David Farnor | On 04, Feb 2017

Heard of BFI Player? Well, there’s also BFI Player+, a subscription service that offers an all-you-can-eat selection of hand-picked classics.

Every Friday, Mark Kermode highlights one of the collection’s titles with a video introduction. This week, it’s Red Desert. Antonioni’s mid-career masterpiece stars Monica Vitti as an emotionally anguished young woman embarking on a tentative affair with a businessman, played by Richard Harris.

What else is new? Here are the latest titles on BFI Player+ this week:

Little Malcolm

The late John Hurt stars in this dark comedy from Stuart Cooper about a revolutionary who leads his Party of Dynamic Erection in a battle against an unseen nemesis. Backed by George Harrison, the film was based on the stage play by David Halliwell.

Shell

Iona director Scott Graham’s brilliant debut stars the excellent Chloe Pirrie as a teen raised by her dad to run a garage in the middle of nowhere. The result is a calm and absorbing coming-of-age drama, shot through with a heartbreaking sense of tangible isolation. Read our full review.

Whisky Galore!

Classic Ealing comedy about the mayhem that ensues when a Scotch-laden ship runs aground off the coast of the Outer Hebrides.

She, a Chinese

British-Chinese director Xiaolu Guo’s 2009 story of a young woman’s journey from a remote Chinese village to London, in an attempt to realise the Western consumer dream.

Better Things

Duane Hopkins’ 2007 debut tells a sombre story with startling beauty, as it follows the stories of various addicts in a West Midlands town.

The Rink (Charlie Chaplin)

Formidable physical comedy is the order of the day in this dynamic Chaplin short, in which he plays a waiter running rings around an angry customer.

All in Good Time

A pair of newlyweds endure a honeymoon staying with the groom’s parents in a comedy from East Is East writer Ayub Khan-Din.

 

A BFI Player+ subscription costs £4.99 a month with a 30-day free trial. For more information, visit http://player.bfi.org.uk.
 

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