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Ian Mantgani
Tomatometer-approved critic
Born in Sligo, Ireland -- also the birthplace of brilliant filmmaker Neil Jordan -- Ian Waldron-Mantgani is the mixed-race son of an Indian-born doctor and Irish-born occupational therapist. He gained access to the internet in 1996 and immediately started posting movie reviews on message boards. After quotes in such publications as the Sunday Times, Ian decided it was time to create his own website. 'The UK Critic' first appeared online at the beginning of 1998, and quickly became Britain's pre-eminent centre of online criticism. On top of schoolwork, sporting activities and personal commitments, Ian reviewed every nationwide release in the year 2000, and continues to update his site weekly with every release of note. He sees the vast majority of films in his own time, with his own money. Despite the lack of monetary compensation, Ian?s reviews are heavily syndicated; he is a DVD reviewer for Apollo Guide, and has in the past served as head critic on CompuServe's UK Entertainment Forum and System Operator for Compuserve?s Empire Magazine forum. Pieces can also be found on entertainmentnutz.com, alltank.com, Reel Talk Movies, GDoggyDog?s Movie Reviews and the rec.arts.movies-reviews newsgroup. Ian makes regular contributions to Ebert?s Movie Answer Man column and provided " of the most amusing entries" to Ebert's witty book of movie cliches "The Bigger Little Movie Glossary". International awards received include four nominations for Online Film Critics Society Member of the Month, and Ian is one of the only British residents in the organisation -- serving the posts of full member, OFCS Mentor, Awards Committee member and Governing Committee member. As of September 2002, Ian has been studying a BA course in Film Studies at Sheffield Hallam University, which has the highest entry requirements of any pure film course in England.
Favorite film of all time: 12 Angry Men (1957)Favorite UK cinema releases of 2001: Requiem for a Dream, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, Traffic, The Contender, You Can Count on Me, The Pledge, Ghost World, Girlfight, Almost Famous, Quills, Audition, Castaway, Hedwig and the Angry Inch, Osmosis Jones, Thirteen Days
Liverpool, UK
http://www.ukcritic.com
Movies reviews only
| Rating | T-Meter | Title | Year | Review |
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The Irishman (2019) |
The film is ultimately about what an indistinct mulch life can be - how little you can believe in if those closest to you are the ones you betrayed. - The Skinny
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| Posted Oct 15, 2019
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Joker (2019) |
The sum of Joker's glib philosophy seems to be that there's a lot of dark stuff out there, and that should really make you think. - The Skinny
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| Posted Oct 03, 2019
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Cold Pursuit (2019) |
Caught noncommittally between action and comedy, it goes from being a cheeky genre meditation to a bore, spinning its snow-capped wheels. - The Skinny
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| Posted Feb 25, 2019
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Varda by Agnès (2019) |
As Varda's physical strength diminishes, and she gives us an ending that very much feels like a goodbye, she goes out by handing us an index to her case studies in how to spread creativity into the world. - Little White Lies
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| Posted Feb 19, 2019
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Amazing Grace (2018) |
Amazing Grace restores a missing piece of cinema history. With the gestures it reveals, and the spirituality it captures, it gives us something else - an act of worship, reborn. - Little White Lies
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| Posted Feb 18, 2019
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Bait (2019) |
A creeping, original British work that feels pounded into existence by hand, or possibly belched up by the angry sea. - Sight & Sound
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| Posted Feb 13, 2019
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The Operative (2019) |
Spy movies often revolve around the question of where loyalties lie, and this one puts an intriguing spin on that prospect. - Little White Lies
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| Posted Feb 13, 2019
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Watergate (2018) |
One long - very long - run-on sentence that throws in a mass of details about the crisis but doesn't shape it in a way that makes sense of the information or gives us a reason to care. - Little White Lies
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| Posted Feb 13, 2019
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Mr. Jones (2019) |
A fiery epic paying further tribute to this forgotten figure of history, and stoking the coals of remembrance as the forces of authoritarianism are, as they say, back in the news. - Little White Lies
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| Posted Feb 11, 2019
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Fourteen (2019) |
This is a wonderful, subtly devastating film from a voice in American independent cinema that will hopefully become better known. - Little White Lies
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| Posted Feb 10, 2019
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The Kindness of Strangers (2019) |
Even Home Alone 2 is far more indelible than The Kindness of Strangers. - Little White Lies
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| Posted Feb 08, 2019
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Burning (2018) |
Burning takes the form of a potboiler with something more disturbing and lingering simmering underneath. - The Skinny
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| Posted Dec 12, 2018
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Destroyer (2018) |
While Kidman's scenery-chewing is effective, the real star of Destroyer is the director, Karyn Kusama. - The Skinny
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| Posted Nov 02, 2018
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Unsane (2018) |
Unsane is sometimes plodding for a movie that has so much going on, but it also has plenty of shocks and as a whole is deeply engrossing. - The Skinny
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| Posted Mar 13, 2018
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U: July 22 (Utøya 22. Juli) (2018) |
It's unclear whether Utøya - July 22 wants to inform or empathise, but in the event it's a self-regarding and misguided piece of exploitation. - Sight & Sound
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| Posted Mar 13, 2018
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Custody (2017) |
Xavier Legrand generates an astonishing amount of tension, and when Custody explodes into rages, it's likely your stomach will clench up with anxiety. - The Skinny
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| Posted Feb 27, 2018
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The 15:17 to Paris (2018) |
Eastwood is making a point here about the heroism of ordinary men, the grit behind seemingly banal bros, though it's one of the oddest and lowest-key films he's ever made. - The Skinny
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| Posted Feb 14, 2018
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Golden Exits (2017) |
The movie is bogged down in misery and mutedness, and the effect is more suffocating than anything else. - The Skinny
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| Posted Oct 12, 2017
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Mudbound (2017) |
You could watch the beginning and end of this movie and understand its point, but the underlying ideological concerns help Mudbound remain involving throughout. - The Skinny
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| Posted Oct 10, 2017
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Going in Style (2017) |
Grab-bag references to comedy entertainment glory give Going in Style a soothing veneer but never cheer its hollow centre. - Little White Lies
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| Posted Apr 07, 2017
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The Void (2016) |
You may not only find yourself craving the seedy elegance of Lovecraft or Carpenter, but also the jolting liveliness of Sam Raimi's Evil Dead. - Little White Lies
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| Posted Mar 28, 2017
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Song to Song (2017) |
In some ways Song to Song is a more straightforward narrative than the intensely personal Knight of Cups, but just as blindingly beautiful and formally distinctive. - The Skinny
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| Posted Mar 11, 2017
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The Birth of a Nation (2016) |
An important subject pre-digested and trivialised with a formulaic, vanity-project idea of seriousness. - The Skinny
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| Posted Oct 17, 2016
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Voyage of Time: Life's Journey (2016) |
A visually dense treat for lovers of Malick's brand of philosophical cinema. - The Skinny
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| Posted Oct 14, 2016
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Toni Erdmann (2016) |
Just as the film seems primed for a self-pitying, cheap-shot conclusion, there's a liberating set-piece of fumbling group adventure that achieves a mythic, cathartic quality. - The Skinny
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| Posted Oct 14, 2016
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Elle (2016) |
A study of victimhood without sentimentality, of iconic strength without forced sass... and of determinedly staking a claim over one's own life against manipulative forces. - The Skinny
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| Posted Oct 14, 2016
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Sully (2016) |
Eastwood remains an American master, and if some of the finer details lack finesse, such quibbles are subsumed by the overall emotional whomp. - The Skinny
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| Posted Oct 12, 2016
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Goodnight Mommy (2014) |
While it grasps at deep thoughts about grief and perversion, Goodnight Mommy feels a specious ruse to show extreme cruelty. - The Skinny
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| Posted Feb 29, 2016
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Unbranded (2015) |
The gift shop DVD from an exciting horse farm. - Little White Lies
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| Posted Nov 27, 2015
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Carol (2015) |
The film never really goes for crescendo, rather it simmers a cauldron of heated but restrained emotions and sensations - gorgeously. - The Skinny
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| Posted Oct 19, 2015
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Sunset Song (2015) |
Stays true to Davies's lushly pained, deliberate style and builds into a sweeping chronicle of land and emotion that could fairly be called a Scottish answer to Gone with the Wind. - The Skinny
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| Posted Oct 19, 2015
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Tangerine (2015) |
A brilliant standalone piece of rhythmic storytelling, throwing itself at the audience as a ball of momentum that rolls to a tender, touching stop. - The Skinny
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| Posted Oct 13, 2015
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High-Rise (2015) |
Hints at going in a Clockwork Orange direction before Wheatley loses formal control in parallel to his characters. - The Skinny
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| Posted Oct 13, 2015
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My Darling Clementine (1946) |
Simple in its storytelling while transcendent as a poem of rhythms, bonds and values. - The Skinny
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| Posted Sep 01, 2015
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Hard to Be a God (2013) |
Bewildering, darkly hilarious, something of an endurance test, and made with such epic scale and precision that it's also breathtaking. - The Skinny
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| Posted Aug 13, 2015
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Dear White People (2014) |
As enjoyable and refreshing as it is, there's a certain bite lacking in the delivery. - Little White Lies
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| Posted Jul 10, 2015
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Paper Moon (1973) |
Sweet, playful, reverberant - this is a perfect movie. - The Skinny
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| Posted Jun 03, 2015
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The Tribe (2014) |
A substantive emotional compendium that's passionately, hypnotically shattering. - The Skinny
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| Posted May 07, 2015
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8 1/2 (1963) |
A carnival of the soul. - Little White Lies
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| Posted May 01, 2015
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The Falling (2014) |
Morley offers much to ponder, and it may be that this is a work that plays better with age - in hindsight, perhaps it can be appreciated for all that it puts on the table rather than for what it answers. - The Skinny
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| Posted Mar 19, 2015
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Dreamcatcher (2015) |
It's a surprising, unlikely record of the peaks, troughs and specificity of being human. - The Skinny
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| Posted Mar 19, 2015
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A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night (2014) |
Righteous, shocking, terrifying, iconic, funny, twistedly romantic and refreshingly unpredictable. - The Skinny
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| Posted Feb 25, 2015
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It Follows (2014) |
A bold, terrifying attack of cinema, immersive on the levels of imagery both beautiful and grotesque, and scares from the shallowest to the most pervasive. - The Skinny
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| Posted Feb 18, 2015
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Black Sea (2014) |
A confused mishmash about greed, madness, violence and sentimental redemption. - The Skinny
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| Posted Dec 04, 2014
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Winter Sleep (2014) |
Unfolding as a deep, empathetic series of conversations, it's an absorbing interplay of coldness and warmth both in its morality and in the stunning snowy landscapes and log-fire interiors of its settings. - The Skinny
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| Posted Nov 13, 2014
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Third Person (2013) |
An interminable illusive boondoggle with clunky turns and a flat, uninspiring reveal. - Little White Lies
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| Posted Nov 13, 2014
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The Art Party! (2014) |
The signs read 'Come to the Art Party' but only the party aspect of art is on show, and the students being lobbied for don't seem to have been invited. - The Skinny
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| Posted Sep 04, 2014
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The Patrol (2013) |
This bungled sortie in Helmand province presents a robust idea that's been executed poorly. - Little White Lies
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| Posted Feb 06, 2014
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O (2001) |
There's an air of authenticity to the proceedings here, and stylistic pretension never obscures good storytelling. - Apollo Guide
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| Posted May 21, 2005
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Koroshiya 1: The Animation Episode 0 (2002) |
- UK Critic
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| Posted Feb 19, 2005
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