Film News South Africa

#OnTheBigScreen: Run and Six Minutes To Midnight

This week's movies include the suspense thriller Run and the period thriller Six Minutes To Midnight.

Run

From the visionary writers, producers and director of the breakout film Searching, comes a suspense thriller that shows that when mom gets a little too close, you need to run.

They say you can never escape a mother’s love but for Chloe, that’s not a comfort — it’s a threat. There’s something unnatural, even sinister about the relationship between Chloe (newcomer Kiera Allen) and her mom, Diane (Sarah Paulson). Diane has raised her daughter in total isolation, controlling every move she’s made since birth, and there are secrets that Chloe’s only beginning to grasp.

Up-and-coming director Aneesh Chaganty and producers Natalie Qasabian and Sev Ohanian, the latter co-writing the film with Chaganty, offer a fresh perspective and unique spin on the style of Alfred Hitchcock’s work while providing mounting paranoia that culminates in a shocking twist.

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Six Minutes To Midnight

The period thriller Six Minutes To Midnight is inspired by the real Augusta Victoria College for girls on the south coast of England that taught German girls throughout the 1930s and only closed at the outbreak of WW2. The school was run on Nazi ideals throughout Hitler’s governance as demonstrated by the school badge, a Swastika on one side and a Union Jack on the other.

Summer 1939, Hitler’s power is growing and tensions between the UK and Germany are at boiling point. The Augusta Victoria College, a finishing school for daughters and goddaughters of the Nazi elite on the south coast of England, is under close scrutiny after the mysterious disappearance of their teacher Mr Wheatley.

The school governess, Miss Rocholl (Judi Dench), hires journeyman teacher Thomas Miller (Eddie Izzard) to replace Wheatley and help prepare the girls for the Anglo-German fellowship. Thomas slowly raises the suspicions of Ilse Keller (Carla Juri), the girls’ German tutor, who has secrets of her own. Caught in the crossfires, Thomas is framed for murder and goes on the run to clear his name and uncover Ilse’s true plan for the girls. Can he stop her before it's too late?

This British war drama is directed by Andy Goddard from a screenplay by Goddard, Celyn Jones and Eddie Izzard.

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About Daniel Dercksen

Daniel Dercksen has been a contributor for Lifestyle since 2012. As the driving force behind the successful independent training initiative The Writing Studio and a published film and theatre journalist of 40 years, teaching workshops in creative writing, playwriting and screenwriting throughout South Africa and internationally the past 22 years. Visit www.writingstudio.co.za
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