There are three endings you should avoid at all costs, endings which all reek of a massive cop-out. The first ending you should avoid is: everything was a lie. The second ending you should avoid is: everything was a dream. And the third ending you should avoid is: god saved us. Now there are notable exceptions to all of those, but by and...

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Christopher McCandless lived a silly life and died a silly death. Here was a guy who gave his savings to Oxfam (twenty-four grand, no less), left home without uttering a word to his family and who thought salvation lay in the wilderness. Too bad, then, that he ate the wrong type of plant and carked it.All the time we’re told what complete arseholes...

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It's always the quiet ones, isn't it? It's always the detached, the reserved and the remote who turn out to be the kinkiest. But then again, if you were in your forties, still lived at home and had a possessive mother, you might be a bit off-kilter too. The opening to The Piano Teacher sees Erika (Isabelle Huppert), a rather prim middle-aged woman,...

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Manhattan has an almost perfect opening...No, I'll start that again. Manhattan does have a perfect opening. No sooner has the film started than you're hit by the sublime synthesis of George Gershwin's music, Gordon Willis' black and white widescreen photography and Woody Allen's voice-over. It's a combination that spoils the senses and one that plainly states Allen's intentions. This is a movie with...

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You'd think the couple in Maybe Baby would be happy. They have lots of money, good jobs and a luxurious flat. Plus they're unable to conceive. But for some reason the absence of a tubby parasite fills them with a sense of loss. They want to enrich their lives by creating life, they want to share their love with a long-term sperm and...

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I'm not sure why Colin Farrell keeps on getting cast in so many big films. His movies rarely make a lot of money and he's not especially talented. He's the kind of actor who can just about tread water – he doesn't ruin the films he's in, but he does nothing to enhance them either. And so it is with The New World.In...

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3:10 to Yuma has one major flaw: at the end Ben Wade (Russell Crowe) doesn’t half seem keen to help Dan Evans (Christian Bale) out. Through the town they run, dodging bullets, and then they even take to the roofs and leap between buildings. Really, would a hardened criminal who wanted to avoid jail be so compliant, especially when his gang is there,...

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