David Hayman Movies

Vera Farmiga, David Thewlis, and Asa Butterfield star in Little Voice writer/director Mark Herman's adaptation of John Boyne's novel concerning the forbidden friendship that between an eight-year-old German boy and a Jewish concentration camp prisoner in World War II-era Germany. The innocent son of a high-ranking Nazi commandant, Bruno has been largely shielded from the harsh realities of the war. When Bruno discovers that his father has been promoted and that their family will be moving from Berlin into the countryside, he doesn't take the news well. Increasingly bored in his sprawling yet dreary country abode and forbidden by his mother from exploring the backyard, young Bruno searches for something to do while his older sister plays with dolls and vies for the attention of handsome Lieutenant Kotler (Rupert Friend). One day, bored and gazing out his bedroom window, Bruno spies what first appears to be a nearby farm; his parents refuse to discuss it, and all of the inhabitants there are curiously clad in striped pajamas. But while Bruno's mother naïvely believes the "farm" to be an internment camp, her husband has sworn under oath never to reveal that it is in fact an extermination camp specifically designed to help the Nazis achieve their horrific "Final Solution." Eventually defying his mother's rules and venturing out beyond the backyard, Bruno arrives at a barbed wire fence to find a young boy just his age emptying rubble from a wheel barrel. Like Pavel, the kitchen worker who cooks all of Bruno's meals, the young boy is wearing striped pajamas. His name is Shmuel (Jack Scanlon), and before long the two young boys become fast friends. But the closer these two boys grow, the more Bruno becomes awakened to the horrors unfolding all around them. His mother is catching on quickly as well, a fact that causes great tension in her marriage to Bruno's father. Later, after Bruno swipes a piece of cake for Shmuel, Lt. Kotler accuses the Jewish boy of stealing and delivers a swift punishment. When Bruno's father announces that the young boy and his mother will be going to live with their aunt in Heidelberg, Bruno grabs a shovel and makes his way to the camp, setting into motion a tragic and devastating sequence of events. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

Scottish short film director David Mackenzie made his feature-film debut in 2002 with The Last Great Wilderness, the tale of two oddballs stuck in a sleepy Scottish town out in the middle of nowhere. The romantically jilted Charlie (Alastair Mackenzie) is headed to a remote location in the Highlands to burn down the house of the celebrity that stole his girlfriend away from him. On the way, he is forced to give a ride to a pseudo-Spaniard named Vincente (Jonny Phillips) who is on the run after sleeping with a violent thug's wife. En route, the car breaks down and the men are forced to stay at the Moor Lodge -- home to a group of similarly odd people that Charlie and Vince soon find themselves compelled to learn more about. The Last Great Wilderness premiered at the 2002 Edinburgh Film Festival. ~ Ryan Shriver, All Movie Guide

Set amidst the controversy of the handover of the Panama Canal from America to Panama in late 1999, this espionage thriller follows seductive British spy Andrew Osnard (Pierce Brosnan), who has found himself recently banished to Panama. When Osnard stumbles into a tailor shop, he meets Harry Pendel (Geoffrey Rush), a garrulous sort with an unmatched penchant for "fluence" -- that is, fabricating wild tales with real-life details. Osnard threatens to expose his shady past, until Pendel agrees to provide him with information about the political situation in Panama. Pendel's wife Louisa (Jamie Lee Curtis) tries to remain unscathed by her husband's constant follies, which escalate and put him in the midst of international discord, while also threatening the shaky relationship between himself and Osnard, who cannot escape each other's grasp. Based on John le Carré's popular 1996 novel, the film also features Catherine McCormack, David Hayman, and young Daniel Radcliffe, who completed this film before his starring role in Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, released later in the year. ~ Jason Clark, All Movie Guide

Mary McGuckian directs this bleak biopic about famed Manchester United soccer star George Best, who dumped his career down the drain with booze, brawling, and drugs. The film charts Best's (John Lynch) rise from Belfast, to fame, to dissipation. ~ Jonathan Crow, All Movie Guide

Actor Peter Mullan won the 1998 Cannes Film Festival "Best Actor" award with this film, directed by Ken Loach (Carla's Song, Ladybird, Ladybird). The drama is set in Possilpark, one of Glasgow's poorest neighborhoods, a rough section where half the population is out of work. Unemployed reformed alcoholic Joe Kavanagh (Mullan) does odd jobs and manages a stumbling soccer team. One of the players is Liam (David McKay), in debt to hood McGowan (David Hayman). Liam and junkie Sabine (Annemarie Kennedy) are raising a small son. After Joe meets social worker Sarah (Louise Goodall), he and his pal Shanks show up to help in the wallpapering of Sarah's apartment. This job creates a problem for Joe with the local unemployment office, until Sarah steps in to cover. It's the beginning of a romance, and Joe and Sarah make an effort to help Liam and Sarah when they are threatened by the loan sharks. Mullan commented, "The drug problem in that place is so serious that people are passive. They are corralled in a sort of dog-eat-dog environment where humans meet to laugh and thrive but have no hope of getting out." Scripted by former lawyer Paul Laverty, the film is inspired by the first half of Loach's Carla's Song. ~ Bhob Stewart, All Movie Guide

In Moscow, after FBI deputy director Carter Preston (Sidney Poitier) and scarred Russian intelligence officer Valentina Koslova (Diane Venora) bring down a key figure in the Russian Mafia, they are threatened by the criminal's powerful brother who swears vengeance on the FBI and immediately hires a professional assassin, the Jackal (Bruce Willis) to kill a leading American political figure. A master of disguises, the Jackal believes in total perfectionism and demands $70 million for the job. The FBI suspects the Jackal is aiming for the FBI director, so they consult with former Basque terrorist Isabella (Mathilda May), in Virginia, and Isabella's former lover, IRA operative Declan Mulqueen (Richard Gere), serving a prison sentence. Promised leniency, Mulqueen agrees to help. Meanwhile, the Jackal prepares false passports, secures a customized computer system to run his Gatling gun, and heads toward his target in Washington, D.C. ~ Bhob Stewart, All Movie Guide

The 18th century Scottish legend of Robert Roy MacGregor comes to life in this stylish adaptation of the swashbuckling novel by Sir Walter Scott. Liam Neeson stars as the title character, a cattle drover and proud head of a Highlands clan who takes a one thousand pound loan from the royal Marquis of Montrose (John Hurt) in order to make a profit on some livestock that will keep his struggling people alive through the coming winter. One of the Marquis' henchmen, wily expert swordsman Archibald Cunningham (Tim Roth) learns of the loan from the nobleman's factor, Killearn (Brian Cox), and steals the money by murdering Rob Roy's best friend MacDonald (Eric Stoltz). Unable to repay the loan and unwilling to give up his land, Rob Roy becomes a fugitive, hunted by none other than Cunningham, who rapes Rob Roy's wife Mary (Jessica Lange). Scotch-British politics come to a boil over the Rob Roy affair, leading to an officially sanctioned showdown between the stoic farmer and Cunningham. ~ Karl Williams, All Movie Guide

In this bizarre thriller, based on a true story, a family moves into their dream house and are appalled to discover that they are not alone when strange things begin to happen. It soon becomes apparent that the special tenants are angry spirits out to destroy the family and their neighbors who have built their homes on top of a graveyard. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

The British psychological thriller The Hawk stars Helen Mirren as Anne Marsh, a housewife with a history of mental illness who begins to suspect that her husband (George Costigan) is a hunted serial killer. ~ Jason Ankeny, All Movie Guide

Produced for Scottish television, Venus Peter was financed by the Orkney Islands Council. The title character is transformed into a "sea child" when he is baptized with salt water. Though his family tries hard to accustom him to life on land, Peter (Gordon R. Strachan) yearns to go to sea -- or, at the very least, to escape his cloistered community. He finds a kindred spirit in Princess Paloma (Juliet Cadzow), the village "looney," who, alas, is eventually carted away to an institution. Briefly fascinated by poetry and music, thanks to his lovely teacher Miss Balsibie (Sinead Cusack), Peter is disillusioned when he finds his teacher in the arms of her lover (and out of her clothing). The final blow to Peter's idealism comes when his grandfather's ship is repossessed. Despite the bleakness of his surroundings and his seemingly dead-end existence, however, Peter never completely lets go of his dreams, and the film ends on a positive note. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

An affectionate reverie about war, childhood, and British stoicism, John Boorman's Hope and Glory is the veteran filmmaker's recollection of the bombing of London during World War II. Set on the British home front during the early days of the war, this episodic movie shows the blitz through the eyes of seven-year-old Billy Rohan (Sebastian Rice Edwards). At the war's outset, Billy finds himself alone in a house full of women, as all the men are called off to join the war effort. With wide-eyed wonder and an outsized imagination, Billy sees the war as a grand diversion, an extension of his world of knights, tin soldiers, and war games. As bombs fall and houses burn, Billy's mother (Sarah Miles) struggles to keep the family together in her husband's absence. Even as Billy seeks to escape the harem of aunts and sisters, Dawn (Sammi Davis), his older sister, falls for a Canadian soldier who gets her pregnant. After the Rohans' home catches fire (not, ironically, as the result of a bomb blast, but from a domestic accident), the family is forced to move in with Billy's cantankerous grandfather in the countryside, where they spend the rest of their summer and enjoy an unusual idyll amid the raging war. Nominated in 1987 for a Best Picture Academy Award, Hope and Glory proved to be another high point in the career of the remarkably protean Boorman. ~ Elbert Ventura, All Movie Guide

An officer of the law becomes a wanted man while trailing a killer in this crime drama. Jack Murphy (Charles Bronson) is a police detective who helped to put Joan Freeman (Carrie Snodgress), a psychotic murderer, behind bars ten years ago. However, Joan is now back on the street and determined to get revenge on Jack. She kills Jack's ex-wife and her new husband, and she cleverly frames the detective for the crime. Jack is arrested and taken into custody handcuffed to Arabella McGee (Kathleen Wilhoite), a rough-and-ready young hoodlum picked up for theft. Jack is able to escape, and has to track down Joan in order to clear his name with Arabella as his unwitting accomplice. Murphy's Law also features Lawrence Tierney and Richard Romanus. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide