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The Guildford Four were framed; there seems to be no doubt about that. A feckless young Irishman named Gerry Conlon and three others were charged by the British police with being the IRA terrorists who bombed a pub in Guildford, England, in 1974, and a year later they were convicted and sentenced to life.

But great doubts grew up about their guilt, it was proven that evidence in their favor had been withheld, and in 1989 their convictions were overturned.

"In the Name of the Father" tells this story in angry dramatic detail, showing that the British police were so obsessed with the need to produce the IRA bombers that they seized on flimsy hearsay evidence and then tortured their prisoners to extract confessions. The film is based on Conlon's autobiography, Proved Innocent, and in its general thrust is factual - although the director, Jim Sheridan , cheerfully explained to the London Daily Telegraph last month how he changed facts, characters and dates to suit his fictional purposes.

As he tells it, the story becomes a tragedy of errors. The film's rambling opening scenes are important in setting up what follows: Conlon ( Daniel Day-Lewis ), a young man from Belfast, finds himself in England with some friends, half-heartedly looking for work, sleeping in a shared squatter's pad, drinking and doing drugs.

Conlon is not a model citizen. One night he robs a prostitute of her earnings, and returns to Ireland, flashing the money and buying drinks for family and friends. A former friend fingers him to the police, and he's snatched from his bed in a predawn raid - along with his astonished father, who had nothing to do with anything, and also eventually finds himself serving a life sentence.

It is Conlon's bad luck that his visit to the Guildford area coincided with the bombing, and that his newfound wealth looks suspicious. The IRA is a tightly disciplined organization whose members are not accustomed to getting rich off their work, or throwing money around, but never mind: Conlon is a splendid suspect, and when a sadistic British policeman ( Corin Redgrave ) gets finished with him, he's a confessed murderer.

The movie does a harrowing job of showing how, and why, a man might be made to confess to a bombing he didn't commit. The early sequences of the movie are a Kafkaesque nightmare for Conlon, who finds himself snatched from his bed and locked up for the rest of his life. It's a nightmare for us, too, because Conlon behaves so stupidly, avoiding the obvious things he could say and do to defend himself.

The greater part of the movie takes place in prison, where Conlon and his father ( Pete Postlethwaite ) are housed in the same cell. His father, a hard-working, honest man, is filled with indignation. Conlon is more filled with self-pity and despair, but gradually, inspired by his father, he begins trying to prove his innocence, and is lucky to convince a stubborn lawyer ( Emma Thompson ) to take his case. She works for years, and even so might not have made much progress if a police evidence technician hadn't mistakenly given her a report she was never meant to see.

Convinced by the film's documentary detail, we assume all these facts are based on truth, and it is a little surprising to discover that the sadistic British policeman is a composite of several officers, that Conlon and his father were never in the same cell - and that the crucial character of Joe McAndrew ( Don Baker ), an IRA man who confesses to the Guildford bombings, is a fictional invention. All the same, the main thrust of the story is truthful: British courts found that Conlon and the others were jailed unjustly.

The film's dramatic thrust doesn't simply go from wrong to right, however. It's more the story of how Gerry Conlon changes and grows during those years in prison. He is shown in the early scenes to be an aimless drifter - a dimmer and more genial version, in fact, of the unbalanced, angry homeless man in Mike Leigh's " Naked ," a British film made at about the same time. In prison, he educates himself and the law educates him; by the time of his release, he is sober, intelligent, radicalized. Seeing this process happen is absorbing, especially since so much of it is inspired by the love of the father for his son.

And yet the film is somehow less than it should be. The urgency of the early scenes is lost when the story turns to prison life, and I began to feel that dialogue and events were repeating themselves. Points about the prison years and the fight for an appeal are made too painstakingly, and there is much dialog when a little would have done. I had the feeling that if 10 or 12 minutes had been edited from the film, from the scenes behind bars, that would have made a big difference.

Some of the weaknesses of script and structure are obscured by the power of Day-Lewis' performance; he proves here once again that he is one of the most talented and interesting actors of his generation. Sheridan was the director of " My Left Foot ," for which Day-Lewis won the Academy Award for best actor. Here is a story with similar appeal, and yet somehow the story doesn't coil and spring; it simply unfolds.

Roger Ebert

Roger Ebert was the film critic of the Chicago Sun-Times from 1967 until his death in 2013. In 1975, he won the Pulitzer Prize for distinguished criticism.

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In the Name of the Father (1994)

Rated R For Profanity and Violence

Daniel Day-Lewis as Gerry Conlon

Pete Postlethwaite as Guiseppe Conlon

Emma Thompson as Gareth Peirce

Produced and Directed by

• Jim Sheridan

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Review/Film: In the Name of the Father; The Sins of a Son Are Visited on His Father

By Janet Maslin

• Dec. 29, 1993

Anatomy of a riot: early in "In the Name of the Father," the feckless antics of Gerry Conlon (Daniel Day-Lewis), a young Belfast ne'er-do-well in the early 1970's, are seen triggering a serious military confrontation. As Gerry horses around on a rooftop, stealing scrap metal and wielding a stick guitar-style, English soldiers mistake him for a sniper. Gerry begins a mad dash away from these authorities, and as he runs through streets and houses, panic erupts everywhere. Instantly roused for combat, Belfast's citizenry sounds the call to arms.

Women bang trash-can lids on cobblestones; English soldiers in riot gear roll up in armored vehicles; the Irish Republican Army vents its fury at Gerry's sheer stupidity. Even after the crisis is resolved peacefully, nerves are jittery all around. In the wake of the kind of incident that has preceded this riot -- the film's quick depiction of an I.R.A. pub bombing in Guildford, England -- such skittishness is painfully easy to understand.

By the end of this extended opening sequence to his scathingly brilliant new film, the Irish director Jim Sheridan has perfectly evoked the backdrop against which Gerry Conlon's story takes place. Though he lives within a political tinderbox, Gerry has no foresight and no native cunning. The film's edgy, volatile atmosphere and Gerry's pathetic naivete make his ordeal that much more monstrous as it unfolds.

Collaborating triumphantly again with Mr. Day-Lewis (after the Oscar-winning "My Left Foot" in 1990), Mr. Sheridan shows the same ability to tell a story both matter-of-factly and metaphorically. His direction is plain and amazingly resonant, pinpointing all the larger misapprehensions that shaped Mr. Conlon's Kafkaesque fate.

Ostensibly the tale of one big glaring injustice, "In the Name of the Father" actually delves much deeper, emerging as a fervent indictment of the bitterness between English and I.R.A. partisans. In making his point through the tale of a hapless victim, Mr. Sheridan could not have invented anyone more weirdly compelling than Mr. Conlon, whose story is true.

Already admired as a startlingly inventive actor, Mr. Day-Lewis gives another dazzling performance in what is so far the role of his career. As played so grippingly and unpredictably, the film's Gerry Conlon is anything but a one-dimensional fall guy. "Proved Innocent" is the title of Mr. Conlon's memoir (adapted by Mr. Sheridan with Terry George), which suggests a certain lack of suspense in this story. But Mr. Day-Lewis draws endless interest out of the ways in which Gerry's character is forged right before the audience's eyes.

Gerry is particularly surprising playing the fool in the film's early sequences, since he lacks the self-possessed cleverness Mr. Day-Lewis so often brings to a role. Adrift in classic post-adolescent rebellion, he is by his own account more interested in "free love and dope" than in politics. When the story's opening riot makes him persona non grata in Belfast, he flees to London for a while. "Remember, honest money goes farther," advises his father, Giuseppe Conlon (Pete Postlethwaite). At this stage in the younger man's life, his father's little pieties merely make Gerry sneer.

The film vividly sets forth the strange facts of Gerry's case: in London, he lives briefly with a group of hippie squatters before being named by one of them as a suspect in the I.R.A.'s two Guildford bombings. Contributing to the case against Gerry is the fact that he breaks into a prostitute's apartment and steals enough money to go home to Belfast in showy finery. (The film has great fun with the image of Mr. Day-Lewis in his Carnaby Street splendor.) This will eventually make him a very poor witness on his own behalf.

Without warning, under the sweeping provisions of the Prevention of Terrorism Act, Gerry is arrested and held for seven days' of questioning, during which a confession is forced out of him. The specter of Mr. Day-Lewis's terrified hippie, sobbing in bewilderment when faced with unrelenting cruelty, is one of the film's most harrowing and sharply etched sights.

But the worst is yet to come. After Gerry is hosed down, de-loused and humiliated, he peers out of his jail cell to see his father being subjected to the same treatment. Giuseppe Conlon, three of Gerry's fellow London squatters and a group of the Conlons' relatives are eventually rounded up, charged with terrorist activities and sent to prison. The film, which shows no interest in being evenhanded, presents a forceful, disturbing case for the innocence of all of them.

"In the Name of the Father" is faithful to the larger facts while taking minor liberties with the Conlons' case, most notably confining both Gerry and Giuseppe in the same prison cell. This shift provides an extraordinary dramatic opportunity for the film to explore the complexities of love between father and son. Their mutual tenderness is thoroughly unsentimental, as when the film lets Gerry reveal that he is still seething over childhood insults. By the same token, Giuseppe (an Irishman whose mother named him after an Italian ice-cream maker) harbors his own anger. When the father falls mortally ill and the son tries to show a responsible side, Giuseppe snaps: "You haven't the maturity to take care of yourself, let alone your mother."

As the film's settings move from city streets to courtroom and then to prison, "In the Name of the Father" sustains a devastating simplicity and a cool, watchful tone. Among the actors who contribute to its steely naturalness are Mr. Postlethwaite, both fond and caustic as a father in an unimaginable predicament, and Emma Thompson as the Conlons' crusading legal counsel.

Corin Redgrave is grimly effective as the English police official who drives the case forward. And Don Baker is equally formidable as the story's emblematic I.R.A. figure. Paterson Joseph (as a Rastafarian prisoner who befriends Gerry), John Lynch (as Paul Hill, his co-defendant) and Britta Smith (as Gerry's gentle-looking aunt, who cooks him a meal and winds up in police custody) further heighten the film's gritty mood. Peter Biziou's cinematography is properly crisp and plain.

"In the Name of the Father" has a title that evokes both familial devotion and prayer. A personal tragedy and a plea for reason, Mr. Sheridan's tough, riveting film succeeds on both scores. In The Name of the Father Produced and directed by Jim Sheridan; screenplay by Terry George and Mr. Sheridan, based on the book "Proved Innocent" by Gerry Conlon; director of photography, Peter Biziou; edited by Gerry Hambling; music by Trevor Jones; production designer, Caroline Amies; co-producer, Arthur Lappin; released by Universal Pictures. Running time: 127 minutes. This film is rated R. Gerry Conlon . . . Daniel Day-Lewis Giuseppe Conlon . . . Pete Postlethwaite Gareth Pierce . . . Emma Thompson Robert Dixon . . . Corin Redgrave Paul Hill . . . John Lynch Benbay . . . Paterson Joseph Annie Maguire . . . Britta Smith Joe McAndrew . . . Don Baker

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In the Name of the Father Reviews

In The Name Of The Father is a gritty, compelling and engrossing film. Day-Lewis is extraordinary, of course.

Full Review | Jun 3, 2022

Jim Sheridan tells his gripping tale with a fury that stokes up an audience the way early Costa Gavras movies used to do.

Full Review | Feb 15, 2018

Daniel Day-Lewis is remarkable.

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/4 | Feb 28, 2014

In the Name of the Father is a model of this kind of engaged, enraged filmmaking, a politically charged Fugitive that uses one of the most celebrated cases of recent British history to steamroller an audience with the power of rousing, polemical cinema.

Full Review | Feb 28, 2014

At every point, Day-Lewis is at the center of the story, and he carries the film with an impassioned performance. It helps that it's a great part.

The picture turns into a kind of stylized morality play about the right and the wrong ways for Irishmen to respond to distorted portraits of their character, and it's terrifically effective.

In the Name of the Father is a deeply stirring film that lessens the moral authority of the I.R.A., English soldiers in Ireland, the British police and the British government.

Day-Lewis, so intricately repressed in The Age of Innocence, here offers a role reversal in an unreserved and emotional performance that throws caution and inhibition to the winds.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/4 | Feb 28, 2014

If Sheridan didn't feel the need to pile on the pedantic subtexts, this would be an absorbing personal drama, rather than a vituperative, question-begging broadside.

The complicated relationship between the rebellious Gerry and the quietly tormented Giuseppe is one focus of the film. The obvious political implications of the dreadful situation are another.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Feb 28, 2014

This is a stirring and exceptionally well acted, though controversial, dramatisation of Gerry Conlon's book about the grave miscarriage of justice suffered by the Guildford Four.

Day-Lewis outdoes his acclaimed performance in My Left Foot, making Gerry a character of palpable realness and complexity.

In this powerful, Oscar-nominated movie, Jim Sheridan infuses a fact-based social injustice drama with a more intimate family tale of estranged father and son, splendidly played by Daniel Day-Lewis and Peter Postlethwaite.

Full Review | Original Score: A- | Mar 25, 2009

By the end of the movie, whether or not you're a member of Sinn Fein, the Brits' brutality toward the Conlons will get your Irish up.

Full Review | Mar 11, 2008

[Sheridan] works with such piercing fervor and intelligence that In the Name of the Father just about transcends its tidy moral design.

Full Review | Original Score: A- | Mar 11, 2008

Sheridan takes a controversial subject and gives it wider appeal by focusing on the family drama of two men who are also political prisoners.

Full Review | Original Score: 3.5/4 | Mar 11, 2008

Miscarried justice often provides the vehicle for emotionally wrenching drama and histrionic fireworks, and such is the case in spades with In the Name of the Father.

Letter-perfect performances from Day-Lewis and Postlethwaite do a lot more than a dozen editorials to make an unforgettable point about the miscarriage of justice.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/5 | Mar 11, 2008

Director Sheridan chronicles the father-son relationship perfectly and also handles the courtroom confrontations skilfully without ever falling into movie melodramatics.

The acting's so good it frequently transcends the simplicities of the script, and whenever Day-Lewis or Postlethwaite is on-screen the movie crackles.

In the Name of the Father (Ireland/United Kingdom, 1993)

Sometimes it's only through the greatest of tragedies and the gravest of injustices that human beings learn to relate to each other honestly and openly. Nowhere is this more apparent than in Jim Sheridan's searing In the Name of the Father , where father and son come to an intimate understanding of each other through shared sufferings.

At eight o'clock in the evening of October 5, 1974, in a pub in Guildford, England, an IRA bomb explodes, killing five people. As public demands for justice grow to a fevered pitch, the police force, headed by Robert Dixon (Corin Redgrave), is forced to turn to the most likely suspects without regard for their guilt or innocence. Gerry Conlon (Daniel Day-Lewis) and Paul Hill (John Lynch), a pair of squatters recently arrived in London from Belfast, become prime targets. When Gerry's father Giuseppe (Pete Postlethwaite) arrives from Ireland to help his son obtain a lawyer, he is charged with participating in an IRA support network.

In a trial high on speeches and rhetoric but low on facts, the "Guildford Four", including Gerry and Paul, are sentenced to life in prison because the judge can't find a reason to hang them, and Giuseppe is given fourteen years. When, after sentencing has been carried out, the police find incontrovertible evidence of the Conlons' innocence, they keep it carefully buried -- until Gareth Peirce (Emma Thompson) ferrets out the truth while attempting to get Gerry and Giuseppe's convictions overturned.

As much as In the Name of the Father is about the true facts surrounding the conviction and eventual freeing of Gerry Conlon and his three innocent friends, the movie's primary aim is more intimate and personal: to show the development of the relationship between an estranged father and son. When Gerry and Giuseppe arrive in prison, they are virtual strangers, distant and cold. Years later, both have confronted their hidden demons and made their peace with themselves and each other.

In the Name of the Father is about victims -- those who do and don't fight back, and the different forms that those battles take. For the IRA, human life is cheap, and all targets are legitimate. For the police, it doesn't matter who's convicted, as long as the perception is that they're doing their jobs. And for the "Guildford Four", and those accused of aiding them, justice is unlikely and nebulous.

Jim Sheridan skillfully interweaves a myriad of subplots and themes into a fast-paced, cohesive whole. He tells of the setup, the corrupt police investigation, the first trial with its various perjuries and cover-ups, fifteen years of prison life, and the second trial. Each character is remarkably realized, and no situation is presented without the shades of gray that differentiate potent drama from its weaker imitations.

It would be hard to find a more dissimilar character to The Age of Innocence 's Newland Archer than Gerry Conlon, but Daniel Day-Lewis brings In the Name of the Father 's irrepressible protagonist to life with the same believability and strength of personality. Many of his scenes with veteran British character actor Pete Postlethwaite, who presents a memorable Giuseppe, are remarkable for their simple intensity.

In a supporting role, Emma Thompson turns in her best performance since Howards End , with a passionate interpretation of Gareth Peirce, a woman who invests more than mere time and effort into Gerry Conlon's case. Ms. Thompson's court speech alone is worth the price of admission, and represents one of the most stirring moments in recent cinema.

In the Name of the Father is a visual treat. There are no grand vistas for the cameras to pan over, but two scenes among many illustrate the level of photographic quality. The first is the stark and chaotic presentation of the Belfast riot. The camera puts the viewer into the streets in the midst of all the confusion and strife, creating a sense of immediacy that many action pictures fall short of. The second occurs much later in the movie, and is more serene and poignant image, as the windows of Gerry's prison cry "fire tears" to match his own manifestations of grief.

Trevor Jones creates a score perfectly wedded to the atmosphere of In the Name of the Father . At times brooding and thoughtful, at others violent and dissonant, Jones' orchestrations here are as distinctive as they are unlike his grandiose Last of the Mohicans work.

For a movie that is so politically-charged, In the Name of the Father manages to sharpen its focus on the individuals rather than the bigger historical tapestry into which their lives are woven. It's impossible to lose sight of the police cover-up, or the IRA's casual views on killing, but the brilliance of Jim Sheridan's motion picture is that we come to view every event from the perspective of how it impacts on the relationship between Gerry and his father, in whose name the final struggle is fought.

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In the Name of the Father Review

01 Jan 1993

133 minutes

In the Name of the Father

sympathetic character. Throwing a post-Oscar Emma Thompson into the mix suggests a project which could easily collapse under its own worthiness, but in fact this film is a considerable achievement. Aside from daring to tackle still controversial material in a fair-minded but righteously wrathful manner, it manages to make gripping a story still headline-worthy enough to be familiar to most British (and Irish) audiences.

In 1974, the IRA bombed a soldiers' pub in Guildford, and the British police somehow seized on petty crook Gerard Conlon (Day-Lewis) and three of his mates as the culprits, then spread the net wider and gained convictions against practically the whole Conlon family, notably Gerry's fiercely moralist father Guiseppe (Postlethwaite), who died in prison. A solicitor (Thompson) got interested in the case and discovered that the police withheld evidence which would have freed Conlon, and the "Guildford Four" fought through to a successful appeal.

Like My Left Foot, this is so sure of itself that it doesn't mind depicting its hero as less than a perfect martyr: we first see him in the midst of a terrifically directed IRA-army skirmish in Belfast, filching the lead off a roof, while his alibi for the night of the bombing is an opportunist robbery of a whore's flat. The length of the film allows Conlon to go through a series of changes, even shunning the tragic 70s clothes and hairstyles for a sharper look as he goes from fringe hippie to despair to determination.

Establishing early a vividly horrid vision of the grubby 70s drop-out culture, the film potently conveys the reality of what the Conlons missed in prison as styles and trends come and go almost subliminally in the background while they endure the monotony of jail life. With the real IRA represented by a maniac who uses a home-made flamethrower on a prison guard, In The Name Of The Father avoids getting into Republican politics, though it indicts the behaviour of the police and (by implication) successive governments in the conduct of this particular case. The heart of the film is the relationship between Gerry and Guiseppe, as the father and son finally settle their lifelong arguments when unjustly imprisoned together.

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Movies | 03 01 2011

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In the Name of the Father

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Release details.

• Duration: 132 mins

Cast and crew

• Director: Jim Sheridan
• Screenwriter: Terry George, Jim Sheridan
• Pete Postlethwaite
• Daniel Day-Lewis
• Corin Redgrave
• Beatie Edney
• Emma Thompson
• Britta Smith

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In the Name of the Father

After 25 years of righteous political thrillers—yes, it has been that long since the release of Costa-Gavras’ Z , the original leftist rabble-rouser—the elements of Jim Sheridan’s In the Name of the Father (Universal, R) seem almost too familiar. A terrorist bombing; innocent people arrested for the crime; a government plot to withhold evidence; years of wrongful imprisonment; a lone attorney digging her way to the truth. Where can the audience stand but in outrage against the fascist oppressors? Sheridan, however, works with such piercing fervor and intelligence that In the Name of the Father just about transcends its tidy moral design. Based on the true story of Northern Ireland’s Guildford Four, who spent 15 years in prison for a crime they didn’t commit, this is an anatomy-of-injustice movie so passionately charged it can stand with the finest dramas of its kind ( Z, All the President’s Men, and A World Apart ). Daniel Day-Lewis, in a memorable performance, is Gerry Conlon, the young petty thief from Belfast who happened to be in London during the fall of 1974, when the Irish Republican Army bombed two pubs in the nearby suburb of Guildford, killing five people. When we first see Gerry, he’s teetering on a Belfast rooftop, taking a break from stealing scrap metal to mime a Jimi Hendrix guitar solo—an act of innocent nuttiness that sets off a riot when the occupying British soldiers mistake him for a sniper. A harmless troublemaker in permanent revolt against his dour, sickly father, the delinquent Gerry confronts the world with a nervous blur of winks and grimaces. Day-Lewis’ greatest characters (the randy Czech physician in The Unbearable Lightness of Being , the raging, disabled Irish author in My Left Foot ) have always been marked by their devious awareness. So it’s a shock to see him play Gerry as a foggy postadolescent nihilist, a goofball rebel with almost no consciousness of what he’s doing or why.

When Gerry’s little rooftop escapade gets him in trouble with both the British and the IRA, he takes off for London and falls in with a comically scruffy crew of hippie squatters. What he doesn’t realize is that he has entered a political minefield. The British police have begun making arrests under the Prevention of Terrorism Act, which allows them to detain suspects for up to seven days. Desperate to find the perpetrators of the Guildford bombings, they fasten on Gerry, his friend Paul (John Lynch), and two members of the commune—as well as Gerry’s father and half a dozen relatives.

The sequence in which Gerry is interrogated and tortured into signing a confession attains a staggering power. As Gerry is beaten by British officers and subjected to appalling mind games, Day-Lewis, in some of the most bravura acting of his career, shows us a simple young punk getting the armature of his personality broken down. By the time Gerry stares at the confession he’s going to sign, whimpering, ”I didn’t do this! I didn’t f — -in’ do this!” we’re witnessing the primal sin of a police state: the creation of a political ”criminal” through criminally immoral means.

Even as he’s railroaded through the courts, Gerry remains an oddball and a screwup. Only gradually does his experience of imprisonment burn away his flakiness, molding him into a man. Day-Lewis actually grows more handsome as the film goes on—his skinny, twitchy features resolve themselves—and this physical transformation becomes a living metaphor for his moral growth. The catalyst of the change is the fact that Gerry’s father, the ailing Giuseppe (Pete Postlethwaite), ends up sharing a prison cell with him. The movie is subtle enough not to oversimplify their reconciliation. Postlethwaite, with his guilty, workaday-Catholic stare, quietly suggests that Giuseppe’s bitterness toward his wastrel son is the dark underside of a love he can’t express. And Gerry, we’re cued to see, has trashed his own life to prove himself unworthy of his father.

As the English attorney who reopens the case, Emma Thompson gives a brisk performance in a slimly written role. This part of the movie feels a little canned; we’ve seen it done before, and done with greater fireworks. It’s in the slow mending of the relationship between the two Conlons that In the Name of the Father becomes not just a muckraking docudrama of British oppression but an excavation of Northern Ireland’s bombed-out spiritual landscape. Sheridan doesn’t get into the ugly complexities of the Irish troubles—the tangled hatred between Catholics and Protestants. Yet he does something almost as revealing when he introduces Joe McAndrew (Don Baker), an ice-blooded IRA leader who, in prison, carries on his anti-British war with a meticulous ruthlessness that seems practically psychotic. When Gerry comes eye-to-eye with McAndrew, who’s presented as a false, evil patriarch, he finally confronts the full force of the hatred that has been tearing his homeland apart. And only when he accepts the love of his own father do those same forces stop tearing at him. In the end, Gerry triumphs over injustice—but, even more stirringly, over the troubles in his own soul. A-

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In the name of the father.

• Parents say (2)
• Kids say (1)

Based on 2 parent reviews

Tough watch for some great acting and a lot of injustice.

Report this review, incredible movie must watch.

This title has:

IN THE NAME OF THE FATHER

What You Need To Know:

(LLL, VV, S, NN, D, Ho, M, B, C) 94 obscenities, 6 profanities & 6 vulgarities; violence in form of fighting, gun play, man set on fire, & explosion; implied promiscuity; male nudity; drug abuse--marijuana & LSD; implied homosexuality; ethnic prejudice; and, some biblical principles--father helps son & positive portrayal of faith and prayer.

More Detail:

The film IN THE NAME OF THE FATHER tells the story of Irish teenager Gerry Conlon (Daniel Day-Lewis) who goes to London in the 1960’s to live in a hippie commune to enjoy free love and dope. He sees his father as lacking the courage to rise above his working class station. While Gerry visits his family in Belfast, the police raid the commune and take members in for questioning about a bombing. His friend names Gerry as the leader, and, after days of interrogation, Gerry signs a false confession. When his father comes to London to get an attorney for his son, he is arrested, too. Both receive life sentences. A young attorney, Ms. Pierce, takes an interest in them, and, when she discovers suppressed evidence, she moves to have the case re-tried. During the fifteen years Gerry and his father share a cell, Gerry learns how strong his father’s faith is.

This is an absorbing, dramatic presentation about an innocent man’s struggle to make sense of a seemingly unjust system. Although the film makes a strong statement about the roots of prejudice, the ultimate triumph of justice and the strength of a quiet faith, the dialogue is filled with obscenity and profanity, the interrogation is intense and physical abuse and male nudity is shown. Unfortunately, it has too many negative aspects in telling a positive story.

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In 'The Father,' Anthony Hopkins' Mind Is Playing Tricks On Him — And On You

Justin Chang

In The Father , Anthony Hopkins plays a man with dementia, and Olivia Coleman is the daughter whose name he occasionally forgets. Sean Gleason/Sony Pictures Classics hide caption

In The Father , Anthony Hopkins plays a man with dementia, and Olivia Coleman is the daughter whose name he occasionally forgets.

There have been many fine films over the past several years about characters struggling with the onset of Alzheimer's disease and dementia, like Away From Her , Still Alice and the recent Colin Firth / Stanley Tucci drama Supernova . But few of them have gone as deeply and unnervingly into the recesses of a deteriorating mind as The Father , a powerful new chamber drama built around a mesmerizing lead performance from Anthony Hopkins.

At this point in his long career, Hopkins would seem to have exhausted his ability to surprise us, but his work here is nothing short of astonishing. He shows us a man whose mind has become a prison, and we're trapped in it right alongside him.

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'we don't know what's coming': anthony hopkins plays 'the father' with dementia.

His character, also named Anthony, is 80 years old and has dementia. At the beginning of the movie, his daughter, Anne — played by the superb Olivia Colman — stops by his London apartment to check on him. Her father's condition has taken a turn for the worse, and his fits of temper have become severe enough to send his latest live-in nurse packing.

Anthony is stubborn and defiant and insists that he can manage on his own. But that's clearly not the case, given his habit of misplacing his things, like the watch that keeps mysteriously vanishing from his wrist, and his inability to remember names and faces, Anne's included.

Filmmaker Faces Her Father's Mortality By Staging His 'Death' Again And Again

As The Father goes on, the more it becomes clear that it's his own mind that's playing tricks on him. What makes the movie so unsettling is the way it wires us directly into his subjective experience, so that the foundations of the story seem to shift at random from scene to scene. We're adrift in a sea of Anthony's memories; each new plot development undermines the one before it.

A man suddenly appears in the apartment, claiming to be Anne's husband, which is odd, since just a few moments earlier, Anne seemed to be single. Anne goes out shopping for groceries, but when she returns, she's played not by Olivia Colman but by another actress, Olivia Williams.

The apartment itself, brilliantly designed by Peter Francis, begins to shift of its own accord. You notice puzzling discrepancies — wasn't there a lamp on that hallway table just a moment ago? Weren't those kitchen cabinets a completely different color? — and suddenly realize that Anthony's mind is blurring different time frames together. At some point, it becomes unclear whether we're in Anthony's apartment or Anne's apartment, into which Anthony has been moved since he can no longer live on his own.

The Father is thus both a psychological detective story and a stealth haunted-house movie. It's an exceedingly clever and polished piece of filmmaking, and it marks an impressive feature debut for the French writer-director Florian Zeller, adapting his own popular play with the veteran screenwriter Christopher Hampton .

You can sense how well this material must have worked on stage, where it's easier to slip between layers of reality. But it works beautifully onscreen, too. The general complaint about most stage-to-screen adaptations is that they wind up feeling too airless and claustrophobic. But those qualities are if anything a bonus in The Father , deepening its portrait of cognitive entrapment.

Code Switch

Portrait of a parent with alzheimer's.

Remarkably, none of the movie's dazzling surface tricks undermine the emotion at its core. The story in The Father may be scrambled, but it's also heartbreakingly simple: A man grows old and loses his memory, and his daughter, after a lifetime of love and devotion, must begin the long, agonizing process of saying goodbye.

Hopkins could deliver this performance on an empty soundstage with no loss of impact. He shows us Anthony's struggle to keep his wits about him, the way he reaches for humor — and then anger — as a means of keeping the inevitable at bay. By the end, though, his every last defense has been stripped away, and Hopkins lays the character bare with a vulnerability I've rarely seen from him or any actor. It's a devastating performance — and an impossible one to forget.

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The Father review – Anthony Hopkins superb in unbearably heartbreaking film

Hopkins gives a moving, Oscar-winning turn as a man with dementia in a film full of intelligent performances, disorienting time slips and powerful theatrical effects

“L et me not be mad, not mad, sweet heaven!” says King Lear, a plea which is overwhelmingly sad because it can never be heard by anyone with the power to grant it. Anthony Hopkins, who played Lear in Richard Eyre’s production for the BBC , now delivers another performance as an ailing patriarch with a favourite daughter and nowhere to stay, in a film directed by Florian Zeller, and adapted by Christopher Hampton from Zeller’s own award-winning stage play. There is unbearable heartbreak in this movie, for which Hopkins has become history’s oldest best actor Oscar-winner , and also genuine fear, like something you might experience watching Roman Polanski’s Repulsion or M Night Shyamalan’s The Sixth Sense.

Hopkins is Anthony, a roguishly handsome and cantankerous old widower, a retired engineer who lives on his own in a spacious, well-appointed apartment in west London, receiving regular visits from his affectionate and exasperated daughter Anne, who is played at the highest pitch of intelligence and insight by Olivia Colman .

But things are very wrong, because Anthony has dementia. He is subject to mood-swings and fits of temper connected with his sudden terror at not being able to work out what is going on. His behaviour has already caused his existing carer to quit, and now Anne tells him that he simply has to get on with the new one, Laura (Imogen Poots). This is because Anne, after the end of her marriage to Paul (Rufus Sewell) – to whom we will be introduced later – has now at last found a new partner and the opportunity for happiness that she deserves. She is going abroad with him, and can’t look after Anthony any more.

What is deeply scary about The Father is that, without obvious first-person camera tricks, it puts us inside Anthony’s head. We see and don’t see what he sees and doesn’t see. We are cleverly invited to assume that certain passages of dialogue are happening in reality – and then shown that they aren’t. We experience with Anthony, step by step, what appears to be the incremental deterioration in his condition, the disorientating time slips and time loops. People morph into other people; situations get elided; the apartment’s furniture seems suddenly and bewilderingly to change; a scene which had appeared to follow the previous one sequentially turns out to have preceded it, or to be Anthony’s delusion or his memory of something else. And new people, people he doesn’t recognise (played by Mark Gatiss and Olivia Williams) keep appearing in his apartment and responding to him with that same sweet smile of patience when he asks what they are doing there. The universe is gaslighting Anthony with these people.

Anthony is of course different from Lear in one particular: he doesn’t know what is happening to him, or has happened. Things are too far gone. But Hopkins shows how an awareness of his previous existence is still there at a deeper, almost physical level, sometimes resurfacing in his devastatingly contrite little apologies to Anne. And one scene with Paul in which Anthony becomes whimperingly afraid shows us that there are things that Anne doesn’t know about Anthony’s life.

Hopkins’s final speech to Williams is the one that reduced me to a blubbering mess. But the most subtly poignant moments are those in which Anthony will laugh – a flash of his old, roguishly charming self – and Anne and his carer will supportively laugh along with him. To some degree, it is a nervous laugh because Anne knows just how easily his mood can turn, and it is also a professional carer’s laugh, and a strained tragicomic laugh, the laugh you do instead of crying. But it’s also a perfectly genuine kind of laugh and, in its way, an urgent, shared gesture of faith in the person that Anthony was and occasionally still is.

The Father has something of Michael Haneke’s Amour in its one-apartment setting, and also something of Alan Ayckbourn’s 1985 stage-play Woman in Mind, in which the heroine retreats from reality. Its effects are essentially theatrical – but they are powerfully achieved, and the performances from Hopkins and Colman are superb. It is a film about grief and what it means to grieve for someone who is still alive.

• Peter Bradshaw's film of the week
• Drama films
• Anthony Hopkins
• Olivia Colman
• Olivia Williams
• Mark Gatiss
• Film adaptations

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Tales from the about my father red carpet.

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Han Hyo-joo Reflects On Blood Free, Her Chemistry With Ju Ji-hoon & Season 2 Possibilities

Abigail's alisha weir on jump from matilda to horror & changes to her vampire character, abigail's melissa barrera talks scrapped alternate ending, potential sequel & jenna ortega friendship.

Sebastian Maniscalco's About My Father is slated to premiere later this month, with cast and creators recently gathering at a red-carpet event to celebrate the movie. The comedy is based on the stand-up comedian's relationship with his real-life father and growing up a first-generation Italian American. Alongside Maniscalco, the film stars The Irishman 's Robert De Niro, Iron Man 's Leslie Bibb, How I Met Your Father 's Kim Cattrall, Succession 's David Rasche, Workaholics ' Anders Holm, and Fresh 's Brett Dier.

In About My Father , Sebastian is ready to propose to his girlfriend Ellie (Bibb), but his father Salvo (De Niro) will only give him his grandmother's ring to do so after meeting her family. Having just been invited to Ellie's family's summer home to celebrate the Fourth of July, Sebastian decides to take Salvo along for some father-son bonding . What follows is a hilarious culture clash between Salvo and Ellie's eccentric and exceedingly wealthy family.

Related: Every Robert De Niro Oscar Nomination, Ranked

At the red carpet event in New York City, Screen Rant spoke to many cast members and creatives about the film, including actors Sebastian Maniscalco, Anders Holm , David Rasche, and Brett Dier, director Laura Terruso, producer Chris Weitz, and Maniscalco's manager Judi Marmel. They discussed favorite scenes and filming memories, the core messages of About My Father , and upcoming projects.

Screen Rant on the About My Father Red Carpet

Screen Rant: First off, I have to ask: do you have a signature scent right now?

Sebastian Maniscalco: Right now I'm going with a brand called Creed. Kind of all over the map, I don't like the smell the same consecutive nights so I tend to throw on different colognes just mix it up a little bit.

Can you talk a little bit about what it was like building a father-son dynamic with Robert De Niro?

Sebastian Maniscalco: Yeah, for me and him it was really organic and quite instant. It wasn't like we hung out outside the set, went to dinner or anything like that. He was extremely prepared coming into this hanging out with my father prior to the filming, so I felt like it was really seamless. I felt like he was a father figure in some ways.

With so many funny people on set, what was the general vibe like? Was it a lot of ad-libbing and that sort of thing?

Sebastian Maniscalco: Yeah, there was a lot of playing around. I co-wrote the script, so the fun was there, but when you hire actors, they bring so much more color to what we're doing. And Laura, the director, allowed us to play with one another and get some gold that might have not been on the page. It was a great group of people and I actually miss working with them.

Screen Rant: Your character has some really unique interactions with De Niro in this movie, like the healing scene and that sort of thing. Can you talk a little bit about what filming those was like?

Brett Dier: Amazing. I gotta say, the scene where I'm playing the flute with him on the bench was probably one of the greatest moments of my career. Because it's just one-on-one with Robert De Niro, and so that's something I'm always gonna hold very close to my heart.

In general, are there any funny moments that stick out to you?

Brett Dier: The table scenes, like the dinner scenes were really fun. The one at the country club and the one when we're all eating the - you know. Spoiler alert. That was awesome.

Your character kind of doesn't really fit in with the rest of the family in so many ways, but what family member would you say your character connects to most?

Brett Dier: I would almost say my sister. There's not a lot of interactions in the film with her, but there is one in particular when I'm healing at the beginning and she comes over, you can see her love for me and how she just accepts me. And I think that's where I feel most comfortable with.

And do you have in general a favorite scene in the movie, whether it's one that you're in or in general?

Brett Dier: Oh, there's an emotional scene that I love towards the end that really gets me.

In terms of your upcoming projects, can you reveal anything about what viewers can expect from Platonic ?

Brett Dier: That's a rom-com that's coming out I think in the middle of June, they haven't really fleshed it out yet. But it's very funny; I saw it, I'm really proud of how it turned out. And they actually changed the name to Maybe It's You, because Platonic is a Seth Rogen TV show. [Stroking the bird decoration on his shoulder ] Oh, I just pet my peacock.

Screen Rant: Your character is so delightfully snobby, I'm such a big fan. How was the character first described to you?

Anders Holm: I don't know what the description was in the script, but just like by the lines and the action that I was reading, I'm like, "Okay, I think I know this guy." Party animal, no self-awareness, just kind of like tucks in the polo and thinks they could go anywhere and do anything. And I'm like, "Well, that'll be fun to play."

What was it like building that sort of rich kid-parent dynamic with Kim and David?

Anders Holm: Yeah, it's interesting, because when he's out of the bubble of his family, he's kind of the cock of the walk kind of thing. He thinks he's the man. But then as soon as he's in the room with a dad, you see him kind of turn into this other guy where he needs his acknowledgment and he needs his approval. And you can see that he's starving for respect, and he covers that by being the fun guy. Because if he sits with himself long enough and doesn't have a good time, he'll realize why he's kind of sad.

Can you talk a little bit about what it was like filming the infamous boating water jet scene?

Anders Holm: So they're like, "Okay, we're gonna get you guys on the jet ski, there's a stunt guy," and I'm like, "Okay, cool." But I'm thinking we could go for a little rip and run real quick, just do some donuts out there, and they're like, "You're not allowed to actually turn on the engine." And the guy got in the water swimming and pushed us into position and then hid behind the jet ski, and I was like, "This is no fun." I wanted to pop a rooster tail and see if I could shake Sebastian off and they're like, "Absolutely not." And I think Sebastian was probably like, "That's okay, that's good. We don't need to go drive around." But yeah, such a hilarious set piece. And it's not Sebastian's butt. I want everyone to know that because I think he doesn't want that to be known as his butt. His is probably perkier, a little rounder. I'd see him in the gym every morning. He's got that apple bottom, for sure.

That'll be our exclusive headline.

Anders Holm: Sebastian Maniscalco: Apple Bottom.

This week also marks the premiere of Muppets Mayhem . Can you talk a little bit about that?

Anders Holm: Muppets Mayhem is the amazing story of Dr. Teeth and Electric Mayhem. They're back, they're gonna put together an album, but it's not as easy as it sounds. So I play a streaming record executive guy who's trying to get their album to launch on his app, and also the ex who has gone from zero to hero - at least he thinks so - of Lilly Singh who plays their manager. And I'm trying to kind of convince her like, "Hey, let's get back together. Let's get these guys on our label and we can be a power couple." But I'm a little misguided. The show is so funny. The people who control the puppets and do the voices are super talented. They're using 1,000% of their brain to do everything, and it's really funny. It's on Disney Plus.

Screen Rant: First I'd love to hear what it was like forming that sort of strange spousal dynamic your character has with Kim Cattrall's character.

David Rasche: I love my wife, and we're on the same page, but we don't want our children to have bumps in their lives. So we pay people to take away the bumps, and that doesn't work out so well for them, you'll find out.

I would love to know if there are any scenes that stick out to you as especially funny to film.

David Rasche: Although it's somewhat truncated, the scene at the dinner table when we all are being goofy was a lot of fun. And also, that first scene where we first need Bob's character and we're sitting around and introduce ourselves, those were particularly fun.

Was there anything when you first signed on to do this role that surprised you about the movie?

David Rasche: You know, you don't read scripts that are this funny. They just don't come to mind. And I don't think anybody would disagree, everybody read it and said, "I'm in." Everybody was right in. It's really funny, it's a great script.

What's your favorite part in general? I know to film it was the dinner scene, but any heartfelt things that stick out to you as well?

David Rasche: Well, who can not shed a tear at the end? When you've got Robert De Niro playing on your heartstrings, you ain't got a prayer.

Screen Rant: First of all, I would just love to hear a little bit about what you felt the core themes of this movie were that you really wanted to come through with the film.

Laura Terruso: For me, it's the most about family. Our relationships with our parents, it's the most primal relationship of our lives. And so when I read the script, I was so immediately connected to it. It's about Sebastian's relationship with his father, a Sicilian immigrant; my mother's a Sicilian immigrant. It's also about what it means to be first generation and to have a parent who's from somewhere else.

Were there any scenes that were particularly difficult to shoot for whatever reason?

Laura Terruso: I mean, the whole movie was difficult to shoot. We shot it in 32 days in Mobile, Alabama, it rained every day. It was hurricane season. So it was a really hard shoot, it's a Fourth of July movie that we're shooting during hurricane season in Alabama. [Laughs] But the actual work of the scenes and working with the actors was an absolute joy because this cast is extraordinary and I'm so lucky to have been able to work with them.

What was it like to direct Robert De Niro?

Laura Terruso: Every director's dream come true. He is a legend for good reason. He really was. I think the thing I learned the most from him is trust, and that once he understood that I had a vision for the film and had a personal connection to the material he just completely trusted me.

Were there any big changes that the movie went through over the course of filming?

Laura Terruso: Always. I mean, every film goes through massive tweaks. The heart of the film was always there, the heart of the film was in the very first draft that I read. That scene on the tarmac was in every draft, and that's really the heart of it, but certain characters changed. Like Doug, Doug became - I worked a lot on Doug and he's kind of my favorite character. [Laughs] There are little tweaks, and actors bring their own qualities to a character and so, as a director, I do want to encourage that and embrace that.

I'm curious with so many comedic people on set, was it fairly unserious? Was there a lot of ad-libbing and stuff like that?

Laura Terruso: Yes, I encourage a lot of improvisation. I want the actors to feel free so that they can feel free to fail. Often I think the best stuff comes out of those moments that are improvisational, where actors are just listening to each other and feel like they can say something that's not scripted.

Screen Rant: Can you talk a little bit about the creative process behind how this movie worked from the beginning?

Chris Weitz: Yeah, well, it was Sebastian's idea to write something about his family, specifically about his dad who he's very close to and credits with everything he has really. And my brother was sent the script and is good friends with Robert De Niro having done a couple of movies with him and passed it on to Robert De Niro, and when he wants to do a movie, it kind of happens, so that's very nice. Laura Terruso came on as the director and she's really brilliant, and talented, and a great person and kind of understood that world being Italian American. So it was just a really wonderful kind of cocktail of people who came together to make it.

Do you have a favorite scene in the movie?

Chris Weitz: Oh, man. I mean, I think Bob and Sebastian are super funny together, so the sort of scenes where they're busting each other's chops. And Salvo, the dad's hair salon, it’s super funny.

What was it like first getting the news that De Niro was going to be a part of it?

Chris Weitz: I mean, at first, it just seems like a joke, because it's like one of those things that you kid about happening when you think about making a movie, that Robert De Niro is gonna want to do it. So it's great, because you know that he's going to be fantastic, and you know that he's going to elevate the level of the movie.

Screen Rant: So first I would just love to hear about sort of what your role was with this project. What was the day-to-day like you?

Judi Marmel: Well I'm Sebastian's manager, so he had this idea, and he and his co-writer, Austen Earl, are longtime friends and so they put together their pitch and we went out and pitched the studios. Lionsgate bought it and then they got a script, and they wrote the script and we continued to build Sebastian's career along the way. And meanwhile, he had done Irishman with Mr. De Niro, and his acting resume just sort of kept building. So all together we ended up putting this cast together, and we'd go out and get the financing in the studio, and we basically put the whole thing together and now we're on the other side of it of marketing this wonderful film.

How did De Niro being a part of it first sort of come to fruition?

Judi Marmel: De Niro has always been a huge idol and a huge actor that Sebastian looked up to, it was somebody who Sebastian had his posters of him in his bedroom as a kid. And then when they worked together in Irishman we always felt like it would make such a great combination. And Paul Weitz, who's one of the producers of the film, has a long relationship with Bob gave him the script and he really responded to it. Then we hired Laura Terruso and brought her on and Bob and she really hit it off and a vision was born.

Can you talk about anything that's next for Sebastian after this?

Judi Marmel: Certainly, so Sebastian just wrapped a new series for Max called How to Be a Bookie. It's a great series that Chuck Lorre created specifically for him, and it follows the story of Danny Calavito who goes all through Los Angeles collecting sports debts both big and small. It's a workplace comedy, the workplace just happens to be the city of Los Angeles as they really fight the evolution of legalized gambling starting to happen.

About My Father Details

Sebastian and his girlfriend Ellie are invited to her family home for a holiday weekend in the summer, but much to his chagrin he has to bring his Italian immigrant father Salvo. Sebastian and Salvo contend with culture clashes between themselves and Ellie's rich family. Over the course of the weekend the two very different families become one.

Check out our other About My Father interviews here:

• Robert De Niro & Sebastian Maniscalco
• Brett Dier, David Rasche & Anders Holm
• Kim Cattrall & Leslie Bibb
• Laura Terruso
• About My Father (2023)

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Movie Review: ‘Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes’ finds a new hero and will blow your mind

This image released by 20th Century Studios shows Noa, played by Owen Teague, in a scene from “Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes.” (20th Century Studios via AP)

This image released by 20th Century Studios shows Proximus Caesar, played by Kevin Durand, in a scene from “Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes.” (20th Century Studios via AP)

This image released by 20th Century Studios shows Raka, played by Peter Macon, in a scene from “Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes.” (20th Century Studios via AP)

This image released by 20th Century Studios shows a scene from “Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes.” (20th Century Studios via AP)

This image released by 20th Century Studios shows Soona, played by Lydia Peckham, left and Noa, played by Owen Teague, in a scene from “Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes.” (20th Century Studios via AP)

This image released by 20th Century Studios shows Noa, played by Owen Teague, from left, Freya Allan as Nova, and Raka, played by Peter Macon, in a scene from “Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes.” (20th Century Studios via AP)

This image released by 20th Century Studios shows Freya Allan in a scene from “Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes.” (20th Century Studios via AP)

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Fans of the “Planet of the Apes” franchise may still be mourning the 2017 death of Caesar, the first smart chimp and the charismatic ape leader. Not to worry: He haunts the next episode, the thrilling, visually stunning “Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes.”

We actually start with Caesar’s funeral, his body decorated with flowers and then set alight like a Viking, before fast-forwarding “many generations later.” All apes talk now and most humans don’t, reduced to caveman loin cloths and running wide-eyed and scared, evolution in reverse.

Our new hero is the young ape Noa (Owen Teague ) who is like all young adult chimps — seeking his father’s approval (even chimp dads just don’t understand) and testing his bravery. He is part of a clan that raises pet eagles, smokes fish and lives peacefully.

That all changes when his village is attacked not by humans but by fellow apes — masked soldiers from a nasty kingdom led by the crown-wearing Proximus Caesar (Kevin Durand, playing it to the hilt). He has taken Caesar’s name but twisted his words to become a tyrannical strongman — sorry, strongape.

Unlike the last movie which dealt with man’s inhumanity to animals — concentration camps included — ape-on-ape violence is in the cards for this one, including capturing an entire clan as prisoners. Proximus Caesar’s goons use makeshift cattle prods on fellow apes and force them to work while declaring “For Caesar!”

Screenwriter Josh Friedman has cleverly created a movie that examines how ancient stories can be hijacked and manipulated, like how Caesar’s non-violent message gets twisted by bad actors. There’s also a lot of “Avatar” primitive naivete, and that makes sense since the reboot was shaped by several of that blue alien movie’s makers.

The movie poses some uncomfortable questions about collaborationists. William H. Macy plays a human who has become a sort of teacher-prisoner to Proximus Caesar — reading Kurt Vonnegut to him — and won’t fight back. “It is already their world,” he rationalizes.

Along for the heroic ride is a human young woman (Freya Allan, a budding star) who is hiding an agenda but offers Noa help along the way. Peter Macon plays a kindly, book-loving orangutan who adds a jolt of gleeful electricity to the movie and is missed when he goes.

The effects are just jaw-dropping, from the ability to see individual hairs on the back of a monkey to the way leaves fall and the crack of tree limbs echoing in the forest. The sight of apes on horseback, which seemed glitchy just seven years ago, are now seamless. There are also inside jokes, like the use of the name Nova again this time.

Director Wes Ball nicely handles all the thrilling sequences — though the two-and-a-half hour runtime is somewhat taxing — and some really cool ones, like the sight of apes on horseback on a beach, a nod to the original 1968 movie. And like when the apes look through some old illustrated kids’ books and see themselves depicted in zoo cages. That makes for some awkward human-ape interaction. “What is next for apes? Should we go back to silence?” our hero asks.

The movie races to a complex face-off between good and bad apes and good and bad humans outside a hulking silo that holds promise to each group. Can apes and humans live in peace, as Caesar hoped? “Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes” doesn’t answer that but it does open up plenty more to ponder. Starting with the potentially crippling proposition of a key death, this franchise has somehow found new vibrancy.

“Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes,” a 20th Century Studios release that is exclusively in theaters May 10, is rated PG-13 for “intense sequences of sci-fi violence and action.” Running time: 145 minutes. Three and a half stars out of four.

MPAA Definition of PG-13: Parents strongly cautioned. Some material may be inappropriate for children under 13.

Online: https://www.20thcenturystudios.com/movies/kingdom-of-the-planet-of-the-apes

Mark Kennedy is at http://twitter.com/KennedyTwits

“My Name Is Loh Kiwan” Reviews, Characters and Storyline

“My Name Is Loh Kiwan” is a 2024 South Korean drama movie penned and directed by Kim Hee-jin, featuring Song Joong-ki and Choi Sung-eun. Inspired by Cho Hae-jin’s fictional novel “I Met Loh Kiwan” from 2019, the film delves into the journey of a North Korean defector seeking sanctuary in Belgium. Available on Netflix in specific areas, the movie debuted on March 1, 2024, offering an exploration of the protagonist’s trials and tribulations.

• Choi Sung-eun takes on the role of Marie Lee, a former shooting athlete.
• Kim Sung-ryung appears as Ok-hee, Kiwan’s mother.
• Seo Hyun-woo plays Ri Eun-cheol, Loh Kiwan’s maternal uncle.
• Lee Sang-hee portrays Seon-ju, a Korean-Chinese immigrant whom Ki-wan encounters at a Belgian factory.
• Jo Han-chul embodies Lee Youn-sung, Marie’s father.
• Lee Il-hwa depicts Jeong-ju, Marie’s mother.
• Waël Sersoub appears as Cyril, a bar owner in Belgium.

Kiwan (portrayed by Song Joong-ki) undergoes a harrowing journey as a North Korean defector who escapes to China with his mother, only to endure separation at the hands of the stringent Chinese authorities. Forced to embark on yet another perilous journey, Kiwan eventually finds himself in Brussels, a land vastly unfamiliar, especially amidst the biting winter. In this foreign terrain, he grapples with homelessness and the relentless struggle to survive. However, fueled by his mother’s dying wish for him to seek refuge and freedom, Kiwan perseveres, determined to find a safe sanctuary.

Amidst his trials, a glimmer of hope emerges when Kiwan crosses paths with Marie (portrayed by Choi Sung-eun), a former Belgian athlete who also faces adversity. Together, they confront their individual challenges, finding solace and strength in their shared determination to overcome their circumstances and strive for a brighter future. As they navigate the complexities of their newfound alliance, Kiwan and Marie forge a profound bond rooted in resilience and mutual support, embarking on a journey towards hope and redemption in the face of daunting odds.

• Cast & crew

Mufasa: The Lion King

Simba, having become king of the Pride Lands, is determined for his cub to follow in his paw prints while the origins of his late father Mufasa are explored. Simba, having become king of the Pride Lands, is determined for his cub to follow in his paw prints while the origins of his late father Mufasa are explored. Simba, having become king of the Pride Lands, is determined for his cub to follow in his paw prints while the origins of his late father Mufasa are explored.

• Barry Jenkins
• Linda Woolverton
• Irene Mecchi
• Jonathan Roberts
• Aaron Pierre
• Kelvin Harrison Jr.
• 2 Critic reviews
• 1 nomination

• Young Mufasa
• All cast & crew
• Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

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Did you know

• Trivia The prequel film will not be a sequel remake of The Lion King II: Simba's Pride (1998) , the direct-to-video sequel to the original film.

Rafiki : [from trailer] This story begins far beyond the mountains and the shadows. On the other side of the light, a lion was born without a drop of nobility in his blood. A lion who change our lives forever. The earth will shake, destiny awaits you.

• Connections Featured in AniMat's Crazy Cartoon Cast: The Sequel of Life (2020)
• When will Mufasa: The Lion King be released? Powered by Alexa
• December 20, 2024 (United States)
• United States
• Vua Sư Tử: Mufasa
• South Africa
• The Walt Disney Company
• Walt Disney Pictures
• Walt Disney Studios
• See more company credits at IMDbPro

Technical specs

• Dolby Atmos
• Dolby Surround 7.1
• IMAX 6-Track
• D-Cinema 96kHz 7.1
• 12-Track Digital Sound
• Dolby Digital
• D-Cinema 96kHz Dolby Surround 7.1

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