Film Review: August: Osage County (2013)

It's hard to discuss August: Osage County, John Wells' adaptation of the Pulitzer Prize-winning play of the same name, without focusing largely, if not solely on Meryl Streep's central performance. Though Tracy Letts' play is very much an ensemble work, one which encompasses three generations of a family who are brought together by the disappearance and death of their patriarch (Sam Shepard), Violet, the drug-addled, cancer-riddled harridan whose harsh, narcotised ramblings punctuate the play, is the dominant force of the story. More than that, though, Streep's performance is so indicative of everything that doesn't work about the film version that it's hard to really get across how bad it is without focusing on her. She's not the only thing wrong with Wells' film, but she is the most readily identifiable.

Film Review: Haywire (2011)

As he hurtles towards 50, the age at which he claims he will retire, or at the very least will take a prolonged break, from film-making, Steven Soderbergh seems intent on burning through as many genres as possible. The already prolific director, who has made 25 feature films in 23 years, will have released three films in the space of twelve months before this year is out, all of which are radically different. Contagion was a stark and bleak look at what could happen in the case of a cataclysmic pandemic, the forthcoming Magic Mike is a comedy about a male stripper played by Channing Tatum, and the recently-released Haywire is an action-thriller that, on the surface at least, seems pretty standard.