One of my earliest memories at the movies is sitting in a darkened cinema as Jurassic Park begins… the rustle of leaves in the dark, me clutching my seat in fear as that first, perfect velociraptor shriek echoes through the theatre. I’d like to say that Jurassic Park inspired my enduring love of film –…
If you believe the blurb, Timequake is a novel that tells the story of an unexplained “timequake” that shifts the world’s population back a decade and forces them to relive every moment of their lives – without opportunity for change, forcing them to make the same decisions, do the same things as they did the…
Like last week’s premiere, “Dark Wings, Dark Words” is largely a place-setting episode. But where “Valar Dohaeris” felt accomplished, thanks to a consistent tone, this episode felt clumsy. I think this is because “Dark Wings, Dark Words” fell victim to the ‘clunky pilot’ curse that I spoke about in my Hannibal review. We’re in the…
I don’t want Pissed Jeans to become successful. I don’t mean this in a hipster “I don’t want these guys to sell out and become mainstream” kinda way. If they sold more records, there’s a better chance they’d tour Australia, after all. No, it’s because it’s hard to imagine the band’s unique template working if…
It’s taken me a while to collect my thoughts on the pilot of Hannibal, a show that’s simultaneously familiar and unfamiliar. On its surface it’s of a piece of many other shows – it’s an investigative procedural (thankfully avoiding any fancy-schmancy forensic technology) and certainly concerns serial killers, like the critically-reviled The Following. Like Bates…
Kids is one of those films more interested in realism than creating a traditional three-act narrative. Its running time is spent following a crew of ratty teenagers who spend their time doing drugs, having sex or trying to do either. The film exudes a grotty verisimilitude; the dialogue may be rambling and inarticulate, but true…
Trance, Danny Boyle’s latest, uses hypnotherapy to venture deep into James McAvoy’s head, aiming to find out the location of a missing painting after an art heist goes wrong. Appropriately, it’s more a film for the head than the heart, presenting an interesting, intricate puzzle that keeps you thinking long after the film is over…
I imagine, for some people, that “The Dead and the Dying,” the penultimate episode ever of Spartacus, will stand as an engrossing, exciting episode of television. It features Spartacus, upon hearing word of Crixus becoming the defeated Gaul, turning the tables on Crassus with some clever deception, then staging a battle in the arena to…
The recent death of Jess Franco inspired me to revisit his filmography (well, some of it). Like many of his films, A Virgin among the Living Dead is laced with an erotic energy, but it’s built on a seductive, languorous atmosphere rather than just flashes of naughty bits (though there’s plenty of them, natch). Discovering…
It took me a while to watch Downton Abbey. The idea of lords and ladies sitting around discussing their worries over a cup of tea didn’t sound like my cup of tea. The pilot quickly changed my mind. The show is gorgeous: sumptuous sets and picturesque period trappings filmed with brilliant camerawork. It’s much warmer…
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