comedy
Swan Song Review
The first time I remember seeing Udo Kier, he was wearing a beautiful lime green jacket and info-dumping a great deal (in a dubbed American accent) on a dance student named Susie Bannion. Little did I know the magnetic charm that this German character actor had on some of the most unique filmmakers of our time; Kier counts among his frequent collaborators the likes of Werner Herzog, Lars Von Trier...
Ghostbusters: Afterlife Review
When a single mom and her two kids arrive in a small town, they begin to discover their connection to the original Ghostbusters and the secret legacy their grandfather left behind. Ghostbusters returns to cinemas with its new instalment ‘Afterlife’, this time not as a reboot but as a new installment to the series that started in 1984 and continued with its second film in 1989. This time around Jas...
Don’t Look Up Review
Two obscure astronomers, grad student Kate Dibiasky (Jennifer Lawrence) and her supervisor, Dr Randall Mindy (Leonardo DiCaprio) detect a comet heading straight for Earth. The numbers are incontrovertible; it’s a planet killer, destined to wipe out humanity. They take the info to the authorities, only to smack up against indifference, disbelief, and political self-interest, chiefly from President ...
Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn Review
I learned two very important things from Bad Luck Banging Or Loony Porn, the provocative new film from Romanian director Radu Jude: 1) that people of a certain age are both shamefully interested in and incredibly uncomfortable with seeing sex on-screen and 2) that Romanians are aresholes. The latter may require more research, but seeing this film with a rather undiversified demographic on a Saturd...
Zola Review
In the spring of 2015, I wasn’t exactly doing a lot with my life. Working part-time in a minimum wage job I began a second Bachelor of Arts, because one round of unemployment wasn’t enough. I had just wrapped up my seventh rewatch of Sex and the City and was in search of another text through which to live vicariously as a sad twenty-something with no social plans on a Saturday night. It was the mo...
Riders of Justice Review
As someone who’s turned a Mads Mikkelsen obsession into a personality trait I am contractually obliged to wax lyrical about everything he does. But I don’t think it’s bias talking when I say that Riders of Justice, from Anders Thomas Jensen, is a wholly successful absurdist action comedy for (almost) the entire family. Its ultraviolence fits nicely in the John Wick/Nobody era of frustrated male wi...
Free Guy Review
Ryan Reynolds is a slave to the game in Free Guy, the new film by director Shawn Levy and from Disney subsidiary 20th Century Studios (née Fox.) He plays a humble bank teller and non-playable character in video game Free City trying to earn free will, become the hero and save the game from shutdown after it is revealed that the game’s quirky and arrogant creator Antoine (Taika Waititi) plans on sc...
Werewolves Within Review
Did you enjoy Knives Out but felt it could do with more lycanthropy? You may just love Werewolves Within, the new film from Josh Ruben and starring a bunch of comedy actors you know you’ve seen in something before. We open in the town of Beaverfield where a man hiding out amongst the snowy trees is taking off his wedding ring very conspicuously and messaging someone who is definitely not his wife....
Cruella Review
When I first heard a Cruella origin story was in the pipeline, I was admittedly intrigued. “You think you can make me ‘understand’ an evil puppy killer, Disney?” I declared to anyone who would listen – which was no-one – “Goodluck!” So has Disney succeeded at humanising one of the most unforgivable Disney villains? Has this flick done for Cruella d...
I Blame Society Review
I’m frankly obsessed with this film. I’ve watched it four times. Each time I notice something new to love. As such, it’s hard to write a review that isn’t just a blow by blow account of what happens. Or a long list of all my favourite lines, many of which wouldn’t make much sense without the context. ‘I’m a murderer, not some frenzied spree killer!’ I quote, cackling, to a group of people who have...
Guns Akimbo Review
GUNS AKIMBO launches into the action from its very first frame. Our narrator is Miles (Daniel Radcliffe) a put-upon video game developer who hates his job; he is under the thumb working on a money-spinning hypercasual game that he has no respect for. His boss bullies him. His long-term girlfriend Nova (Natasha Liu Bordizzo) has left him (probably). When he’s home alone in his flat, he gets hammere...