At the end of last year, the second season of Westworld (“The Door”) received the home Blu-Ray release treatment, with a three disc set showcasing all ten episodes of the big budget HBO series. The season introduced us to the other “worlds” that run alongside Westworld – while a number of storylines and timelines helped […]
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Bad Times at El Royale hit cinemas last year to mixed reviews, though I found it an engaging film, with a clever plot stemmed in the traditions of film noir and crime fiction. The set design was phenomenal and the characters were just the right amount of over-the-top to make them feel right at home […]
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Denis Villeneuve shone a light on issues that now seem more rife than ever in 2015’s hard-hitter Sicario. For its follow-up, sub-headed Day of the Soldado, the concerns at hand are more unnerving than before, and whilst the argument of whether or not the original film needed a sequel is still a valid talking point, […]
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We all know the story where the butler did it. But Agatha Christie’s Crooked House isn’t like that. Published in 1949, the novel was one of the author’s favourite stories. This is also a beautifully-shot period film. It’s an adaptation that leads you down the garden path and around the maze of an eccentric family’s […]
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After two seasons chasing the notorious Cali Cartel leader Pablo Escobar the DEA finally caught up with him. The rules have changed and now they’re after his successors. With Escobar out of the way business is booming for the cartel, on their way to becoming the biggest cocaine trafficker in history. Follow Agent Pena’s (Pedro […]
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The coming-of-age story, Breath is based on the acclaimed, Tim Winton novel of the same name. It is about two adolescent boys named Pikelet and Loonie who learn to surf thanks to a chance meeting with a former professional named Sando (Simon Baker). The film has just been released on Blu-ray and features several hours […]
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The secret’s out about the excellent drama/thriller series, Mystery Road. It’s actually a gripping, Australian detective story that sees the character, Jay Swan reprised from Ivan Sen’s films, Mystery Road and Goldstone. This time around the crime takes place in the small outback town of Patterson where the locals are elusive and tight-lipped about what […]
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The average woman is said to criticise herself around eight times each day. It is in this headspace and society that a rom-com like I Feel Pretty exists. The film had the best of intentions and tries to tackle some complex topics like how hard we women can be on ourselves and the feelings of […]
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Based on JP O’Donnell’s ‘Gallagher’ novels, and directed by Bobby Moresco the action-packed crime thriller Bent was recently released on DVD and Blu-ray. Here’s a bit more about the film: Upon his release from prison, disgraced former detective Danny Gallagher (Karl Urban) makes a plan to seek revenge for a drug bust that went horribly […]
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Mild-mannered Sam (Jon Bernthal) is a retired rodeo champ living a quiet existence as a motel manager in a quiet Alaskan town. We get the impression that he’s not asking for much – just a space to live out his days as peacefully as he can, perhaps get to know Bernadette (Rosemarie DeWitt) a little […]
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The Handmaid’s Tale is set in a dystopian future unlike those we are used to seeing. There aren’t any flying cars or amazing technology that you’d assume to see here. There is nothing but solid regression, simplifying life back to its roots. In fact, it appears that everything has gone backwards in the worst possible […]
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Ash vs Evil Dead is the followup series to Sam Raimi‘s Evil Dead trilogy that pits Ash (Bruce Campbell) against more Deadites proving the chainsaw wielding, shit-talking badass can’t seem to escape the presence of evil. I am a huge fan of the original Evil Dead films as they inhibit a specific tone unlike any […]
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A Family Man is a film about an ambitious, corporate-type who is forced to reassess his priorities. Sound familiar? It’s because this road to redemption is a well-trodden one. A Family Man continues along this journey of clichés without offering anything particularly original or endearing through the process. Gerard Butler (300) stars as Dane Jensen […]
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Returning to the genre that arguably brought him to fruition, Gore Verbinski’s (The Ring) A Cure For Wellness is a decidedly morbid slice of cinema that revels in its own jarring weirdness. Here’s a film that has considerable monetary backing (something of a surprise for a particularly eerie horror experiment) yet comes off more like […]
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The Confirmation plays out like a Sherlock Holmes tale set in a scarce stretch of rural America, with weekend dad Walt (Clive Owen) and his precocious son Anthony (Jaeden Lieberher) spending a murky 24 hours chasing down a stolen tool kit. In the directorial debut from Nebraska writer Bob Nelson, the role of Sherlock and […]
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Take Down (aka Billionaire Ransom) is what you would get if you made cardboard cut-outs characters and put them in a world that was like Brat Camp-meets-The Hunger Games. The film is a thriller that is short on character development and suspense. It means that what ensues feels rather slow, tedious and contrived. The story […]
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Rosehaven is a comedy show that finds the funny in lots of things. It’s a fish-out-of-water comedy, a buddy comedy and a sitcom set in rural Australia. This eight-part series debuted on the ABC in 2016 and it was a hit with audiences. This is because it’s a funny show about two rather unlikely friends […]
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Despite a strong (albeit utterly unhinged) performance from Kevin Costner, Criminal‘s convoluted and underdeveloped plot make for what can only be described as an incredibly boring, yet more importantly, disappointing film to watch. Best known for his mildly received 2012 biographical crime thriller The Iceman, Ariel Vroman’s Criminal sees Kevin Costner star as Jericho Stewart, an […]
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Believe it or not, this isn’t a film about Simone Biles latent fifth gold medal that became a bronze. Aside from the scenes of gymnastics, this film is about as far from the grace of the American superstar as any film could possibly be, but unabashedly so. The Bronze is what happens when The Big […]
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Green Room is one of those movies that isn’t at all hesitant about sneaking up on you and showing you exactly what you’re in for, be it through taboo subject matter (white supremacy) ultra violence or a range of truly sadistic characters. And once you accept what your next hour and half is going to […]
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Apparently we live in a world where members of boybands decide that writing and starring in a post-apocalyptic zombie filled cowboy shoot-em-up Western is a good idea. Initially when I saw the trailer for this film I had a little optimism that it could be one of those “so bad it’s almost good” type of […]
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In 1988, a year after Tim Burton, Micheal Keaton and Jack Nicholson tried their hand at interpreting the Batman mythos, Alan Moore and Brian Bolland released a 48-page graphic novel that explored the Jokers origin, the extent of his lunacy and Batman and Jokers relationship far better than anyone had done at that point. That […]
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Biographical films, especially ones that revolve around triumphs of the human spirit, can range from the truly inspirational The Pursuit of Happiness to award-bait films like the dull and manipulative The Blind Side to unmitigated disasters like the agonizing Patch Adams. However, very few of those films show the comedic side of life and this is where Eddie the Eagle […]
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At first glance, it seems a little odd to see Batman headlining the follow up to 2013’s Man of Steel. Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice is an undeniably clunky title but, having seen it, it feels surprisingly fitting. It’s far more of a Batman film than it is a Superman one. There’s a lot going on here and while […]
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The Adderall Diaries comes across as an incomplete and incoherent collision of storylines. While an interesting concept to discover the faults in our memory and recollections, the unfocused execution of the film ultimately leaves you confused and bewildered more than it does captivated. Based on the true crime memoir of the same name, The Adderall […]
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American nationalism is back on-screen once again in full display in the action sequel to Olympus Has Fallen. On a minor note, Gerard Butler, Aaron Eckhart, Morgan Freeman, Angela Bassett and others from the previous film are back as well. But seriously, the first film, by director Antoine Fuqua of Training Day fame, was a […]
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When it comes to modern crime thrillers, film sometimes has trouble competing with television. Each year sees dozens of TV series – prime-time, cable and otherwise – tackle the genre and for a film to really stand out against this herd and compete with stuff like True Detective or Luther, it has to go big or go home. […]
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It is a truth universally acknowledged that when Hollywood is on to a good thing, they will milk the shit out of it and exploit it until audiences are sick of it and then move on to the next “cool” thing. Right now that thing is very much zombies, so don’t be surprised to see […]
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Homegrown science fiction adventure film Arrowhead brings a lot of ambition to the table but little else. For fans of the genre, it’s a bold step forward into disappointingly familiar territory. Directed and written by Jesse O’Brien, the film follows Kye (Dan Mor), a prisoner of war between two interstellar factions locked in political conflict. Kye is […]
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Loosely-based around Japan’s real life (and really terrifying) ‘suicide forest’, The Forest is a pretty underwhelming and generic horror flick. There’s an enormous gulf in how evocative and eerie the subject material can be and how compelling this film is. There are so many different ways to deploy and explore the premise of this film. Unfortunately, it seems very few of those […]
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