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I’ll start with a statement about Django Unchained, and then I’ll spend most of the rest of the review justifying it. Django Unchained is cool. Like, really fucking cool. So why is this film, rolling in on a wave of hype and expectation, so cool? Well, for a start, there’s Tarantino. Django seems to be […]
Continue ReadingAs the chill descends over the country, our TV habits seem determined to bring us to far warmer climes. The eagerly anticipated return of Hilary favourite Sun, Sex and Suspicious Parents along with the more depressing What Happens in Kavos and Stacey Dooley Investigates… Magaluf have fuelled essay crises and post-tute relaxation alike. All three […]
Continue ReadingIt’s that time of the year again: the beautiful people are suiting up, Daniel Day-Lewis is making space on the mantelpiece, and gongs are being dished out left, right and centre. The big one – the Oscars – doesn’t roll round until 24th February, but of the rest it’s the Golden Globes that carries the […]
Continue ReadingOn 15th January 2013, it was announced that HMV had gone into administration. A day later, Blockbuster faced the axe. There’s a worrying trend at work here – there are troublingly few places to obtain a physical DVD on the high street. So what busted Blockbusters? The obvious answer: the internet. A trip to hmv.com […]
Continue ReadingBen Lewin’s The Sessions is the most perfect film I’ve seen in months, quite a statement in the wake of Tom Hooper’s jaw-dropping adaptation of Les Misérables. Lewin’s film is based on the life of journalist and poet Mark O’Brien, a Californian who contracted polio aged just six years old. Far from being just another […]
Continue ReadingThis week, Zombieland director Ruben Fleischer brings us a new gun fest. But be warned, Gangster Squad is not for the faint-hearted; two people are dismembered within the first ten minutes. We’re plunged straight into the mob-dominated LA of 1949, where the water is murky with blood and the air is thick with gunfire. The […]
Continue ReadingFor long-time fans of the stage musical of Les Misérables, it has been hard to approach the film production other than on a rollercoaster of trepidation. From the mere idea of making it into a film, through the sometimes surprising casting news to the first set photos of what appeared to be a giant barricade […]
Continue ReadingThe Oscar for Best Picture does not confer greatness on its own. Few would argue that Crash is a better film than Brokeback Mountain, or that Forrest Gump has had more of an impact on pop culture and films than Pulp Fiction. However there is still a sense of disappointment when a truly great film […]
Continue ReadingThe BBC’s nature programmes have never had the most detailed titles – The Blue Planet, Planet Earth, Frozen Planet – and its new offering Africa is no exception. The idea seems to be to give audiences the barest idea of what they are tuning in for, allowing the programme-makers to paint on the largest canvas […]
Continue ReadingIt’s a brave film that decides to start with a declaration that this story will make you believe in God. Admittedly, those words are directed to the in-built audience of Rafe Spall, listening to the adult Pi Patel telling his tale of floating across the Pacific, but his character is so nebulous as to require […]
Continue ReadingTo many of us the new films about Alfred Hitchcock may come as a great surprise. We may not have anticipated, when walking into the theatre, that our perception of him would be so radically altered. By the end of Hitchcock and The Girl, the man who charmed us so often with his baby cheeks […]
Continue ReadingYou may have noticed that it’s nearly Christmas and, as such, all self-respecting film critics have taken it upon themselves to compile a best film of the year list. Fortunately, I am neither self-respecting nor a film critic, and so I won’t bore you with mine. Instead I have noticed what the critics haven’t; people […]
Continue ReadingAn Unexpected Journey takes place not only in the shadow of Erebor, the mountain homeland towards which Bilbo Baggins, Gandalf the wizard and a company of dwarves travel through a hostile Middle-Earth, but also in that of The Lord of the Rings, the wildly successful trilogy to which the new Hobbit films are a precursor. […]
Continue ReadingChristmas films are typically saccharine, sentimental and shit. Movies like the dreadful Santa Clause series, or the eye wateringly bad Four Christmases threaten to turn even the cheeriest of souls into scrooges. Had Love Actually been set and released in October, its combination of predictable plotting, wooden dialogue and an unbearably upbeat tone would surely […]
Continue ReadingFor those looking for love, gone are the days of coffee, candlelit dinners and online dating. For anyone serious about escaping loneliness/cats/academia, taking to our TV screens is the new way to find ‘the one’. The modern classic in this genre is ITV’s Take Me Out, an event now essential in the college social calendar. […]
Continue ReadingThere are very few films that truly change the course of someone’s life. Sure, Die Hard may be your favourite Christmas movie or you might have taken a term’s worth of piano lessons after someone showed you Amadeus, but none of that compares with the pivotal role Battle of the Planet of the Apes played […]
Continue ReadingAccording to many, the cinematic equivalent of treason has occurred recently in Hollywood. Producer Cass Warner has recently come under fire for her efforts to create a sequel to the classic Casablanca film, with phrases such as “squandering the mystery” and “violating common sense” used by various reporters – with online comments demonstrating even less […]
Continue ReadingYou might have seen the trailer which was released this week for World War Z, a zombie epic starring Brad Pitt. If not, you should, because it’s pretty exciting stuff. The trailer sees Pitt face a zombie pandemic, of which we catch a few glimpses. Hordes of undead are seen causing mayhem, and scores of […]
Continue ReadingA loser, struggling in every aspect of his life, turns his fortunes around completely by taking up a little-known activity and achieving a moderate degree of success, as well as validation from those around him. It’s a pretty familiar story – from Dodgeball through to Nacho Libre and even School of Rock, we’ve seen this arc […]
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