Parky at the Pictures (In Cinemas 29/5/2014)

Frazzled at the end of a long day of disappointing auditions, theatre director Thomas Novachek (Mathieu Amalric) is ready to go home. However, he is cornered by late arrival Vanda Jordan (Emmanuelle Seigner), who gives him a sob story about why she is so late for a slot he cannot find on the call sheet. Blowsy and gum-chewing, Vanda seems all wrong for the part in Thomas's adaptation of Leopold von Sacher-Masoch's Venus in Furs, even though she shares a first name with its heroine, Vanda von Dunajew. Moreover, she hasn't put in much preparation for the role and seems to have little insight into either the character or her situation.

Yet, such is her eagerness to please that Thomas agrees to let her read and is surprised when she produces a full script from her bag. She also unpacks a dress she has bought specially for the audition and shows him an authentic Viennese smoking jacket from 1869, which she encourages him to put on as he runs her lines. Keen to get home to fiancée Marie-Cécile, Thomas agrees to play Severin von Kushemski in the hope of demonstrating to Vanda that she is wasting her time. But he is impressed when she approaches the lighting desk in the auditorium and alters the mood of the set, which still contains props from a Belgian musical version of Stagecoach (including a hilariously phallic cactus). Moreover, he is captivated by the way in which she slips into character with surprising and persuasive ease.

Vanda asks lots of questions that seem to betray a lack of education and Thomas finds it hard to take her seriously, even after she changes into her period dress and modulates her accent to deliver her lines. But they soon settle into the roles of Kushemski and Dunajew, as they meet for the first time and she is beguiled by his intellect after finding a picture of Titian's `Venus With Mirror' in the pages of his book. She coaxes him into telling a revealing anecdote about the boyhood humiliation he suffered at the hands of his aunt and he finds himself falling under her spell. He has long remained a bachelor, as he has never found the woman to whom he wanted to give himself entirely. But Vanda is both voluptuous and sensual and he begs her to treat him as a slave and degrade him in order to keep him in line.

With the line between fact and fiction fast beginning to blur, Thomas loses his temper when Vanda suggests the play is merely about child abuse and he snarls that he detests critics who always have to find a subtext or a contemporary relevance for everything they see. She marvels that Dunajew seems to be both a feminist ahead of her times and an incarnation of Venus eager to make Kushemski see the error of his ways. But Thomas is equally amazed, as Vanda seems to know a good deal more about the play than she has been letting on and the pair slip in and out of character as they banter about ambiguity, control, fantasy and reality, and the tensions between the sexes.

The mood is broken by a phone call from Thomas's fiancée and he is put out to return to the stage to find Vanda also chatting on the phone. He asks about her life away from the stage and she tells him she was an army brat who followed her soldier father. However, his curiosity is deflected when she returns to the text as Dunajew proposes drawing up a contract for a year to see whether he has what it takes to be her vassal. Kushemski readily agrees, even though she demands that he finds out the room number of a dashing Greek soldier who has caught her eye. Vanda breaks off again to sip coffee and ask Thomas why he dropped the opening part of the novel and he is again taken aback by her unsuspected knowledge. She suggests they improvise and changes the lighting again and strips to her black lingerie and lets down her long blonde hair to recline on the divan as Aphrodite taunting Severin in a Germanic accent about his love of fur and how powerless he is to resist her.

Vanda is now giving the stage directions and Thomas seems happy to obey, as he has realised he can add a layer to the action by suggesting that Vanda is Venus in disguise looking for revenge. Of course, it doesn't occur to him for an instant than Vanda Jordan may already have anticipated his `inspiration' and he snaps back when she suggests there is a lot of himself in both characters. She dons his jacket and perches his glasses on the end of her nose, as he lies on the sofa to be quizzed about his relationship with Marie-Cécile and how unfulfilling it is. Vanda mocks Thomas for choosing a younger women with brains, beauty and a bank account in order to make himself feel better about ageing and his flawed artistry. But he cuts her short and suggests they return to the play.

Thomas re-arranges the set to resemble a birch grove, while Vanda puts her dress back on and prepares her next ruse at his expense. She takes exception to the inherent sexism of the piece and when he attacks her for not having the wit to see below the surface, she starts to leave. He pleads with her to stay and she complains that Severin retains control even as he succumbs to her whims, as that is what he craves. However, Vanda resumes her performance and shows Severin the contract she requires him to sign and informs him he will become her valet, as well as her sexual slave. She orders him to get her a box at the opera close to the handsome Greek and admonishes him when he protests at her readiness to explore her new carnality.

But, once again, Vanda challenges the veracity of the text and accuses Thomas of peddling corny nonsense because Dunajew would never take a birth twig and thrash him for his insubordination. He defends his work and she puts a knife to his throat. But they are interrupted by his phone and, when he returns to the stage, he accuses her of pretending to call her partner. Vanda shrugs and tells him that she is a private eye who has been hired by Marie-Cécile to check him out before she commits to marriage. But he doubts her story about them meeting at the gym and seems disenchanted by the entire exercise.

However, Vanda tosses him a footman's uniform and overrides his objection that the servile alter ego is named Gregor by calling him Thomas. She gets him to help her into a pair of knee-high boots with spike heels and orders him to tell Marie-Cécile that he won't be home. Completing his transformation, she places the dog collar that she had been wearing around his neck. As they return to the play, Vanda feigns difficulty with playing the moment Kushemski tries to renege on the deal and asks him to play Dunajew to help her understand her motivation.

Once more, Thomas fails to notice the tables being turned, as she puts the fur (actually a knitted shawl) around his shoulders, daubs on some lipstick and makes him wear her black court shoes. He falls to his knees as Dunajew explains that she had only assumed the role of mistress to try and cure Kushemski of his perversion. But Vanda (as Severin) pulls a gun and berates him for his deception. She informs him that she is going use her stockings to tie him (as Dunajew) to the statue of Venus in the garden and Thomas (now utterly confused as to who he is) allows himself to be led to the cactus like a cur on a leash.

As she ties him up, Vanda tells Thomas that the problem with this play is the inescapable conclusion that it is pornographic and degrading to women. Ignoring his protests that it has been drawn from an acknowledged work of literature, she leaves him in the darkness. As she sidles in from the wings with a single spotlight on the cactus, Vanda quotes a line about the fury of the Bacchae and torments Thomas by dancing naked with her fur before slinking off the stage and into the stormy night, leaving him to await the shame of his inevitable discovery. 

Given the resemblance between Mathieu Amalric and a younger Roman Polanski, this is a picture that delights in inviting speculation. Quite how much personal history has been explored here is open to question, but it's unlikely that the 80 year-old Pole has exposed himself quite as courageously as his wife. Emmanuelle Seigner delivers one of her best screen performances here, as she tilts the slow-burning battle of wills and wits to lure Amalric into her trap. He responds with total conviction, as Pawel Edelman's camera glides archly around the stage to capture each shift in tone and perspective. But, while the audience always knows who Thomas is and which role he is playing, the true identity of Vanda remains something of a tantalising mystery.

Non-French speakers are at something of an advantage, as the subtitler has helpfully placed the play text in italics. But Polanski and Ives do a decent job of concealing their sleights of hand, as they comment on both Sacher-Masoch's milieu and mindset, the state of modern gender politics, the process of directing actors and, who knows, maybe even the everyday dynamic within the Polanski household. Cunningly counterpointed by Alexandre Desplat's score and drolly edited by Hervé de Luze and Margot Meynier, this may miss its step in striving to prove in the closing sequence that Thomas wishes to submit more than Vanda seeks to subjugate him. But it atones in sly style and satire for what it lacks in political or philosophical depth

The final act similarly proves the weak link in Axelle Ropert's Tirez La Langue, Mademoiselle, which is also known by the translated titles Miss and the Doctors and Stick Out Your Tongue. As in her admirable debut, The Wolberg Family (2008), Ropert exploits a claustrophobic setting to examine the strains placed upon an intimate relationship. But, while it often intrigues, this 13th Arrondisement ménage lapses into melodrama in a way that the late-career François Truffaut (who is an obvious inspiration) would never have allowed. Nevertheless, the performances are admirable, as is Benjamin Esdraffo's score, which reinforces the link to the nouvelle vague with its the allusions to the timeless music of Georges Delerue and Michel Legrand.

Siblings Cédric Kahn and Laurent Stocker work as a paediatric team in the Chinatown district of Paris. Their desks sit side by side in their office, while their apartments are within view of each other across a courtyard. Everyone knows them and Kahn's dog Aspro and such is their attention to detail that, when they pay a home visit to diabetic tweenager Paula Denis, they leave a message on mother Louise Bourgoin's phone (while she is working late at the nearby Fidji bar) to keep her in the loop.

Receptionist Camille Cayol has a crush on Kahn, but he kindly warns her against mixing work and affairs of the heart. But his words soon come back to haunt him even though his first meeting with Bourgoin does not go well, as she cautions him not to interfere when he ticks her off for leaving her vulnerable daughter at home alone. Long-standing client Gilles Gaston-Dreyfus is more gracious when Kahn and Stocker tease children Nusch and Zéphir Batut about being too healthy. But their easy manner has come at a price, as Stocker attends Alcoholics Anonymous meetings and longs to find the woman of his dreams. He has casual sex with fellow member Chloé Esdraffo, but heads home alone, while Kahn bumps into Bourgoin as she finishes her shift in the early hours of the morning and invites her to have some soup at a seemingly never-closing restaurant. She doesn't stay long, but he is smitten by her straight talking and refusal to be lectured about raising her child.

Teenage epileptic Alexandre Wu is fed up with the doctors for making him stick with medication that cramps his style and is preventing him from getting a girlfriend. Kahn is frustrated at not being able to help him, but Stocker says he is just growing up and going through a rebellious phase. However, he begins feeling amorous himself after chatting with Bourgoin after she finds him dozing outside a café and confides that she threw Denis's father out when she stopped loving him. Stocker leaves her a note after making another house call to Denis and goes to watch her working at Fidji. Despite her protest that his presence disconcerts her, Stocker tells Bourgoin that he loves her and insists that his feelings have nothing to do with feeling sorry for her.

Concerned that Kahn is not himself, Stocker testifies at an AA meeting about the bond they share and the responsibilities that come with it. But he leaves hurriedly when he spots Gaston-Dreyfus enter the hall and calls pal Serge Bozon to ask how he should handle a potentially ruinous situation. He suggests greeting him as his doctor and deflecting the problem and Stocker feels pleased with himself for playing it so cool. However, his efforts to charm Bourgoin are less accomplished and he struggles to respond when she says she can recognise an alcoholic after watching her brother drink himself to death. Unable to contain his feelings any longer, Stocker confides in Kahn, who accompanies him to the apartment and waits downstairs as Stocker plights his troth. Bourgoin is surprised to see him and thanks him for being so kind to Denis. He tells her how their dying mother had thanked them for putting off starting families of their own to look after her and gushes that he has waited his entire life for her. But, even though Bourgoin is not impressed with his patter, she lets him down gently and allows him to leave with his dignity and the belief that persistence might pay off if he keeps waiting for her.

When Denis is rushed to hospital, Kahn responds to Bourgoin's call and sits with her in the waiting-room. He warns her that Denis may be gravely ill if she has been lying about feeling well to stop Bourgoin from worrying about her and she wishes Jean-Pierre Petit was there to look after his child. Kahn calls him and orders him to face up to his responsibility and Bourgoin is so touched that she kisses him and forewarns him that he's in for a tough time, as she can be highly unpredictable. Suddenly perkier about the office, Kahn enthuses about his feelings while dictating medical notes and takes the day off after sleeping with Bourgoin because he can't bring himself to stop looking at her.

Stocker learns the truth when he sees the chemistry between Kahn and Bourgoin across the bar at Fidji and summons the courage to confront his brother the following day. He puts a brave face on things and jokes about Bourgoin having a sister. But, at AA that night, he wonders why he bothers and his mood would scarcely have been helped had he heard Wu boasting to Denis in his uncle's bubble tea shop that he has ditched the brothers because they were hindering his recovery. Denis insists that she still likes them, but agrees there is more to them than meets the eye.

Keen for a distraction, Kahn plays table tennis with Bozon and manages to cut his eye. When they go the surgery, Bozon winds up playing go-between as the brothers pass messages from separate rooms and Kahn protests that he cannot help Bourgoin's feelings and Stocker complains that he needs her more. The latter goes to see Bourgoin and asks if he has a chance with her and she admits to not loving him. When he asks Kahn, she tells him to mind his own business and the friction between the siblings becomes more intense. Yet, when they are called to a hotel guest suffering from a vomiting bug, Stocker agrees to treat him when he realises that he is Petit and he doesn't want Kahn to get into trouble for having a conflict of interests.

The next day, they break the news that they are making Cayol redundant, as their patient numbers are slipping. She urges them not to let Bourgoin come between them and Stocker tries to do the right thing when taking a call inviting Kahn to dinner. He dresses smartly and buys Bourgoin flowers. But he is appalled to discover that Petit is joining them and realises how pleased Denis is to have her daddy home when she barely acknowledges the present he has bought her. As they prepare supper, Petit reminds Bourgoin that he will always be Denis's father and, when it dawns on him that Bourgoin lacks the nerve to resist him, Kahn leaves and runs thought the nocturnal streets to Stocker's apartment and they hug before Kahn falls asleep on the sofa. Stocker calls Bourgoin and asks what she intends to do and tells her that he will pass on her message as he hangs up and the camera closes in on a medieval illustration of the circulatory system.

A period of time elapses and Kahn returns to his rounds and is seemingly back to his normal self. He calls Stocker, who is looking across the Riviera and glad to be away from Paris. Kahn tells him that Wu is doing much better with his new physician and announces his intention to close the practice, as it is getting to expensive to live in the capital. He goes to see Bozon in hospital and reassures him that the procedure he is about to undergo is going to work wonders. As he leaves, he sees Judith in a neighbouring room through a gap in the door. She tells him she has been back in the city for a month and has finally ditched Petit. He protests that she hurt him greatly and isn't sure he can forgive her. But she insists she has only returned because she loves him and wanted to find him again. She falls to her knees and pleads with him to give her another chance. Bozon calls out to Kahn because he is certain he is going to die. He reassures him and returns to Denis and Bourgoin and promises them he will make the most of whatever time is left to him to make them happy.

Stocker mails a letter to his brother wondering why they stayed together for so long when they needed to go their separate ways. Back in Paris, Cayol bumps into Gaston-Dreyfus and they chat about this and that and whether the brothers were ever really happy. They bid each other farewell and the camera lingers on the street scene, as life goes on.

Admirably played by director Cédric Kahn and Comédie-Française veteran Laurent Stocker, this is a meticulously made picture that frequently reveals Ropert's past as a critic. Initially offbeat and leisurely paced, it drifts into more conventional melodramatic territory as the story develops, but the performances remain compelling, even as the characterisation becomes more contrived. Nevertheless, Céline Bozon's immaculate photography and Sophie Reynaud-Malouf's intricate production design ensure a stylistic and tonal consistency that complements the adult ambitions of Ropert's script, which is much stronger at defining the distinctive world that Kahn and Stocker inhabit than in exploring the emotions they have suppressed to make it possible. So, while this rather marks time after the excellence of her debut, this does more than enough to suggest that Ropert - who also wrote L'Amitié (1998), Mods (2002), La France (2007) and Tip Top (2013) for Serge Bozon to direct - looks set to make the transition from page to screen with enviable aplomb.

Following their gay variation on Shakespeare, Were the World Mine (2008), director Tom Gustafson and screenwriter Cory Krueckeberg remain in a musical mood with this slacker rite of passage that gently ribs the new breed of thirtysomethings content to live at home and eke out a living in a dead-end job. Trading slightly in stereotypes and settling for a few too many convenient happenstances, this may not be particularly sophisticated. But its affection for its characters and love of the mariachi sound is evident and, consequently, this makes for genial viewing, while making a few wry asides on the reversal of the usual direction of the traffic over the Rio Grande.

Stuck in a mid-West rut, Shawn Ashmore resents mother Kate Burton trying to be supportive when he loses his menial job and is forced to spend more time at home. Keen to get away from her nagging, he shuffles into the local Mexican restaurant, El Mariachi, and is so taken by the music played by ageing patriarch Fernando Becerril that he begs for a post in the kitchen so he can hear more. Ashmore is delighted when Becerril, who used to be a minor celebrity back home, offers to teach him a few tunes and he is soon so swept up by the sound that, despite barely being able to play a guitar, he announces he is going to Guadalajara to study it at source.

Fleeced by a couple of crooked cops on his arrival, Ashmore is rescued by Martha Higareda, a graduate of the University of California at Santa Cruz, who has reluctantly returned home to help widowed mother Adriana Barraza run the family restaurant. Once again landing a kitchen job, Ashmore is introduced to Lila Downs, who sings with a local band and not only does Ashmore improve rapidly, but he is also offered an audition with a top mariachi combo.

The plot proceeds along pretty predictable lines from here on in. But, while Ashmore's success takes a bit of swallowing, it's less what occurs on screen than what is skirted that proves so disappointing. It's suggested that Ashmore has a history of psychological problems, but this thread is never developed and even his relationship with Higareda overcomes the bisexuality that initially seems to be such a key element of her persona. Nevertheless, Tom Sandusky's music is splendid and Gustafson treats it with the respect it deserves by exploring complexities that bely its reputation as a fun-time party novelty. He also collaborates well with cinematographer Kira Kelly and production designer Darío Carreto to capture the sights, as well as the sounds (and not to mention the tastes and smells, with all that food around) that make the contrast between Kansas and Jalisco so striking, but welcoming.

Adam Bakri also finds himself caught between clashing cultures in Hany Abu-Assad's Omar, a tense mix of political thriller and romantic drama that represents a vast improvement on the Nazarene's American debut, The Courier (2012). It also marks a return to the Palestinian question for the first time since Abu-Assad followed his excellent feature bow, Rana's Wedding (2002), and the trenchant documentary Ford Transit (2003), with the exceptional study of a suicide bomber's psyche, Paradise Now (2005). But what makes this so riveting is the moral ambiguity the characters feel towards their cause and comrades when faced with conflicting personal desires or the dictates of the Israeli Defence Force.

Scaling the Qalandia Wall and burning his hand on the rope as he slides down the other side after being shot at, West Bank baker Adam Bakri goes to see his pals Iyad Hoorani and Samer Bisharat for tea and chat. He also swaps covert notes with Hoorani's teenage sister, Leem Lubany, who loves his writing and promises him that they will run away together to a new life the first chance they get. However, social visits come at a price and, when Bakri is returning from an early morning assignation with Lubany, he is caught by an IDF patrol and has his nose broken with a rifle butt when he gets mouthy after being ordered to stand on a rock with his hands on his head.

Such provocation convinces Bakri of the rectitude of Hoorani's plan to kill a soldier in the barracks and the pals target shoot in the wilderness to prepare themselves for the mission. As they discuss the future, it becomes clear that they are still naive and Bakri is stung by Hoorani's reluctance to let anyone date his sister. Despite their callowness, however, Bisharat succeeds in picking off a trooper in the compound and Bakri drives the getaway car before blowing it up to destroy any evidence.

Shortly after snatching a kiss off Lubany the next day, however, Bakri is chased through the streets and felled by a shot to the leg. He is manacled and beaten by a torturer and has his genitals scorched when he tells his abuser to wipe his nose. Left in solitary, he dreams of Lubany. But he is eventually moved to a bigger dormitory cell, where he is approached by members of Hamas and the Al Aqsa Brigade. Uncertain who to trust, he lets down his guard when a kindly prisoner warns him against collaboration and avers that he has nothing to confess. His words are played back to him by agent Waleed Zuaiter, who assures him that this slip is serious enough to put him away for 90 years and Bakri's lawyer confirms his plight. However, Zuaiter offers Bakri a way out, as he will let him return to Lubany if he betrays Hoorani.

Returning home with the story that he was released through lack of evidence, Bakri rushes to show Lubany that he is safe. He also leaves a message with Bisharat's seven spinster sisters for him to get in touch and is give instructions where to meet. Unwilling to compromise his friends, Bakri tells Hoorani that he has been freed to trap him and he promises he will think about him dating Lubany if he arranges the ambush of some off-duty soldiers to prove his loyalty. Readily assenting, Bakri rendezvous with Lubany at the humble home he has found for them and they kiss for the first time after she gives him a beany she has knitted for him. This comes in useful when he is pursued by IDS agents who come snooping around his home and he ditches his jacket and covers his head to give them the slip.

When he goes to meet Lubany from school, however, Bakri sees her talking through the fence to Bisharat and he becomes more suspicious when she asks for details of the ambush he is setting up. She warns him that some of her classmates think he is a traitor because he was released so quickly and urges him not to be jealous of Bisharat, as she only loves him. Confused, Bakri goes about his task and Rohl Ayadi confesses that he has been offered a visa to New Zealand to snitch for the IDS. Hoorani is delighted that the quisling has been caught and not only gives Bakri a photograph of Lubany to copy, but he also promises to arrange their nuptials as soon as he can.

The following day, however, as the three pals shoot the breeze in a café, they are ambushed and Bakri is suspicious that Bisharat disappeared moments before two men pulled guns from a dumpster on the pavement outside and began shooting. Hoorani escapes, but Bakri finds himself in custody again and Zuaiter is furious with him for trying to make him look foolish. He cautions Bakri that he knows what he is doing at any hour of the day and shows him a photo of him chatting to Lubany in an alleyway. Moreover, he warns him that he is now on his own and Bakri is savagely beaten in the corridor for being a traitor. He asks to see Zuaiter again and, on hearing him getting an ear-chewing from his wife on the phone, he jokes that no man is free. They laugh and Zuaiter offers Bakri a mint and a last chance at salvation.

Returning home with an electronic tag on his calf, Bakri tries to see Lubany, but she accuses him of having let the side down and says she wants nothing more to do with him. Distraught, Bakri tries to remove the tag with a buzz saw and watches helplessly as Bisharat and Lubany converse through the school fence. He asks Bisharat to meet him and they go into the wilderness above the village. Bakri puts a knife to his throat and charges him with passing secrets to the enemy. Bisharat insists that he had no option, as Lubany was pregnant and the IDS offered to help if he worked for them.

Deceived and confused, Bakri promises Bisharat that he won't let anything happen to him and even asks Hoorani to accept Bisharat as a brother-in-law when they meet the next day. Suddenly a shot rings out and Hoorani is killed. Zuaiter comes to inspect the corpse and gives Bakri his word that he will keep hold of it for two months so that nobody can blame him and Bisharat for being the last people to see him alive. Bakri then meets with Lubany's male relations and arranges the betrothal, which Lubany reluctantly accepts after Bakri refuses to pick up the note she proffered on a saucer while serving tea. Handing Bisharat a wad of cash, Bakri returns to his bakery and tosses Lubany's picture into the oven. A few weeks later, he catches her eye as he walks in Hoorani's funeral procession and informs Bisharat that he wants nothing more to do with him.

Two years later, senior Palestinian leader Ramzi Maqdisi tracks Bakri down and asks what he remembers about Hoorani's death. Bakri feigns ignorance when he asks where Bisharat got the money to marry Lubany and shows no emotion when Maqdisi says the autopsy proved that Hoorani had been dead several weeks before he was found. Bakri tries to scale the wall to find out what is happening, but has to rely on an old man to give him a boost up the rope. He calls on Lubany and sees her nursing two children. She has given up her studies to become a mother. But Bakri is stunned when she tells him her son is only a year old, as this means that Bisharat was lying when he told him Lubany was pregnant. She bitterly regrets that things didn't work out between them and says sorry for every doubting his probity.

Having apologised for letting her down, Bakri calls Zuaiter and asks him for a gun in return for delivering the real culprit for the barrack killing. He sends Lubany a letter and she looks towards the camera as she finishes reading it. But it is too late to stop Bakri, who asks Zuaiter to show him how to load the pistol and asks if he can have a try. Once he has the weapon in his hand, he turns to Zuaiter and, recalling an anecdote Bisharat had once told him, he asks the Israeli if he knows how they catch monkeys in Africa before shooting him in the head.

What makes this picture so sad is the futility of the assassination that ruins so many lives. Ground down by the petty humiliations of occupation, Bakri and his buddies convince themselves that a strategically worthless act of rebellion is entirely justified and their failure to recognise that their token gesture will have such hideous repercussions highlights both the desperation of the Palestinian people to recover some control over their lives and the pitiful ignorance of those unaware that every action is bound to have a more terrifying reaction. But Abu-Hassad refuses to blame the freedom fighters for their recklessness, as oppression appears to have left them with little option to do otherwise. Yet, it's love for a faithless girl rather than patriotism that drives Bakri to make so many self-destructive mistakes and it's noticeable that Abu-Hassad and production designer Nael Kanj fill Bakri's dauntingly enclosed world with so many advertisements making false promises about better times ahead.

Despite its surfeit of increasingly self-conscious twists, Abu-Hassad's screenplay is studded with similar ironies, as well as several darkly comic quips, which are delivered with confidence by an inexperienced cast.   Outside the prison sequences (which are chillingly designed by Yoel Herzberg and photographed by Ehab Assal), Bakri perhaps falls short of the requisite mix of grit and vulnerability, while his apparent lack of understanding of the political complexities of his cause and the true nature of violence threatens to make him more of a cipher than a genuinely tragic anti-hero. But his helplessness when flirting with Lubany is deeply touching and, thus, his final sacrifice is stripped of any glamour, as this is the act of a man who is already dead inside.

Reckless romance in a time of conflict is also the theme of Frank Borzage's 1932 adaptation of Ernest Hemingway's A Farewell to Arms.. Loosely inspired by the same events that informed Richard Attenborough's In Love and War (1996), the story centres on an American ambulance driver and a volunteer nurse on the Italian front in the months leading up to the Battle of the Piave River in June 1918. Little combat is depicted, as the emphasis rests firmly on the morality of stolen passion in the midst of a crisis. Yet, the overriding emotion in Benjamin Glazer and Oliver H.P. Garrett's screenplay is the fear that those caught up in the Great War will die before they have had a chance to live.

Italian surgeon Adolphe Menjou rhapsodises to American pal Gary Cooper about the pretty English nurse he has just met. An architect who volunteered to drive ambulances at the front, Cooper is happy to drink and patronise prostitutes, but has no truck with love. However, when he mistakes Helen Hayes for his escort during an air raid, Cooper is instantly smitten and fobs Menjou off with Hayes's friend, Mary Philips when they double date at a soirée supervised by head nurse Blanche Friderici. As they walk in the moonlit garden, Hayes reveals that she entered nursing because her fiancé of eight years had joined up. But she has been alone since his death and, despite having seen colleague Peggy Cunningham being sent home for getting pregnant by a soldier, Hayes allows Cooper to take her virginity as they canoodle beneath a statue.

Eager for Hayes to know that he genuinely loves her, Cooper turns back from an expedition to the front to confess his feelings and Menjou decides to transfer Hayes to Milan to prevent his pal doing anything foolish. Yet, when Cooper is wounded by a stray shell while off duty, Menjou sends him to Hayes's hospital to recuperate and they are married by sympathetic priest Jack La Rue. Superintendent Mary Forbes takes a very dim view of Cooper, however, and arranges for him to be sent back to the line when she finds bottles hidden around his room. Hayes bids him a tearful farewell in the bedsit they had been sharing before taking a train to Brissago in Switzerland to have his child. She writes to him daily, but Menjou intercepts their messages and Cooper becomes so distraught that he deserts in order to find her.

Philips curses him for compromising Hayes when he confronts her in Milan and refuses to reveal her whereabouts. So, he places an advertisement in the newspaper for Hayes to meet him at his hotel, only for Menjou to keep the rendezvous. Feeling remorse for keeping the lovers apart, he tells Cooper where Hayes is staying and he risks being captured by the military police as he makes his way to the Swiss border. He arrives as Hayes comes out of surgery, having lost her baby during an emergency caesarian. She insists on prettifying herself before Cooper is allowed into her room and she allows him to make plans for their future, even though she knows she is going to die. As the locals take to the streets outside to celebrate the signing of the Armistice, Hayes passes away and Cooper picks her up to stand in the sunlight streaming through the windows proclaiming a new dawn.

Stripping away so much of the muscularity that makes Hemingway's prose so distinctive, this is a shamelessly sentimental melodrama that would certainly have struck a chord with audiences who would have lived through the conflict and endured their own share of love and loss. The author supposedly detested it for playing down the battlefield horrors he had witnessed. But, while acknowledging that this merely pays lip service to the source novel and rather lurches between incidents to stress the whirlwind nature of the love affair, there is no denying the brilliance of Borzage's technique, which owes much more to the visual fluidity of the silent era than the staticity of the first five years of the talkies. The standout sequences involve a point-of-view shot showing the ceilings of the Milanese hospital as Cooper is wheeled through the corridors on a gurney and the floating boom shot that picks out the pertinent details in Hayes's shabby room as she fibs in a letter to her beloved about residing in the lap of luxury. But, exceptional though Charles Lang's photography might be (his soft-focus close-ups of Hayes are ravishing), Hans Dreier and Roland Anderson's production design is also exemplary and reinforces Paramount's reputation for being the most European of the Hollywood studios.

The performances are admirable, although Cooper (who would only come into his own under Frank Capra in the middle of the decade) delivers his dialogue with a stiffness that is only partially explained by his character's diffidence. The underrated Menjou (who was recently seen excelling in Stanley Kubrick's Paths of Glory, 1957) particularly excels as the medic who allows jealousy and camaraderie to cloud his judgement, while Hayes is touchingly human as the well-bred lady paying the cruellest price for succumbing to animal passions. The frank discussion of her deflowering and pregnancy is typical of American cinema in the so-called pre-Code period, although Borzage makes much of the bedside wedding to legitimise the stillborn child and make Hayes's demise all the more tragic. It is noticeable how differently Charles Vidor played this aspect of the story in the 1957 colour remake with Jennifer Jones and Rock Hudson.

The pitiless realities of a very different form of warfare are laid bare in Sebastian Junger's Battle Company: Korengal, a sequel to the 2010 Oscar-nominated documentary, Restrepo, which Junger made in collaboration with the photojournalist Tim Hetherington. Junger paid fulsome tribute in Which Way Is the Front Line From Here? (2012) to the Oxford-educated colleague who lost his life on assignment in Libya in 2011 and his spirit pervades this second encounter with the men of Battle Company 2nd of the 503rd Infantry Regiment 173rd Airborne Brigade Combat Team. Many have since been demobbed and openly admit to missing the combination of brotherhood and adrenaline rush that gave meaning to their mission to `the Valley of Death'. But, while these calmer reflections make for an intriguing contrast with the opinions espoused in the heat of battle, there is always a sense that this is more of a repository for unused footage than a fresh insight into a nightmarish tour of duty.

Commissioned to produce a series of articles for Vanity Fair, Junger and Hetherington spent a year with the platoon during its 15-month stint in the Korengal Valley in north-eastern Afghanistan. The outpost in which they were billeted was named after PFC Juan Restrepo, who was killed early in the deployment, and the embedded pair pulled no punches in depicting the tedium and uncertainty that the mostly callow troopers experienced between foot patrols through the villages dotting the inhospitable terrain and their sporadic fire fights with an invisible enemy. Ultimately, the unit would participate in Operation Rock Avalanche, as the US command sought to flush out the Taliban rather than react to its guerrilla sorties and Jungner and Hetherington exposed themselves to unspeakable dangers in recording the fate of heroes and casualties alike.

While Restrepo was an eyewitness account of the campaign, Junger seeks here to provide a first-hand inquiry into its conduct and the impact that it had on the young men who risked their lives a long way from home in a conflict they never fully understood. The intention is entirely honourable and some of the testimony from the intimate interviews he conducted with the survivors is both shocking and moving. But, by presuming that the first film will have made an indelible impact on the audience, Junger fails to provide sufficient context for the revelations made by Misha Pemble-Belkin, Kyle Steiner, Sterling Jones, Brendan O'Byrne, Miguel Cortez, Aron Hijar, Mark Patterson, Joshua McDonough and Kevin Rice, as well as Sergeant LaMonta Caldwell and Captain Dan Kearney. Moreover, he omits to explain why soldiers like Tad Donoho, Tanner Stichter, Matthew Moreno and Jason Mace (who feature in the Afghan footage included here) don't figure among the talking heads.

Among the topics broached are the purpose of the mission and whether the troops won any hearts and minds during their stay in what they all agree was a hellhole. The majority seem to have little compassion for the villagers they were protecting and aver that they always prioritised the safety of a comrade over any thought of promoting democracy. They also concur that they would have been willing to take a bullet for a buddy and few can conceal the pleasure they took in picking off a foe. Even now, they speak of their weapons with affection and, yet, they feel as much resentment towards the officers who ordered them into terrifying situations as they do the jihadists whose cause they despise. The discussion of the pain felt at seeing friends wounded or dying is humblingly touching. But there is also something disconcerting about the pride that these kids still take in their kills and it is deeply sobering to note lack of remorse in their oft-repeated mantra of `I did what I had to do'.

It's not all about carnage, however, as Junger coaxes the men into reminiscing about the boredom they endured during their down time. They joke about the tattoos, pranks and macho tests of strength and endurance that helped pass the interminable hours and forged unbreakable bonds. But, while they mock each other's musical tastes or recall the thrill of installing a generator so they could play Guitar Hero, evidence of tensions does occasionally surface, with the African-American Sterling Jones hinting at an undercurrent of racism, as he confides his suspicion that everybody hates him.

However, Junger resists prying too deeply (either at Restrepo or on civvy street) about the extent to which the mission affected relationships with loved ones and how much contact the once inseparable brothers in arms have had with each other since they returned home. Clearly certain subjects remain taboo and it is disappointing that Junger offers no information on how his interviewees are adapting to comparative normality. But it is obvious that these men are still living with what they saw and did and that their memories are still too raw to assume much objective perspective. One hopes they will come before the camera again in a decade's time to share how things turned out for them. But, until then, they should be accorded some privacy, while Junger himself needs to move on and turn his remarkable talent to a new issue.

More unwelcoming terrain provides the backdrop for Jessica Oreck's Aatsinki: The Story of Arctic Cowboys, a profile of brothers Aarne and Lasse Aatsinki, who belong to the North Salla reindeer collective in Finnish Lapland. Bucking the trend to lament the passing of ancient traditions, Oreck reveals how this hardy cabal has embraced technology and uses walkie-talkies, computers, quad bikes and helicopters to keep track of its animals. Moreover, these canny herders have also recognised the tourist value of their lifestyle and operate Santa experiences in the run up to Christmas. Which kind of begs the question, why has this interesting, if rarely compelling documentary has been released in the last week of May?

In the opening sequence, the physical demands of herding reindeer are made plain, as the cowboys erect fences and wrangle the large and often frisky beasts so they can have their ears tagged and their teeth and pelts inspected. But, while Oreck has an eye for the spectacular chopper shot of majestic creatures hurtling through picturesque forests, she also proves prepared to provide an unflinching record of the less cosy aspects of the trade, as she films the slaughter and butchering of an animal whose coat is meticulously stripped from its bones and then nailed to a wall to dry.

Sometimes, the women and children help out and there is a palpable sense of occasion, as they use giant banners to round the calves into pens. But, once again, Oreck refuses to romanticise, as she depicts Aarne and Lasse wielding knives as carcasses pass before them on a system of pulleys. Yellow flowers may dance in the breeze as they take a cigarette break, but the blood on their white overalls provides a grim reminder of the efficiency with which they sliced bellies, eviscerated entrails and severed limbs. Fortunately, the blades are used for gentler purposes, as the cowboys collect kindling for a bonfire. They only take as much as they need and roast fish in the flames and boil a kettle for coffee. A husband and wife toss titbits to their dog, which snuggles in for warmth as geese pass overhead in the duskening sky.

Oreck cuts deftly from the crackle of a blaze to the silence of a blanket of snow and the Aatsinkis are seen chatting to tourists about antlers as they take them on sleigh rides in the misty bluish light. But, as we have seen, these are modern cowboys and snowmobile excursions are also on offer, along with snowball fights. The scenery looks delightful and Oreck captures the midnight sun over the trees as the reindeer are returned to their pens at the end of the day. However, the scene indoors proves just as inviting, as mother Raisa decorates a Christmas tree and children Inka, Vilma, Hilla-Inkeri and Lauri sing charmingly for Santa when he pays a visit to thank them for lending him some reindeer to help Rudolph pull his sleigh. But this is just another working day and Aarne and Lasse attend to the visitors and watch a couple of male reindeer locking antlers.

In truth, even though this is probably their most lucrative time of year, the cowboys don't look as though they enjoy being quaint curios for outsiders. But they seemingly have no alternative but to exploit this Arctic wonderland because the rewards are so meagre for feeding the animals in the darkness with miners' lamps on their heads, for warding off marauding wolverines and searching for strays that have wandered away from the herd. However, as Oreck insists on sticking to an observational approach, it's not always easy to glean the full import of what we are being shown. Thus, while it is wonderful to see the Northern Lights glinting green in the grey sky, it would be nice to know the precise reason why wood is whittled in a certain way for burning or whether Aarne and Lasse are doing something significant while drinking coffee by candlelight or scouring the wilderness in a howling gale, or whether they are posing for Oreck's camera as flagrantly as they put on their Arctic act for the tourists.

One of the siblings welcomes a new baby boy (Oreck doesn't seem to think it's important to differentiate between the siblings) and he takes him for a ride on a snowmobile and props him up against a tree as he lifts the machine over a hump in the path. This sequence contrasts with the delicate mannenr in which a calf has its fluffy hoof trimmed. But the thaw means that the herd needs to be sent out to pasture and the business of identifying and tagging new-borns is undertaken with typical phlegmatism. Oreck peers over the shoulders of the herdsmen to catch close-ups of the complicated diagrams that seem so central to the process. But they remain a mystery to the audience, unlike the intricacies of castration, which are shown in insouciant close-up.

A cross-cut to sausages being cooked on sticks seems a touch unnecessary, but Oreck often reflects the bleak humour of her dour subjects. She also conveys the unfussy affection they have for each other. But, ultimately, there's a limit to the number of kettles warming in campfires one can show before the novelty begins to wear off. The same goes for panoramic shots of stampeding reindeer and close-ups of body parts been sliced, nicked, slashed or flayed. There is a purity to Direct Cinema. But some topics need more than handheld visuals and ambient sound to make them comprehensible, especially when there is always the suspicion that the director is manipulating the `reality' as readily as Robert Flaherty did in Nanook of the North in 1922.

Oreck's compositional sense is splendid and she is well supported by sound recordist Kevin Wilson. But neither Aatskini brother could be described as a particularly camera-friendly personality, while the anthropological value of the project is decidedly limited by the decision against using captions or narration. Curiously, Oreck seems almost indifferent to the reindeer themselves, as she makes no attempt to study them as anything other than the commodities on which the cowboys rely for transport, food, clothing and ancillary income. Thus, while this will doubtlessly prompt some to reassess their priorities and their impact on their environment, it will leave many more with a lot of unanswered questions.

Charlie Paul similarly fails to scratch the surface of an equally fascinating subject in For No Good Reason, a tribute to the life and art of Ralph Steadman that flits between archive footage, stylised animations by Kevin Rich and length sequences in the studio at Old Loose Court that involve Johnny Depp standing around in a big hat and smoking while his 77 year-old host searches for inspiration in the ink blots he has splattered on to a fresh sheet of cartridge paper. The sum of these parts is patchy in the extreme, as the viewer is left to piece together the fragments of biographical detail and discern what they can about Steadman's highly distinctive technique. Given some of the characters encountered along the way, this cannot be anything other than wackily entertaining. But Alex Gibney covered a sizeable part of the story in Gonzo: The Life and Work of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson (2007) and Paul struggles to unearth the reason why such a seemingly mild-mannered man could have been responsible for some of the most ferocious images in cartoon history.

As Steadman welcomes Depp to Kent, it soon becomes clear that hard facts are to be at a premium, with the titles and dates of books being deemed immaterial to a tale of occasional excess and frequent excellence. Steadman claims that he knew he wanted to change the world the moment he learned to draw properly, but he has clearly continued to find this a frustrating process, as not only does the world not want to be changed, but he also has trouble satisfying his own high expectations (as he does here with an improvised picture of an unloved pet that he freely admits he doesn't much like).

He recalls going to America in 1970 and using his first book as a calling card. However, he quickly became embroiled in a project to produce 1000 pictures that exposed the plight of the homeless in New York City and his discovery that Skid Row was a museum of misery whose exhibits were invariably scorned by onlookers convinced him that his work had to have a crusading edge. The means to this end came out of the blue when Hunter S. Thompson invited Steadman to illustrate his report on the Kentucky Derby for Scanlan's magazine. In addition to abusing every substance they could get their hands on, the pair produced a savagely satirical assault on the patrons of Churchill Downs and accidentally invented gonzo journalism.

Having sketched his black Labrador, Steadman returns to his association with Thompson, who asked him to illustrate his 1971 book, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. According to Rolling Stone editor Jann Wenner, this became an instant literary classic and Steadman admits that the line drawings felt like something he had to get out of his system. He used to enjoy teasing Thompson that his contribution made the book. But their complementary eccentricity ensured its cult status and Depp is somewhat surprised to learn that Steadman was less of a drug hound than his friend and that they remained chalk and cheese, in spite of their enduring bond.

As if keen to change the subject, Steadman engages Depp in a discussion of the merits of India ink and explains how different effects can be achieved by flicking the wrists or using a brush or paint blower. He concedes a penchant for Francis Bacon's habit of letting chance take a hand in his work and praises Rembrandt for the `scintillating intellectual exercise' of chronicling the ageing process in his self-portraits. Depp looks on with suitable awe as Steadman employs masking fluid to add colour and uncover portions of the paper so that he can surprise himself by the outcome. As he stands back to admire his rather bizarre image of a startled man, Steadman reveals that his biggest influence is Picasso, as he lived to create and was never afraid to do so on his own terms.

As if to celebrate the benefits of random happenstance, Paul dispenses with chronological order in the next segment - while also overlooking the collaboration on Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail ’72 (1973) - to recount Steadman and Thompson's antics surrounding the world heavyweight championship bout between Muhammad Ali and George Foreman in Zaire in 1974, the 1970 America's Cup and the 1980 Honolulu Marathon. In the ensuing jumble of anecdotage, it would seem that Steadman daubed `F*ck the Pope' on one of the competing yachts while Thompson peppered neighbouring craft with flares, Thompson sold the fight tickets and they had to watch the Rumble in the Jungle on television, and the pair sought to subvert the race in Hawaii by using a van to get ahead of the leading athletes and taunt them at the finishing line. As Depp chortles in admiration, Steadman shruggingly concedes they did these things for no good reason and, in the process, reinforced the bad name of gonzo.

Following a rather rambling reminiscence about Thompson bouncing ideas off a mistreated bird named Edward, Paul inflicts a montage of trademark illustrations whose savage subject matter is left unidentified as a rather twee song about favourite things plays on the soundtrack. Wenner opines that Steadman was often wilder than Thompson when it came to work and suggests that he overstepped the mark in his depiction of Nixon's America. Steadman readily admits that he used his wit as a weapon in this period. But he didn't always want to be on the attack, hence his decision to write the gardening column for Rolling Stone and his desire to distil the truth about Leonardo Da Vinci from the 50-odd books that had been written about him. Adopting a first-person perspective, I Leonardo (1983) sought to expose the man, as well as his art and his inventions. Steadman was delighted to discover that they had perfectionism in common and that Leonardo considered taking the trouble to get something right to be a prerequisite of genius.

Although Paul doesn't mention it, Steadman was born in Wallasey on the Wirral in 1936. He was raised in Abergele in North Wales and attended the local grammar, where he bowed his head during the 1947 school photograph as an act of rebellion against the detested headmaster, Dr Hubert Hughes. In many ways (as a montage of Ralph and Johnny hanging out fills the screen), Steadman has been biting back at authority ever since and he shows Depp his artwork for a booklet marking the 50th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. He reads from the terms, as another sappy song plays behind him, and he concludes that his targets have always been those who cheat and swindle the oppressed.

But he also regrets that his style has prevented him from being taken seriously as an artist. In order to rectify this, Paul quotes a Polaroid advertisement starring Laurence Olivier and invites Richard E. Grant to describe how Steadman manipulated the emulsion on Instamatic snaps to produce the grotesque images for the 1996 edition of his diaries, With Nails. Steadman recognises that the essence of his oeuvre is the distortion of reality and Terry Gilliam applauds him for retaining his anger with the world long after the rest of the 60s generation has lost its fire and venom. 

Steadman reflects fondly on his brief association with William S. Burroughs and laments Thompson's decision to commit suicide in February 2005. Wenner claims that Steadman always wished that Thompson was a nicer man, but realised that the tension between them was vital to their working dynamic. A decade after his loss, Steadman still resents him for bailing out and removing the fun from his life, while there was still much to rant about. But he agrees with Depp that Thompson was always going to choose the method of his departure and it just happened to be blowing his brains out while on the phone to his wife Anita.

As a tribute, Steadman designed a memorial poster and he continues to sign limited edition prints to make a little money on the side. He complains that everything he has done has been meaningless and curses that he now helps pollute a world overloaded with information and imagery. But the pride he feels in his prolific output is readily evident and the lengthy closing montage of confrontational cartoons demonstrates the power and potency of his achievement.

Egged on by the somewhat superfluous Depp and his own desire to stake his claim in the New Journalism legend, Steadman proves a splendidly testy raconteur. He stands at his desk and chatters with a deceptive geniality, as bile drips from his stories as caustically as it does from his work. Realising he is capturing gonzo gold, Paul leaves him to it. But he also allows him to ramble in places and editor Joby Gee might have been a bit more ruthless with the scissors in some of the more stridently self-justifying passages.

However, audiovisual overload is very much the leitmotif of this hagiographical tract, which fatally lacks Steadman's knack for plucking the image juste from chaos. Skilled though the animation is, it often feels like an inessential embellishment designed to amuse those not quite convinced of Steadman's status, while the insistence on assuming that everyone watching is as familiar with his career as Paul and Depp means that countless specific and general references go unqualified. But the grossest miscalculation is the use of tracks by the likes of Slash, the All-American Rejects, Jason Mraz, James Blake, Ed Harcourt and Crystal Castles, which frequently have no bearing on the timeframes or material being considered on screen and almost without exception amount to noise pollution.