In all my years as a loyal Boxing Day cinema-goer, this particular crop of films might be the strangest. Several films here feel beamed in from an alternate universe; others are decidedly creations of our own ghastly world. There are mawkish dramas, aeriform travelogues, and at least two entries which live and die on the power of their stars’ abs. In other words: fitting diversions. Enjoy!
Anyone But You
Starring: Sydney Sweeney, Glen Powell
Directed by: Will Gluck
The Hollywood sex comedy is back! Unfortunately, this one is neither sexy nor very funny, though it was, famously, shot in Australia – the backdrop for a wedding whose guests include two sworn enemies and not-quite-exes (Sydney Sweeney and Glen Powell). They concoct a plan to act as lovers for various nefarious reasons, making goo-goo eyes in public while privately trading jabs that sound AI-generated. It is a bad film but a great 100-minute desktop screensaver which regularly cycles between sweeping oceans, drone shots of Sydney harbour and Glen Powell’s torso.
One Life
Starring: Anthony Hopkins, Johnny Flynn, Helena Bonham Carter
Directed by: James Hawes
As far as cinema goes, the UK may as well be Mars; it is a truth universally acknowledged that each year must deliver at least one blockbuster British release that is completely inscrutable anywhere else. (See also: Empire of Light; Living; Operation Mincemeat). The 2023 edition arrives in the form of this bingo card of British tropes: a BBC-produced (check) second world war (check) tearjerker (check) starring Anthony Hopkins (check, check, check) as a real-life stockbroker who was instrumental in the rescue of hundreds of Jewish children.
Read more: One Life review – Anthony Hopkins moves in stirring second world war drama
Poor Things
Starring: Emma Stone, Mark Ruffalo, Willem Dafoe, Ramy Youssef
Directed by: Yorgos Lanthimos
Here’s a London period drama of a very different variety: the new film from The Favourite and The Killing of a Sacred Deer director Yorgos Lanthimos, who turns the city into a steampunk fantasia. Emma Stone plays a young Victorian woman resurrected by a mad scientist as a grunting Frankenstein-ish creation with jet black tresses and a child’s brain. Unburdened from worldly woes, she embarks on a cross-continental journey that is sometimes enlightening, mostly horny. It is “one of the year’s must-see performances”, according to our review.
Read more: Poor Things review – Emma Stone has a sexual adventure in Yorgos Lanthimos’s virtuoso comic epic
Coup de Chance
Starring: Lou de Laâge, Valérie Lemercier, Melvil Poupaud, Niels Schneider
Directed by: Woody Allen
Despite every promoter and cinema’s best efforts, it is bleedingly obvious that Coup de Chance is a Woody Allen film. His late-career trademarks are on full display in this autumnal tale of romantic capers that saunters along like jazz, punctuated by serendipities and misfortunes that feel lightly mystical. It is not, of course, Allen’s first outing in Paris, but it is his first film in French, starring César-nominated actor Lou de Laâge as an adulterous lover whose extramarital affair takes a turn for the moribund. Our critic called it Allen’s best film in a decade.
Read more: Coup de Chance review – Woody Allen’s tale of ill-fated lovers is his best film in a decade
Migration
Starring: Kumail Nanjiani, Elizabeth Banks, Awkwafina, Keegan-Michael Key, Danny DeVito
Directed by: Benjamin Renner
The neurotic-director-to-cartoon-writer pipeline has a surprisingly storied history: Noah Baumbach for Madagascar 3, Charlie Kaufman for Kung Fu Panda 2, and now Mike White for Migration, an animation about a group of mallards flying from New England to Jamaica for the winter. There is mayhem and family fun aplenty; there is also a voice cast that, inexplicably, includes Kumail Nanjiani, Elizabeth Banks, Awkwafina and Danny DeVito. I wish everyone involved a happy payday.
Wish
Starring: Ariana DeBose, Chris Pine
Directed by: Chris Buck, Fawn Veerasunthorn
By all accounts, Disney has had one of its worst years on record: Marvel’s chokehold at the box office has well and truly splintered; multiple Pixar movies went straight to streaming; even sure bets like Indiana Jones and The Little Mermaid underperformed. At last, here comes the house of mouse’s final resort: the aspirationally titled Wish, a brazen shot at replicating the Frozen template to world domination. It has so far been roundly panned as “cynical” and “uninspired”; still, it’s this or the mallards.
Read more: Wish review – Disney marketing exercise disguised as a fairytale
Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom
Starring: Jason Momoa, Patrick Wilson, Amber Heard
Directed by: James Wan
Also hoping to beat the superhero slump is this sequel to DC’s underwater odyssey. The impossibly shiny, impossibly hunky Aquaman (Jason Momoa) is back and so is his extremely campy trident, which is almost as gold as his wetsuit. Together, they must protect their kingdom – Atlantis – from certain destruction. It is all classic comic book fare, bolstered by its superhero’s unique ability to command waves of both water and undying thirst.
Two Tickets to Greece
Starring: Laure Calamy, Olivia Côte, Kristin Scott Thomas
Directed by: Marc Fitoussi
With very little marketing and nary a Wikipedia entry, I remain unconvinced this a real movie, though its official synopsis insists it is about “three fabulous femmes”: two estranged childhood friends, and a woman named Bijou played by Kristin Scott Thomas. Travelling to the island of Amorgos, they confront all manners of past traumas and present mishaps under the beaming Aegean sun. Yamas!
