A KID FOR TWO FARTHINGS (StudioCanal). Carol Reed directs this slice-of-life snapshot of teeming Petticoat Lane in the 1950s. The Jewishness is toned down. There is a remarkable performance by 6-year-old Jonathan Ashmore as a boy who believes a goat (he thinks is a unicorn) will be able to bring good fortune to the community.
ONE FROM THE HEART (StudioCanal). A mechanic (Frederic Forrest) and a window-dresser (Teri Gerr) break-up. He has a fling with a circus performer (Nastassja Kinski). She has a fling with a waiter (Raul Julia). Will they re-unite? Francis Ford Coppola had a financial disaster in 1982 with this romantic musical which is set in Las Vegas. It is the total studio-bound, stagy artificiality and the colourful photography, not the banal script, which makes the film special.
LILTING (ITVX). Young man (Ben Whishaw) makes contact with the mother (Cheng Pei-pei) of his recently deceased Chinese lover (Andrew Leung). She lives in a retirement home. He needs a translator to talk with her. It is the actual language barrier between them which makes this modest and sensitively acted British film so touching.
CHEVALIER (Searchlight). Joseph Bologne (1745-1799), illegitimate son of an African slave and French plantation owner, is sent as a child to Paris and grows up to be a famous virtuoso violinist, fencer and composer. Marie Antoinette made him a chevalier. Racism stopped him from becoming the director of Paris Opera. Napoleon banned his music and erased him from history. Kelvin Harrison Jr stars.
NAPOLEON (Amazon). Joaquin Phoenix, looking very sombre and dour, wears the iconic bicorne hat but lacks the charisma. The great military commander fought 61 battles. His legacy was over 3 million dead. Ridley Scott’s epic is at its best on the battlefields. The film is less interesting when it concentrates on Bonaparte’s childless marriage to Josephine (Vanessa Kirby).
CIRCLE OF DANGER (StudioCanal). American (Ray Milland) comes to the UK to discover how his brother died in World War II. The only thrills in Jacques Tourneur’s 1951 thriller are in the climax, a confrontation between three men on a wild heath. There is no danger at all elsewhere.
NYAD (Netflix) In 2013 on the fifth attempt, Diana Nyad was the first woman to swim from Cuba to Florida, 110 miles, without a shark cage. The film is a tribute to her courage and persistence. The amazing feat, however, has not been ratified. Annette Bening is Nyad. Jodie Foster is her trainer.
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