Under the Shadow (2016)

Under the Shadow: Directed by Babak Anvari. With Narges Rashidi, Avin Manshadi, Bobby Naderi, Arash Marandi. As a mother and daughter struggle to cope with the terrors of the post-revolution, war-torn Tehran of the 1980s, a mysterious evil begins to haunt their home.

“Aptly described as u0026quot;pretentious, repellent pornography,u0026quot; The Ages of Lulu is a film you really could do without. Indeed, not only does Spanish director Bigas Lunau0026#39;s (he of Jamón, jamón, Golden Balls and The Tit and the Moon fame) film fire hugely clear of the mark in its attempt at sexually heightened drama, it also suffers from a dodgy cast (Javier Bardem, what were you thinking?), lame acting and a wholly unrealistic plot. Not to put too fine a point on it, then, youu0026#39;d be better served boiling your head than watching this hyper-sexual and highly explicit u0026#39;art houseu0026#39; trash.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eOn the DVD: The Ages of Lulu is transferred at an anamorphically enhanced 1.78:1 and image quality is very good, though in some scenes very slightly soft. The film can be watched with or without English subtitles, and the sound is unremarkable stereo. The main extras are a seven-page essay on Bigas Luna and five pages detailing the now restored 110 seconds of cuts made to the 1998 video release. The main title still contains 65 seconds of alternate footage to the cinema original for legal reasons. Also included are filmographies of Lunas and Oscar Ladoire, two trailers plus trailers for six other films.”