Anastasia Steele: [while they are in a supermarket, Christian is pushing the cart, looking uncomfortable] When's the last time you went shopping?

Christian Grey: Houston. A week ago.

Anastasia Steele: What'd you buy?

Christian Grey: An airline. (Yes, this is actual Fifty Shades Darker dialogue)

At the end of Fifty Shades of Grey, Ana walked out on Christian but she’s soon lured back to his ‘kinky fuckery’ as screenwriter Niall Leonard so delicately puts it- presumably a quote from EL James’ awful source material.

Christian Gray, he of the bulging biceps and bulging… wallet, is still both incredibly creepy and intensely boring. In order to make him feel less creepy, one of his former submissives is stalking Ana and his Mrs Robinson figure, Elena Lincoln (Kim Basinger, completely wasted- although being completely wasted is a benefit when watching this film) is warning Ana that she cannot satisfy Christian’s needs.

Nobody seems at all concerned that what Christian needs is psychiatric help. His explanation of his fetish (it all stems back to his mother) doesn’t redeem him. In another attempt to drown out Christian’s creepiness, Ana’s sleazy boss Jack (Eric Johnson) tries it on with her.

There are many awful moments in the film; Christian guides Ana into drawing on his chest in lipstick to mark the boundaries he is comfortable with is particularly cringy. However, the crowning glory goes to Rita Ora. We should have been thankful that her role in the previous film was a couple of lines; the ‘American’ ‘accent’ she is sporting made me wince with every word that came out of her mouth.

The bedroom scenes are dull, underscored by the sort of dreary urban music that was around in the early noughties. Subtlety is not a strong point of this film; when Ana decides to pay a trip to Christian’s infamous Red Room, ‘I’m Not Afraid’ plays on the soundtrack.

What really ruins the film is not the tepid flirting, the cheesy soundtrack or the robotic acting, but the glacial pace. When Ana tells Christian that she wants to take things slow, this should have been an early indicator that the film would drag. The tacked-on plot is buried under endless dull conversations between Ana and Christian; from what I can gather, it’s a sort of erotic thriller, except the film is neither erotic or thrilling.

The attempts at drama fizzle out because the film constantly tries to reassure us that Ana is her own woman and she shows disapproval at Christian’s bad behaviour. In doing so, it takes any potential romance and excitement out of the film. The source material doesn’t work with modern sensibilities and the filmmakers don’t have enough guts to deviate from the mainstream.

I have yet to watch the climax of the trilogy (cue innuendo-laden posters) and I have a feeling that despite all the banging, the film series will end with a whimper.
 

'If you place an object in a museum does that make this object a piece of art?' (Christian Nielsen, The Square)

Part art-world satire, part absurdist comedy and part social-commentary, watching The Square is like wandering around an art gallery. Anyone who’s been to an art gallery will recognise the stillness and slow pace (which accounts for the two-and-a-half hour running time) but despite this, there are lots of comic moments, including an ill-advised advertising campaign and the live performance art seen on the film’s poster.

The film is really hinged on Stockholm’s X-Royal Gallery’s lead curator, Christian Nielsen (Klaes Bang), who fobs off American reporter Anne (Elizabeth Moss) when she probes into the nonsensical art-speak on his website. It’s a great moment of culture clash as Anne concedes to his European philosophising which is professional BS-ing.

Christian’s social apathy is reflected by the public, as crowds of people wander past street beggars, glued to their smartphones. Initially the social commentary is more under the radar with the focus on comedy but near the end of the film, it’s soapbox territory. Your mileage on that may vary- is writer/director Ruben Ostlund mouthing off about the problem of homelessness or is it a study of middle class guilt? I would say it’s the latter- Christian is only struck by small moments of generosity when he’s doing well for himself. Besides, unless you are an artist who is actively engaged in social work, you can hardly make a film criticising art’s exploitation of social deprivation unless you are a massive hypocrite.

The film’s title refers to the X-Royal gallery’s latest art installation- a lit-up outline of a square in the gallery’s courtyard, with a plaque that says within the space of this square, everyone has equal rights. Is it genuinely thought-provoking or is it merely paying lip-service? Though the film is satirical, it does make you think about the point of art.

Though Dominic West gets equal billing with Elisabeth Moss, his role is only really a cameo, as the artist of one of the gallery’s exhibitions ‘Mirrors and Piles of Gravel’. Sporting a pair of horrid yellow sunglasses that bring to mind 90’s Britpop, he is the typical pretentious artist.

Without wishing to give more away, the comedy ranges from satirical to black comedy to absurdist comedy. One particular bit of gross-out comedy means that you might wish to leave the children/grandparents at home, unless you enjoy the awkwardness.

One final note- despite the majority of the film being in Swedish, there are a couple of scenes in English, so that should open it out to audiences who hate reading subtitles.