Change Your Image
kaospheric
Ratings
Most Recently Rated
Reviews
Made in Italy (2020)
Nepo baby curse strikes again
Nepo baby Micheál Neeson aka Richardson sleepwalks through the film with a mouthful of cotton wool, his affected and distracting Made In Chelsea accent painfully at odds with his famous Dad's gritty tones.
Fortunately for him, his character is so one dimensional it doesn't require anything in the way of heavy-lifting.
The rest of the cast do their best - Neeson himself is always good value, as is Lindsay Duncan, putting in a turn as an acidic real estate agent. But it's hard to get past the miscast junior Neeson.
Like Micheál's delivery, Made In Italy is limp and meandering, with little to redeem it.
Orpheus' Song (2019)
This song is a hit
Short and sweet, Orpheus' Song is an exercise in slowly building sexual tension. The chemistry between the two leads is intoxicating, and the scenery almost as gorgeous as Philipp (a luminous Sascha Weingarten).
From Zero to I Love You (2019)
Good gay rom-coms don't come along very often
Frankly, I could watch anything with the apparently ageless, engaging and charming Darryl Stephens in it, so I'll try to get through this review with as little bias as possible. But in truth, Spearman has assembled a talented cast that delights from beginning to end. Stephens has palpable chemistry with his handsome co-star, Scott Bailey. Keili Lefkovitz is effervescent in the potentially thankless role of the down-low guy's wife, and Stephen Bowman is a ton of fun as Stephen's best friend. Veteran Richard Lawson - trivia: his first credited role, in 1971, was "Homosexual", in Dirty Harry. He went on to appear in pretty much everything, including Dynasty (1986) and Angry Boys (2011) - plays Stephen's father, who, in a refreshing twist, is a black father who doesn't have a problem with his gay son.
Good gay rom-coms don't come along very often. From Zero To I Love You manages to be hopelessly romantic, a hoot, and genuinely insightful (the damage wrought by Pete and Jack's affair isn't merely brushed under the carpet).
Surprising, enchanting, and sexy, From Zero To I Love You is a winner. Doug Spearman: what's next?
Beneath the Skin (2015)
Excruciating
A film with no redeeming features whatsoever: a storyline with more holes in it than a colander, the pacing of a snail, gratuitous scenes of gay bashing, repetitious incidental music, amateur British actors attempting Canadian accents, and a suburban Berkshire house that doubles for a Nova Scotia apartment building (the entrance for which is the kitchen back door).
The lead, Aaron Ellis (also the writer and director), has the charisma of a soggy biscuit.
Just awful, on almost every level.
Bashment (2011)
Worst LGBT feature of all time?
The sexy cover art will draw you in, but what awaits is an exercise in perseverance: can you withstand 90 minutes of sledgehammer subtle Rikki Beadle-Blair berating you with his (albeit worthy) message: we should all just get along.
No one seems to have told Beadle-Blair that film is about showing, not telling. And boy, does he tell us. Over, and over, and over again, the unfortunate cast reciting endless, repetitious scenes on the subject of being black and gay, and being black, and not gay. And being white and gay and not black. All with lashing of cod urban slang that would make Ali G blush.
Cinema ought to be fun, or at least artfully thought-provoking, but writer and director Rikki Beadle-Blair has taken the BLUDGEON THE AUDIENCE WITH YOUR MESSAGE route. That'll work!
At least Beadle-Blair manages to stay behind the camera for this one (after disgracing his earlier effort KickOff with his excruciating shtick) but his influence here is all too obvious. The dialogue is embarrassing and the denouement laughable. Another talented young cast wasted on a mediocre script, with a crash course in amateur cinematography.
It takes real talent to screw up a film about a gay rapper, with a cute young cast. Leave it to Rikki Beadle-Blair to achieve that.
Like his gay football stinker KickOff, Bashment was a massive flop on its release, and even the London Lesbian and Gay Film Festival declined to show either film.
Kickoff (2011)
Own goal
Talented young actors are let down by the overbearing and self-absorbed Rikki Beadle-Blair, who shoehorns himself into every scene he can, a queasy clown (without the jokes) whose self-regard is matched only by his ability to grate on the audience (he wrote, directed and stars).
A gay football comedy with an attractive cast ought to have been a runaway success, but this own goal sank without a trace on its release.
Whilst not as bad as Beadle-Blair's appallingly misjudged and abrasive Bashment, KickOff is cack-handed, overwrought and unfunny.
The cast deserved better than this.