hello welcome to the film review. what do you have for us? this week, we go to beirut in 1982. it's mad men in the middle east, wherejohn hamm tries to negotiate the release of a hostage in the negotiator. and there's a big goldfish, an angry one coming up. there it is, jason statham getting his teeth into the meg, a prehistoric shark is on the loose. can he save us from it? and we take a rare cinematic trip to paraguay for a film called the heiresses. it's about late—flowering freedom found amongst older women. so let's start with the negotiator. this has been billed as sort of bond or bourne meets mad men, in beirut. that's right, bourne is a particularly good example, because it's written by tony gilroy, the scriptwriter who wrote the first

four bourne films and directed one of them himself. so he's very good on the shady operations of the cia and the negotiations that happen, and mad men, because donald draper, one of the great tv characters of our time, was played byjohn hamm, who left the television after that series to go to the movies, and i don't think he's ever quite had a part that matches don draper — there are very few around — until now. he plays mason skiles. it's not as good a name as don draper, i'll give you that. but he is enjoying the high life in 1970s beirut, when a terrorist incident ruins his life and family. ten years later, he's a washed—up alcoholic settling small trade disputes in notown, america and propping up the local bar, which is when he gets a strange tap on the shoulder and the cia, in shady form, try to recruit him again. $6,500 and a first class ticket. i wouldn't go back to beirut if it was the last place on earth.

flight leaves at 8:45pm tonight. well, it sounds like you've got about six hours to find somebody else. i was told that is not an option. look, i have no idea what's happening here. it would be a lot easier for both of us if i did. but, er... i was told to tell you that... time is extremely tight and the agency would be deeply grateful for your cooperation. it's a serious request, they know that. tell them i don't have a passport. they put one in there with the ticket. so what do you make of it, jason? well, off he goes to beirut and he's given a handler called sandy, a local cia operative, played by rosamund pike, with a succession of cold stares, which helps him through the rubble of beirut. this film is really good on the atmosphere of the crumbling town that beirut has become,

because it's been seized from all sides, druze militia on one side, muslims, christians, thejewish negotiations with the israelis. we don't know who's got the hostage — is it the plo, is it the various militias? it was an extraordinary time in the middle east. i don't know if you were out there as a news correspondent... i was sent to beirut actually in the ‘80s. john mccarthy had just been kidnapped. it was just a terrifying time. so hostage—taking was all the rage, in a way, terry waite and john mccarthy, and that's the era we are in here, especially with the americans trying to horse trade. they wanted the release of another terrorist. it becomes a moral maze as well as a kind of bond scenario. the tension is great. it's a real game of poker, which is what mason skiles is really good at, and that's whatjohn hamm excels at. he's got this sort of sweaty, intense desperation. one thing that's refreshing about the film is it's a lot of adults talking a lot.

the action is not as much as it would be in a bourne, although that's there, but a lot of it is about the negotiations and the quick talking and shady characters. you never know who to trust or not. there is always going to be a switcheroo and a double—cross at the end. it's available in cinemas and on download as well today, and it's called beirut in some territories. if you are looking for the negotiator, sometimes it's called beirut. that's a bit confusing! there you go. let's move on to the meg, which is definitely called just the meg, about a prehistoric shark. it sounds like a watery version ofjurassic park. yeah, i thought it might be like a dance inspired by meg ryan in katz‘s deli doing that fake orgasm, but it's not. it's just jason statham taking on a prehistoric shark, which has been awoken from the sea bed by a billionaire sea explorer. jason, who plays a deep sea rescuer, obviously, goes down in his submersible to try and save people stranded at the bottom, but they awake this shark.

something huge is out there, they say. yes, it is. there's this huge shark, like jaws after a lot of fish food. he's got bigger and bigger. almost too big — you can't really see the monster that well. it's almost not as scary as it should be, but there are moments where it leaves teeth marks on the glass, and that is a scary fish! that doesn't deter statham, who dives in. he was a former diver, actually, in his previous career, before he became an action hero. so the watery stuff he's really good at, diving off boats, taking on the shark with his captain ahab moment. look, it's a silly, popcorn, summer blockbuster movie, and it does deliver on all of those. interestingly, although it's about a prehistoric monster, it's probably the future of blockbusters, with a lot of chinese characters in it, because that's the burgeoning market. and it's set in some chinese resort, a swishy chinese resort where there are a lot of people in the water and they need to get out pretty quick before the shark comes. but statham will be there to save them, don't worry, and if you are worried,

as seems to be contractually obliged, in alljason statham films, he does get his top off at some point. it's up to you to decide if that's anything to do with it. all right. thank you very much for that. and then we've got the heiresses, which is a spanish drama. even more unusual than that, it's a paraguayan drama. i'm not sure i've ever seen a film from paraguay. we've had a great latin american new wave of films from chile at the moment, argentina and brazil over the last 15 years. this is the first from paraguay and, if this is anything to go by, i hope there's a lot more to come. it's called the heiresses, and it's a really extraordinary story about two women who live in a crumbling mansion in the capital of paraguay. that's a good question — what's the capital of paraguay? er... it's asuncion. of course, i did know that. it was on the tip of my tongue. ecuador? no. so, in asuncion, and i've never really seen it in the cinema before,

but it's obviously a capital that is riven by inequality, so there's the wealthy area, where this is set, and it's about class privilege, but it's also about a female couple who live in a house they've clearly inherited, but they are coming up on hard times. one of them might be sent to prison for tax evasion, so they are selling off the family silver. 0k, it looks pretty atmospheric. it is. the atmosphere is really good, the cinematography, the kind of crumbling nature of this area, but also the faces that we get. one of the women that we see there is chela. when her partner gets sent to jail, that prison is very evocative. it's a chaotic space with poorer people. she ends up sort of ferrying richer women around, because they don't trust local taxi drivers in paraguay. in most of south america, a risk of kidnap is a major thing. there's a lot of it about this week in the movies. she becomes a sort of local taxi driverfor the rich, the ladies who lunch in this area of asunci n, and she suddenly discovers a freedom when she gets behind the wheel of a car,

a late—flowering romance with another woman called angie, who she finds rather sensual and striking, played by ana ivanova. the woman, chela, won the best actress at the berlin film festival earlier this year for her performance. it's her first screen performance ever. that's how rare cinema is in paraguay. she's been a stage actress all her life and this is her first ever screen appearance. you'd never know. she's brilliant. i hope there is more from paraguay. it's a very tender, atmospheric and suggestible film. it is very slight and you have to read between the lines, a lot of glances and looks, but i thought it was excellent and a really impressive debut. probably the film of the week. 0k. jason, best out at the moment? the best film out at the moment, i know there is mamma mia and mission impossible, but if you are looking for a sort of small british success, there is a film called apostasy, which is out at the moment. again, a rare glimpse into a society i'd never seen on camera before. it's jehovah's witnesses. the writer and director of this, dan kokotajlo,

was a jehovah's witness growing up and he's sort of now showing what it's like in there. if you've ever wondered what it's like — and it's notjust the jehovah's witnesses, it's any religion, any sect where the intensity, children are growing up and splitting from the mother and questioning things... you rarely see a british film that's actually about religion or about faith, and that's what this is. i thought it was brilliant. fantastic performances from molly wright and siobhan finneran, who plays the mother. a brilliant glance into a bit of british society which, you think you've seen it all, you haven't. and a quick look at the best dvd. a big change of pace here! i'm going for peter rabbit, which is out. not anything immediately to do with beatrix potter, which i always found a bit twee, be honest. this is james corden voicing beatrix potter's fluffy—tailed hero, and i think he does it rather well. i think it's funny. it got terrible reviews when it came out, including from me, and i've since seen it with my kids and i think it's really funny. they love it, it's got a lot of energy, and it's kind of anarchic and funny,

and very well done in many places, with lots of characters for the animals. it's a very funny film, and i'm sorry i gave it a bad review in the first place. i'm retracting that and saying it's good. jason, you've changed your mind. thank very much indeed, jason. that is it for this week. thank you for watching the film review. bye— bye. good evening. it is fair to say most of us have had sunshine and rain today. not any normal rain, pretty much like a monsoon with localised flooding, such as here in surrey. things have calmed down but only for a while. very changeable heading into the weekend. most places will be dry on saturday and there will be rain on sunday. all our weather is

coming in from the atlantic, which is why it is so changeable. that area of cloud brought storms earlier today was that it is getting moved away by this ridge of high pressure. the low pressure will bring in cloud of the two sharp showers on the eastern coasts of england. for the most pa rt eastern coasts of england. for the most part we will have clear skies. it will be quite chilly overnight. towards the far south—west we have much more power which will come into play as we head into tomorrow. a bit ofa play as we head into tomorrow. a bit of a struggle to get much play at lord's for the cricket. we should get a full day's played tomorrow. increasing amounts of cloud that it should stay dry. we have cloud in the south—west which will push its way north and east through the day. more in no way of cloud for scotland and the eastern side of england. temperatures may be a bit higher

than they were today put a lot of places will be dry by the end of the afternoon. into the evening, the rain will continue to push northwards and eastwards. for a time we thought it was going to be quite windy weekend. the area of low pressure that is driving the weather is slowing down. everything is slowing down, including the weather front which will be a real nuisance during the second half of the weekend. we will get bursts of rain, wetter on the south coast, the south west of england were maybe a glimpse of sunshine in between the rain. sunshine and showers for northern ireland. quite humid air. temperatures widely 2222 celsius. average we can expect as we move into the early part of next week. the showers should fade away. a weather front approaches the north

west and it will allow the south—east of the uk to turn warmer with temperatures up to 25, even 26 celsius. this is bbc world news today. i'm kasia madera. our top stories... the us piles on the economic pressure on turkey. but president erdogan remains defiant. hundreds of rya nair flights are cancelled after pilots in five european countries go on strike. in romania — thousands of demonstrators are protesting in the capital bucharest, they accuse the government of corruption and low wages. flash floods force hundreds of people to be evacuated from the south of france. hello and welcome to world news today. us president donald trump has announced he's ramping up sanctions against turkey, doubling steel and aluminium tariffs against the country.