Pick of the week
Don’t Worry Darling
With gossip about Shia LaBeouf’s firing, director Olivia Wilde’s relationship with cast member Harry Styles, and star Florence Pugh’s alleged pay gap to Styles, this 50s-set cold war mystery arrives carting a ton of baggage. That it turns out to be a stylish, entertaining watch is a pleasant surprise. There’s a heavy Stepford Wives vibe to the comfortable life of Pugh’s Alice, in a US desert town where all the men, including her husband Jack (Styles), work at the top-secret Victory Project. Alice begins to suspect something’s not quite right with the place and the people – but are her off-kilter experiences only in her mind? Pugh is as engrossing as ever in a twisty tale of all-American paranoia.
Saturday 17 June, 6.25am, 5.55pm, Sky Cinema Premiere
***
Paradise Highway
If you can believe the doyenne of French cinema, Juliette Binoche, as a rough’n’ready Canadian trucker, then Anna Gutto’s dark road movie has much to recommend it. Sally (Binoche) reluctantly carries out illegal courier jobs for her convict brother Dennis (Frank Grillo), who is being threatened in jail. That is until the latest package turns out to be Leila (Hala Finley), a victim of child sex trafficking. Going on the run with the girl, Sally has to choose between loyalty and morality, while Morgan Freeman’s FBI veteran gets ever closer.
Saturday 17 June, 6.25am, 5.55pm, Sky Cinema Premiere
***
The Killing of Two Lovers
The film’s title and clanking soundtrack give a jagged edge to this wrenching drama about a couple’s trial separation. In a rural Utah town, Clayne Crawford’s David tries to keep things friendly with wife Niki (Sepideh Moafi) for their four kids but hopelessness threatens to overwhelm him; the awkward exchanges between father and children reveal the impact the split is having on everyone. Director Robert Machoian skilfully establishes an air of knotted suspense over David’s mental state, in a landscape where all joy seems to have washed away.
Monday 19 June, 10.55pm, Film4
***
Rafiki
Banned in Kenya, Wanuri Kahiu’s lesbian romantic drama is a defiant riposte to her country’s persecution of LGBTQ+ people. Two Nairobi teenagers – self-contained Kena (Samantha Mugatsia) and outgoing Ziki (Sheila Munyiva) – fall in love but, in a Romeo and Juliet-style twist, their fathers are political rivals in a local election. Surrounded by homophobia on the streets and from the pulpit, the couple struggle to be themselves – but this is far from a Shakespearian tragedy, and the girls’ relationship proves a match for society’s prejudices.
Monday 19 June, 2.20am, Film4
***
Seven Days to Noon
This tense, flab-free thriller from the Boulting brothers follows the police hunt for a scientist who has stolen a nuclear bomb and threatens to detonate it in central London in a week. With the capital evacuated, viewers may be reminded of the eerily empty city of 28 Days Later, but for audiences in 1950 the recent war would have given the film an added frisson, as the search roams through bombed-out buildings and unnaturally quiet streets.
Tuesday 20 June, 2.35pm, Talking Pictures TV
***
Limbo
The experiences of asylum seekers in Britain are given an imaginative treatment in Ben Sharrock’s deadpan drama, set in the sublime but unforgiving wilderness of a remote Scottish island. Amir El-Masry plays Omar, a Syrian musician stuck with other single men in the middle of nowhere. Along with Farhad (Vikash Bhai), an Afghan Zoroastrian and Freddie Mercury fan, he awaits a decision about his claim while fluctuating between boredom and despair. Still, there’s a lot of leftfield humour to be had from their lot, not least in the “cultural awareness” classes run by Sidse Babett Knudsen’s teacher.
Tuesday 20 June, 9pm, Film4
***
Oldboy
His romantic mystery Decision to Leave was one of the finest releases of last year, but Korean film-maker Park Chan-wook is better known for intricate, violent revenge tales, none better than this 2003 movie. Cho Min-sik gives his considerable all (not least in the notorious octopus-swallowing scene) as Oh Dae-su, a father held captive for 15 years by figures unknown, then suddenly released. His hunt for his jailers brings him into contact with Kang Hye-jung’s chef Mi-do, but their tender connection is skewed by Dae-su’s vengeance, depicted in impressively bloody detail.
Wednesday 21 June, 11pm, Sky Sci-Fi
