Don’t mention the m-word: are mutant X-Men about to show up en masse in Spider-Man: Brand New Day?

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An intriguing chat about warped DNA in the record-breaking trailer for the new Spider-Man movie could mean a host of long-awaited arrivals in the MCU There was a time when the mere mention of the term “mutant” in the Marvel Cinematic Universe was frowned upon. Rival studio 20th Century Fox owned the rights to the X-Men and with it the whole idea of a parallel branch of humanity, which meant superheroes were contractually obliged to have received their powers from somewhere else. Radioactive accidents, experimental serums, infinity stones, the bite of an unusually committed arachnid: Marvel tried them all, but left the mutation thing alone. Occasionally, comic book icons such as Scarlet Witch were retconned in the MCU to remove their X-gene origins, but for the most part, the very notion of mutation seemed to be placed under narrative quarantine – as if this were a door the studio had quietly agreed not to open. This week saw the record-breaking release of the debut teaser trailer fo...
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La Syndicaliste review Isabelle Huppert is fascinating in blood-boiling injustice drama

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French film about real-life trade union whistleblower and rape survivor Maureen Kearney, accused of inventing her assault

‘My name is Maureen Kearney. I didn’t lie. I didn’t make anything up.” This French drama about a blood-boiling real-life case of injustice is the story of whistleblower and rape survivor Maureen Kearney, who for four years lived with a criminal record: falsely convicted of wasting police time, accused of inventing her rape. It’s a political thriller that tells the story matter-of-factly, and is perhaps a little lacking in the pace department. But Isabelle Huppert carries it along with a performance every bit as gripping as you’d expect. (Kearney is actually Irish, but has lived and worked in France since the mid 1980s; Huppert plays her as French).

Adapted from a book by investigative journalist Caroline Michel-Aguirre, this is a film of two halves, beginning with the whistleblowing. It’s 2011, and Kearney is a powerful trade union official, going into battle for the 50,000 staff at French nuclear engineering giant Areva in her armour of full makeup and blond hair so immaculately blow-dried it could deflect arrows. Kearney has the trade minister’s number in her phone and can summon President Sarkozy to a meeting. (Rumour has it he called her “a hysteric in a skirt”.) She turns whistleblower after being handed documents revealing secret plans to sell off France’s nuclear technology to China.

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