Rise of the Conqueror review – Gladiator meets throat singing as Mongol hordes ride out

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Christian Mortensen takes up arms as the 14th-century kingmaker Timur but could do with a stronger force behind him and a better beard in front The western-produced Greco-Judeo-Roman epic has been with us since early cinema, while the Chinese film industry kept the eastern end up with a string of recent historical pictures. But what about the lands in between? Apart from a smattering of pictures about Genghis Khan, including John Wayne’s regrettable appearance in 1956’s The Conqueror , the Mongol hordes have not exactly ravaged the box office. So it’s refreshing to see Rise of the Conqueror sally forth, with Christian Mortensen in the saddle as the 14th-century Turkic-Mongol chieftain Timur . This is basically Gladiator with added throat-singing. Man-at-arms Timur is a kingmaker caught between his native Barlas tribe, which includes his testy brother-in-law Hussayn (Mahesh Jadu) who’s eager to reclaim his family’s rule in Samarkand; on the other side is occupying Mongol warmonger Tuglu...
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X Trillion review – all-women voyage to the ‘Pacific garbage patch’ packs a rousing punch

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This film following a group travelling 3,000 miles to investigate plastic pollution reveals some shocking truths, even if it feels a little light on science

Co-founded by environmental activist Emily Penn in 2014, not-for-profit organisation eXXpedition has made waves with their all-women voyages to remote sea territories, where their members witness firsthand the startling scale of marine plastic pollution. Taking part in the project in 2018, film-maker Eleanor Church was among a multidisciplinary cohort who set sail across 3,000 miles towards the North Pacific gyre, the infamous “garbage patch” where ocean plastics have been accumulating since the 1950s.

The arduous journey is one of both heartache and beauty. There are moments of sheer wonder, as the awestruck women observe a pod of dolphins spin, jump and glide across the cerulean sea. The same shimmering waves, however, also carry countless pieces of plastic, which irreversibly disrupt existing ecosystems. Throughout their three-week odyssey, the crew collect samples from the seawater, revealing a shocking density of microplastics; their findings suggest that each square kilometre of the surface of the North Pacific gyre can carry as much as half a million fragments.

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