Now Showing Oct 20

Two of Hollywood’s biggest stars – Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz – join forces to co-star in ‘Knight and Day’, an action-comedy in which a woman who dreams of meeting Mister Right suddenly becomes caught up in a world of trouble when she crosses paths with (and falls for) a man who turns out to be a spy.

Cruise and Diaz haven’t performed together since 2001’s ‘Vanilla Sky’; however, rather than co-starring in another psychological thriller, this time they return to the world of spy flicks – a genre in which they’re both well-versed (think ‘Mission Impossible’ for Cruise and ‘Charlie’s Angels’ for Diaz).

In a story that unfolds in New York, the Alps, Austria, Spain and a tiny deserted island in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, Diaz plays June, a woman who, before boarding a flight that will get her home in time for her sister’s wedding, bumps into a particularly charming man who introduces himself as Roy. She finds herself seated near him during the flight, and the two become friendly. June begins to feel an attraction; however – as soon becomes apparent – Roy is in fact a spy who’s currently involved in a particularly dangerous mission: a mission in which June soon becomes unwittingly caught up.

As she realizes her predicament, any premonitions of a possible romance that she may have been having soon turn to panic, and before she’s had time to think, she’s ensnared in a world of trouble that she’s completely unable to comprehend. June later learns that the man she’s become entangled with is on the run from a group of federal agents; however, the real question on her mind is whether or not Roy is her ‘knight in shining armour’.

What brings the film to life is, undoubtedly, the brilliance of Cruise and Diaz as a duo. In a world where 3D action is all the rage, the film refreshingly avoids any use of it – even during an explosive beach scene in which the couple are suddenly attacked by an enemy aircraft. Furthermore, throughout the film not only do both Cruise and Diaz seem to be immensely enjoying themselves, they also perform their own stunts: Cruise leaping between cars during a high speed car-chase scene, and Diaz pulls off one-eighty turns while behind the wheel. The director allowing these two more than capable action-film stars the freedom to perform so naturally together is acclaimed director James Mangold, whose previous works include titles such as ‘Kate & Leopold’ and ‘Walk the Line’.

Knight and Day

USA, 2010
Opened: Oct 9
Director: James Mangold
Cast: Tom Cruise, Cameron Diaz
Distributor: 20th Century Fox Pictures
Website: movies.foxjapan.com/knightandday/

Ranbou to Taiki

A man named Hidenori and a woman named Nanase live in the same small house together. Pretending to be brother and sister, they carry on a bizarre existence in which each night Hidenori spies on Nanase (who knows she’s being spied on) from a space in the attic. However, when a new couple moves to the neighbourhood, the strange relationship that exists between this unusual and reclusive couple begins to fall apart at the seams.

The second film adaptation of a work written by Yukiko Motoya, a spirited young writer and stage director whose previous works include ‘Funukedomo, Kanashimi no Ai wo Misero’ (known in English as ‘Funuke: Show Some Love, You Losers!’), ‘Ranbou to Taiki’ tells a peculiar – and at times obscene – tale of humour, sadness and love.

Japan, 2010
Opened: Oct 9
Director: Masanori Tominaga
Cast: Tadanobu Asano, Minami, Eiko Koike, Tadayuki Yamada
Distributor: Media Factory/Showgate
Website: ranbou-movie.com/

Senna

A documentary about the life of Ayrton Senna – the world-class Formula One racing driver who won the F1 world championship three times before his death during the San Marino Grand Prix at the Autodromo Enzo e Dino Ferrari in Italy in 1994 – to commemorate what would be his fiftieth birthday. In addition to bringing together both public and private footage from various countries, the film also includes a number of interviews by Senna himself, members of his family and other drivers, regarding his fierce rivalry with Alain Prost and his disagreement with various decisions made by FISA’s Jean-Marie Balestre.

UK, 2010
Japanese Title: Airuton Sena: Onsoku no Achira he
Opened: Oct 8
Director: Asif Kapadia
Cast: Ayrton Senna, Alain Proust, Frank Williams, Ron Dennis, Vivane Senna, Milton da Silva, Neide Senna, Jackie Stewart, Sid Watkins
Distributor: Toho Towa
Website: senna-movie.jp/

Le petit Nicolas

A film adaptation of the French children’s story by Jean-Jacques Sempé that’s been loved in France for more than 50 years and translated into as many as 30 different languages, ‘Le petit Nicolas’ tells the story of a young boy named Nicolas who overhears a conversation that leads him to believe that – should his expectant mother give birth to a new younger brother – he’ll be abandoned by his parents. Fearing the worst, Nicolas quickly assembles a small group of trusted friends to devise a plan…

Overflowing with humour, ‘Le petit Nicolas’ could perhaps be thought of as a France’s equivalent of Japan’s ‘Chibi Maruko-chan’.

France, 2009
Opened: Oct 9
Director: Laurent Tirard
Cast: Maxime Godart, Valérie Lemercier, Kad Merad
Distributor: Comstock Group/Face to Face
Website: www.petitnicolas.jp/index_pn.html