Tina

Tina (2021)

Directors:  Daniel Lindsay, T.J. Martin. Cast: Angela Bassett, Tina Turner, Oprah Winfrey, Ike Turner, Erwin Bach, Kurt Lode.

A great Tina Turner fan may see this documentary differently probably wanting to see more or to hear more, but as a casual Turner listener and somebody who was obvious to most of what I’ve just seen this was almost the perfect biography. It gave me enough to understand her greatness, her achievements, her story and get inside her mind like very few of these types of film do. Right from the start when she announces that her life wasn’t a good life and that the “bad” outdid the “good” you just sit up and listen. This is as candid and insightful as some of the best documentaries can get and by the time the ending comes along and you’ve been on the full journey I have to confess I found the epilogue overwhelmingly emotional.This is a survival story. A celebration of a truly remarkable woman, from the time when she first appeared on TV, performed in Las Vegas, through a nightmare which never seemed to finish, to her amazing comeback as a middle-aged woman and ending with her performing to a massing crowd of 186,000 people in Rio: it’s Inspiring, moving, empowering.

The documentary has some great archive material and some really strong interviews with only the people who matter.At times it’s slightly repetitious and it could have done with a few trims, but the end point is so strong that I was able to forgive it all.

On Sky in the UK and HBO in the US.

The White Tiger

The White Tiger

Director: Ramin Bahrani. Cast: Adarsh Gourav, Rajkummar Rao, Priyanka Chopra,

Adapted by the Man Booker Prize winner novel from 2008, this Oscar nominated film by Iraniana-American Ramin Bahrani is at its heart a rag-to-ritches story which turns to a trip to hell and then back again. It is also a gripping story about inequality, corruption, class war and contradictions of contemporary India seen through the incredibly expressive eyes of a driver working for a massively rich family.

There are similarities with Last year Oscar winner “Parasite” especially how it slowly turns something much sinister than one might think at the start and how it uses using crime and unexpected violence to expose the inequalities in modern India (in a similar way as “parasite” had done for South Korea).Adarsh Gourav is spectacularly good in the main role of Bahrani often doing so much with just a simple smile: he is sweet, naive, honest to start with, until rage and frustration born out of injustice will make him into something quite different (a white tiger, as the title suggests).

This is really not your typical Bollywood India film, nobody breaks out to dance (though somebody at some point does sing), there’s no love story and things are doing to turn pretty dark. Poverty is real, the inequalities are stark and no winning lottery will turn your life around (There’s even a very intentional poke at “Slumdog Millionaire”).

It is a slick, sharp, fast-paced satire, with an epic sweeping feel to it. I found utterly compelling and very entertaining.

On Netflix.