The White Balloon — Mubi.com
Jafar Panahi is now the Palme d’Or-winning and Oscar-nominated director of It Was Just an Accident — exiled from his native Iran and previously imprisoned and tortured by the regime. His career began in 1995 with this small, tenderly executed slice of social realism, co-written with Abbas Kiarostami. On New Year’s Eve in Tehran, where it’s a tradition to buy or catch a fish, a seven-year-old girl longs to purchase a new fish for her family’s pond. After convincing her parents to give her their last money for the mission, she and her brother set off to buy the fish in the 90 minutes before the stores close. A simple story, expertly told through the eyes of its young protagonist.
Pictures of Ghosts — Mubi.com
Brazilian director Kleber Mendonça Filho’s The Secret Agent has enjoyed much critical and award success this season. In this documentary essay from 2023, however, he takes a journey through the now rundown neighbourhoods of his childhood in Recife. He offers a moving rumination on memory and the magic of early encounters with the movies. Mixing archive with the director’s bemused meditations on life, death and family, it’s a personal film that avoids the trap of solipsistic navel-gazing.
Song Sung Blue — Buy from Apple TV+
Hugh Jackman stars opposite Kate Hudson, who delivers an Oscar-nominated performance, in Craig Brewer’s gently moving drama about a couple who make their living performing as a Neil Diamond tribute act, navigating the highs, lows, joy and heartbreak of their long musical journey together.
The Miracle Worker — Prime Video
Arthur Penn’s 1962 biopic of Helen Keller and the struggles of her tutor Anne Sullivan to teach her communication skills was a hit at the time, earning two Oscars for its stars Anne Bancroft and Patty Duke. Based on the stage play of the same name, it is emotionally devastating, unsentimentally inspiring and expertly directed with restraint and empathy.
Anemone — Rent or buy from Apple TV+
Much hyped for marking the return to screen of Daniel Day-Lewis after announcing his retirement in 2017, this directorial debut by his son, Ronan Day-Lewis, may be too uneven and infuriating to warrant the buzz. Day-Lewis Snr plays a man who’s opted for life as a hermit in the cold woods of Northern England. When his estranged brother (Sean Bean) arrives for a long-overdue reconnection meeting, dark secrets from the past and unresolved trauma inevitably emerge. While the film may not deliver on its full promise, it is saved by the committed performances of its two leads.
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