Phil Jeng Kane
Phil has written for magazines, corporate videos, online ads, and even an app. He writes with one eye on the future, one eye on the past and a third eye on the Lotto numbers. His social bits are here.
Ride Like a Girl Review
In 2015, Michelle Payne became the first woman to win Australia’s most prestigious horse race, The Melbourne Cup. The film RIDE LIKE A GIRL is a biopic that tells Payne’s story from the early 1990s up until her historic win. Michelle was one of ten Payne children raised by her father Paddy after the early death of their mother in a car accident. They lived on a farm at Miners Rest in Country Vict...
Ad Astra Review
AD ASTRA is a big budget science fiction movie that stars Brad Pitt in the role of Major Roy McBride. It is set in the near-future and McBride is part of the United States Space Command, colloquially referred to as SpaceCom. He is the son of the famous Clifford McBride (Tommy Lee Jones) who, years ago, travelled to the farthest edge of our solar system on a mission to discover signs of extra-terre...
Freaks Review
Seven-year-old Chloe(Lexy Kolker) lives with her father (Emile Hirsch) in a boarded up, dilapidated home that she cannot leave. Every time she attempts to walk out of the front door, she is stopped by her father. She finds this frustrating and doesn’t understand why she can’t go out in the street like the other children that she can see out there. She is particularly tempted by an ice-cream truck ...
The Australian Dream Review
Australians love sport. That is part of the international image we cultivate. Sport. ANZACS. Deadly animals. Drop bears. Larrikins. Sport. Those are some of the images and ideas that form the picture we like to present to the world. We have created a fun and likeable image that helps to sell us as a tourist destination. However, asking questions about ourselves and our history is not something we...
Danger Close: The Battle of Long Tan Review
The Battle of Long Tan took place in a rubber plantation near Long Tân, in Phước Tuy Province, South Vietnam. It occurred on 18th August 1966, during the Vietnam War. Australian and New Zealand troops fought the forces of the Viet Cong and People’s Army of Vietnam (NVA). In DANGER CLOSE:THE BATTLE OF LONG TAN, the men of Delta Company are tasked with finding Viet Cong firing positions after ...
The Keeper Review
In 1944, Bernhard Trautmann (David Kross) is captured in the forests near Kleve, Germany.He is a 21-year-old paratrooper and he has been fighting for four years. He is sent to a British Prisoner-of-War camp in Lancashire, England. Jack Friar (John Henshaw), the manager of non-league side St Helens Town, sees Trautmann goalkeeping in a POW match and uses a combination of bribery and trickery to re...
Booksmart Review
Amy (Kaitlyn Dever) and Molly (Beanie Feldstein) are about to graduate high school. The long-time best friends spent four years studying hard and have been offered places in top colleges. They studied so hard, in fact, that they never socialised with their peers, whom they consider to be immature time-wasters who will never amount to anything. Their view about themselves and their fellow students...
Spider-Man: Far from Home Review
SPIDER-MAN: FAR FROM HOME is the twenty-third film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe; the last entry of the MCU’s Phase Three and the final movie in what is now known as The Infinity Saga. It follows AVENGERS: ENDGAME (2019) and contains some events that connect back to the defeat of Thanos and the death of Iron Man. The movie is written by Chris McKenna and Erik Sommers and directed by Jon Watts w...
Long Shot Review
It’s 2019 and US President Chambers (Bob Odenkirk) is a lazy politician and former television star who thinks that with his current level of popularity, it is a good idea to make his run for movie stardom rather than his second-term as president. He informs the Secretary of State, Charlotte Field (Charlize Theron) and endorses her as a future presidential candidate. At a charity event one night, C...
Top End Wedding Review
Australian rom-coms are not numerous, so the arrival of a new one is worthy of note. TOP END WEDDING is the story of Lauren (Miranda Tapsell) and Ned (Gwilym Lee) a couple who live in Adelaide. Lauren is a successful lawyer working for a non-specified big business. Her time is taken up working on big deals and trying to meet the demands of her strict boss Hampton (Kerry Fox). Ned is a rather less...
Avengers: Endgame Review
AVENGERS: ENDGAME is the twenty-second film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. It is the last film in what is now dubbed the Infinity Saga. It is a direct sequel to AVENGERS: INFINITY WAR (2018), however it contains story threads, elements and characters from many of the preceding twenty-one movies. Which is why some folks have spent the last few weeks catching up with or re-watching those films. Y...
Hotel Mumbai Review
The Mumbai terrorist attacks of 2008 were a series of shootings and bombings that occurred over four days from 26 November to 29 November. Ten men from the Pakistan-based Jihadist organisation Lashkar-e-Taiba killed more than 160 people and wounded 300-plus. There were twelve planned attacks; targets included taxis, a café, cinema, hospital, railway station and several hotels, including the luxury...