Film Talk: Latest Movie Releases – A powerful telling of an atrocious chapter in history with Till

2022 packed a monumental cinematic punch, with hard-hitting gems like Oliver Hermanus’s Living and black comedy beauties such as The Banshees of Inisherin shining as the jewels in its crown. And, of course, who could forget the long-awaited return to the cockpit of a certain Pete ‘Maverick’ Mitchell as Tom Cruise finally dusted off those aviators for a Top Gun sequel?

It was a year that saw the Jurassic Park legacy gang reunite, Chris Hemsworth chisel his god-bod back into form for Thor 4, and a much-anticipated return to Pandora with Avatar: The Way Of Water.

We were treated to The Secrets Of Dumbledore, found out Where The Crawdads Sing, and even had front row seats to another Death On The Nile. The question is, can 2023 possibly hope to fill the big hefty boots that 2022 has left behind?

Based on the first offerings of the year – yes, ladies and gentlemen, yes it can. Sparing no emotional punches, at the top of the bill this week we have Till, a harrowing telling of the true story of a teenage boy’s lynching in 1955 Mississippi. Shocking and powerful, this one puts the talent of Danielle Deadwyler front and centre as a grieving mother in a poignant and heartbreaking struggle for justice.

Also released this week, our home-grown ‘Favourite’ Olivia Colman is leading the charge in Sam Mendes’ valentine to cinemagoing, Empire Of Light. Meanwhile, Hollywood royal and timeless talent Tom Hanks is stepping into the shoes of A Man Called Otto. Welcome to 2023 folks – it looks to be a good ‘un. Lights, camera, action...

TILL (12A, 130 mins)

Released: January 6 (UK & Ireland)

In August 1955, 14-year-old Emmett Till was lynched in Mississippi during a visit to his cousins. He was accused of making inappropriate advances to a white female store owner.

Two men stood trial for killing Emmett and were found not guilty by an all-white jury.

The following year, the men admitted to the crime in a magazine interview, protected against prosecution for the same offence by the double jeopardy clause in the US Constitution.

Director Chinonye Chukwu’s harrowing drama relives this shocking chapter in modern US history and the subsequent quest for justice spearheaded by Emmett’s mother, Mamie Till-Mobley.

Danielle Deadwyler electrifies every frame of Till as the grief-stricken yet defiant matriarch, urging her boy to be on his best behaviour in Mississippi (“Be smart down there”) and passionately advocating solidarity at a Harlem rally to effect change (“The lynching of my son has shown me that what happens to any of us, anywhere in the world, had better be the business of us all.”)

A script co-written by Michael Reilly, Keith Beauchamp and Chukwu is respectful to a fault and exercises restraint at the most critical juncture (Emmett’s horrific final moments are heard but not seen.)

Mamie Till-Mobley (Deadwyler) lives in a middle class, all-black neighbourhood of 1955 Chicago with her 14-year-old son Emmett (Jalyn Hall), who is about to visit his cousins down in Mississippi. She is reluctant to let her boy stray outside the city limits.

“I don’t want him seeing himself the way those people are seen down there,” Mamie tells her mother Alma (Whoopi Goldberg), but she nervously relents and Emmett travels to the town of Money – population 398 – with his cousins Maurice (Diallo Thompson), Wheeler (Gem Collins) and Simmy (Tyrik Johnson).

At the Bryant’s Country Store, Emmett violates an unspoken code of conduct by paying 21-year-old white proprietor Carolyn Bryant (Haley Bennett) a compliment: “You look like a movie star.”

In the dead of night, Carolyn’s hot-headed husband Roy (Sean Michael Weber), and accomplices, drag Emmett from his cousins’ home.

A grief-stricken Mamie insists on an open coffin and the US is confronted with shocking images of Emmett’s bludgeoned face, which intensifies efforts by the NAACP to introduce legislation.

Till is a deeply affecting history lesson that does not stray outside clearly marked dramatic lines that relate to the court case and its aftermath.

Deadwyler is sensational and richly merits a seat at the Academy Awards nominations table, with sterling support from Hall, who exudes fresh-faced innocence from his opening scene. Period detail is impeccable.

As a bruising parting shot, closing title cards remind us that lynching only became a federal hate crime in March 29, 2022 when President Joe Biden signed The Emmett Till Antilynching Act into law.

Chukwu’s picture could not be more timely.

A MAN CALLED OTTO (15, 126 mins)

Released: January 6 (UK & Ireland)

Misery loves the company of Tom Hanks in director Marc Forster’s English-language remake of the 2015 Swedish comedy drama A Man Called Ove, adapted from the novel by Fredrik Backman.

The two-time Oscar winner plays a socially awkward 60-something curmudgeon, who intends to take his own life so he can be reunited with his late wife but is repeatedly distracted from the grim task by unsuspecting neighbours.

Screenwriter David Magee transplants the darkly humorous subject matter from Scandinavia to the snow-laden American Midwest but retains the core emotional values of Hannes Holm’s original script including a dewy-eyed resolution that targets tear ducts almost as ruthlessly as the fictional Dye & Merica real estate agency identifies elderly residents in Otto’s neighbourhood for hasty relocation to the nearest care home.

A Man Called Ove was nominated for two Academy Awards including Best International Feature Film. Despite an endearing lead performance from Hanks and a luminous supporting turn from Mariana Trevino, it’s unlikely that Forster’s picture will be troubling Oscar voters but A Man Called Otto still charms and uplifts without apology.

EMPIRE OF LIGHT (15, 115 mins)

Released: January 9 (UK & Ireland)

Writer-director Sam Mendes’ unabashed love letter to the moving image unfolds in a fading picture house on the English coast in the early 1980s when an adult ticket cost £1.50 and a box of Maltesers from the concessions stand would set you back two shiny 10p pieces.

On the big screen, the Elwood brothers played by John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd loudly preached Everybody Needs Somebody To Love and on the streets of Thatcherite Britain, the National Front clashed violently with police.

Racial tensions provide the hastily sketched backdrop to Mendes’s intimate character study informed by memories of his mother’s struggles with mental illness, necessitating an abrupt change of tone that hinges on a dazzling performance from Oscar winner Olivia Colman.

She is perpetually luminous when Mendes’ script feels dim and unfocused, navigating the mood swings of a diagnosed schizophrenic who stops taking her prescribed lithium and spirals in front of the one person who genuinely cares about her.

A workplace romance with co-star Micheal Ward is artfully shot but his character is underwritten and Mendes barely scratches the surface of the bigotry of the era.

THE ENFORCER (18, 90 mins)

Released: January 6 (UK & Ireland, selected cinemas)

Commercial and short film director Richard Hughes makes his feature debut with an action thriller about a veteran hit man on the road to redemption.

Ageing mob heavy Cuda (Antonio Banderas) serves time behind bars to protect his powerful employer Estelle (Kate Bosworth) and he re-enters society with a strong desire to rebuild bridges with his estranged teenage daughter.

Haunted by his deficiencies as a father, Cuda takes pity on 15-year-old runaway Billie (Zolee Griggs), who is shoplifting to survive on the streets of Miami.

Billie is subsequently abducted – fresh meat for a child sex trafficking ring with strong ties to Estelle’s criminal empire.

Cuda resolves to rescue the girl and forcibly bites the hand that feeds him, moulding a streetfighter called the Stray (Mojean Aria) into his protege capable of killing anyone that stands in their way.

PIGGY (18, 100 mins)

Released: January 6 (UK & Ireland, selected cinemas)

School bullies get their comeuppance in a blood-soaked Spanish horror written and directed by Carlota Pereda, which is expanded from her award-winning 2019 short film of the same title.

Sara (Laura Galan) is painfully self-conscious about her weight and a clique of girls in town mercilessly target her insecurities.

After one horrific incident of humiliation, Sara is sole witness to an enigmatic stranger (Richard Holmes) kidnapping one of her tormentors.

Grateful that someone in the world is on her side, Sara faces a moral dilemma about reporting the crime or remaining silent.

As the stranger targets more venomous youngsters in the community, Sara becomes an accomplice to crimes that shock local police and her overly protective mother Asun (Carmen Machi).