Review Cinema: Spartacus | Stanley Kubrick | slave-turned gladiator | Last chance Harvey

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The Review - AT THE MOVIES with DAN CARRIER
Published: 4 June 2009

Also on release this week

• SPARTACUS
Directed by Stanley Kubrick
Certificate PG.
We have all seen it on the little screen, but why not check out Stanley Kubrick’s slave-turned-gladiator-turned rebel leader epic in the comfort of a cinema?
The film has been re-released this week and with Kirk Douglas, Laurence Olivier, Jean Simmonds and Peter Ustinov starring it is no wonder the film became a classic. All hail Spartacus!

• LAST CHANCE HARVEY
Directed by Joel Hopkins
(Certificate 12a).
With two leads in Dustin Hoffman and West Hampstead-based Emma Thompson, it is hardly surprising that this low key and amiable rom-com provides a gently watchable 90-odd minutes.
New Yorker Harvey (Hoffman) comes to London to attend his daughter’s wedding and learns a few hard truths along the way. Fretting about his job writing advertising jingles back home and aware that his daughter is closer to her step-dad than him, what should be a joyous occasion is rather a chore.
But things begin to get interesting when he meets Kate Walker (Thompson).
She is used to men being nothing but annoying let-downs – every blind date she goes on seems to end in disaster and she is beginning to accept the fact she may spend the rest of her life alone. Until, of course, Last Chance Harvey appears.
There has long been a history of transatlantic romance: PG Wodehouse spent decades writing books about spiffy English gents and game Yank girls hitting it off. This film is in much the same vein and with the same, predictable ending.
Still, if it is happy escapism you want...

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