Well some of these I've been waiting for weeks to talk about in a round up but Easter has given me enough to squeeze into one entry. A while ago I saw Delicatessen - I wasn't particularly excited about it because it's Jean-Pierre Jeunet (and I only thought Amelie was okay, but I enjoyed A Very Long Engagement much more) but I found it extremely enjoyable. It's very funny throughout, completely mad but beautifully quirky. All of the film's appeal lies in the performances of Dominique Pinon and Marie-Laure Dougnac - it's just such a shame she's done so little since because she was a delight. So if post-apocalyptic cannibalistic hotels sound like your kind of thing then this will do nicely and it's a nice surprise to see Karin Viard being sexy back then in a completely trashy kind of way... 
I saw a classic hollywood film I've been meaning to catch for ages on tv the other week, The Bad and the Beautiful. It's very similar in structure to the later (and superior) film The Barefoot Contessa but despite not having the talent involved in front of or behind camera this is a good film. Not Lana Turner's best performance but she's good and while I've never had much time for Kirk Douglas he and his massive bum-chin are both fine in the role here. Won an oscar for Gloria Grahame in supporting actress and I can see why, she was very fun and memorable and stole scenes naturally.
Another film was a lovefilm rental which bears the subtitle "a.k.a. what happened before the hype" as Yella was the film which Nina Hoss won best actress for at the Berlin Film Festival ... over a certain Marion Cotillard in *that film about that french singer*. To be honest, I can see why, Marion's is a very physical, showy role and this is everything that is not, subtle, natural, a performance working on multiple levels, it's extremely skillfully done but not in an obvious way. The film's resolution originally had me crying "cop-out" but the more I think about it (and the 2 lengthy interviews on the dvd with star and director are very revealing and informative) it did have to be that way and it does add layers to Hoss's performance and the film. Very pacey, short, snappy, but meditative film with attractive leads (in many meanings) in an extremely watchable and unusually pensive film.
I saw brit-com Magicians on Sky because I was just that bored and while perfectly inoffensive it just wasn't that funny. I barely laughed out loud a couple of times. Never been a fan of Mitchell & Webb, this hasn't made me want to seek anything of theirs out. Story is a couple of magicians reunite years after a trick went wrong and the one guy accidentally decapitated his wife for a competition. Nothing really drags this up into even average, I couldn't recommend it.
More recently I saw Coeurs by Alain Resnais, it's a very sheened, smooth ode to pointlessness. I hate being not too enthusiastic about this film because it is littered with good performances (especially the unendingly divine Isabelle Carré, André Dussollier and Sabine Azéma) and is doubtlessly very polished from a technical standpoint but the characters have no growth, there is practically no plot and it's sadly quite dull. Resnais brings attention to his own technique either due to over-directing by having shots of flats from an aerial view and having it snow indoors etc. (not unlike Eternal Sunshine... but with much less of a point) or by having a lack of control of tone. The shifts from surrealism to artificiality don't serve the themes and merely highlight the director's technique rather than enhance the story he's telling ... because he isn't telling one. It's a bit of a conceit and the kind of film the phrase "intellectual counterfeit money" was made for.
Finally, Sleuth, not the 1972 one, the Kenneth Branagh remake. Despite being totally different I really liked this. Caine has some godly stares and moments at the beginning and end of the movie and the visit of the Inspector is particularly gripping. Law has some overt theatrics but he manages to do so in character. It's beautifully shot, edited resulting in a rapier like pace and extremely modern. Branagh's direction is interesting, using multiple surveillance technologies to make the way it's told serve the modern nature of it all. I don't think it's *great*, but then I didn't think the original was *great* either but both are extremely enjoyable romps. I think I *just* preferred the original because I love Larry so much but this is very far from a pointless exercise, it's an entirely different film, not a remake, more re-imagining. Extremely watchable, breathless with some extremely fine acting and told in a novel way. Gorgeous to look at with plenty of giggles on the way and the odd moment to shock ... and this is of course without even mentioning "the gimmick" that you would only know if you've seen the original. Good stuff, well worth seeing.