Parky at the Pictures (In Cinemas 31/7/2014)

Accompanied by pianist Stephen Horne, this thoughtful choice curated by the estimable Bryony Dixon succeeds in conveying both the changing political tone of the time and the nature of screen entertainment in an era when few films lasted more than a single reel. Rather than taking each title in running order, it makes more sense to assess them by type and, as the 14-strong slate begins with Looping the Loop at Hendon, the initial focus falls on what were known as `topicals'. These were general interest stories that lacked a hard news edge, but kept audiences informed and amused by showing them the latest fads and fashions, as well as public figures going about their duties. What is so remarkable about this footage of pioneering aviators Gustav Hamel and Bentfield Hucks performing stunts over a Middlesex airfield is that Wilbur and Orville Wright had only made the first flight 11 years earlier and yet aeroplanes would soon play their part in the war.

Back in August 1914, Dogs for the Antarctic must have made for poignant viewing, as the loss of Captain Robert Falcon Scott was still fresh in the public mind. However, Sir Ernest Shackleton was determined to cross the frozen region from sea to sea and this footage shows that he had learned a lesson from Norwegian Roald Amundsen, who had used dogs for both transport and food in pipping Scott to the South Pole in 1912. The story of Shackleton's heroic, if ill-fated expedition aboard the Endurance would be told in Frank Hurley's silent epic, South (1919), but this `magazine' clip suggests the extent to which few were anticipating a global conflagration to erupt during the long, hot summer.

Indeed, many felt that Ireland would be the place where British troops would see action. But the cause of women's suffrage made the headlines with equal frequency and Palace Pandemonium would have divided audiences as it depicted Emmeline Pankhurst clashing with the police in her bid to petition King George V at Buckingham Palace. Despite being adept at generating maximum publicity, the Suffragettes would have to wait another four years before the Representation of the People Act gave the vote to women over 30 and another decade before the 1928 legislations enfranchised all females over the age of 21.

The war did much to convince the establishment of women's growing value to a rapidly changing society. But few would have believed that much of the continent would be under arms just 37 days after Serb separatist Gavrilo Princip assassinated Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife Sophie in Sarajevo on 28 June. Indeed, as Austrian Tragedy reveals, Emperor Franz Josef II and his family put on a brave face in rallying round new heir Archduke Karl at his wedding to Princess Zita of Bourbon-Parma. But tensions had been brewing for over a decade between the Central Powers of Austria-Hungary, Germany, Bulgaria and the Ottoman Empire and the Triple Entente of Britain, France and Russia and contingency plans had long been in place for the defence of the empire. In Egypt and Her Defenders, British Consul General Lord Kitchener is seen reviewing the troops, as well as taking in the sights, which are tinted in sepia and blue to enhance the exoticism of the imagery. But preparations were also being made on the home front and Scouts' Valuable Aid shows a troop of Sea Scouts keeping an eye out for German dreadnoughts from the cliffs of the South Coast.

The naval conflict would eventually bring the United States into the war, as the sinking of the passenger liner RMS Lusitania in 1915 and the German resumption of unrestricted submarine activity two years later helped end the policy of Isolationism. But the majority of Americans had still been shocked by footage of German atrocities in neutral Belgium, even though items like German Occupation of Historic Louvain, from September 1914, erred on the side of discretion and avoided showing corpses to concentrate on soldiers parading through the city and the damage done to such buildings as St Peter's Church and the ancient university library.

However, the government was slow to understand the value of screen propaganda and the Beastly Hun was mocked as much as maligned in items like General French's Contemptible Little Army, which animated cartoonist Lancelot Speed's rapidly drawn caricatures of a pompous Bosch trooper and the brave Tommy seeking to cook the goose of Prussian militarism. But any hopes that the war would be over by the end of 1914 were quickly dashed and Christmas at the Front gave audiences a glimpse of the conditions being endured by their loved ones in the trenches. There's no football match or carol singing on show here. Instead, there are brave faces making the most of a melancholic celebration in the dreadful knowledge that this may well be the last festive season they ever see.

Purely on the cinematic front, 1914 was a notable year, as Giovanni Pastrone demonstrated the viability of feature production with Cabiria. Back in Blighty, Cecil Hepworth was experimenting with his Vivaphone sound-on-disc system and The Rollicking Rajah is presented here as an example of the kind of `soundie' that astounded audiences 13 years before Al Jolson changed moving pictures forever in Alan Crosland's The Jazz Singer. Sadly, the synchronised soundtrack has long been lost. But the tune and lyrics have been pieced together from surviving sheet music for singer Tim Everett and, while some may cavil at the racial stereotyping, this musical interlude reflects rather accurately the prevailing attitude to the non-Causasian parts of the British Empire.

Another important screen landmark in 1914 was Louis J. Gasnier's serial, The Perils of Pauline, which starred Pearl White as the eponymous heroine who constantly has to be rescued by Harry Marvin (Crane Wilbur) from the dastardly schemes of the avaricious Koemer (Paul Panzer), the secretary to her late guardian who is keen to bump her off before she can inherit a fortune. The first instalment, `Through Air and Fire' is presented here and it's interesting to note the way Gasnier cross-cuts between scenes filmed on location and on simple studio stages as Pauline is cast adrift in a hot-air balloon, has to shimmy down a rope to a cliff ledge and then has to wait in a burning attic for the desperate Harry to ram a locked door with a handy motor car and rescue her.

The concept of film stardom was still relatively new, as performers had been billed anonymously before Carl Laemmle had sought to drum up some publicity for the Independent Moving Pictures Company of America in 1910 by revealing that rumours of the demise of his biggest star, known only as `The Imp Girl', had been greatly exaggerated and that Florence Lawrence was alive and well and ready to headline his next flicker. Standing just 4'10", New Yorker Florence Turner was every bit as popular in her role as `The Vitagraph Girl'. Indeed, the dramas she made with heartthrob Wallace Reid in 1910 led to them being feted as American cinema's dream couple. But fame proved fickle and Turner and regular director Lawrence Trimble crossed the Atlantic in a bid to relaunch their flagging careers. In addition to headlining music-hall bills, Turner also founded her own production company at Cecil Hepworth's studio at Walton-on-Thames and Daisy Doodad's Dial is one of the dozens of one-reelers she made with Trimble calling the shots.

In truth, this is a rather peculiar comedy, in which Turner and husband Tom Powers decide to enter a face-pulling competition at the Amateur Actors Club. However, toothache prevents Turner from participating and she is most put out when Powers wins. So, when a second contest is announced, Turner goes alone and creates such a commotion practicing her grimaces on the train and in the street that she is arrested for disturbing the peace. She accuses Powers of arranging for her detention when he comes to bail her out and she is troubled in the night by an array of gurning expressions floating above her bed.

This use of superimposition is slickly done, but much of the action is staged on theatrical sets and filmed in mid-shot with a static camera. In Turner and Trimble's defence, George Nichols proved no more adventurous in A Film Johnnie, which was made at Mack Sennett's legendary Keystone Studio and starred Charlie Chaplin in only his sixth picture. However, this offers an intriguing insight into movie-going in 1914, as the Little Fellow goes to see his favourite star, The Keystone Girl (Peggy Pearce), in a Civil War melodrama and gets so lost in the action that he annoys those sitting around him and is thrown out on his ear.

Determined to meet his idol, Chaplin goes to the studio and cadges some spare change from Roscoe `Fatty' Arbuckle, only to have it pinched by the tight-fisted Ford Sterling, as he arrives for work. Slipping through the street door, Chaplin finds himself in the middle of a bustling set and annoys director Edgar Kennedy when he ruins a take by trying to rescue Mabel Normand from her attacker. He causes more chaos with a prop pistol before hot-footing across town with the cast and crew in a cavalcade of cars to shoot the finale against a blaze that is about to be tackled the local fire brigade. Chaplin gets a soaking from a hose and wants nothing more to do with the movie business. But, of course, he was on the cusp of becoming the most recognisable face on earth, although his fame was almost matched in this country by Fred Evans, a fellow Londoner and music-hall alumnus who made slapstick and parodic shorts under the name `Pimple' with his co-director brother Joe for their Teddington-based company, Folly Films.

In many ways anticipating the anarchic humour of The Crazy Gang and The Goons, Lieutenant Pimple and the Stolen Submarine turned its budgetary limitations to its absurdist advantage by emphasising the cheapness of the sets and props, as Pimple is dispatched by the War Lord (played by Joe) to inspect a submarine that has been offered to the government by a budding inventor. Having climbed into the vessel (which is nothing more than a rowing boat with an obviously fake turret), Pimple and the inventor find themselves in a cavernous control room, where the crafty lieutenant negotiates a knockdown price. However, he entrusts the craft to some foreign spies and has to disguise himself as a diver in order to confront them. But, having defeated one agent in a hilarious underwater punch-up, Pimple gets himself locked in the sub and has to attach a hastily scribbled call for helps to a passing fish. He is mightily relieved when word comes that assistance is on its way, but he gets bored waiting and trudges back to the surface under his own steam. Without wasting a moment, he informs a handy admiral about the fleeing spies and they give chase down the Thames in a wonderfully homemade battleship.

At the height of their powers, the Evans brothers produced around six comedies a month. Yet, within two years of this inventive and mischievously self-reflexive romp, they started finding it more difficult to raise funding and Fred returned to the boards. The Pimple production line remained operational to the end of the war, but they only managed a couple more outings in the early 1920s and Fred scraped by as an extra before reuniting with Joe (who moved to America) to do his bit with a puppet show during the Second World War. Unfortunately, only a handful of Pimple films have survived. But there might just be an audience for them on DVD, alongside this apt and well-chosen selection.

The war centenary also explains the timing of the release of A Promise, an adaptation of Stefan Zweig's posthumously published novella, A Journey into the Past, which marks the English-language debut of the admired French director Patrice Leconte. Although he made his name with comedies like Les Bronzés (1978) and The Hairdresser's Husband (1990), Leconte has also produced such notable period pieces as Ridicule (1996) and The Widow of Saint-Pierre (2000). But the combination of the stilted dialogue composed with Jérôme Tonnerre and some anachronistic acting undermines the credibility of a melodrama that is further enervated by a complete lack of chemistry between the young leads.

Having been raised as a ward of state, Richard Madden graduates from university in 1912 and is hired as an engineer by Frankfurt steel tycoon Alan Rickman. Impressed by his willingness to work late, Rickman moves Madden into an adjoining office with secretary Maggie Steed and further promotes him after he attends to him during an after hours seizure. Swearing Madden to secrecy about his illness, Rickman uses him as a go-between while he recuperates and introduces him to his wife, Rebecca Hall, and their young son, Toby Murray.

Despite sleeping with laundress Shannon Tarbet at his tenement digs, Madden is instantly smitten with Hall and volunteers to tutor Murray in order to spend more time with her and listen to her divine piano playing. Hall is delighted with Murray's progress and buys him a train set as a reward. But Madden is insulted when she tries to give him a bonus and Rickman notices their exchange from an upper-storey window. However, he is aware of Madden's value to the company and is intrigued when he explains how they could turn a greater profit if they started importing manganese from Mexico. The pair discuss the prospective deal at an open door as they marvel at Hall's interpretation of Beethoven's Sonata Pathétique and Madden later sneaks into the drawing-room to sniff the piano keys, oblivious to the fact he is being watched by housemaid, Sarah Messens.

He is also unaware that Hall has paid a visit to his lodgings and is taken aback when Rickman offers him the post of private secretary and suggests that he moves into his home, so that he can always be on hand if required. Tarbet is appalled by Madden's social-climbing treachery and watches him depart in a chauffeur-driven car after a last night of passion. Despite claiming to value his independence, Madden follows meekly up the stairs as Hall shows him to his room and notes that she has placed her favourite painting on the wall.

Madden listens raptly as she chats happily during supper and is surprised to be left alone with her when Rickman retires early. Hall explains that her husband never eats dessert and reveals that she married him when her fiancé died in a climbing accident. She has never found the age gap a problem, but is glad to have a new companion to help her finish a jigsaw. Their hands touch as they examine the pieces and Madden boldly informs her that the portrait Rickman had commissioned does her an injustice, as is conveys so little of her beauty and spirit. Despite thrilling to the compliment, Hall remains outwardly calm as she bids Madden goodnight and he watches her silhouette through the drawn curtains as she gets ready for bed.

The following morning, he takes a reckless chance by sneaking into her bedroom to listen to her humming in her bath. But he tries to keep his mind on his duties at the steelworks and his tutorials with Murray. However, they are interrupted one afternoon by a scream and Hall is grateful when Madden disposes of a rat that has come in from the garden. Rickman notices the relationship developing between the pair, but contents himself with sardonically ambiguous remarks and stern glances from windows, as Hall and Madden play a game in the garden with Murray and she assures her guest that she would never cheat in order to win. Yet her heart skips a beat one rainy evening when Madden stops the car to offer Hall a lift and he blows on her cold hands as he rubs them for warmth. On their return, Rickman scolds them for making too much noise in the nursery and Hall complains that she hates being cooped up in a monastery.

Madden offers to escort her to a village fete and is pleased to be mistaken for Murray's father. They flirt while posing for a photograph and stroll in the park after momentarily panicking that the boy had got lost. He dances with his mother in a lakeside pavilion and Madden looks on indulgently, while imagining holding Hall in his own arms. But Tarbet is less than impressed with his fixation and passes a crude comment about the boss's missus when she returns the few belongings that Madden had left at his old address.

Yet Rickman lends Madden a tuxedo so that he can accompany Hall to the theatre, where he gazes on her neck through his opera glasses and feels suitably emboldened to ask why they keep denying the obvious love between them. Hall is dismayed by his lack of tact and they drive home in silence. But Hall summons Madden when Rickman has an attack in the night and thanks him the following morning for the prompt action that saved her husband's life and delivered her from a fate worse than death.

While Rickman is confined to bed, he breaks the news to Madden that the bank has agreed to finance their Mexican venture. But he wishes him to manage the mine and Madden is left with little alternative but to accept the posting when Rickman asks if there are any personal reasons to prevent him from spending two years in Vera Cruz. Hall has to choke back the tears when Madden tells her he is leaving and he is distraught when she confesses that she will struggle to live without him. He tries to kiss her cheek, but Hall rushes away and resists a further attempt to embrace her while she is arranging some flowers. She suggests that they should take a vow to remain faithful to one another during his sojourn and wait to see if their feelings are still the same when he returns. Madden reluctantly agrees before the sound of a smashing vase brings Rickman running and Hall has to reassure him that Madden had been helping her capture a rodent

Murray is excited that Madden is going on an adventure and has him point out Mexico on his globe. But Hall can barely listen and, after supper, she breaks up her completed jigsaw in frustration. Madden drops to his knees to pick up the pieces from the floor and Hall gasps when he touches her ankle. However, she stops him from going any higher and flees to her room, where Madden watches her letting her hair down in silhouette while cherishing the face piece he has purloined from her puzzle.

On their last night together, Madden surprises butler Jean-Louis Sbille by moving his place setting closer to Hall. But they are interrupted by Rickman coming to wish his protégé bon voyage and he taunts them both by lighting a cigar and declaring that he has decided to indulge his pleasures while he still has the chance. Hall watches Madden's train depart the following morning and immediately begins a secret correspondence that requires her to open a post office box under an assumed name. She finally admits to her feelings, while Madden insists that he envies the paper on which he writes, as it will soon be held in her hands. But she lives in constant fear of Rickman discovering the box of letters on the top of her wardrobe and is crushed when he reveals that he has had a letter from Madden revealing that he almost died from a bout of fever.

But Hall retains her dignity when war breaks out and the missives stop coming after a Christmas postcard to the entire family announces that a naval blockade will delay Madden's return by six months. She continues to write even though her letters are returned unopened and Rickman has to console her when she wakes in the night in a cold sweat of fear. As the years pass, Hall tells her lover how Rickman fell ill after the steelworks were requisitioned and how she decided to send Murray to boarding school after his father's funeral. But she struggles to endure the pain of Rickman telling her on his deathbed that he had initially hoped to bring her and Madden together, but had sent him away because he could not bear the fact that he had so completely replaced him in her affections.

Indeed, so great is Hall's anguish that she scarcely seems to care when Germany loses the war and the Weimar Republic is proclaimed. Yet, six years after Madden's departure, she receives a phone call asking if he can visit. Hall throws open the curtains and abandons the mourning clothes she had been wearing for her lost love rather than her husband. She even has Sbille cut her hair in the latest style and can barely contain herself when Madden approaches through the mist the next day.

He explains that he has returned on business, as he now owns a chemical fertiliser plant and needs some contracts signing. Hall tries to make polite conversation, but flinches when he states that his greatest regret was being abroad while his compatriots were being slaughtered. He apologies for the prolonged silence and promises that he did send a letter after the Armistice. But Hall is simply glad that he is alive and that he world is now at peace. She tells him that Murray is studying geography at university and wishes to be an explorer. However, they finally get round to addressing the subject of their promise.

Madden slots the missing face piece into Hall's jigsaw and admits that he has slept with several women since they last met. But Hall concedes that men have needs and assures him that she does not hold his infidelities against him. They take a train and concur that it has taken a good deal of time for them to reach their destination. Yet all the hotels are booked because of a veterans' parade and Madden allows the desk clerk to think that a scar on his hand was incurred at the front. As the room is being cleaned, however, they go for a walk to the pavilion where Hall had danced with Murray on the day of their idyllic outing. As she gazes out across the lake, Madden touches her neck and places an arm around her shoulder. He nuzzles her and she makes him vow never to leave her again, as they turn to kiss.

Stefan Zweig started writing Journey into the Past in the 1920s and returned periodically to polish the prose before his death in 1942. The story remained unpublished until it appeared in a German collected works in 1976 and it has since divided critics between those who consider it a fine example of the Austrian's refined intensity and those who believe it to be a little stale. However, one suspects that Leconte and Tonnerre have done little to persuade many to seek out the original, as this is an airless interpretation whose flaws extend well beyond any latitude that one might grant a script being written in a second language.

The dialogue frequently rings hollow, but it hardly helps that Hall and Madden deliver it in a modern manner that exposes its gaucheness. Hall has several costume roles to her credit and it is surprising that she misses the fin de siècle feel by such a margin. Yet the usually reliable Rickman also seems a little wayward and their combined imprecision and lack of passion leaves the miscast Madden floundering, as he tries to keep up. The scene in which he and Rickman eavesdrop on Hall playing Beethoven is particularly excruciating, but Madden is no more convincing when arguing with Tarbet or giving orders to foremen and chauffeurs. However, it is the absence of a spark between the lovers that proves most ruinous, although Leconte must share the blame here, as he fails to convey any interiority as the characters declaim and shuffle around Ivan Maussion sets whose effectiveness (like that of Pascaline Chavanne's costumes) is seriously undermined by the usually impeccable Eduardo Serra's flatly lit digital imagery. Even Gabriel Yared's score seems to prolong the agony of a picture that owes nothing to life and does a severe disservice to its source.

Another French director falls wide of the mark with Mood Indigo, as Michel Gondry sets himself the near impossible task of filming Boris Vian's cult novel, L'Écume des jours. This love story-cum-satirical jibe at postwar Parisian intellectuals was coolly reviewed on its original publication in 1947. But it slowly started to acquire a following in the 1960s and became a set text in schools. However, each reader created their own impressions of its futuristic pastiches, romantic interludes and flights of fancy and, thus, Gondry faces the same problem of imposing his own vision on preconceived notions that confounded Charles Belmont in Spray of the Days (1968) and Go Riju in Kuroe (2001).

Indeed, as is often the case, those unfamiliar with the text will be at something of an advantage, as they have no preconceptions to disappoint. But, while Gondry and co-scenarist Luc Bossi strive to remain as faithful to Vian as possible, the decision to relocate the action to the present day leaves some of the more outré imaginings looking quaintly antiquated, while the over-reliance on visual effects distracts Gondry from the core story, which encapsulates the poignant pessimism that gave Vian's writing its niche.

Colin (Romain Duris) lives in a rooftop apartment with his lawyer-cum-cook Nicolas (Omar Sy), who gets personalised tips from the TV chef Gouffé (Alain Chabat), who occasionally reaches through the screen to hand him ingredients. Somewhere in a cavernous room, Colin's life is being copied from a book by a phalanx of typists working on a never-ending conveyor belt, while a mouse (Sacha Bourdo), who resides in an exact model of Colin's house, scurries around an apartment that seems to have a life of its own (particularly the doorbell, which scuttles off like a cockroach each time it is rung).

A leisured man of means, Colin is expecting a visit from his friend Chick (Gad Elmaleh) and tracks him down to a bookshop using a Heath Robinson version of Google that is operated by little people who resemble the Numbskulls that will be familiar to ageing readers of The Beezer and younger fans of The Beano and The Dandy. Chick is a devotee of philosopher Jean-Sol Partre (Philippe Torreton) and spends most of his money on his writings and memorabilia. But Colin is less in thrall and is impatient to show off his pianococktail machine, which determines the content and potency of each drink by the mood and intensity of the melody being played on its keyboard.

Chick has fallen for Alise (Aïssa Maïga), who just happens to be Nicolas's niece, and Colin feels a bit left out because Nicolas is in a relationship with Isis (Charlotte Le Bon). However, as they are all invited to Isis's party that night, Nicolas offers to help Colin make a good impression with the ladies by showing him how to dance the biglemoi. He places Duke Ellington's `Chloe' on the souped-up record player, which sends oscillating coloured circles across the room as Nicolas demonstrates how to infeasibly elongate his legs in time to the music. Colin leans back and lets gravity take over and his legs still have a corkscrewy feel to them a few hours later, as he chases his puppyish shoes down the stairs to head off to the soirée.

Having presented Isis with a gift for her dog, Colin is introduced to Chloé (Audrey Tautou), who laughs when he almost chokes on a snack in his klutzy bid to appear suave. However, Nicolas spares him further embarrassment by getting everyone to do the biglemoi and Colin feels himself falling under Chloé's spell as devises her own steps so that they can dance cheek to cheek. Yet, the following day, Colin confides in Chick that he is not sure that Chloé would even recognise him again. But Nicolas has everything under control and serves a large cake containing a capsule concealing a note informing Colin that he has a date with Chloé in his favourite part of Paris in two hours time.

Momentarily unsure where to go, Colin hits upon Les Halles, even though it is essentially a construction site because a hole has inexplicably opened up beneath the old market place. They link arms and Chloé compliments Colin on his sense of humour as they wander around. He suggests they take a ride in a cloud-shaped pod that is lifted high above the streets on a crane and Chloé makes up a song about Colin's name. She is taken aback by his indelicate remark about two naked women in the back of a car, but accompanies him into a railway tunnel full of bird cages. Moreover, even though she thinks it's a bit premature, she allows him to kiss her as they sit on a park bench.

The cloud takes their photograph, which bears the legend `Six months later' on the back and the action resumes with the now inseparable Colin and Chloé enjoying a huge breakfast before they go ice-skating at the Molitor rink. The tannoy is operated by a giant crow and Colin finds himself in the middle of a pile-up caused by a figure in red trying to snag an object flying overhead. Chloé confides in Chick and Alise that she wants to marry Colin, but doubts he has the courage to propose. But he pops the question as they are carried away on stretchers after another collision and Chloé is overjoyed.

On their wedding day, Chloé sends the mouse to check that Colin is coping with the pressure and it seems as though Chick has everything under control. However, en route to Saint-Eustache, he sees a Partre mannequin in a shop window and insists on stopping to buy it. Colin arrives at the steps of the church and is informed by the priest (Vincent Rottiers) that he and Chloé will have to race with Chick and Alise in model cars to see who wins the right to marry and the couples zoom along the aisles while a robot-cum-spaceship flies above them depositing a figure on a parachute. Fortunately, Colin and Chloé prevail and they kiss underwater before Nicolas sweeps them away for a honeymoon along the Sunshine Road.

They drive through a rainbow and stop to picnic. Yet, while Chloé sits in sunlight, Colin is drenched by a split-screen downpour and they rush to a nearby hotel, where owner's daughter Tilly Scott Pedersen invites them to a party. Colin lifts Chloé and tosses her upwards so that she flies to the balcony outside their room and everything seems idyllic. But, as they sleep, something blows through the window and settles in Chloé's chest.

Chick takes Alise to a Partre conference and takes a tumble while trying to record his speech. Alise is growing tired of her boyfriend's obsession, but she has more things to worry about, as Chloé is unwell. She threatens to slap anyone who frets, but Nicolas and the mouse notice that less light is coming through the apartment windows, while Colin realises that the expensive remedies produced by the pharmacist (Natacha Régnier) are starting to eat into his fortune. Yet Chloé remains in good spirits and slaps Colin and Chick when she feigns pain during a day out. She sends the boys to Molitor, while she goes shopping with Alise and Isis. But she faints and Colin has to dash across the city (whose walls seem to close in on him as he runs with such recklessness that his shadow is hit by a car) in order to console her and reassure her that he doesn't regret marrying her for a second.

Dr Mangemanche (Michel Gondry) comes to examine Chloé the next day and informs Colin that she has some strange music on her lung and needs to come to his surgery for tests. He tries to cheer Colin up by showing him a picture of his own wife and is insulted when he bursts out laughing. But he has little reason to smile when Chick asks to borrow the 25,000 doublezoons he needs to purchase Partre's pipe and trousers, as well as a book that bears the indentation of his thumb on its pages. Moreover, the tiny metal pellets produced by a wired-up rabbit at the pharmacy cost a packet and Colin has to face the awful prospect of getting a job.

Chloé is reluctant to swallow the wriggling pills and asks Colin to make love to her. She claims to feel better, but is evidently weak as they walk to Mangemanche's surgery, where he x-rays Chloé and finds a water lily on her lung. He informs them that she can only drink two spoonfuls of water a day and has to be surrounded by flowers in the hope that they can drive the lily away. They return home in silence, but Nicolas offers to help pick up the flowers that will be needed to fill Chloé's sick room. Aided by the florist (Louise Mast), Colin makes his selection from the rows of rotating displays inside the shop, while Alise watches in amazement as the bunch she brings Chloé wilts when placed uoon her breast. She is also surprised to see that Nicolas has aged from 32 to 47 and that the difference is even reflected in his passport.

Meanwhile, Colin tries to find a job and loses his temper when his chair keeps collapsing during an interview. He has more luck at an armaments factory, where the boss (Zinedine Soualem) hires him to lie naked on a metal seed mound that is used to grow weapons. Despite missing Chloé, who has gone to a clinic in the country, Colin fires the rapidly ageing Nicolas because he can no longer afford his wages and refuses to allow him to stay on for free. He even sells the pianococktail to Duke Ellington (Kid Creole) and gets drunk as he plays a series of sentimental songs.

Indeed, the world is becoming an increasingly colourless and smaller place without Chloé, who is allowed to return home after Mangemanche removes the lily (but warns Colin that her left lung could easily become infected). Realising that Colin is strapped for cash after being fired for producing guns with rubbery barrels, Mangemanche waives a portion of his fee. Such is his desperation that Colin gets a job working his own book in the hope amending the plotline, but he cannot keep up with the speed of the passing typewriters and succeeds in only causing chaos.

Chloé is aware that her time is short and urges Colin to find happiness with Alise. But she has lost patience with Chick and exacts fiery revenge upon Partre for alienating his affections. Colin lands a job with `the administration' that involves warning people of imminent medical problems. However, he is distraught when he sees Chloé's death listed on his charge sheet and screams in despair during a dismally rainy night as he lifts her from her bed of flowers and she passes away in an ever-shrinking room.

The priest insists that he can only offer a pauper's funeral and Nicolas and Alise support Colin as the coffin is tossed into a mass grave. He shoots angrily at the surface of a lake with one of his bendy guns and the apartment begins to fold in on itself. However, the mouse rescues one of Chloé's drawings and takes it to the typing pool where it becomes part of an illustrated book whose pages are animated to show the happier moments of Colin and Chloé's romance, as the picture ends.

Heavily indebted to production designer Stéphane Rosenbaum, cinematographer Christophe Beaucarne and Julien Poncet de la Grave and his stop-motion and digital effects teams, Gondry had clearly revisited some of his past Björk promos and the Jim Carrey-Kate Winslet dramedy Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004) in order to approximate the world envisaged by Boris Vian. Yet he only partially succeeds in carrying the viewer along with him, as the dazzling visual panoply ultimately fails to disguise the fact that the characterisation is as wafer thin as a storyline that is frequently swamped by eccentricity and affectation.

Despite being too old for the role of Colin, Romain Duris is his usual charming self. Yet, while he charges through the action with the assurance of a sleepwalker, his co-stars often seen bemused by what is going on. Elmaleh and Maiga are particularly ill-served by the Partre subplot, which makes far less sense on screen than it does on the page, as Vian was a notable opponent of Jean-Paul Sartre and his brand of Existentialism, which he parodied with ruthless precision, along with the Army and the Catholic Church. But the typecast Tautou is the one left highest and driest by another elfin variation on Amélie Poulain that stubbornly refuses to come to life, in spite of the actress's winsomely best efforts.

Most ruinous, however, is Gondry's Gilliamesque decision to plump for stylistic overload over discreet selectivity, as Vian's delicately tragic love stories becomes increasingly baffling and exhausting, as Gondry stuffs it with preening instances of his imagination and ingenuity that seem to have been designed less to complement the narrative than to gainsay those who claim that source is unfilmable. Thus, even though there are odd moments of inspiration, Gondry repeatedly prioritises excess over emotion and, as a result, this is anything but `Froth on a Daydream'.

Spaniard Jorge Dorado also succumbs to the temptation to let the SFX do the heavy lifting in Mindscape, the first picture produced by Jaume Collet-Serra for his Ombra Films company. The horror genre has been thriving in Spain for the past 15 years and Dorado doubtlessly picked up a few tips while assisting Guillermo del Toro on The Devil's Backbone (2001) at the start of a lengthy apprenticeship that also saw him make a number of shorts. But, while it's solidly played and strewn with twists and red herrings, this slick, but slight chiller scripted by Guy and Martha Holmes lacks the necessary Hispanic ambience and feels far too calculated in its effort to appeal to mainstream global audiences.

Two years after failing to prevent wife Frida Palsson from committing suicide in the bath at their beach house, psychic detective Mark Strong reassures Mindscape boss Brian Cox that he is fit to resume his duties. The TV news playing in the corner of the office is dominated by the trial of dissembling senator Julio Perillán and the newsreader helpfully explains that Cox's company specialises in exploiting mind-reading techniques that were perfected for the US government in the 1970s and allow agents to become eye witnesses to past events by infiltrating memories.

Cox offers Strong a straightforward case to ease him back to work. But it quickly becomes clear that the reasons for 16 year-old Taissa Farmiga's refusal to eat go much deeper than mother Saskia Reeves and stepfather Richard Dillane imagine. Strong subjects Farmiga to a series of tests to discern whether she has sociopathic tendencies, but she is smart enough to realise what he is doing and he is sufficiently impressed to promise to help her so that she can devote herself to her art. As he leaves, Strong meets Indira Varma, who monitors Farmiga's every move on a bank of CCTV screens. But he is frustrated that Reeves and Dillane refuse to allow him access to the complete case file and is slightly taken aback when his first visit to Farmiga's subconscious reveals that not only are Dillane and Varma lovers, but that Reeves once cut her daughter's hand during a fight over a letter opener.

Strong is so pleased with Farmiga's level of co-operation, however, that he agrees to let her see a photograph of his wife if she shares a sandwich with him. He reports news of her progress to Reeves and also asks Varma for a date. But, as he walks her home, Strong thinks he sees Farmiga spying on them from a street corner and his concerns mount the following morning when he learns that Varma has been hospitalised after being pushed down a stairwell. Farmiga insists that Dillane is trying to frame her, as she stands to inherit a large sum of money from her father and Dillane will assume control of it if he succeeds in demonstrating that his stepdaughter is insane.

More anxious than ever to help her child, Reeves agrees to hand over the entire case file and Strong watches footage of Farmiga answering questions with surprising self-assurance after a suicide bid. He also discovers that she was involved in a scandal with photography teacher Alberto Ammann and persuades her to revist her schooldays during their next session. He sees her being bullied by Antonia Clarke and her clique after being befriended by class misfit Jessica Barden and notes how she responds to Ammann's coy flirtation. However, Strong suspects that Farmiga is faking her memories when he notices a stopped clock in a corridor as she relives how she wormed her way into Clarke's good books by pretending to know nothing about the alcohol she had stolen from the principal's quarters.

Keen to find out what really happened at the school, Strong visits Ammann in prison and he avers that Farmiga is a predator who seemed to delight in exploiting his weakness and ruining his life. Having cast doubts over Barden's existence, Clarke also suggests that Farmiga was anything but a victim by showing Strong a hole in her throat. He confronts Farmiga with his discoveries and she shows him a signed photograph of herself with Barden before reliving the moment when Clarke and her friends were poisoned and Farmiga blamed Barden for lacing the tea to get back at her for dumping her in favour of the cool kids.

Farmiga sketches Strong's portrait and writes at the bottom that he is her safe place. However, he feels convinced that he is being watched in his apartment and also senses that someone is following him when he gets an unidentified call from the Dillane household in the middle of the night and he snoops around the grounds to investigate. The next morning, Strong slips into Dillane's study and notices a rose woven into the rug that resembles the ones Farmiga is always drawing. However, Dillane catches him and asks him to leave, while assuring him that he has not hired anyone to tail him.

Strong returns to Farmiga's room and is disturbed to discover that she has acquired the ability to slip out of her memories without him noticing. Yet he fails to spot that she also managed to merge a vision of a developing bath overflowing in the school darkroom with Palsson's suicide and, when Strong questions her about Ammann, she insists that he was harmless and that the pictures he took of her were artistic rather than pornographic. Following a visit to the beach house to take it off the market, Strong calls on Cox and asks if he ever treated Farmiga at her home. He has no recollection of ever doing so, but Strong is appalled during the next session when he sees Cox approaching the young Farmiga (played by Eliza Bateman) in her stepfather's office with the seeming intention of sexually abusing her..

Naturally, Cox denies the charge when Strong accuses him during a dinner party. But Strong is convinced that this incident lies behind Farmiga's eating disorder and he assures Reeves that her daughter is cured. Farmiga certainly seems brighter when Strong pays her a final visit and she gives him a key as a keepsake of their time together. However, as he packs away the documentation in his office, he hears Senator Perillán reminding TV reporters of the dangers of accepting evidence on face value and Strong suddenly wonders whether he has been duped, as he notices the similarity between Barden and Farmiga's handwriting, discovers the lie about Barden hidden in the class yearbook and examines again the photographs planted on Ammann's computer.

Strong's mind is already racing when he receives a call from Farmiga begging him to come over and he arrives at the sprawling house to find the front door open. He goes inside, but no one answers his calls and he enters the surveillance room to check the CCTV footage. The door locks behind him and on one of the screens he sees Farmiga leaning over Reeves's prostrate body before the power fails. Finding his way on to the landing, Strong calls the police and seems not to notice as he treads in a small pool of blood in his bid to chase after the retreating Farmiga. He loses her in the woods and is taken aback when she comes up behind him and whispers an apology in his ear before clasping his hands. As he turns to see her disappear, Strong is arrested by armed cops and realises that Farmiga has framed him for her murder.

Pointing out that the key found in Strong's possession opens the surveillance room door, detective Rod Hallett is unconvinced by his pleas of innocence and taunts Strong that he is going to spend the rest of his life behind bars. But mind detective Noah Taylor assures Strong that he has seen enough in his memories to be able to testify at his appeal, even though the courts don't always accept Mindscape evidence. Cox promises Strong that everything will be done to help him. But his cause is greatly aided when Farmiga sends a photograph of herself holding a dated newspaper to prove she is still alive and she looks directly into the camera as she leaves a florist's having just sent her deliverer a single red rose.

As the action closes, Strong watches the new occupants of the beach house enjoying their lives and calls on Varma to see if she is open to a second date. However, few viewers will be satisfied by this ending, which makes too neat a job of tying up the loose ends. Indeed, it feels like the duplicitous climax to the Family Guy two-parter in which it is revealed that Stewie had merely been running a simulation to see what would happen if he tried to kill Lois. The debuting sibling scenarists more likely had Jonathan Demme's The Silence of the Lambs (1991) and Christopher Nolan's Inception (2010) uppermost in their minds when they devised the storyline, but Dorado simply doesn't have the budget or the experience to carry off that level of narrative legedemain or audiovisual panache.

He is ably served by production designer Alain Bainée, cinematographer Óscar Faura and editor Jaime Valdueza, who begins each memory jaunt with a taut flash montage filled with teasing images. However, the tale is often told with all the booming subtlety of Lucas Vidal's score and few will have difficulty in picking up on the clues that Strong conveniently seems to miss with disconcerting regularity. He lacks the vulnerability to convince entirely as a man still processing a major trauma, but he combines well with the 19 year-old Farmiga, whose composure and furtive ferocity make her seem both sympathetic and psychotic.

Little is asked of the supporting cast, but they acquit themselves admirably in what is never anything less than engaging entertainment. But genre aficionados tend to expect a little more originality and a lot more complexity and this is why they will also struggle to find much to commend in Adam Wimpenny's debut feature, Blackwood. As the Yorkshireman cut his teeth on such TV comedy shows as Ant & Dec's Saturday Night Takeaway, Lee Nelson's Well Good Show, Strutter and The Revolution Will Be Televised, an old-fashioned English ghost story might seem a bit of a stretch. But Wimpenny has learned how to suspend disbelief while working on Derren Brown: Trick or Treat and The Real Hustle and it is less his big-screen inexperience than the unpersuasiveness of the central performance that prevents first-timer JS Hill's script from seizing the attention.

Little is asked of the supporting cast, but they acquit themselves admirably in what is never anything less than engaging entertainment. But genre aficionados tend to expect a little more originality and a lot more complexity and this is why they will also struggle to find much to commend in Adam Wimpenny's debut feature, Blackwood. As the thirtysomething Yorkshireman cut his teeth on pop promos and commercials, as well as such TV comedy shows as Ant & Dec's Saturday Night Takeaway, Lee Nelson's Well Good Show and The Revolution Will Be Televised, an old-fashioned English ghost story might seem a bit of a stretch. But Wimpenny has learnt how to suspend disbelief while working on Derren Brown: Trick or Treat and The Real Hustle and it is less his big-screen inexperience than the unpersuasiveness of the central performance that prevents first-timer JS Hill's script from seizing the attention.

Recovering from a nervous breakdown and the ensuing scandal that cost him his cushy living at Oxford, tele-historian Ed Stoppard accepts a position at a provincial university and reassures superior Sebastian Dunn that he is back to his brilliant best, even though he now plans to put family first. He is shown around a remote manor house in the country by estate agent Kenneth Collard and moves into Blackwood with wife Sophia Myles and their young son, Isaac Andrews.

Myles is concerned that they can't afford such a big place and is slightly unnerved by some of the bric-a-brac left behind by the previous occupant. But Stoppard is more concerned by gamekeeper Russell Tovey, a war veteran suffering from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, who keeps hovering around the house in a vaguely sinister daze. Moreover, Stoppard is more than a little put out when vicar Paul Kaye (himself a former services chaplain) leaps to his friend's defence when asked about the rumours that he killed his wife and child.

Shortly after term begins, Stoppard receives a visit from geneticist pal Greg Wise, who is in the area to conduct some research with PhD student, Joanna Vanderham. Stoppard ticks him off for sleeping with his assistants and implies that he is a bad influence he is glad to be away from. But Myles is pleased to have the company, as she has clearly found Stoppard's fall from grace exceedingly stressful and feels more than a little isolated in her new home.

Yet Myles hears nothing when a stopped grandfather clock chimes in the night and Stoppard is disturbed by knocking noises and the sight of a bloodied hand reaching up to the bedside table. A car crash and a power failure do nothing to soothe his nerves and he becomes convinced that the house is haunted by Tovey's victims when he is terrified by the sight of a boy in a wooden owl mask clutching a machete outside the bedroom door.

Certain that the neighbours are hiding the truth to protect Tovey, Stoppard vows to find out more about the case and is sure he is on the right track when he snoops around Tovey's hut and finds a photograph of a mother and son. Yet, while he leaps to conclusions while conducting his investigation, Stoppard is quick to caution his students against filling in the gaps left by history. He also reminds them that the past is key to the future, as its lessons prevent humanity from endlessly repeating the same mistakes.

But Stoppard appears to have learnt little from his recent experiences and shortly after he sees a shadowy figure lingering in an upper window, Andrews informs him that he has found an elusive playmate. Now sure that Kaye is conspiring to protect Tovey from answering for his crime, Stoppard convinces himself that he also means to murder Myles and Andrews. But his mind is becoming ever-more unbalanced and when Wise pays a return visit, Stoppard kills him for flirting with Myles. Desperate to protect Andrews, as his father goes on the rampage with a bill-hook, Myles lures Stoppard into the basement and succeeds in electrocuting him on the wet floor, as it becomes apparent that what his tormented mind has been experiencing was not a series of hauntings, but premonitions.

Predating the first moving images, the old dark house story has long been a cinematic staple and Wimpenny and Hill (a 3-D artist by trade) deserve credit for trying to approach its gothic tropes from a slightly different angle. Reuniting after the 2009 short, Roar (which also starred Tovey), the pair audaciously open with a roving shot of a dusty abandoned property whose eerie silence is suddenly shattered by the chiming of a seemingly broken clock. Indeed, they have evidently done their homework in trying to put a horror spin on Joseph Losey's Accident (1967), as the influence of Jack Clayton's The Innocents (1961), Robert Wise's The Haunting (1963), Nicolas Roeg's Don't Look Now (1973) and John Hough's Watcher in the Woods (1980) is evident throughout.

But, while he keeps Doctor Who alumnus Dale McCready's camera moving around Michael Howells's atmospheric sets, Wimpenny soon proves over-reliant on editors Stephen Haren and Colin Sumsion to provide periodic jolts to atone for the lack of sustained suspense. He finds no solution, however, to the problem of Stoppard's inertia and, as a consequence, the stiff superciliousness that proved so resistible in the revival of Upstairs Downstairs prevents the audience from empathising with what should have been an unbearable plight. Indeed, saddled with some woeful dialogue, Wimpenny struggles with the actorly tone throughout and it's perhaps unsurprising that the most interesting performances come from previous collaborators, Tovey and Kaye, with whom he worked on the MTV show, Strutter.

He does seem, however, to have a keen ear for music, as Lorne Balfe's orchestral score is the best thing about the picture. Yet, while Wimpenny's shortcomings as a storyteller are exposed a little too often for comfort, he proves himself to be an accomplished stylist and it will be interesting to see how his sophomore outing, The Mandrake Experiment, turns out.

Although he has amassed some impressive credits after working in the theatre, television and film for over four decades, Gareth Evans has only directed two features and they form the first parts of a trilogy exploring the connection between creativity and libido. While Desire (2009) considered the terrors of writer's block, Delight examines the ethics of combat journalism and the psychological scars that reporting from a war zone can have on those trying to build a future while haunted by the past. As the son of a former BBC Foreign Correspondent and the author of a Cambridge doctoral thesis entitled Rites of Recuperation: Film and the Holocaust in Germany and the Balkans, Jones brings a unique insight to this troubling topic, which was recently tackled with a disappointing lack of finesse by Norwegian Erik Poppe in A Thousand Times Good Night. But Jeanne Balibar proves no more persuasive as a traumatised photojournalist than compatriot Juliette Binoche and, consequently, this earnest drama lacks the personal and the political power to spark debate.

While spending a rainy night in a tent in the hills behind Aberystwyth, French photojournalist Jeanne Balibar and children Pandora and Raphael Jones are grateful to be offered a room in the farmhouse owned by her colleague and erstwhile lover, Rupert Allan. However, Balibar is shocked to learn from his son, Gavin Fowler, that Allan has shot himself and she finds herself unable to resist when Fowler attempts to seduce her, even though she has known him since he was a boy. Their canoodling is viewed enviously through a half-open door by Naomi Everson, who helps take care of Fowler's grandmother, Sue Jones-Davies, who is suffering from dementia.

Balibar wakes the following morning to find the kids helping Fowler tow her broken-down Mini back to the farm. They are watched by Allan's ghost as they visit his final resting place beside a stream and Balibar returns to the house to pack up her stuff after she receives a frosty reception from Fowler's mother, Eiry Thomas. He is keen for Balibar to stay and tries to pin her down on his bed. But he refuses to allow her into the room containing Allan's archive and it is only after she discovers that Fowler is a talented artist and they have another cuddle in the barn that she decides to stay for a few days.

The children are excited by the prospect of exploring the countryside and Fowler takes them fishing with nets in a nearby river. Balibar takes her camera everywhere and snaps incessantly, even rolling on to her back in order to snap some RAF jets on training flights overhead. Back at the farm, Pandora lets slip that they are on the run from their journalist father, Tim Dutton, and Fowler tries to pry into Balibar's private life as they lie in bed. But she is more interested in Allan's secret room and persuades Fowler to let her inside. She finds footage of Allan in the field and recalls the last time she saw him, when he went after a story that she considered ill-advised.

During an expedition to a ruined castle the next day, Fowler teaches Balibar to draw and they kiss passionately and continue their love-making back in the barn where he keeps his canvases. But Allan's spectre is forever lingering and Fowler asks which of them she prefers as he sketches the children fishing off a bridge. They call Fowler to help when they catch something and Balibar is left to ponder what she is doing. Yet, after a fresh fish lunch, Balibar tells Fowler that she loves him and hopes that he will be able to put up with the mood swings that she cannot help having because the memories of what she has witnessed creep up on her unexpectedly.

Their love-making is interrupted, however, when Pandora falls into the water and Fowler helps pull her out. That evening, Balibar feels the need to call Dutton from a payphone in the village and let him know they are safe. They go to the pub that Thomas runs with partner Iestyn Jones and Everson serves them with stiff politeness. Thomas is more amenable, even though Balibar's credit cards are refused, and she warns her that the worst thing she can do in trying to care for Fowler is to mother him.

Balibar is sure she knows Everson from somewhere and tries to apologise to her for stealing Fowler, but she wants nothing to do with her. Confused by her conflicting emotions, Balibar wanders into the sea during an idyllic day at the beach and Fowler has to abandon his painting to rescue her. But Dutton tracks them down the next day and tries to avoid a scene in the pub after it emerges that he is having an affair. Fowler struggles to keep his temper as Dutton and Balibar argue in the street and the kids tuck into sausage and chips.

Dutton and Balibar wander into the churchyard and he begs her to give him another chance, but she insists he has forgotten what love means. He also urges her not to throw her career away and reminds her that she is soon to be a witness at a war crimes trial and offers to use his status to protect her from the fallout. That night, Fowler asks how Balibar met Dutton and she explains that they had been covering the conflict in Chechnya together. Allan was sceptical about Dutton's motives, but Balibar says she was drifting apart from him because he kept crossing the line between reportage and disaster tourism and she shows Fowler video footage of his father at a sawmill where an execution was staged solely for the benefit of the cameras.

Balibar had walked away, but Allan had stayed and she is certain that the victims would have lived if he had not shown such bravura. Suddenly, Fowler realises that she has come for evidence to convict war criminals and he tries to console her when she cries tears of bitter regret. In the kitchen the following morning, Balibar tells Fowler that Everson resembles one of the sawmill victims and reveals that she feels them looking accusingly at her each night as she tries to sleep. But they are interrupted by Dutton, who has put in an offer to buy the farmhouse and Thomas orders Fowler to listen to his proposal.

As Balibar informs her children that she feels the need to return to the frontline a final time to conquer her demons, Everson takes pictures on her digital camera and Balibar finds the scrutiny hard to take. Dutton tells Fowler that Balibar suffers from PTSD and that he has no hope of curing her, as a trigger (like a vaguely incestuous sexual release) could set it off at any moment. He even suggests that she might be driven to suicide by the torment. But Dutton is also trying to protect his own position, as he knows the scandal that might follow any revelations at the Hague tribunal could taint him by association. Thus, he threatens Balibar that he will run his version of the story that night unless she comes home to play happy families. But Everson has reassured Balibar that she will eventually come to terms with what she has seen and she seizes the courage to stay, as Dutton is driven away by the distressed Jones-Davies firing a rifle into the air.

Up in Allan's bolthole, Balibar tells Fowler that she regrets getting him involved in such a mess. She confides that she could run away from her responsibilities by destroying the evidence, which she shows him for the first time. But he promises to stand beside her and support her through her ordeal and they make love that night, as Allan's spirit wanders away into the darkness.

In many ways, this feels like a grown ups version of Lisle Turner's Here and Now, as a conflicted soul comes to the country and finds destiny-changing answers in the company of a misunderstood stranger. Unfortunately, this well-meaning melodrama also shares many of the same flaws, as the big themes at issue are discussed in hollow-sounding platitudes by thinly drawn characters who never quite come to life. Yet, while some of the problems are embedded in Jones's screenplay (which keeps springing surprises rather than having them emerge organically from the action), his languid direction precludes any sense of jeopardy or suspense. Moreover, by having so many grave revelations come tumbling out after Dutton appears on the scene, Jones yanks the focus away from Balibar's psyche and romance and trains it on a ghastly incident whose wider domestic and geopolitical significance comes completely out of the blue.

It hardly helps, however, that Balibar is so unconvincing as the disquited heroine (who insists on being called Echo, even though her name is Emma). The close-ups of her darting eyes convey something of her guilt and grief, but she often feels more skittish than agonised and is far too secretive and capricious to invite easy empathy. Her compulsive snapping also feels like a contrivance, while her fling with Fowler never feels remotely authentic. Indeed, it is only when she gets to argue with Dutton about their failing marriage and his sham concern for her well-being that Balibar truly inhabits her character.

Alongside her, the support playing is committed but variable, as the various sub-plots fail to catch light. Similarly, cinematographer Alex Ryle too often reflects the beauty of the scenery without capturing its ambience, while the persistent tinkling of Fiona Howe's piano score (which receives choral accompaniment during the more intense moments) further attenuates the intended realist aura. Yet, while this never rings true, it retains the kind of sincerity that characterises Jon Sanders's work and it will be intriguing to see how the triptych ends with Delirium (aka Denial), a tale of academic lust and idealism that is due to shoot some time this year.

Another bucolic locale proves to be less than idyllic in Daniel Patrick Carbone's Hide Your Smiling Faces, an assured debut feature that takes its cues in recreating the wonder and woes of American adolescence from the works of David Gordon Green, Jeff Nichols and Jordan Vogt-Roberts. Opening with a deeply disconcerting shot of a snake attempting to swallow a fish whole, this is both a paean to the marvels of nature and the resilience of youth and an oblique treatise on mortality and the unknowability of existence. Truthfully played by the young cast and evocatively photographed to capture the subtle shades of summer, this has an unsettling somnambulance that prompts the viewer into filling in the narrative gaps both during the screening and for several hours afterwards.

Fourteen year-old Nathan Varnson and his nine year-old brother, Ryan Jones, have moved to a new house on the New Jersey/Delaware border with their parents, Christina Starbuck and Chris Kies, and their faithful dog, Daisy. Although clearly still suffering from the culture shock of relocating to a rustic location, the boys have found a friend in Ivan Tomic, who lives with his alcoholic father, Colm O'Leary, on the edge of the woods. When not exploring with Tomic and learning that the animal kingdom is often much crueller than human society, Varnson joins Thomas Cruz and his pals in wrestling bouts that often become quite boisterous.

These fights are unsupervised, as the adults seem to trust their children to discover the harsh realities of life for themselves. But, when Tomic finds a gun in the outhouse and shows it to Varnson and Jones, he is subjected to a furious tirade by O'Leary. Shortly afterwards, Varnson and Cruz spot Tomic's body while sitting on a disused railway viaduct and the brothers have their suspicions about O'Leary, even though the official version at the funeral is that Tomic slipped and fell while playing.

A few days later, O'Leary brings Daisy home on a lead and tells Starbuck that he will shoot her if he finds her on his land again. Jones is angry that a bad man can threaten his pet and, when the siblings find various dead animals in the forest, they decide to teach O'Leary a lesson by leaving a cat carcass on his doorstep. An afternoon or so later, they row a boat into the middle of a lake and Varnson pushes his brother into the water in an act of tough love to prove to Jones that he can swim.

Even though he gets bored listening to him forever musing about death (and even contemplating suicide) Varnson also hangs out with Cruz and they seek to counter the boredom of living in a backwater by stealing from a drive-in burger bar. Jones has his own friendship with Andrew M. Chamberlain and they practice kissing on each other through a sheet of cling film. However, Jones is left to his own devices when Daisy disappears and he is mightily relieved when his panicked search through the woods culminates in him finding the dog tied to a concrete block at the side of the road. He tells Varnson what has happened and he plots to wreak his revenge on O'Leary by tossing the slab through the window of his house and going on a smashing rampage inside. However, while he is preoccupied, Jones slips away and steals the gun from the shed.

Unsurprisingly, the boys get a telling off from their parents. But Varnson wakes Jones in the night and they ride off on his bike to the viaduct, where they camp out for two nights. They discuss whether Tomic's death was an accident or whether O'Leary might have pushed him. Jones reveals that he has taken the gun and Varnson admires his pluck. They find a dead racoon and Varnson tosses it on the bonfire. But Jones insists they give it a proper burial.

Nothing is said about their vanishing act when the brothers get home and Jones goes for an outing with Daisy. She runs behind his bike and he throws her into the water when they reach the lake and is proud of her when she swims to the shore. Varnson meets up with Cruz at the outdoor wrestling club and learns that he has been badmouthing him and saying that he lacks the nerve to take his own life. The pair fight and each loses his temper as the bout descends into a brawl. However, everyone is astonished when Varnson pulls out O'Leary's gun and holds it to Cruz's temple.

He walks away, leaving Cruz and his cabal to accuse him of being a psycho. As he marches through the woods, however, Varnson comes across an inquisitive bear cub. Trying not to show any fear, he stands still and lets the animal nuzzle his hand before it lollops away and the teenager struts home with quiet pride both at showing Cruz he is not a pushover and at demonstrating to himself that he has more courage than he suspected.

On his way home, Jones passes O'Leary's place and wanders inside. He is grabbed by the grieving father sitting in the dark and reaches into his haversack for the gun. However, he senses that O'Leary means him no harm and was probably surprised by the sight of a boy appearing from nowhere. The Irishman leans forward and strokes Jones's face and he apologises before jumping through the broken window and scarpering into the woods. It starts to rain and Jones realises that the summer is almost over. He looks up to the heavens and tries to catch the drops on his tongue, as, in spite of everything he has been through, he is still only a child.

Echoes of everything from Lord of the Flies to Stand By Me reverberate around this distinctive, intimate and yet poignantly universal rite of passage, as writer-director Daniel Patrick Carbone strives to capture the essence rather than the actuality of childhood innocence being tainted by experience. He is superbly served by feature first-timers Varnson and Jones, who behave like real brothers as they banter, bully and bond during a traumatic summer in which they learn much about themselves and the confusing world around them. Yet there is nothing sentimental about their adventures, which often recall the solemn deeds in René Clément's Jeux interdits (1952) and Bouli Lanners's Les Géants (2011) rather than the cosier, more formulaic coming-of-age sagas manufactured in Hollywood.

Acting as his own editor, Carbone imposes a leisurely pace on Nicholas Bentgen's mottle-verdant imagery, which is moodily counterpointed by Robert Donne's electro-acoustic score, which is forever alive to the thrill and dread of juvenile uncertainty. But what is most appealing about this low-key picture is its refusal either to make exalted pronouncements about growing pains or to push the protagonists towards epiphanal moments that will definitively shape their fates. Instead, Carbone sticks to the symbolism of his arresting opening image of the struggle to survive in the face of overwhelming odds.

Finally, this week comes Drew DeNicola and Olivia Mori's documentary Big Star: Nothing Can Hurt Me, which chronicles the career of a 1970s American band that has had an incalculable impact on the contemporary music scene even though it fell apart before it ever had chance to find its audience. Teenage Fanclub's Norman Blake, Hot Chip's Alexis Taylor, Matthew Sweet, Robyn Hitchcock, Lenny Kaye, Yo La Tengo's Ira Kaplan, Kliph Scurlock and Steve Drozo of The Flaming Lips, and REM's Mike Mills all hail Big Star as power pop masters. Yet, chances are that most viewers won't have heard of Alex Chilton, Chris Bell, Andy Hummel and Jody Stephens or the amazing music they produced in a burst of creativity that made them the ultimate cult combo.

John Fry founded the Ardent Studios in Memphis in the mid-1960s on the back of the British Invasion and producer Jim Dickinson recalls the boom in guitar bands that went against the prevailing trend for soul and country groups. Among the new breed of musicians was 14 year-old Alex Chilton, the lead singer of The Box Tops, who had a massive No.1 hit in 1967 with `The Letter'. The son of an gallery owner, Chilton had been influenced by artists like William Eggleston and Ardent employee Carole Manning recalls him being a precocious kid at school. But selling millions of records and playing to screaming girls didn't suit Chilton and, by 1970, he was keen to create a new sound.

Having forged a link with the Stax label, Ardent began running workshops for aspiring musicians and teenager Chris Bell astonished Fry, Dickinson and engineer Steve Rhea with his talent and the complexity of his songwriting. John Dando recalls him doing a lot of drugs while studying at the University of Tennessee, but they inspired him to experiment with fresh sounds and it was his fearless innovation that persuaded Chilton to form a band with Bell, bassist Andy Hummel and drummer Jody Stephens. Working with the first Mellotron in the United States and George Harrison's old Moog keyboard, they laid down tracks like `Ballad of El Goodo' and `Watch the Sunrise' in just a few takes and session musician Richard Roseborough was blown away by their skill at the mixing desk.

The quartet took the name Big Star from a chain of grocery stores and dubbed their first album #1 Record, in the mock pretentious hope that it would be a self-fulfilling prophecy. Fry was convinced he had discovered the new Lennon and McCartney in Clifton and Bell and was delighted when Stax supremo Al Bell formed Ardent Records to release the LP in 1971. But, in spite of steady radio play and some excellent reviews in the music press, Stax made an unholy mess of distributing the album and local record salesman Rick Clark laments the fact that it remained pretty much invisible, even after John King was brought in to handle the PR.

Fry remained confident that Big Star were on to something, but Bell was frustrated that much of the critical focus had fallen on Chilton and he complained bitterly that his own contribution had been unfairly overlooked. Dickinson suggests that he allowed himself to be swept away by the fantasy of fame and success, but David Bell recalls that his brother took what he perceived to be rejection so hard that he swallowed some pills and wound up in hospital being treated for a mental illness.

While Bell suffered, King came up with the brainwave of relaunching Big Star at the inaugural Rock Writers of the World convention in Memphis in May 1973. Among those to attend were rookies Pete Tomlinson, Chris Stamey, Jaan Uhelszki, Billy Altman, Jon Tiven and Ross Johnson, who were more looking forward to meeting legendary scribes like Lester Bangs that seeing Big Star play live. But the gig went down in rock history, or at least it did with the 140 critics who witnessed it and declared it a seminal moment in American musical history.

The response prompted Clifton, Hummel and Stephens to return to the studio and Bell popped in periodically to make perfunctory contributions to what would eventually become Radio City. The sessions were characterised by heavy partying and Fry concedes that the atmosphere was often as wild as it seemed in Eggleston's infamous film Stranded in Canton. Yet, the band still produced tracks of the calibre of `Daisy Glaze' and `September Gurls' and Fry was hopeful that Stax's new partnership with Columbia Records would prevent a repeat of the distribution fiasco. However, parent label chief Clive Davis was fired soon after the deal was signed for fiddling his expenses and, as Stax went bankrupt, the record disappeared without a trace.

Despite triumphs like a gig at Max's Kansas City in New York, Hummel quit the band to return to college and he was replaced by John Lightman. He felt sorry for Chilton and Stephens, who were playing superb music to half-empty venues. But they were having more luck than Bell, whose bid to find his niche in London resulted in him drinking too much and he returned to Memphis more depressed than ever. Determined to produce another album, Chilton and his girlfriend-cum-muse Lesa Aldredge enlisted the help of Jim Dickinson (whose widow Mary Lindsay Dickinson shows us round his trailer home and explains how he had a genius for filling the space between the notes). Roseborough also sat in on the sessions, which generated such key tracks as `Kangaroo' and `Stroke It Noel'. But Stephens admits that Third/Sister Lovers was less a Big Star album than a reflection of Chilton's addiction and self-absorption.

Meanwhile, Chris Bell and Van Duren were back at Ardent and engineer John Hampton remembers being hugely impressed with the songs they were working on. Bell had been Born Again and his zealous faith dominated his lyrics. However, brother David agrees that they also reflected his drug dependence and a quest for love that was complicated by confusion over his sexuality. Having abandoned Big Star, Chilton had formed Alex Chilton and The Cossacks and photographer Stephanie Chernikowski and musician Terry Ork share fond memories of them playing punk-oriented songs like `Bangkok' at CBGB in New York in September 1977.

Chilton also brought The Cramps to Memphis to record on the same mixing desk that Elvis Presley had used at Sam Phillips's Sun studio. Chilton also continued to produce angry songs of his own like `Like Flies on Sherbert', but Chris Bell had given up trying to realise his dream and musicians Chris Stamey, Mitch Easter and Will Rigby had to drag him away from the Danver's restaurant where he was working to sit in on a recording session. Yet Chilton was also going through a rough patch, as he experimented with `art damage' music as part of Tav Falco's Panther Burns. But he also sang backing vocals on `You and Your Sister', which formed the B-side of Bell's last single, `I Am the Cosmos', which sold only a handful of copies before he was killed when his car hit a utility pole in Germantown in the early hours of 27 December 1978. Like Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix and Jim Morrison before him, he was 27 years old.

Fry recalls sitting up in bed around 1.30am and feeling a presence in his room. But, while David Bell is grateful that his brother left such a wonderful legacy, sister Sara Stewart wishes he had lived a normal life, as that way he might still be alive. Yet, Bell was fast becoming a posthumous icon, as EMI had released #1 Record and Radio City as a double album in 1976 and Big Star suddenly became popular in Britain and Europe. In 1987, The Replacements released a single entitled `Alex Chilton', while Cheap Trick's cover version of `In the Street' became the theme tune to That 70s Show. Initially, Chilton was wary of the adulation. But, in 1993, he and Stephens reformed Big Star with Ken Stringfellow and Jon Auer of The Posies and they continued to play occasional gigs over the next 17 years - as well as recording the 2005 studio album, In Space.

Footage is shown of the 2009 gig at Brooklyn Masonic Hall and Stephens recalls how happy he was to see Chilton enjoying being part of Big Star again. But he died of a heart attack on 17 March 2010 and Congressman Steve Cohen paid him a handsome tribute in the House. Curt Kirkwood of Meat Puppets organised a memorial concert in New York and Andy Hummel played alongside Norman Blake, Chris Stamey, Mike Mills and Michael Stipe before he succumbed to cancer on 19 July.

Stephens takes consolation that his band is more popular today than it has ever been and David and Sara admit to being pleased that fans sometimes take photos of their childhood home, as though it was the indie equivalent of Graceland. In many ways, Big Star anticipated the alternative music style by turning the pain of their private lives into beauty. But, while DeNicola and Mori trace the outline story well enough, they offer little by way of musical analysis and much more might have been said about the influence of The Beatles, The Byrds and The Rolling Stones on their stylistic evolution.

The co-directors also avoid prying too deeply into Chris Bell's psychological problems, which is a shame, as useful comparisons might have been made with Nick Drake, Daniel Johnston and New York Dolls bassist, Arthur Kane. More might also have been said about Hummel's life away from Big Star and Chilton's jazz collaboration with René Coman and Doug Garrison. But this still stands as an admirable introduction to a band that rock history forgot and it will more than have served its purpose if it sends a few people in search of the 21-strong soundtrack album, Nothing Can Hurt Me.