Month / March 2026

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The Splinter of Iceland in the Heart

Volaða Land/Vanskabte Land (Godland, Hlynur Pálmason, 2022)

Ástin Sem Eftir Er (The Love That Remains, Hlynur Pálmason, 2025)

At the start of Vanskabte Land, we are told that the film was inspired by a cache of nineteenth-century photographs and the travelling priest, Lucas (Elliott Crosset Hove), documents his journey across Iceland to establish a church with his glass plate camera. The source is invented – but the rounded corners of the Academy ratio film are signifiers of photography and unexpected as a means of showing the landscape.

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Bloody Hail

Project Hail Mary (Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, 2026)

It is perhaps just as well that In Our Time recently had episodes on Archaea and the Marian Trench (including discussion of extremophiles), because the suspension of disbelief about beings that eat the stars was a little easier.

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Oscar 2026

I’ve not seen the whole Best Picture shortlist, but I’ve seen most.

  • Bugonia (Yorgos Lanthimos, 2025)

The least interesting of the Lanthimos films I’ve seen – apparently a remake of Jigureul jikyeora! (Save the Green Planet!, 2003) in which Teddy Gatz (Jesse Plemons) and his cousin Don (Aidan Delbis) kidnap medical CEO Michelle Fuller (Emma Stone), convinced she is an alien. Your allegiances waver and like all of the films I’ve seen from the shortlist it needs a trim. There’s a rather inevitable left turn and we fall into camp.

  • Frankenstein (Guillermo del Toro, 2025)

Steven Spielberg is a lover of Peter Pan and yet Hook (1991) seemed to suggest he didn’t get it. del Toro seems to fall into the same flaws here – Shelley’s classic and abused novel, although the Universal and Hammer versions create a mythos that is tangential to the novel. Here we shift the action to the mid-19th century (and yet dynamite has been invented already), add an abusive back story for Victor (Oscar Isaac), shuffle Victor’s relatives and the syphilitic Henrich Harlander (Christoph Waltz). Jacob Elordi is watchable as ever as the Creature – he’s clearly rehearsing Heathcliff – but his ability to push a ship free of ice strains credibility rather than his muscles. The Arctic setting is just a fingers up at purists.

  • F1 (Joseph Kosinski, 2025)

Best Tony Scott tribute act, judging by the trailers, but an advert for a sports industry rather than the US military. Not seen, so I could be missing some subtlety.

  • Hamnet (Chloé Zhao, 2025)

Overrated adaptation, in which a neglected historical figure is shown how to feel by William Shakespeare.

  • Marty Supreme (Josh Safdie, 2025)

A rather fun screwball comedy, in which Marty (Timothée Chalamet) attempts to raise the money that will allow him to attend and win the world table tennis championship. The sport is mostly a metaphor, as Marty faces setback after setback. Abel Ferrara gives great cameo and it’s worth pondering the universe where this was called Wiff-Waff and directed by Ken Loach.

  • One Battle After Another (Paul Thomas Anderson, 2025)

I’ve largely avoided Anderson after Magnolia (1999) – which my memory tells me I saw the same day as either The Green Mile or Eyes Wide Shut and left me vowing never to see another film. So, this came as a pleasant surprise. “Ghetto”  Pat Calhoun (Leonardo DiCaprio) has long since retired from a career of revolutionary crime and has been left to look after a daughter Charlene (Chase Infiniti) – but now Col. Steven K. Lockjaw is on his trail This goes to unexpected places – not least being a Thomas Pynchon adaptation (ish).

  • O Agente Secreto (The Secret Agent, Kleber Mendonça Filho, 2025)

Another film about confronting the past – former academic Armando (Walter Moura) returns home to reconnect with his son and to search for details of his late mother. But there is soon a bounty on his head. There’s a complicated time structure – which I’m not sure adds up – and some surreal moments of black comedy. Definitely a contender.

  • Affeksjonsverdi (Sentimental Value, Joachim Trier, 2025)

Possibly Trier’s least interesting film to date but I’d be happy for it to win – probably my favourite on the short list. Stage actress Nora Borg (Renate Reinsve) refuses her father Gustav’s (Stellan Skarsgård) offer of a starring role in a quasi autobiographical film and he goes all Vertigo in casting an American starlet (Elle Fanning).

  • Sinners (Ryan Coogler, 2025)

It feels a long time since I saw this – Michael Jordan as twins sets up a Deep South bar and makes some enemies who are even more dangerous than the local White community. Some beautiful set pieces and stay for the credits – shame the Native American subplot didn’t go as far as it could have done.

  • Train Dreams (Clint Bentley, 2025)

I blinked and missed this – in part because the blurb didn’t sound like what I wanted to see. I’ll catch some time, maybe.

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Machine Learning

Molly vs the Machines (Marc Silver, 2026)

It is a relief that I was in my mid-thirties before social media hit me — I am, in a dubious phrase, a digital immigrant.

I suspect some of the systemic racism, sexism and homophobia, I would have been soaked in and probably expressed would put me in cancellation territory. The (large) dormitory village where I grew up was hideously white — there was a Black technician, but I don’t recall any Black pupils. Ethnic diversity was for takeaways and corner shops, or something in the (not very) big city. It wasn’t quite a monoculture, but the only access to alternate lifestyles was in print. I am/was overweight, which was added to the litany of low key bullying.

Social media allows the weight conscious to see many more images than the glossy magazines I could have consumed. Perceived self-image is magnified, trauma added to trauma, cyberbullying not only endemic, but no further away than the mobile in your pocket. It’s never easy being a teen, but I’m glad I’ve got it out the way with when I did.

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