:00:00. > :00:00.football internationals with Dean Saunders. That's at 6. 30. Now
:00:00. > :00:20.though, it's time for the Film Review.
:00:21. > :00:25.Hello and welcome to the Film Review on BBC News. To take us through this
:00:26. > :00:29.week's cinema releases is Mark Kermode. What do we have? You must
:00:30. > :00:33.know that the big release of the week is The Girl on they train,
:00:34. > :00:40.there are posters for it absolutely everywhere.
:00:41. > :00:46.We also have 13th, a documentary. And Mel Gibson is back in Blood
:00:47. > :00:51.Father. The Girl on the Train, heavily
:00:52. > :00:54.anticipated by a lot of us, especially those who've read the
:00:55. > :00:58.novel? It's those that have read the novel that have been the most
:00:59. > :01:01.vociferously critical about the fact it changed location, it's been to
:01:02. > :01:05.America, the cast members are too glamorous, there's been a lot of
:01:06. > :01:10.that stuff. Let's consider the film on its own merit. Emily Blunt is
:01:11. > :01:20.Rachel, an alcoholic, her life has fallen apart since her divorce.
:01:21. > :01:24.She's on the train every day. Her ex-husband is there. She looks away
:01:25. > :01:28.to a neighbouring house where she imagines a couple living a perfect
:01:29. > :01:32.life until she sees something which jars with her vision. However,
:01:33. > :01:36.because of her condition, she's an alcoholic, she doesn't know what
:01:37. > :01:47.she's seen. She's not sure what she remembers. She's not even sure what
:01:48. > :01:51.she's done. Here is a clip. I'm here because I...
:01:52. > :01:56.Because I... Because I woke up covered in blood.
:01:57. > :02:12.I had bruises all over my arm and... I may have fallen
:02:13. > :02:18.and somebody helped me up. My husband, he used to tell me what I'd
:02:19. > :02:25.done the night before. I learnt when you wake up like that, you just say
:02:26. > :02:29.you're sorry. You just say you're sorry for what you did and sorry for
:02:30. > :02:35.who you are. And you're never going to do it again.
:02:36. > :02:39.Very powerful. I think she's great. It's a really great piece of
:02:40. > :02:43.casting. She's terrific in the movie. You can see the
:02:44. > :02:47.cinematography catching her woozy state of mind. The film is shot in
:02:48. > :02:51.your face, very expressive, as if the camera itself is drunk which I
:02:52. > :02:56.liked very much. Some people have compared this to Gone Girl, although
:02:57. > :03:03.actually a closer comparison would be with that film Before I Go To
:03:04. > :03:08.Sleep. People forget? Yes, it's got amnesia, duplicity. As film making
:03:09. > :03:12.is concerned, it's solid if not particularly remarkable. However,
:03:13. > :03:15.Emily Blunt is like the lightning conductor, she's the thing that
:03:16. > :03:19.holds the whole movie together and because so much of it is to do with
:03:20. > :03:22.taking the various perspectives of the novel and making them into
:03:23. > :03:25.something that works coherently on screen, I think she is the force
:03:26. > :03:31.that holds the movie together. So I enjoyed it. I know that some people
:03:32. > :03:37.who're crazy about the book don't lake it but you're always going to
:03:38. > :03:40.get changes from page to screen. The cinematography was good and worked
:03:41. > :03:46.very well. Although it's not directed with the same visual
:03:47. > :03:50.panache as there was in Gone Girl, I think Emily Blunt is worth the price
:03:51. > :03:55.of the ticket because she really made it work. To have a seriously
:03:56. > :03:59.centrally flawed character is a great device to give you an edge.
:04:00. > :04:07.You're not quite sure because she's not quite sure? Unbalanced unstable,
:04:08. > :04:15.unreliable. Sympathetic and engaging and that is a credit to her. Now,
:04:16. > :04:20.13th is about the 13th amendment of the US constitution? It's an
:04:21. > :04:25.interesting documentary that argues in a balanced fashion that after the
:04:26. > :04:30.abolition of slavery, the disenfranchisement that came with
:04:31. > :04:34.slavery continued through various segregation laws and now is
:04:35. > :04:39.represented in the penal system. The #139 amendment says the outlaw on
:04:40. > :04:44.servitude except as a punishment for crime. What the film does is it
:04:45. > :04:49.looks at the way in which the penal system is organised, it goes all the
:04:50. > :04:55.way through the laws, through Nixon and the war on drugs and argues that
:04:56. > :05:03.actually at key moments in history, politicians have used other language
:05:04. > :05:06.to actually keep racially discriminatory laws in practise
:05:07. > :05:11.without ever admitting it. They are looking at work done in prisons,
:05:12. > :05:15.saying it's a modern form of slavery that companies use but don't like to
:05:16. > :05:19.admit to it. I thought it was really well done. You are a great admirer
:05:20. > :05:28.of the director and you look at this documentary and you can see why. She
:05:29. > :05:32.has a line of argument and the film is poll emical, very interesting, a
:05:33. > :05:38.fascinating watch, a grim watch, but I thought it made its arguments very
:05:39. > :05:43.persuasive. A basic statistic is that there are more African-American
:05:44. > :05:47.males in the criminal justice system in jail, on probation, than there
:05:48. > :05:52.were slaves in the 1850s. Astonishing. I think you will like
:05:53. > :05:57.this very much, it's in cinemas and also on net flick. Blood Father,
:05:58. > :06:06.Liam Neeson, not Mel Gibson. It would be easy to dismiss this as
:06:07. > :06:13.another dad-sploitation. He's got to rescue his daughter in trouble, you
:06:14. > :06:17.know. It's a bit more than that. Mel Gibson's rehabilitation is eagerly
:06:18. > :06:20.awaited. He's a washed up reformed alcoholic living in a trailer
:06:21. > :06:26.convinced his life amounted to nothing. He gets a call from his
:06:27. > :06:31.estranged daughter who is in big trouble and Mel helps her. It turns
:06:32. > :06:34.out she's as pretty much messed up as he is. Here is a clip that has
:06:35. > :07:40.almost no dialogue in it. It's that wounded bear thing that
:07:41. > :07:45.he's doing, you know, big and burly but also tired, washed up. Then of
:07:46. > :07:51.course what happens is he can't keep her safe for very long, the bad guys
:07:52. > :07:54.turn up, then it turns into an action movie with shoot-outs and
:07:55. > :07:59.punch ups and motorbikes on the road. It's an exploitation B movie
:08:00. > :08:02.but it's very well done, it understands the genre cliches and
:08:03. > :08:08.uses them rather effectively, harking back to things like Mad Max,
:08:09. > :08:14.when Mel Gibson was young and had that crazed look in his eyes. Now he
:08:15. > :08:23.looks like a wounded bear, which is great casting. Very good. It has a
:08:24. > :08:28.throw back sensibility to some extent. I went in expecting it to be
:08:29. > :08:32.the lowest common denominator and was pleasantly surprised by how, yes
:08:33. > :08:38.it's a story you have seen before but it was told well, a good, solid
:08:39. > :08:42.B movie that is exactly what it is, does what it says on the packet and
:08:43. > :08:47.offers Mel Gibson a chance to do that wounded bear, angry father
:08:48. > :08:54.thing that he does rather well. His name in the film? So John Link.
:08:55. > :09:03.Link to the past. Yes. Exactly, you are becoming a film critic.
:09:04. > :09:09.Your best of the week is Under the Shadow? The best out at the moment.
:09:10. > :09:14.You'd love this. It's set in Tehran, set in Jordan, the UK's entry for
:09:15. > :09:19.best foreign language film Oscar. It's a really intelligent chiller,
:09:20. > :09:26.made by a British company. Draws on the devil's back. It's the story of
:09:27. > :09:29.a mother and her daughter in an apartment block being besieged not
:09:30. > :09:35.only by missiles because it's set in the war in the 80s, but also
:09:36. > :09:39.apparently by spirits. It's really intelligent and smart. I say this as
:09:40. > :09:43.a die hard horror fan, there were moments in it that were properly
:09:44. > :09:49.scary. Why is it British? A British company made it and the director
:09:50. > :09:53.lives here so it qualifies for our foreign language film Oscar.
:09:54. > :09:59.I can see tick, tick, tick, tick, for the films you have chosen. Your
:10:00. > :10:06.DVD is War Craft the Beginning. What is your problem? Have you seen it? I
:10:07. > :10:11.haven't. I've heard about war craft. I'm very resistant. Two
:10:12. > :10:17.It got stinky reviews partly due to the fact that it was under silly
:10:18. > :10:21.embargoes. Duncan Jones taking on a huge gaming franchise and making it
:10:22. > :10:27.to a fantasy movie. No-one went into this more worried than I did and I
:10:28. > :10:29.was surprised by how much it had his thumb prints over it, how much it
:10:30. > :10:34.was about characters that I was interested in. They are handled, the
:10:35. > :10:37.gender politics are very impressive, it's a film that's clearly made by
:10:38. > :10:41.somebody who loves the subject matter and believe me, it's lovely
:10:42. > :10:46.to see a film that's made with love and attention for all Isth its flaws
:10:47. > :10:51.and I'm flying the flag for it. On DVD and Blu-ray it will be
:10:52. > :10:55.reassessed and in years to come, people will say War Craft was
:10:56. > :11:00.mistreated. I'm speechless! Thank you very much. A quick
:11:01. > :11:09.reminder, more film news and reviews from across the BBC at
:11:10. > :11:14.www.bbc.co.uk/Americakermode. Next week we are on the red carpet at the
:11:15. > :11:19.London Film Festival with special guests.
:11:20. > :11:29.Thank you very much for watching, enjoy the movies, goodbye --
:11:30. > :11:32.www.bbc.co.uk/markkermode. Still Somme dangerous weather
:11:33. > :11:33.conditions along the East Coast of