Rather than telling a story or exploring a philosophy it just ticks off all
Rather than telling a story or exploring a philosophy, it just ticks off all the red letter days in the colourful life of the Mexican surrealist: there’s the bus crash that left Kahlo in permanent pain; her marriage to the pathologically unfaithful Diego Rivera; her own flings with Leon Trotsky and Josephine Baker; and, every now and then, some painting.Constrained as it is by its generic structure, Frida has a few visual flourishes: Julie Taymor, the director, inserts some animations, sepia tints and sequences that merge live action with Kahlo’s paintings. Salma Hayek is fine in the title role, but her awards nominations must have been a reward for her getting the project off the ground rather than for her performance, eclipsed as it is by Alfred Molina’s as her elephantine husband.Jackass: The Movie (18) is an extended episode of MTV’s zero-budget, zero-sanity stunt show. Armed with video cameras and an utter disregard for their own safety, the Jackasses tightrope over an alligator pool, get tattooed in the back of an off-roading truck, and so on It’s an affront to the motion-picture medium. It’s also shamefully funny.The best thing about Analyze That (15) is the title. In 1999’s Analyze This, Robert DeNiro was a mob boss who sought treatment from Billy Crystal’s petrified psychiatrist The follow-up has no such peppy premise.
It tries on one plot after another for size before throwing up its hands and admitting that it’s the least necessary sequel ever made. Life and Debt (PG) is a vehement documentary about the World Bank’s deleterious effects on Jamaica – a political thriller crossed with Naomi Klein’s No Logo.n.barber independent.co.uk. This is filth. If you are at all squeamish about naked men contorting their genitalia for public amusement, please look elsewhere. No other article in this newspaper is likely to mention what my companions call “dick tricks”
This is filth.
We are sitting in a cold, damp room above a theatre in King’s Cross and a beautiful young man is tugging his remarkable penis. “Could you just step back a bit?” asks David Johnson, a producer of repute. “You’ll take my friend’s eye out.”Later, he leans back in his chair, chuckling: “That was one of the biggest I have ever seen. It will all be downhill after this.”These are the auditions for a show called Puppetry of the Penis, which started as outrageous street theatre in Australia, became a huge (so to speak) West End attraction and is now playing across the world “We have four companies,” says Simon Bryce. “They will be performing tonight in New South Wales, Chicago, Boston and Grimsby.