New Zealand writer-director-actor Taika Waititi has always had a quirky comedic streak. With his latest, Hunt for the Wilderpeople, he’s closest to a defining style that can easily translate across a variety of audiences. That might be why he’s been selected to helm the next instalment of Marvel’s Thor franchise. His first feature film Eagle…
Read a synopsis of A Second Chance and you might go in expecting an especially spicy episode of SVU. The story’s packed with crime, parental neglect and a particularly potent package of twists. But what prevents this from being a feature-length Danish Law & Order episode are the steady hands of director Suzanne Bier. Perhaps…
My estimable colleague Jono Winter recently posted a favourable – if tentatively favourable – review of X-Men: Apocalypse on this site. As a steadfast fan of (most) of the X-Men films, I found time in my overseas holiday to fit in a (Croatian-subtitled) screening of the film and, regrettably, I can’t concur with his positive…
Set amongst the iconic streets of New York, low-budget independent film, Time Out of Mind is a two hour social commentary on the life of a homeless man. It centres on George Hammond (Richard Gere), whose name we don’t learn until over halfway through the film. No ID, no home, no immediate contacts; George is truly…
I enjoyed this flick—but then again, I’m an X-Men disciple who worships at the altar of film series progenitor, Bryan Singer. Ordinary film-goers who don’t know their Wolverines from their Cyclopses may be inclined to mutter ‘X-Meh’ when leaving the theatre. And understandably so as, on this occasion, Singer fails to find cohesion with a…
As Penelope in A Bigger Splash, Dakota Johnson is enigmatic yet authentic, knowing yet naïve; a daughter, a lover, a seductress, and a child all at once. The role allows Johnson to undercut the cliches of Hollywood femininity: innocent child, sexualised nymph, or idealised mother. In projects like A Bigger Splash, television sitcom Ben and Kate…
Action flick Bastille Day opens with a naked Frenchwoman (Stéphane Caillard) strolling through Paris. We soon learn that her nudity is intended to serve as a particularly dramatic distraction, allowing pickpocket Michael Mason (Game of Thrones’ Richard Madden) to pilfer a few wallets and passports at the orders of a local fence (Eriq Ebouaney). With…
Truman’s tone is set from its opening scene. Telling the tale of a long-term friendship between two men, Julián (Ricardo Darín) and Tomás (Javier Cámara), tested by the former’s terminal illness, it begins by chronicling the banal vagaries of Tomás’ lengthy transit from his home in Canada to Madrid, Spain. The weariness of Tomás’s journey…
Any long-running television show tends to look to its past for inspiration. One of the primary drawcards of serialised TV is characterisation, and what better way to flesh out a character than delve into their past. There’s a tendency for this to go bad – I’m thinking specifically of a second season episode of The…
It’s been a while since I’ve gone to a cinema and done nothing but laugh for 90 minutes. Was this because laughter surround me from beginning to end? Or was it that Bad Neighbours 2 was simply a well-written comedy? You can judge for yourself but in my opinion the sequel surpassed the original in many…
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