If you can forget about Bond for one spy-loving, Martini-shaking moment, then there’s plenty of other gold to enjoy at the Ritzy this month. Our film contributor – Marshall. Adam Marshall – picks out the highlights.
Try as I might, I’ve found it impossible to draw any clever analogy between James Bond and Steve Jobs (something about having a ‘Licence to kill…the competition with his innovative technological designs’?). Danny Boyle brings Aaron Sorkin’s screenplay to the big screen for the simply named STEVE JOBS (from 13 November). Instead of a traditional cradle-to-grave biopic, we’re instead given a behind-the-scenes snapshot of four Apple product launches, which reveal the personal and working relationships behind the genius. And with the sensational Michael Fassbender in the lead role, you should be a million times more excited about this than the new iPad Pro.
THE LADY IN THE VAN (from 13 November) is a funny little story. Man befriends homeless woman and let’s her live in his driveway. In normal circumstances, it would barely make the ‘and finally’ slot of the local news. But when the custodian in question is national treasure Alan Bennett, expect an Olivier Award nominated stage play and eventual cinematic adaptation. Add in national treasure Maggie Smith as the titular lady, and you have the recipe for the feel-good film of the autumn.
He may still be a fair distance away from national treasure status, but Nicholas Hoult has come along way from About a Boy and is an increasingly interesting screen presence. KILL YOUR FRIENDS (from 6 November) is set in 1997 where Hoult (who would have been the tender age of 7 at the time) is a Britpop A&R man who’ll go to disturbing lengths to establish the next Oasis, Blur or – shudder to think – Ocean Colour Scene. Think American Psycho, but with more Union Jacks, three-chord riffs and Kappa trackie bottoms.
I surely can’t be the only Brixtonite who saw Sean Baker’s superb 2012 London Film Festival flick Starlet? Well, he returns with TANGERINE (from November 13), which he shot exclusively on iPhones (Stevie J would have been proud). About two transgender sex workers and their pursuit for revenge on a love rat, between the original filming method and Baker’s knack for allying comedy with sentimentality, this will be one well worth catching.
And if none of those appeal and you’ve already seen Spectre five times, then there’s always the inevitably fascinating documentary HE NAMED ME MALALA (from 6 November), the fourth and final instalment of the compelling Hunger Games saga MOCKINGJAY – PART 2 (from 20 November) or the unseen side of one Hollywood’s greatest legends in LISTEN TO ME MARLON (3 November).
