thank

you. Incredible... Keep the traffic jam going now... Let me help you...

Thank you for joining us. Sarcasm, Tommy... Does your butler have the

night off? LAUGHTER looking cute in your matching

jackets. They are cranky because the Pittsburgh Steelers lost. Tell your

aunt about the presidential fitness award. It is a good story... Well,

that is a lot of -- that is not a lot of yo-ho-ho! In another movie,

they would work it out, they would learn to love each other... Chevy

Chase would turn up. In this one, a beast arrives, Krampus, the

touch-tone, on the 1 hand, I would say, Gremlins, Joe Dante, a touch of

capital at the poltergeist, and rare exports, very strange, obscure film.

There is a kind of Spielberg quality to the music, we feel like we are in

safe hands. -- Rare Exports. What is lovely about it, it is not

frightened to show its teeth, like Gremlins, when it needs to bite, it

shows its teeth. Gremlins is a work of genius. This is not that, what it

is aiming in the right direction. I saw this, having had a week of

really quite icky Christmas releases, it was a real place to see

something that did not mind being a little bit nasty, that was not

scared to be a bit scary. It does not entirely work, some of the jokes

do not completely come off, you need a leap of faith to get over some of

the cracks in the narrative logic, but there is enough predator faced

clown dolls (!) and scary gingerbread men in it, if you are

looking for a Christmas release, seek this out! It did look like two

different films. What is nice, gremlins is the same, people forget

how nasty nasty bits of Gremlins are, how much of a bite the movie it

is! -- how much they -- how much of a bitey movie it is. What have you

yet seen Carol? Have you yet seen Carol? I have not,

some of us have to work from time to time! What it does, it adapts this

for the screen from the Patricia Highsmith novel, it is a screenplay

which is 16, which is not overly wordy, so much is to do with gesture

and nuance, fantastic performances from Kate Blanchette and Rooney

Mara, behind it all, the maestro, Todd Haynes, one of those directors

who has moved from the margins of arthouse experimentation into the

mainstream without ever selling out. -- Cate Blanchette. Without ever

losing the subversive edge. -- it is a screenplay which is cis inked. You

can tell that this is the man who made capital letter Superstar: The

Karen Carpenter story, who made a film using Barbie dolls, you can

tell that he made Poison. And yet it has the mainstream appeal of

something like far from Heaven. You will love it. I have taken the

delivery of your DVD choice. Mia Madre. Indeed, I think this is

incredibly accessible, superb from nano Marathi -- Nanna Maretti. And

the American actor with him she has to work, he is utterly insufferable,

John Turturro. Superb performance. As with all of his best work, it is

very strongly personal and autobiographical but what I like

about it, it is a humanist movie, it is about real people in real

situations that you can... You understand the situation. Even if it

is nothing that you have experienced, you sympathise, it is

very low key, it is very funny but also melancholic. -- Nanni Moretti.

Five out of five that are hits, in various ways, incredible! That is

interesting. Sunset Song, I have to say, is, for me, the standout. When

you see at the beginning -- when you say at the beginning you want it to

be good, when I first saw it, I was terrified that it would let me down

because I'm such a fan of Terence Davies. I have seen it three times.

It did not let me down. I have seen it three times. That is love! A

quick reminder before we go, Moore film use and reviews from across the

BBC online including all of the previous shows. -- more film news

online. Thank you very much for