JOHN HODGE

T2: TRAINSPOTTING (2017)
Starring Ewan McGregor, Ewen Bremner, Jonny Lee Miller and Robert Carlyle. Directed by Danny Boyle.

First there was an opportunity... then there was a betrayal. Twenty years have gone by. Much has changed but just as much remains the same. Mark Renton returns to the only place he can ever call home.

They are waiting for him: Spud, Sick Boy, and Begbie. Other old friends are waiting too: sorrow, loss, joy, vengeance, hatred, friendship, love, longing, fear, regret, diamorphine, self-destruction and mortal danger, they are all lined up to welcome him, ready to join the dance.

REVIEWS T2 Trainspotting - Take another hit

BASTILLE DAY (2016)
Starring Idris Elba, Richard Madden, Charlotte Le Bon, Kelly Reilly and Jose Garcia. Directed by James Watkins.

On the eve of Bastille Day, a young French woman, Zoe Naville, slips across Paris with the intent of planting a bomb to make a radical political statement but means to kill no one. At the last moment, she decides that she cannot commit this violent act.

Michael Mason, an American pickpocket, steals Zoe’s bag, keeps what he can use and throws the rest away into a garbage bin next to a busy Metro stop. At the same time, inside the ultra-secure CIA Station in Paris, Sean Briar, an agent brought in from the battlefields of Syria and Iraq in the wake of a mission that has gone terribly wrong, struggles to adjust to his reassignment as a desk-bound data analyst: a misfit real warrior in a world of cyber counter-terrorists.

When the bomb goes off, Michael becomes the only suspect. Briar is determined to find him and bring him into custody before the French authorities do.

From then on, Briar, Michael, and Zoe will be bound together in a 24-hour suspense ride across the city, in a frantic attempt to expose a conspiracy of chaos and greed that only they can prove.

REVIEWS Bastille Day - Idris Elba's realistic action drama

THE PROGRAM (2015)
Starring Ben Foster, Chris O'Dowd, Guillaume Canet, Jesse Plemons, Dustin Hoffman and Elaine Cassidy. Directed by Stephen Frears.

The film charts the thrilling rise of pro-cyclist Lance Armstrong through the ‘90s and early 2000s, battling cancer, as he and his fellow American teammates dominate and change the quintessentially European sport of cycling. Winning the Tour de France an unprecedented seven times, Lance retires as one of the great sporting heroes of our time, and worth millions of dollars. Sports writer David Walsh is at first charmed by Lance’s charisma and talent, but as he probes further, he believes the world is being sold a lie. After speaking out about his concerns, Walsh finds himself ostracised by the cycling community. As a lone voice he perseveres, but it will be several years before Lance is exposed.

REVIEWS The Program - The man, the myth, the legend, the lies

TRANCE (2013)
Starring James McAvoy - Simon, Rosario Dawson - Elizabeth Lamb and Vincent Cassel - Franck. Directed by Danny Boyle.

Simon, a fine art auctioneer, teams up with a criminal gang to steal a work of art worth millions of dollars, but after suffering a blow to the head during the heist he wakes to discover that he has no memory of where he has hidden the painting. When physical threats and torture fail to produce answers, the gang’s leader Franck hires hypnotherapist Elizabeth Lamb to delve into the darkest recesses of Simon’s psyche. As she digs deeper into his broken subconscious, the stakes become much higher and the boundaries between desire, reality and hypnotic suggestion begin to blur and disappear.

REVIEWS Trance - Are you watching closely?

THE SWEENEY (2013)
Starring Ray Winstone - Jack Regan, Hayley Atwell - Nancy, Damian Lewis - Frank Haskins, Ben Drew - George Carter and Allen Leech - Simon Ellis. Directed by Nick Love.

Armed and dangerous, the Sweeney Flying Squad are old school crime fighters enforcing the law. Led by legendary detective Jack Regan and his loyal partner George Carter, they have their own unique way of operating and always get results. With a bank heist in progress and his old enemy making a reappearance on the London crime scene, Regan will do whatever it takes to get the job done, even defying orders from his no-nonsense boss.

REVIEWS The Sweeney - Worth a butcher's hook