ACTION THRILLER

WRATH OF MAN (M18)

119 minutes

Rating: 4/5

This pulse-racing action thriller showcases British film-maker Guy Ritchie at his Guy Ritchie-st.

The maker of movies about bad men who look virtuous because those around them are worse is back with another fist-and-firearms spectacular featuring favoured tough guy Jason Statham.

Statham, as in other Ritchie projects (crime thrillers Lock, Stock And Two Smoking Barrels, 1998; Snatch, 2000; and Revolver, 2005) does most of his acting here with furrowed brows and flying feet.

The movie opens with a mystery: "H" (Statham), as he is nicknamed by his colleagues at a Los Angeles armoured car security company, is a new hire who is foreign to their world, and not just because he comes from across the pond. His American buddies suspect that the steel-clad four-wheelers are merely vehicles (pun intended) for a deeper mission, one that the tight-lipped limey will not disclose.

FILM FESTIVAL

30TH EUROPEAN FILM FESTIVAL

The pandemic sent last year's edition into hiatus but it is back, with a slate of 23 films aimed at sending a positive message in a difficult time.

Presented by the Embassy of Luxembourg, the French-language animated feature Funan (2018, PG13, 85 minutes, screens on Sunday, 5pm) is director and co-writer Denis Do's personal story.

Do has turned his mother's experiences into this story about Chou (voiced by Berenice Bejo), forced to leave Phnom Penh by the Khmer Rouge authorities as part of a programme to reset Cambodia back to "Year Zero".

Chou joins thousands of others on the march but, in the confusion, becomes separated from her son and his grandmother. To find them, she has to put her own life at risk.

WHERE The Projector, Level 5 Golden Mile Tower, 6001 Beach Road MRT Nicoll Highway WHEN Now to May 23 ADMISSION $13.50 weekdays, $15 weekends, book at euff.com.sg/tickets SCHEDULE euff.com.sg

DOCUMENTARY

MY OCTOPUS TEACHER (G)

85 minutes, Netflix

Rating: 4/5

Film-maker Craig Foster is going through an unspecified mid-life crisis. While snorkelling around the kelp forest off the coast of South Africa with camera in hand, he meets the creature of the title, a female going about its daily business of hunting shellfish and fish while trying to not get eaten by sharks.

His intellectual fascination with the animal's playfulness, curiosity and cleverness deepens into an emotional bond. Along the way, cameras capture moments of life-and-death drama and tenderness, which Foster finds are helping him gain perspective on his own issues.

Directors Pippa Ehrlich and James Reed use narration by Foster to craft a story about nature as therapy - yes, this can be read as one man's "forest bathing" episode, to use the Japanese term for the healing power of going into the wild.

In some places, the centring of Foster's story feels excessive. Skim over those bits and what is left is solid and entertaining proof, as if any were needed, that pandas might have the looks, but it's the octopuses which have the smarts.