This is brilliant! The 90 minute Season 2 premier of The Walking Dead starts tonight in the US and i can not find what date the UK premier is! If you know then please tweet us @panicdots Check out the season 2 trailer below!
Title: THE WAY BACK
Running time: 128 minutes
RRP (DVD): £19.99
RRP (Blu-ray): £24.99
Ratio: 2.35:1 (16×9)
Certificate: 12
Subtitles: English
Special features: ‘Making of’ featurette,Cast and crew interviews
Starring: Jim Sturgess, Ed Harris, Colin Farrell, Saoirse Ronan, Mark Strong.
Directed by Peter Weir
The story is told through the eyes of Polish prisoner Janusz (Sturgess) as he finds himself thrown into a Siberian Gulag on the testimony of his wife, obtained under torture by Stalin’s men. Sentenced to 20 years he is thrown into a world of turmoil and pain. A world where kindness can kill.
A small group of prisoners, out of desperation and necessity, band together to make their escape. Little do they know that Communism will be harder to escape than they think and that beyond the 1000 miles of Siberian wilderness is another 3000 miles to freedom.
As they battle through beautiful desolation they traverse the harshest terrain on the planet facing certain death with every step. It is only after they are joined by innocent waif Irena (Ronan) that the humanity lost in the harsh prison world is slowly reawakened.
The Way Back is a visually stunning film as Director of Photography Russell Boyd takes us from icy Siberian Wilderness through snowy forest, empty desert and eventually to the Himalayas. The scenery is as engaging as the story, reflecting the desperation in the characters with the sparsity of features. The conflicting colours of each terrain changes along with the character of each of the men as they fight for survival against the elements. The Siberian landscape is a dark and empty world for dark and empty hearts as the men retain the ethos of prison life Colours brighten as they slowly start to rely on each other when they have spent so long living with no-one to rely on but themselves.
The outstanding ensemble cast, led by the infallible Ed Harris, keep the story grounded with the emmense combined talent on show here. Harris is Mr Smith, the inevitable gruff loner who trusts no-one. 
As usual there is a heart there to be found, especially when they are joined by Irena, played by the fantastic Saoirse Ronan taking another step on her meteoric rise to fame. Ronan and Harris easily portray two lost souls who form an uneasy friendship in adversity. Mark Strong makes a short but memorable appearence as Khabarov, Janusz’s first friend in the Gulag. He (Strong) plays this with the usual menacing and untrustworthy undertone that always leaves you questioning his integrity. Unfortunately the weak link in the cast is Colin Farrell who plays career criminal Valka. His acting here harks back more to ‘Bullseye’ in Daredevil, a role any Farrell fan would surely wish to forget. This is only compounded further by a rather half hearted story arc that tries to soften his harsh exterior at times but to no real effect.
The stand out performance of the film is definately Sturgess. With the combination of innocence and a forced and de facto leadership role placed upon him by the group, he is able to show a great range of talent as the conflict inside is evident throughout. It is, through every beat, his story and he lives up to it with fantastic emotion often seen in a fleeting glance or moment of weakness. While Saoirse is a very talented actress it is Sturgess who comes out as the rising star of the film and is certainly a young man with a very bright future ahead of him.
Director Peter Weir does a great job combining the scale of the surroundings with a rather intimate story about perserverance and the determination of man. The only problem is that at times, in order to move the story on, it becomes a little flitting with quick cuts from explanation of a plan to the men after completing the plan without showing the actions that got them there. I understand that he has 4000 miles to cover in a little over two hours but it takes away some of the urgency of the characters plight.
The Way Back is a beautifully shot and thoroughly entertaining film that is definately worth a watch.
The Way Back is out on DVD and Blu-Ray on 9th May.
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Chris Writes
Twitter: @Chris__Writes
Website: www.chriswrites.net
ONDINE is the story of Syracuse, a simple fisherman who catches a beautiful and mysterious woman in his trawler’s nets. The woman seems to be dead, but then she comes alive before Syracuse’s eyes and he thinks he may be seeing things. However, with the help of his ailing, yet irrepressible daughter, Annie, he comes to believe that the fantastical might be possible and that the woman (Ondine) might be a myth come true. Ondine and Syracuse fall passionately in love, but just as we think the fairytale might go on forever, the real world intercedes. Then, after a terrible car crash and the return of a dark and violent figure from Ondine’s past, hope eventually prevails and a new beginning is presented to Syracuse, Ondine and Annie.
ONDINE premieres on VOD, Xbox Live, Playstation, Amazon and Vudu May 7th and In Theatres June 4, 2010.
As the home grown stars and press descend upon Belfast’s Black Box to witness the launch of the city’s 10th Film Festival, running from 15th – 30th April, as a genuine lover of all things cinema, you can’t help but be elated how the event has transformed over the past decade.
Starting originally as a small element within the west of the city the has now become a main cultural fixture in the Northern Ireland calendar. Belfast might be an ever changing city, but what has not changed is its everlasting love affair with the cinema.
Lord Mayor of Belfast, Naomi Long, commented: “The Belfast Film Festival has grown to become a flagship annual event in the city’s calendar. It promotes our city and its people on both an international and national stage, and its reputation for innovation and creativity is widely regarded. The city of Belfast is extremely proud of these achievements and we look forward to the 20th, 30th and 40th birthday celebrations and beyond.”
The BFF once again continues to showcase the filmmaking talent coming out of Northern Ireland, with world premieres of locally made productions such as Empire – a film set in Belfast, shot over three years on a zero budget and loosely based on the Greek myth of Orpheus.
Other premieres include Five Day Shelter, starring BAFTA nominated John Lynch, a highly visual drama interweaving the lives of several characters in a contemporary urban setting over five days.
While indie cinema fans, of the weird and wonderful, are bound to be excited by Colin McIvor’s directorial debut, Cupcake, which tells the tale of a man who inherits his parent’s bakery which promises to be a visual feast for all the senses.
Serving as a reminder to the past is the imaginative Mickey B, a feature film adaptation of Shakespeare’s Macbeth, made with serving prisoners as cast, in Northern Ireland’s infamous maximum security prison HMP Maghaberry.
An eccentric range of innovative filmic events once again dominate the programme, including a screening of Stephen Sommers’ modern B-Movie hit, Deep Rising, while the audience sail down the River Lagan. The John Hughes 80s masterpiece, Pretty in Pink, shown in Belfast nightclub Slide. A workshop presented by BBC presenter, William Crawley, dissecting the ‘anatomy’ of the legendary 1957 courtroom epic, 12 Angry Men directed by Sidney Lumet, as well as, screening an episode from the cult 60s TV show, The Prisoner, inside the First Church of Christ which will be followed by a discussion on the importance of architectural heritage in Belfast.
Opening the BFF will be the UK/Irish premiere of Triage, starring Colin Farrell as war photographer Mark Walsh while closing this year’s festivities is the UK premiere of Tetro, the latest film from the institutional Francis Ford Coppola – also his first original screenplay since The Conversation.
In partnership with the Shruti Foundation and Lady Rana, the BFF will also have in attendance, Shyam Benegal – one of India’s most highly regarded filmmakers – who will give a public lecture at the Great Hall in Queen’s University on 22nd April. Two of his films Zubeidaa and The Making of the Mahatma are set to be screened.
Greenberg starring Ben Stiller will also be shown at the festival...
One of the most appealing prospects of the festival, for most of the public, is the vast range of high profile productions set to screen over the 16 day programme including Noah Baumbach’s – screenwriter of The Life Aquatic, Fantastic Mr Fox and The Squid and the Whale - Greenberg, starring Ben Stiller, the Russian made Tsar – a film about the 16th Century Ivan the Terrible – as well a showing of Paul Schrader’s – screenwriter of Taxi Driver – Adam Resurrected, the quirky black comedy Dogtooth, the powerful Vincere – based on the life of Bentio Mussolini’s first wife, Ida Dalsar – the visually spectacular Japanese feature Symbol amongst many others.
The BFF also hopes to break the boundaries of offering audiences some visual treats mixing the sights of modern and classic cinema with contemporary sounds of performers such as Denmark’s Efterklang and the USA’s Wooden Shjips.
As a way to support the increasing numbers of aspiring filmmakers, writers and producers in Northern Ireland and their thirst to know more about ‘the business’. Organisers have set up a two day seminar called Northern Exposure = Deal Closure. The event will bring in key London sales agents, distributors, producers and literary talent agents for a series of four industry-focused panel sessions and discussion groups. Confirmed panellists include BAFTA nominee Tony Grisoni (Red Riding Trilogy), Robin Gutch (producer Warp X), Hilary Davis (Banksdale Films), Stephen Murphy (Optimum Releasing) and Nick Marston (Curtis Brown Agency) plus more.
Full information on tickets and the programme in its entirety is now available on the official Belfast Film Festival website at http://www.belfastfilmfestival.org.
