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In Todd Haynes’s May December, icy restraint might leave you too cold

Netflix’s provocative drama, starring Natalie Portman and Julianne Moore, plays on juicy tabloid fascination but there’s something missingExpensive and atmospheric as it looks, there’s a whiff of trash culture from the very first lines of the film May …

Netflix’s provocative drama, starring Natalie Portman and Julianne Moore, plays on juicy tabloid fascination but there’s something missing

Expensive and atmospheric as it looks, there’s a whiff of trash culture from the very first lines of the film May December, which inflamed the age-gap discourse since its Netflix release last weekend and has already garnered accolades for Riverdale’s Charles Melton as best supporting actor. Our first introduction to Gracie, the arch, lispy housewife played by Julianne Moore, is in her airy kitchen; anticipating the arrival of a famous actor, she off-handedly recalls her own meeting with Judge Judy.

Off-handed is Gracie’s way – she’s prolific at the brag or barb wrapped in tissue paper. So, too, is the film, directed by Todd Haynes from a screenplay by Samy Burch, which summarily reveals its conceit through a series of overly deferential questions and strained niceties. Gracie’s husband Joe (Melton) is chiseled, smooth-faced and diffident, in noticeable contrast to her wrinkles and brittle temperament. The famous actor Elizabeth (an excellent Natalie Portman) is visiting the couple and their three children because she is playing Gracie in a movie about their headline-grabbing relationship, which began when she was 36, he 12, and both worked at a pet store.

In Todd Haynes’s May December, icy restraint might leave you too cold

Netflix’s provocative drama, starring Natalie Portman and Julianne Moore, plays on juicy tabloid fascination but there’s something missing

The West End turns upside down … Stranger Things: The First Shadow – in pictures

Netflix’s phenomenally successful sci-fi horror saga continues with a new stage production, now running at the Phoenix theatre in London. Here’s an exclusive first look Continue reading…

Netflix’s phenomenally successful sci-fi horror saga continues with a new stage production, now running at the Phoenix theatre in London. Here’s an exclusive first look

The West End turns upside down … Stranger Things: The First Shadow – in pictures

Netflix’s phenomenally successful sci-fi horror saga continues with a new stage production, now running at the Phoenix theatre in London. Here’s an exclusive first look Continue reading…

Netflix’s phenomenally successful sci-fi horror saga continues with a new stage production, now running at the Phoenix theatre in London. Here’s an exclusive first look

Can Greta Gerwig bring a new kind of magic to Netflix’s Narnia Chronicles?

The Barbie film-maker is set to direct adaptations of at least two of CS Lewis’s fantasy novels for the streaming giant – will she do better than the last ones?You might think Greta Gerwig an unusual choice to take on CS Lewis’s Narnia stories for Netf…

The Barbie film-maker is set to direct adaptations of at least two of CS Lewis’s fantasy novels for the streaming giant – will she do better than the last ones?

You might think Greta Gerwig an unusual choice to take on CS Lewis’s Narnia stories for Netflix. And at first glance, few would argue with you. Beginning her career as an actor in mumblecore movies such as Baghead, Hannah Takes the Stairs and Greenberg before transitioning into indie cinema as a film-maker with Lady Bird, Gerwig became a household name with this year’s $1.4bn-grossing, conservative-baiting, slyly subversive comedy fantasy Barbie, a movie that will be remembered as the most topically adroit cinematic event of 2023, despite ostensibly being about a child’s plastic toy.

So what on earth might Gerwig do with Aslan, Eustace Grubb and Mr Tumnus the faun? Gerwig is down to make at least two from Lewis’s seven-book series for Netflix, and the streamer’s chairman Scott Stuber hinted to Variety this week that the films might be more traditional than we might think. “She grew up in a Christian background,” Stuber said. “The CS Lewis books are very much based in Christianity. And so we just started talking about it. We don’t have IP, so when we had the opportunity [to license] those books or the [Roald Dahl stories] we’ve jumped at it, to have stories that people recognise and the ability to tell those stories.” Stuber said Gerwig was currently working out the “narrative arc” of the films, but implied heavily that The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe would be a central focus.

Can Greta Gerwig bring a new kind of magic to Netflix’s Narnia Chronicles?

The Barbie film-maker is set to direct adaptations of at least two of CS Lewis’s fantasy novels for the streaming giant – will she do better than the last ones?

OA writers Brit Marling and Zal Batmanglij: ‘We’ve had to create our own reality’

The TV showrunners redefined sci-fi with their acclaimed Netflix series, until its sudden cancellation left them reeling. Now they’ve regrouped to take on the whodunnitBrit Marling and Zal Batmanglij arrive at the Chelsea Hotel in New York in a frenzy….

The TV showrunners redefined sci-fi with their acclaimed Netflix series, until its sudden cancellation left them reeling. Now they’ve regrouped to take on the whodunnit

Brit Marling and Zal Batmanglij arrive at the Chelsea Hotel in New York in a frenzy. “We’re flying by the seat of our pants,” Marling announces, underscored by the vibrating of Batmanglij’s phone; the 148-day writers’ strike ended just hours ago and now, suddenly, the duo can work once more. Inboxes are being inundated.

They are also experiencing a sense of deliverance, they say, now that they can finally talk about their new show, A Murder at the End of the World. They have been working on it for nearly half a decade, ever since the cancellation of their hit series The OA in 2019. “I feel like we’ve been on a tanker ship and we’re finally seeing land,” says Batmanglij.

Diana Nyad’s epic swim from Cuba to Florida isn’t even the most astounding part of the story | Emma Brockes

Annette Bening plays the swimmer in a new Netflix biopic; but as her coach, Jodie Foster also achieves something remarkableThere is something mythic about the story of Diana Nyad, the first (and, to date, only) person to swim the 110 miles from Cuba to…

Annette Bening plays the swimmer in a new Netflix biopic; but as her coach, Jodie Foster also achieves something remarkable

There is something mythic about the story of Diana Nyad, the first (and, to date, only) person to swim the 110 miles from Cuba to the US without the use of a shark cage. Nyad was 64 and on her fifth attempt when she succeeded in 2013, a feat that should not have been humanly possible. As well as the sharks, there were deadly box jellyfish, and the Gulf stream itself, threatening to sweep her away from the support boat and out into the ocean. Her success was inspiring and continues to inspire, although, as we see in Nyad, the new Netflix biopic, not always in the obvious ways.

You would have to be a maniac to attempt – and keep attempting – what Nyad did, and this is the energy brought by the actor Annette Bening to the title role. Bening’s heroine is capricious, raging, solipsistic to the point of narcissism, and wholly indefatigable. At an age at which people in general and women in particular are not considered apex performers, Nyad breaks her 30-year hiatus on swimming and, for all the reasons people make radical changes at that stage of life – fear of death, fear of obsolescence, fury at the realisation that this is all going to be much shorter than anticipated – gets back in the pool. She is, per the movie, a total nightmare of a person and also blows your mind.

Diana Nyad’s epic swim from Cuba to Florida isn’t even the most astounding part of the story | Emma Brockes

Annette Bening plays the swimmer in a new Netflix biopic; but as her coach, Jodie Foster also achieves something remarkable

Robbie Williams review – four hours of grim navel-gazing from the uber-star in his undies

As Robbie lies in bed and monologues his way through endless clips of his miserable glory days, the new Netflix series gives off a seriously onanistic vibeRobbie Williams isn’t wearing any trousers. Sitting cross-legged on his bed in his LA mansion, th…

As Robbie lies in bed and monologues his way through endless clips of his miserable glory days, the new Netflix series gives off a seriously onanistic vibe

Robbie Williams isn’t wearing any trousers. Sitting cross-legged on his bed in his LA mansion, the pop star is watching his past self on a dusty laptop: a stream of behind-the-scenes archive footage that moves from the fan-frenzy of Take That to the wildly popular super-tours of his solo era to his painful departure from the heart of the zeitgeist. Why he needs to do this in his pants is unclear. Is it meant to be a metaphor for the intimate, no-holds-barred nature of this documentary series? A nod to the fact that this is Robbie: frank and unfiltered? Or maybe it’s just a sign that Williams is a natural-born exhibitionist (as if we needed another one).

Whatever the reason, the undies can’t help but underline the onanistic vibe. It is mostly Williams in the footage, the only other main character being his on-off songwriting partner Guy Chambers (who filmed most of it). And save a brief appearance from his wife, Ayda Field, there are no other talking heads either. This is Williams on Williams: a claustrophobic, navel-gazing, four-hour-long monologue delivered by Robbie past and present, outlining the depression, anxiety and addiction that accompanied his uber-stardom and has seemingly characterised his entire life.