Captain Corelli's Mandolin (2001)

Picturesque innocence of Pelagia’s love in Eden-like setting

Just two years ago, we left Hugh Grant lounging in a Notting Hill square, with a pregnant Julia Roberts snuggling up to him, and, like millions of others, he was reading a paperback with that unmistakable Mediterranean-blue jacket design. It was a cute bit of advance product placement for production company Working Title’s next project: Captain Corelli’s Mandolin, the story of a lovely young Greek woman and her affair, during the second world war, with a captain from the occupying Italian forces.

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Pain and Glory: A self-indulgent movie by Pedro Almodovar

Pain and Glory: A self-indulgent movie by Pedro Almodovar

In Pedro Almodóvar’s Pain and Glory (Dolor y Gloria), there is a poster on a character’s wall advertising Fellini’s 8 1/2, and that can only mean one thing. It’s going to be one of those films. At some time or another, male auteurs of a certain age feel the need to make a semi-autobiographical drama in which they look back on their youth and their career, and now, at last, it is Almodóvar’s turn.

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