Mar 24th   
Wonderland*   
(US 2003)
Lions Gate Films/Flirt Pictures. 104m. 

Porn film star John Holmes becomes implicated in the Wonderland murders in July 1981 among the drug-fueled Los Angeles underworld.
Stylized in the manner of Rashomon to show different perspectives on an unsolved murder case, and hardly a good advertisement for LA justice, but carried along in a certain glitzy nostalgia to hold the attention, and also a barely cohesive plot.

Written by: James Cox, Captain Mauzaer, Todd Samovitz, D. Loriston Scott.
Producers: Michael Paseornek, Holly Wiersma.
Director: James Cox.
Starring: Val Kilmer, Kate Bosworth, Dylan McDermott, Lisa Kudrow, Josh Lucas, Christina Applegate, Eric Bogosian, Carrie Fisher, Ted Levine, Janeane Garofalo.
Photography: Michael Grady.
Music: Cliff Martinez.

Preceded by:
A Hole Lot of Trouble*
(GB 1969. Monarch Film. 27m.; Builders dig a hole in the wrong part of the road, in this weaker but almost as engaging variation on The Plank.; w: Ian Flintoff, Francis Searle; d: Francis Searle; s: Victor Maddern, Arthur Lowe, Bill Maynard, Ken Parry, Tim Barrett; ph: Terry Maher; m: Peter Jeffries.)

Mar 19th  
Mother's Pride**  (12A)
(Odeon Colchester)

(GB 2025)       
EFD/Circus/Media Finance Capital Founding/Flying Fish/Twickenham Film Studios. 93m. ws

A local boy returns to his home village and revives the family ale to help their threatened traditional old pub.
Heartwarming Ealing-style parochial British comedy in attractive surroundings, with most of the cliches firmly in place, some good performances, and fresh enough to make it above the average.

Written by: Meg Leonard, Nick Moorcroft.
Producer: James Spring.
Director: Nick Moorcroft.
Starring: Martin Clunes, Jonno Davies, James Buckley, Mark Addy, Gabriella Wilde, Luke Treadaway, Lana Moorcroft, Josie Lawrence, Miles Jupp.
Photography: Toby Moore.
Music: Simon Boswell.

+ filmed mainly around Norton St. Philip in Somerset

Mar 18th  
The Student of Prague*     
(Ger 1926)   
Sokal-Fiml Gmbh. 91m. bw. silent

An impoverished fencing student exchanges his other self for riches to a mysterious man in order to pursue his dream, but his doppelganger proves to be his undoing. 
Semi-supernatural drama with elements of Faust and Jekyll and Hyde, and some lapses in characterisation and variable Expressionistic performances, but some innovative camera trick work. The middle of three versions of this story, the others in 1913 and 1935.

Written by: Henrik Galeen, Hanns Heinz Ewers.
Producer: Henry Sokal.
Directror: Henrik Galeeb.
Starring: Conrad Veidt, Agnes Esterhazy, Elizza Le Porta, Werner Krauss, Ferdinand von Alten, Fritz Alberti.
Photogtaphy: Gunther Kramp.

THE STUDENT OF PRAGUE (1926). Seven years after The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1919, above), Conrad Veidt is still under the control of Werner Krauss