Iain Canning Movies

Director Jim Loach and screenwriter Rona Munro collaborate to adapt Nottingham social worker Margaret Humphreys' autobiographical account of her noble effort to expose the systematic deportation of British children to Australia, and to reunite them with their devastated families. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi

Emmy Award-winning director Tom Hooper (John Adams) teams with screenwriter David Seidler (Tucker: A Man and His Dreams) to tell the story of King George VI. When his older brother abdicates the throne, nervous-mannered successor George "Bertie" VI (Colin Firth) reluctantly dons the crown. Though his stutter soon raises concerns about his leadership skills, King George VI eventually comes into his own with the help of unconventional speech therapist Lionel Logue (Geoffrey Rush). Before long the king and Lionel have forged an unlikely bond, a bond that proves to have real strength when the United Kingdom is forced to flex its international might. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi

The final months of Bobby Sands, the Irish Republican Army activist who protested his treatment at the hands of British prison guards with a hunger strike, are chronicled in this historical drama, the first feature film from artist-turned-filmmaker Steve McQueen. Davey Gillen (Brian Milligan) is an IRA volunteer who is sentenced to Belfast's infamous Maze prison, where he shares a cell with fellow IRA member Gerry Campbell (Liam McMahon). Like most of the IRA volunteers behind bars, Gillen and Campbell are subjected to frequent violence by the guards, who in turn live with the constant threat of assassination at the hands of Republicans during their off-hours. Campbell and Gillen are taking part in a protest in which they and their fellow IRA inmates are refusing to wear standard prison-issue uniforms as a protest against Britain's refusal to recognize them as political prisoners, a move that is complicating their efforts to pass information among the other prisoners. As the protest fails to get results, one IRA member behind bars, Bobby Sands (Michael Fassbender), decides to take a different tack and begins a hunger strike, refusing to eat until Irish officials are willing to acknowledge the IRA as a legitimate political organization. However, while Sands' protest gains the attention both inside prison walls and in the international news, not everyone believes what he's doing is right, and Sands finds himself verbally sparring with a priest (Liam Cunningham) who questions the ethics and effectiveness of the strike. Hunger received its world premiere at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival, where it was screened as part of the Un Certain Regard program. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

A free-spirited art student and a roguish poet find their addiction to each other taking a back seat to their taste for heroin in director Neil Armfield's intensely personal tale of recreational drug use gone bad. When Candy (Abbie Cornish) and Dan (Heath Ledger) first fell in love, they both thought they had found all they ever needed in life. Despite financial hardships, the pair sustained themselves on the vibrant life force that burned blindingly bright as it promised an invincible future. Their intoxicating romance a blissful altered state of which heroin played only a minor role in the beginning, Candy and Dan soon decide to strengthen their bond by marrying and starting a family. Their manufactured Eden gradually becomes an uncontrollable inferno, however, as Candy's parents slowly pull away due to the pain of witnessing their daughter's slow slide into oblivion, and even chemistry professor Casper (Geoffrey Rush), who was at first complicit in their experimentation, admits that Candy and Dan's blind devotion to the drug is now forever ingrained into their commitment to one and other. As the marriage deteriorates right along with Candy's increasingly fragile mental state, Dan must make the difficult decision to either rescue her or pull away in hopes that the clarity of separation will finally empower her to break free of the addiction that binds her. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi