Unfortunately this reworking of Master And Man hasn’t the resonance of Ivansxtc, but Huston is slyly compelling.
The emotional heavy lifting is done here much less through performances, digital cinematography or editing than through the wheeling out of familiar European classical music heavyweights in the form of Schubert’s Piano Sonata in a Major D.959 and Gorecki’s Symphony No 3. Disappointing.
Takes a bit of getting used to, but it's often very, very funny.
Its endgame gets seized up in the fateful cold, but the duelling performances – Huston's saturnine patrician, Jacobs's plaintive everyman – never falter.
Terrific, gallows-witty.
Minimalist, fascinatingly acted.
It's a nuanced story, cleverly combining claustrophobia and agoraphobia, and the moving climax takes on a sonorous spiritual tone of revelation and redemption.
Terrific performances underpin a tale that goes from initially superficial to intensely satisfying.
The film unfurls through a series of brilliantly staged and intensely uncomfortable interactions between the supercilious Basil and the grating Nick. Individually repellent, together they make a fascinating and utterly compelling double act, one that taps into the need to forge genuine connections.
Bernard Rose
General release. Check local listings for show times.
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