After one of the most bizarre career slumps in recent memory, David Gordon Green is back doing what we all knew he did best. This isn't the one-stop return to earlier glories which we hoped it might have been but it does represent another finely taken stride.

Manglehorn stars a resurgent 74 year old Al Pacino as a lonesome locksmith in love with a cat. He lives a solitary life in his rundown home; writing endless letters to an unresponsive old flame, while his wealthy son stays distant. He passes the time playing slots and eating dinner in fluorescent lit bars and sterile restaurants until a friendly bank clerk finds a way to squeeze into his life.

It's an enjoyable watch thanks to Pacino's old pro performance, and it does bare Gordon Green's quiet Texan stamp, but a vague, nagging unresolved feeling remains that we never really knew this man. When used well, ambiguity can be one of cinema's most powerful weapons, but Green's super stylized rhythyms here work more to distract then enhance and a pretentious grand reveal late on does little to excite.

Green displays some of his more recent, less palatable tastes here- heavy dreamlike editing; an overuse of monologue-but he has returned to sort of scrap yard film making which once saw him hailed as American independent cinema's next big star. With Manglehorn, alongside Joe and Prince Avalanche (prize winners over the last two years in Venice and Berlin respectfully), however, the Texan is certainly back on track.  

Manglehorn is not the George Washington successor we still find ourselves pining for today, but it does suggest that we might not have to hold our breath much longer.

Spring Breakers

Harmony Korine’s rampant return to feature films is a loud and garish look at the Britney loving youths of Beach Party MTV and while seemingly bright, thrilling and drenched in EDM tack, with Korine pulling the strings it’s clear that something more sinister is at work.

Teen stars Selena Gomez, Venessa Hudgens and Ashley Benson join Korine’s wife Rachel to play four tempestuous college students who, following a slick one-shot diner hold up, set off on a spring break trip of partying and debauchery. A police bust leaves the girls in prison where they turn to Alien, a RIFF RAFF –channelling Pied Piper played by James Franco, to bail them out. A whirlwind of escalating madness and depravity ensues causing shifts in the group’s eerie dynamic as Alien succumbs to his newfound Sirens.

  The casting really is a phenomenon. Franco provides a welcome break from his baffling descent into half-baked art projects with a great turn as Alien but the squeaky clean girls backing him up are the film’s defining coup. Art wickedly imitates life as Korine dangles the golden carrot of artistic integrity in front of his young starlets.

Korine was 17 years old when he wrote Larry Clark’s Kids and with Spring Breakers  it’s clear the great agent provocateur has lost none of his edge,  a bold, uncompromising director whose work feels as fresh today as it did almost two decades ago. 

Fantasy Filmfest Nights: Stoker

For a weekend in mid-March the ever popular Fantasy Filmfest will return for a springtime instalment and while smaller than its Autumnal counterpart the confident and compact programme should prove a welcome diversion from all those post Berlinale blues. As ever, Sci-Fi and Horror are on the cards with a few big hitters and some promising debutants providing the thrills.

Following the death of her father a gifted girl (Mia Wasikowska) enters a game of cat and mouse with her mysterious Uncle(Matthew Goode) in Park Chan Wook’s Stoker. Well received at Sundance, the Oldboy director’s first English language work is sure to be the weekend’s hottest ticket; Tanked on a new drug called “Soy Sauce”, Paul Giamatti and his friend John must defend the earth from a surreal invasion in the spoilerifically titled John Dies at the End, the latest offering from legendary cult director Don Coscarelli; Oscar winning director Barry Levinson takes a shot at the found footage genre with eco-terror piece The Bay; 26 directors (Including Ben Wheatley) contribute a short piece on death, each one based on a letter of the alphabet in The ABCs of Death; Also screening are debut works from Juan Carlos Medina (Painless), long time horror prosthetics artist Paul Hyett (The Seasoning House) and Irishman Ciarán Foy (Citadel). 

Safe Haven

A girl on the run finds sanctuary in the quaint town of Southport. Taking on a new identity, Katie (Julianne Hough) begins to set up a new life. Here she meets handsome widower Alex (Josh Duhamel) and the pair begin to go through the motions. They ride Kayaks and kiss in the rain- she even charms his kids- but, just as the mush levels hit critical, the skeletons in Katie’s closet show up to crash the party.

Spring Breakers sees Harmony Korine return with his tongue in cheek and his finger still firmly on the pulse in a compelling film that is loud and provocative with a tone somewhere between Beach Party MTV and early Criss Cuningham. A sun-soaked binge of a movie filled with booze, drugs and commercial dub-step.

Teen stars Selena Gomez, Venessa Hudgens and Ashley Benson join Korine’s wife Rachel to play four young and beautiful college students. After holding up a restaurant, the girls set off on a spring break trip of partying and debauchery. Following a police bust the spring breakers find themselves in prison and, refusing to call their parents, they’re at a loss. That’s until Alien (a very on form James Franco) decides to bail them out and take them under his wing, not realising what he’s dealing with until the girls begin to pull the strings.

Korine’s casting is quite a phenomenon. Franco may at times seem to be playing out his career like some half-baked project from a first year art student, appearing in General Hospital and jumping on any piece of beat generation fluff he can get his hands on, but when he wants to he can be terrific. Here we find him channelling Texas' resident wierdo Riff Raff to great effect. Following her exHigh School Musical co-star Zac Efron (who appeared in Bahrani’s decent if disappointing At Any Price at this very festival) Vanessa Hudgens makes her own punt at artistic integrity, joining the squeaky clean Benson and Gomez in what is a major casting coup for Korine. In interviews the girls have claimed it’s just a movie about partying and perhaps they’re right but there is a real sense of art imitating life, Korine luring them in to all this moral ambiguity in exchange for a shot at credibility. Korine himself must have been bighting his tongue with delight as the swarm of tween fans greeted them on the red carpet. How this film is marketed should make interesting viewing, it might even land him his first real dose of mainstream attention.

It was 1995 when a 19 year old Korine blew everyone away with his script for Kids. Around the same time Spike Jonze, with his video for Sabotage, was seen as the godfather of Music Television. The station is by all means a shadow of its former self but how strange that 17 years on it would be Korine who would have more to say about its current audience. He always seemed to be a cut above those west coast generation X-ers, refusing to deal in half measures with films like Julien Donkey Boy, Trash Humpers and the mighty Gummo. With Spring Breakers he could well claim himself to be among America’s greatest agent provocateurs. A fearless, uncompromising director whose work feels as fresh today as it felt almost two decades ago.