The Best Films of 2017
A shitty year with some excellent movies.
New Blood in a Deteriorating Body: Logan
At this point, a superheo film eschewing setting up spinoffs and post-credit scenes in favour of robust character development feels almost revolutionary.
15 Reasons why X-Men: Apocalypse Sucked
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…
Pan (2015)
I remember a time. A special time, when around every corner was another secret waiting to be discovered, another story to be told. It was a time that could never end. Of course it did end. We grew up. Reality intertwined our perception and the tales we’d created faded into insignificance. Pan asks us to…
Interview with ‘That Sugar Film’ Director Damon Gameau
Up until now, Australian actor Damon Gameau had probably been best known as ‘that guy from The Tracker (Rolf de Heer, 2002)’ or ‘that guy from Underbelly: a Tale of Two Cities’. Nowadays, I suspect we’re more likely to start referring to him as ‘that sugar guy’, after his documentary, That Sugar Film. The film…
Chappie (2015)
The toxic critical reaction to Neil Blomkamp’s latest sci-fi flick, Chappie, is understandable coming from those expecting the film to offer up a coherent social allegory, a coherent narrative or coherent action. It doesn’t deliver on those expectations. But once you recognise that the sharp satire of District 9’s opening half is an outlier rather…
X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014)
There’s been a wealth of conversation recently about the increasing homogenisation of superhero films: Matt Zoller Seitz kicked off the discussion with his piece on “Things Crashing Into Other Things” and I can’t dispute his points. Even if you enjoy most of the new wave of big budget superhero pictures, it’s hard not to notice…
Double Feature: X-Men (2000) and X-Men 2 (2003)
As an introduction to a film series that’s still going fourteen years later, X-Men did everything it needed to. Specifically: be an adequate film with an amazing cast. There’s not much to X-Men. It’s more like a feature length television pilot than a complete movie, spicing up its introduction to this world of superpowered mutants…
Prisoners (2013)
On paper, Prisoners seems like its destined to be forgotten as yet another unremarkable thriller. The film concerns the abduction of two young girls and focuses its attention on two men searching for them; Hugh Jackman as Keller Dover – zealous carpenter and father of one of the girls – and Jake Gyllenhaal as Detective…
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