While our Saturday Cinema Summary does an admirable job of rounding up the week's new releases, London's celluloid attractions run deeper than the local multiplex's offerings. From retrospectives of filmmaking greats, to cult classics introduced by obsessive cinephiles, each week we'll offer a preview of the forgotten films and rare screenings worthy of your attention. Wednesday: 4 Months, 3 Weeks, 2 Days, the stark Romanian film that snatched the Palme d'Or at Cannes last......

Getting the most press this week is The Edge of Love, an account of the women who surrounded legendary boozer (and occasional poet) Dylan Thomas during the Second World War. London lovers will cherish it for the “wonderful rendering of Blitz London” (Independent, 3-stars) but overall it’s got very average reviews. The Guardian (2-stars) calls it an “exasperatingly unfocused and underpowered movie.” The performances of Keira Knightly, Sienna Miller and particularly Mathew Rhys (as......

Yes, you read that right. Film4 are offering you the chance to win a Phillips Home Cinema. This is quite simply AWESOME. You must read on... Film4 Summer Screen at Somerset House returns for ten nights from 31st July to August 9th 2008. The magnificent Edmond J. Safra Fountain Court at Somerset House will once again be transformed into a full-scale open-air cinema with state of the art giant screen, 35mm projection and surround-sound. The......

There’s loads of London-y programmes on the telly this week, so you’re a bit spoiled for choice. Luckily, we’re here to help you out. On TV, Londonist likes: Monday, 16 June Dickens’ Secret Lover (Channel 4, 21:00-22:00) Dickens’ London is pretty firmly entrenched in the minds of anyone who’s read one of his books, and this is a look at the man behind the stories. Well, the man and his secret lover. This programme......

Happy Bloomsday, friends. If on this, the 104th anniversary of Leopold Bloom’s epic wanderings around Dublin, our column is even less coherent than usual, don’t blame us and our second-rate attempts to mimic the master. On the other hand, maybe you should. Do we contradict ourselves? Very well then, we contradict ourselves. Come, mess. Bloomsday: Alright, so perhaps you have no idea what we’re babbling on about because (GASP!) you’ve cracked the cover of......

This week needs to be officially declared ‘Useless Blockbuster Week’ as our critics clobber the two big releases, The Incredible Hulk and The Happening. First up we have the rebooted Hulk trying to succeed where Ang Lee’s 2003 effort failed for not making enough money. The new approach is to cut to the core of Hulk’s appeal by focusing purely on the angry green Hulk-smashing action and not much else. Edward Norton reluctantly stars......

If, like the rest of the film-going world, you were wowed by Ellen Page’s performance in Juno last year, and have been raving about her to everyone you meet, you’ll definitely want to get one up on your filmy friends by checking out Page’s 2005 performance in a screening of “Mouth to Mouth” at the Curzon Soho this Sunday 15 June. Filmed a full two years before Juno was the talk of the town,......

So, the smack-down that was Indy v SATC was officially won by Indy (presumably with one of his famed punches to the face). While those two films continue to soak up every last ton of box office cash we have a blockbuster free week of smaller scale films. The biggest release of the week is Gone, Baby Gone. It’s directed and co-written by Ben Affleck who’s looking for career salvation after being unforgivably rubbish......

Our weekly roundup of film reviews continues, courtesy of James Bryan... The tsunami of hype has crested and the reviews are in. As if you hadn’t heard, four years after they bowed out on the small screen, the fading stars of Sex and The City have returned for their close-up. Yes, we know it’s an orgy of shameless consumerism or, as one blogger describes it, “a Taliban Recruitment video”, but are they still worth......

The global siege that is Indiana Jones and The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull is in full swing. Right now, millions of people are sitting in the cinema waiting for the iconic theme music to kick in so they can hopefully bask in the nostalgic glow of their youth. It’s been a tough ride getting here, from the highs of the trailer to the lows of the early reviews. So while it may hoover......

While we're waiting for details of the new Bond film to start leaking, The Barbican are celebrating what would be author Ian Fleming's 100th birthday with a weekend dedicated to the suave legend. The full list of Bond films was voted down to 4 by Barbican website users and they've just announced that the winning films are 'Goldfinger', 'From Russia With Love', 'Casino Royale' and 'Dr No'. Showing on the weekend of 7/8 June,......

Our weekly roundup of film reviews returns, courtesy of James Bryan... This week lead character Speed Racer stars in the film Speed Racer (see what they did there) and Morgan Spurlock bottles it like a shandy in Where in the World Is Osama Bin Laden? It’s difficult to forgive the Wachowski brothers for the lameness of the Matrix sequels and their bid for redemption, Speed Racer, isn’t going to win them any new fans.......

Rejoice or recoil: It looks as though the long-rumoured film adaptation of Martin Amis’ London Fields is viable again. Originally announced in 2001 with David Cronenberg directing, the project had been shelved as of 2006. But now, with Hallam Foe’s David Mackenzie slated as the new director, the possibility of the film seeing the light of day is once again alive. The script for the film has long since been completed by Amis and......

Our weekly roundup of film reviews returns, courtesy of James Bryan... This week, Robert Downey Jr. gets suited and booted as Iron Man, more romantic comedy nonsense in Made Of Honour and Joy Division get the referential documentary treatment. Like the first lamb of spring, the first comic book film of the summer marks the changing of the seasons. With Hellboy, Batman and the Incredible Hulk all just around the corner Iron Man is,......

To many of us, physics is as impenetrable as a nun in Fort Knox. But if stranded in 1950's smalltown America with nothing but a modified De Lorean and an anachronistic body warmer, we'd know exactly how many gigawatts to feed into our flux capacitor. Such is the power of the movies. But, like Steven Hawking and the Predator, physics and film are not always comfortable bedfellows. In the interests of telling a good......

Our weekly roundup of film reviews returns, courtesy of James Bryan... This week, London tube comedy Three and Out, the erotic thriller that is a Deception and Russell Brand tries to take America in Forgetting Sarah Marshall. It’s baffling that as a nation we’re so consistently bad at comedy films. Despite having the home-grown talent, British comedy films, as a general rule, suck. So it is with Three and Out, the Tube suicide comedy......

Ether 2008 is well under way, and last night Radio Soulwax Presents… made sure to kick it up a notch. For the UK premiere of the tour film Part of the Weekend Never Dies, Belgian electro band Soulwax had taken over the Royal Festival Hall, and as well as showing the film in the auditorium (twice), guest DJs such as UK DJ Riton played sets throughout the night. The film paints a picture of......

The Long Good Friday. That's if you can judge these things on the index of Movie London by Tony Reeves. This updated tome from Titan Books lists the Hoskins flick 21 times, with John Wayne's Brannigan a close second on 20 entries. The locations of over 500 films are revealed in this smart volume of filmic London - from obscure Ealing comedies to the biggest blockbusters. Do you know which bit of Kensington featured......

Our weekly roundup of film reviews returns, courtesy of James Bryan... This week Irish hitmen are on the run In Bruges, Mike Leigh’s deliriously upbeat Happy-Go-Lucky and Daniel Craig remembers his hazy youth in Flashbacks of A Fool. Several years ago Hollywood fell hook, line and sinker for the plucky charm of Colin Farrell and he's been under-delivering in major films ever since. He turns the tables in his latest, In Bruges, by actually......

Tube drivers are irked by a new film that takes a light-hearted look at one of the more harrowing aspects of working for London Underground: the "person under a train", TfL-speak for a suicide. Members of the Aslef union plan to picket the premier and hand out fliers expressing their displeasure. Three And Out, released next Friday, tells the story of a Tube driver unfortunate enough to experience two "one-unders" in quick succession. Discovering......

Our weekly roundup of film reviews returns, courtesy of James Bryan... This week The Rolling Stones get the concert film treatment in Shine A Light and George Clooney goes screwball in Leatherheads. If you’re the Rolling Stones, you get directors of the calibre of Martin Scorsese making your concert films. In Shine A Light they’re captured in all their craggy-faced glory playing a small NY benefit concert. The critics are split on this. Kevin......

Our weekly roundup of film reviews returns, courtesy of James Bryan... This week's two big releases are the Eighties nostalgic Son of Rambow and the terrifying-sounding Funny Games. British film Son of Rambow is the story of two suburban boys who make their own sequel to Rambo: First Blood after watching it on pirate video. Set in the early Eighties it's full of affection for the period (skill!), Peter Bradshaw notes in his 2-star......

It’s getting warmer! Ok, not really. Lazy evenings lolling about in one of the city’s grand parks are still a ways off, so keep heading inside to galleries and theatres for your (heated) culture fix. This week’s cerebral theme? Attention-grabbing names. You’ll see. Onwards! The film You, the Living opens this week. The film has received rave reviews and filmmaker Roy Andersson is being touted as the next Bergman. You know, nothing special. First......

Our weekly roundup of film reviews returns, courtesy of James Bryan… Unfortunately there’s not much to whet the cineaste’s appetite this week. Most of this week’s releases are comedies ranging from the mediocre to the terrifyingly bad. Let’s dive right in. First up is a film that comes to us deep-coated in vitriol and with the promise of being so spectacularly bad that you should rush to the cinema immediately to witness this once......

Now that you’ve spent a long, slothful weekend hiding from the snow on your mum’s couch, bloated with chocolate whilst watching endless episodes of the Simpsons and the Hollyoaks (No? Just us?) your brain could probably use a little stimulation. Luckily, London’s art scene is ready for you in this “out like a lamb…” week. If you want to stretch your brain a bit, but don’t want to stray too far from the sitting......

Our weekly roundup of film reviews returns, courtesy of James Bryan… This week we’ve got superior Spanish horror The Orphanage, Easter kids fantasy film The Spiderwick Chronicles and po-faced environmental documentary The Eleventh Hour. The Orphanage gets great reviews from The Guardian and The Independent with The Times differing its opinion. Peter Bradshaw in The Guardian (4-stars) says that the: chiller, set in contemporary Spain, is involving and disturbing, and revives the genre's great......

Our friends at Film Friends Forever are holding their monthly film night tomorrow night, and they have an absolutely cracking line-up of Oscar, Bafta & other award winners and nominees. Check out the viewing list here, all to be enjoyed in Corbert Place, Truman Brewery from 6.30pm - there's animation, arthouse, short music movies and live music as well as £3 beers. Sounds good? Yes, it does and it should, seeing as this monthly......

Our weekly roundup of film reviews returns, courtesy of James Bryan… This week’s big releases are Brian DePalma’s multimedia Iraq film Redacted and prehistoric CGI romp 10,000 BC. Redacted, Brian DePalma’s controversial and supposedly anti-American film about the Iraq War might not have impressed many critics (or moviegoers) in the US but it’s getting good reviews this side of the Pond. James Christopher in The Times (4-stars): Redacted is not just a damning inside......

The London Lesbian and Gay Film Festival is nearly here and to celebrate, we've got a pair of tickets to give away for the BFI IMAX's All Night Musicals on Saturday 29 March. The 70s themed line up of films gets incrementally camper, and the costumes get more outrageous, the later it gets. The recent Dreamgirls movie opens the bill, followed by 80s-tastic dance and drama spectacle, A Chorus Line (based on the 1970s......

While our attention is on sociological and artistic dichotomies posed by the scientific community, there is yet more thought-provoking stuff scheduled for this evening. And a good chance to see a little known museum in our city too. Don't say we never give you value for money... The Grant Museum of Zoology is one of the University College of London (UCL) museums, originally founded for teaching purposes in 1827, and is packed with skeletons,......