It’s not the geekiest publication in the world, but Vanity Fair has posted a bunch of treats from Episode VII (2015) in the past week, including interviews with costume designer Michael Kaplan, legendary composer John Williams, and veteran Star Wars writer Lawrence Kasdan. At the bottom of each page are set photos by legendary photographer…
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Blackhat opens with exhilarating paranoia. The camera soars, impossibly, through a computer chip, where tiny lights flicker with an ominous trill. We are watching a hack that triggers the overheating of a nuclear plant in China and nullifies the warning signs. People die because of a series of numbers. A similar but harmless breach is…
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Episode 1: The force gets ahead of itself While anticipation mounts for Episode VII’s release in December, Disney are busy preparing two stand-alone Star Wars films, as well as Episode VIII (2017). Apparently they’re no longer able to produce a franchise one film at a time. The first stand-alone, Star Wars Anthology: Rogue One (2016),…
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In the bustling city of Sapporo, Anna (Sara Takatsuki) sits alone and silently sketches the other, happy girls. Presumably they don’t have asthma, their parents are alive and, unlike her foster parents, they don’t keep them just for the tax benefit. After she has an attack that asthma cannot fully explain, her foster mother, Yoriko…
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While We’re Young has one shot where Josh (Ben Stiller) and Jamie (Adam Driver) are cycling towards us. Josh strains something in his back, forcing him to stop in the middle of a busy New York street. He manages a yelp to his younger friend, though Jamie hears nothing and keeps on pedaling, no hands,…
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Avast, mateys! Here be SpongeBob with another cinematic adventure. This time he voyages out of water, out of time, out of earth and out of his dimension. Whatever it takes to restore the cornerstone of civilisation the Krabby Patty. The secret formula for this highly addictive burger has mysteriously disintegrated into thin water, and the…
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“No one ever knows what we do.” Ever wonder where those captions on your TV come from? Do you know what a court reporter is? Both utilise the invisible art of stenography – “the act or process of writing in shorthand by hand or machine” – a tradition that dates back to the time of Cicero, who developed…
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Late in the film, iconic fashion designer Yves Saint Laurent is rumoured to have died. A few opportunistic journalists decide to get a headstart on the obituary. They discuss their angle: take it easy on the drugs, alcohol. They agree he was a visionary, that he transformed fashion. They say they ‘liked’ him. Maybe they mean ‘admired’, since…
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