Film & TV

Trailer for the Australian black comedy The Mule is unveiled.

Entertainment One has released the trailer for the new Australia black comedy The Mule. Written by Insidious stars Leigh Whannell and Angus Sampson and directed by Sampson and Tony Mahoney, The Mule is a dark Australian comedy that is based on a bizarre series of true(ish) events. Since the trailer’s release, it has become the third…

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The Iris Interview: Rupert Young talks the popularity of Merlin ahead of Supanova & plans for 2015.

The next run of Supanova expos are just around the corner, with Adelaide and Brisbane up next as hosts for a weekend full of meet and greets, cosplaying, merch buying and Q&A panel goodness. Featured on the guest line up for Adelaide and Brisbane are names including Jack Gleeson (Game of Thrones’ King Joffrey), Oliver and James Phelps (Harry Potter’s Weasley Twins) and this dashing…

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TV Review: Doctor Who Season 8 Episode 12 “Death In Heaven” (UK, 2014)

  If you’re like me, you’re still trying to figure out whether or not you liked the Doctor Who season finale, “Death In Heaven”. Yes, arguably it was one of the stronger episodes in terms of its writing, but was it worth the amount of gravitas given to it in the week preceding? Perhaps not. Almost…

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What to Watch: The Iris’ Weekly TV Picks (13th – 16th November 2014)

Thursday Mean Girls, Ten, 9:30 pm AEST Providing an unexpectedly hilarious insight into the social dynamics of American high schools, 10 years on, Mean Girls – unlike Lindsay Lohan’s career – is still totally ‘fetch’. Looper, Ch. 9, 9:40 pm AEST If you’re a fan of time travel, Looper is the Thursday night film for…

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TV Review: The Mindy Project, Season 3, Episode 7 “We Need To Talk About Annette”

By Amy Nancarrow In my review of last week’s episode, “Caramel Princess Time”, I made the case that the best episodes of this season of The Mindy Project are those that have Mindy and Danny working together, and not fighting or facing some sort of relationship trouble. This week’s offering, “We Need to Talk About…

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Smaug the Magnificent waits to surprise travellers at Wellington Airport, New Zealand

Smaug the Magnificent has made himself comfortable in Wellington Airport’s busy terminal. The sculpture was revealed in front of 200 of the world’s biggest Hobbit fans this week, who made their way to New Zealand as part of the global Hobbit Fan Fellowship competition. Under the art directions from Richard Taylor and Rob Gillies, Smaug…

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Box Office Report: As predicted, Interstellar dominates the box office in its opening week

Well you could see it coming a mile off. Christopher Nolan’s Interstellar has derailed any chances Gone Girl and Fury had of sticking in at number 1. The ambitious blockbuster raked in $4 million in its opening week here. It reportedly failed to match what Warner Bros anticipated but it definitely isn’t small pickings for…

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Tarantino’s The Hateful Eight locks in its cast

Quentin Tarantino’s new film The Hateful Eight has been through the ringer. From proposed book adaptations to table readings to lawsuits over the leaked screenplay, the prolific filmmaker’s newest venture hasn’t exactly had a clear direction. But things have smoothed out over time and we now have received a teaser, albeit no footage. The next stage in production…

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Five Matthew McConaughey Performances You Need To Watch

Alright, Alright, Alright…. Before we experienced the “McConaissance” of 2013/2014, which culminated in a much-deserved Oscar win for Dallas Buyers Club, a brief but memorable appearance in ‘The Wolf of Wall Street‘ and of course True Detective, Matty McC had already stepped away from the rom-coms that were sullying his good name by going all-out for…

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DVD Review: Spike Island (UK, 2012)

Imagine The Inbetweeners if they were an aspiring jangly rock quintet living in Manchester in 1990. The result would be Spike Island.The film tells the story of a gang of lads who just want to get off with girls, be in a band and meet their idols, The Stone Roses at the latter band’s Spike…

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Epic new trailer released for The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies

Two films down and one to go. And this week we finally got a good taste of The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies, the third in a trilogy of films adapting the J.R.R. Tolkien masterpiece The Hobbit, in the form of a brand new, epic trailer that has already received some 8 million views…

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Film Review: My Mistress (Australia, 2014)

Stephen Lance continues showing love for the unexpected in his first foray into a full length feature, My Mistress, dabbing an angsty coming-of-age story with just enough difference to keep things interesting, drawing upon his own teenage experiences to make for a semi-autobiographical exploration of pain, distraction, and healing in a young kid. In this…

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Exclusive: Composer Christopher de Groot discusses his Screen Music Award nomination for Sororal.

Ahead of the Screen Music Awards, which take place in Sydney this Wednesday, we caught up with film and theatre composer Christopher de Groot to discuss his nomination for his work on the low budget film Sororal. You worked with director Sam Barrett on a film noir project in the past (Esoterica). How did your approach…

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TV Review: Bones Season 10, Episode 6 “Lost Love in the Foreign Land” (USA, 2014)

By Kimberley Veart This week’s Bones episode was truly fantastic, cleverly managing the topic of human trafficking with compassion and sensitivity, and also exploring the relationships of the characters we have grown to love, all while solving a murder of course. Rather unconventionally, the episode opens with a scene between Dr. Cam Saroyan and intern…

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What to Watch: The Iris’ Weekly TV Picks (10th – 12th November 2014)

By Kimberley Veart Monday Goodfellas, Gem, 8:30pm AEST “As far back as I can remember, I’ve always wanted to be a gangster.” This critically acclaimed film follows the true story of gangster Henry Hill (Ray Liotta), and his associates Jimmy Conway (Robert De Niro) and Tommy Devito (Joe Pesci) as they climb up the Mob…

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Disney announces title for Star Wars Episode VII on Twitter.

Star Wars fans responded with a mix of happiness and disappointment when it was announced on Twitter this week that the anticipated Star Wars franchise’s Seventh episode would called The Force Awakens. Disney simultaneously announced that the film’s principal photography has been completed. Naturally, this is a film with a lot of post production and its release…

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Q & A announces line-up for “A Place To Change Your mind” next Monday Nov 10

Next Monday 10th of November on ABC, 9:35pm (AEDT), Tony Jones, will be joined with a panel of strong-minded people across all disciplines of politics, science and public affairs: Baroness Susan Greenfield who is a British neuroscientist that believes technology is altering our brains; Environmental Minister, Greg Hunt, who is overseeing the rollout of Direct…

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Disney announces details for Toy Story 4

Those loveable folk at Disney have announced the return of their immensely popular Toy Story series with a fourth installment, planned to be released on June 16th 2017. The news has understandably sent waves of giddish joy throughout the world today. In addition, John Lasseter, who helmed the first two Toy Story films, will return…

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TV Review: The Mindy Project, Season 3, Episode 6 “Caramel Princess Time”

By Amy Nancarrow Mindy’s back after a two week hiatus and, surprise, surprise, Danny and Mindy are having relationship troubles again. This time, Danny is angry that Mindy is late to everything: to work, to dates, to the Italian stand-up comedy night that Danny likes – and Mindy can’t understand why it’s such a big…

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Exclusive: Reggie Watts shares his impressions on the latest Doctor, Peter Capaldi

Comedian and musician Reggie Watts is a pretty big Doctor Who fan. He even sung a song with Amanda Palmer about the show. So when he was in Australia recently for Just For Laughs, and so as pretty big Doctor Who fans ourselves, we’re thought we’d find out what he thought about the latest Doctor,…

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Film Review: Interstellar (M) (USA, 2014)

It’s easy to write about a film that was a bit more average than you’d expected; it’s much, much more difficult writing about a film like this, without making it sound like you are just gushing through a stream of superlatives between cast names and plot points. What Christopher Nolan has done with Interstellar is…

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What to Watch: The Iris’ Weekly TV Picks (6th – 9th November 2014)

Thursday: Gus Worland: Marathon Man, A&E (Ch. 122), 7:30 pm AEST Exclusive to Foxtel, this new documentary series follows the journey of Australian radio presenter and avid couch potato, Gus Worland as he attempts to transform himself into a lean, mean marathon man in time for the New York marathon. The Happenings, Ch. 7, 9:45…

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Film Review: Love, Rosie (UK, 2014)

By Erica Enriquez Based on the novel by Cecelia Ahern (who also wrote P.S I Love You), Love, Rosie is a British film directed by Christian Ditter, about two best friends, Rosie Dunne (Lily Collins) and Alex Stewart (Sam Claflin), who, despite their mutual attraction for each other, go their separate ways after high school,…

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Entries now open for the 2015 Sydney Film Festival

Entries are now open for the 62nd Sydney Film Festival, set to run from 3-14th June 2015. Last year, out of 2,500 films 192 were invited to the Festival, and was viewed by 156,000 audience members. Two new award categories were also introduced: the Documentary Australia Foundation Award for Australian Documentary and the Event Cinemas…

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Jane Campion’s The Piano to celebrate its 21st anniversary with DVD re-release.

Jane Campion’s masterpiece ‘The Piano’ will be released on Blu-ray, DVD and Digital on the 10th December 2014 to celebrate its 21st anniversary. The story revolves around Ada (Holly Hunter), a young mute woman who reluctantly arrives in 19th century New Zealand for an arranged marriage. Loneliness grips her, and she has only her daughter (Anna Paquin) and…

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Fury edges out Gone Girl for the second week in a row.

  War drama Fury has secured a second week on top of the Box Office bringing in $1.8 million. The Brad Pitt WWII epic has only just kept Gone Girl from re-acquiring number 1 position again. Praised for its loyalty driven narrative and thrilling action sequences, Fury has revitalized a genre, clearly helping it lead…

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TV Review: The Walking Dead Season 5 Episode 4 “Slabtown” (USA, 2014)

It’s looking like The Walking Dead crew have found a nice little formula where occasionally they’ll venture away from Rick and catch up with with the plights of peripheral characters every now and then. We got two episodes focusing on The Governor last season, and while they had their faults, the show established that it…

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Monster Fest 2014 coming to Melbourne’s Cinema Nova and Yah Yah’s.

Cinema Nova in Carlton and Yah Yah’s Collingwood in Melbourne are set to host Monster Fest, a 10 day marathon dedicated to cult horror movies. Running from November 20-30, the two venues will be hosting over 40 films, trivia nights, master classes, Q&A’s with film directors and parties. Films on offer include the follow up to the…

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The Iris Interview: Neve McIntosh on Madame Vastra & the new direction of Doctor Who!

  As Australian Doctor Who fans still reel from last weekend’s adventure, Adelaide and Brisbane Whovians are preparing for a member of the current cast to journey out to Australia for the Supanova Pop Culture Expo! With both Peter Capaldi and Jenna Coleman causing chaos on the Doctor Who World Tour earlier in the year, plus Coleman’s return last month to meet…

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Film Review: Living Is Easy With Eyes Closed (Spain, 2013)

Living Is Easy With Eyes Closed is a Spanish film inspired by the iconic lyrics from “Strawberry Fields Forever”. I stumbled across at the cinemas last week and attended on title alone. As a Beatles fan I wasn’t disappointed, but how about as a film fan? It just so happened that in my spontaneous choice…

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