Film & TV

From page-turner to prime time: The power of the crime adaptation

There’s something deliciously ironic about the fact that, in an age obsessed with spoilers, audiences are flocking to stories where many already know the ending. Prime Video’s “Crime On Prime” slate isn’t just ambitious – it’s strategic. With adaptations of novels by James Patterson, Patricia Cornwell, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, and Catherine Ryan Howard launching…

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Film Review: Dolly; grimy hicksploitation horror flick is a feral love letter to the genre

There’s a particular kind of grime that clings to the best grindhouse horror – the sense that if you wiped your hand across the screen, it would come away sticky. Dolly, directed by Rod Blackhurst, leans into that filth with feral enthusiasm. This is not polite horror. It’s blood-caked, sun-bleached, and proudly nasty; a love…

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Film Review: Solo Mio is a breezy, lush romantic comedy grounded by the surprising softness of Kevin James

Romantic comedies don’t usually hand the microphone to the guy who gets left at the altar. Solo Mio does, and that alone gives it a slightly different flavor. Kevin James has flirted with the genre before (and memorably scene-stole in Hitch), but here he steps fully into leading-man territory. Reuniting with the Kinnane brothers (Directors…

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Interview: Nick Corirossi and Armen Weitzman on the value of sincere comedy with The Napa Boys; “It feels like we’ve forgotten what movies used to feel like.”

If legacy sequels are supposed to coast on nostalgia, Nick Corirossi and Armen Weitzman clearly missed the memo. With The Napa Boys – the entirely fabricated “fourth chapter” of a wine-soaked comedy franchise that never actually existed – the longtime collaborators have pulled off something both mischievous and oddly sincere. Co-written by Weitzman and Corirossi,…

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Film Review: Scream 7; nostalgia and camp abound in meta-heavy sequel

The road to Scream 7 has been so fraught with controversy that it could almost qualify as its own horror story. Following the success of 2023’s Scream VI – itself marked by the absence of franchise cornerstone Neve Campbell amid a pay dispute – the seventh entry endured director departures, cast exits, online backlash, and…

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Film Review: Idiotka is a sharp, stylish satire with a whole lot of heart

With her feature debut Idiotka, filmmaker Nastasya Popov delivers a spirited satire that skewers influencer culture and reality television while grounding the chaos in something surprisingly tender: family. At its centre is Margarita – or Margusya – played with precise comic timing and quiet vulnerability by Anna Baryshnikov. A young Russian American woman living in…

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Ten years of changing the frame: Melbourne Women in Film Festival celebrates a landmark anniversary

The Melbourne Women in Film Festival (MWFF) is marking a major milestone in 2026, unveiling its tenth-year program with a bold and celebratory lineup championing women and gender-diverse filmmakers from Australia and beyond. Running March 19th – 23rd across ACMI and Federation Square, the festival continues its decade-long commitment to amplifying underrepresented voices on screen….

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What’s your favourite opening scene?: Ranking the Scream franchise

With Scream 7 stalking its way into cinemas this week, there’s no better time to revisit the franchise’s most sacred tradition: the opening kill. From subversive fake-outs to era-defining terror, the first ten minutes of a Scream movie are its thesis statement – laying out the rules, the tone, and the body count to come….

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Interview: Jordan Giusti on Floodland, climate reckoning and the meaning of home

Lismore has long worn its floods as a badge of resilience – a town that rebuilds, again and again, along the banks of a river that refuses to be tamed. But in Floodland, director Jordan Giusti looks beyond the mythology of grit and endurance to ask a far more unsettling question: what happens when resilience…

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Interview: Director Frank E. Flowers on The Bluff and crafting a fierce female-led action adventure

In the adrenaline-charged action-adventure The Bluff, Priyanka Chopra Jonas stars as Ercell “Bloody Mary” Bodden, a former pirate forced to confront her violent past to protect her family. Director Frank E. Flowers spoke with our Peter Gray to discuss bringing the Cayman Islands’ rarely seen history to life on screen, the meticulous authenticity behind the…

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Film Review: The Bluff; entertaining, though not revolutionary jaunt for audiences in the mood for swords and spectacle

The Bluff is a spirited dive into pirate-infused action, set against the jaw-dropping Cayman Brac, where towering bluffs and Skull Cave provide the perfect backdrop for a story about revenge, family, and redemption. At its heart is Priyanka Chopra Jonas as Ercell “Bloody Mary” Bodden, a woman dragged back into the violent world she thought…

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Interview: David Maler on Zumeca and rewriting the story of conquest through love

History is often told in sweeping gestures – conquest, empire, survival. But in Zumeca, David Maler narrows the lens. Set against the violent collision of worlds in the early days of the Americas, the film reframes the so-called “discovery” of the New World through something far more intimate: the relationship between a Spaniard, Miguel, and…

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Film Review: The Testament of Ann Lee; you truly haven’t seen anything like Mona Fastvold’s assured spiritual fever dream

There’s a particular kind of audacity required to make a film like The Testament of Ann Lee. It’s a historical epic. It’s a spiritual fever dream. It’s a full-bodied musical about celibate 18th-century dissenters who worshipped by trembling and dancing themselves toward transcendence. And somehow, under the assured direction of Mona Fastvold, it coheres into…

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Interview: Amanda Seyfried and director Mona Fastvold on the ecstasy, grief, and radical power of belief of The Testament of Ann Lee

From the outside, The Testament of Ann Lee might sound like an unlikely cinematic proposition: a period biopic about the founder of the Shakers, structured as a musical, rooted in ecstatic song and movement rather than spectacle. But in the hands of writer-director Mona Fastvold and star Amanda Seyfried, the film becomes something far more…

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Interview: John Patton Ford on How To Make A Killing and turning moral chaos into comedic gold

When How To Make A Killing hits screens, audiences meet Becket Redfellow, a charmingly ruthless heir-in-waiting determined to reclaim the fortune his estranged, high-society family denied him at birth. Disowned and raised in the working-class world of New York, Becket (Glen Powell) will stop at nothing – and kill anyone in his way – to…

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Film Review: How To Make A Killing proves that sometimes the sharpest comedies are the ones delivered with the straightest face

John Patton Ford’s How To Make A Killing arrives disguised as a revenge thriller, but what unfolds is something far more sly, strange, and darkly delightful. Loosely inspired by the 1949 classic Kind Hearts and Coronets, the 2026 film swaps aristocratic Britain for modern American excess and delivers a wickedly funny meditation on class, greed,…

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Interview: Joel Johnstone on faith under fire in Grizzly Night; “Conviction was the spine of the character for me.”

In 1967, two grizzly bear attacks nine miles apart shattered the illusion that America’s national parks were a perfectly managed wilderness. Nearly six decades later, Grizzly Night revisits that harrowing evening with a human-first lens – less creature feature, more reckoning with faith, fear and fragility. Directed by first-time feature filmmaker Burke Doeren and written…

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Win a double in-season pass to see Ghostface burn it all down in the slasher sequel Scream 7

Thanks to Paramount Pictures Australia and Superdream, we have 10 double in-season passes (Admit 2) to the anticipated slasher sequel, Scream 7, starring Neve Campbell, Courteney Cox, Isabel May, Jasmin Savoy Brown, Mason Gooding, Anna Camp, Joel McHale, Mckenna Grace, Michelle Randolph, Jimmy Tatro, Asa Germann, Celeste O’Connor, Sam Rechner, Ethan Embry, Tim Simons and…

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Interview: Director Brad Anderson on navigating parenthood and the end of the world in Worldbreaker

The end of the world has rarely felt this intimate. In Worldbreaker, the earth is split apart by an event known as The Stitch, unleashing feral, mutating creatures called Breakers and reshaping the balance of survival itself. With men most susceptible to infection, women lead the fight for humanity’s future. Amid the chaos, a battle-scarred…

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Film Review: EPiC: Elvis Presley in Concert is a reminder of why Elvis still matters after all these decades

There’s something quietly poetic about Baz Luhrmann returning to Elvis Presley after the maximalist fever dream of his 2022 biopic. If that film was a glitter cannon aimed at the myth, EPiC: Elvis Presley in Concert feels like Luhrmann lowering the lights and letting the man step forward on his own terms. Built from rediscovered…

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The Revenant returning to global theatres for 10th year anniversary engagement

Ten years ago, The Revenant arrived in theaters, redefining what audiences expect from physical and emotional endurance in cinema. Weight loss, weight gain, dangerous stunts, extensive prosthetics – these are just some of the extremes actors endure to inhabit a role. But few have pushed themselves as far as Leonardo DiCaprio did in this film,…

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Film Review: Jimpa is a warm and talkative portrait of queer family

Sophie Hyde has always been drawn to intimacy – the kind that sits in the uncomfortable pauses between people who love each other but don’t quite know how to speak plainly. With Jimpa, arguably her most personal film to date, she turns that lens inward. The result is a warm, thoughtful and occasionally over-explanatory family…

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Interview: Sophie Hyde on directing Jimpa and the radical act of listening; “Maybe that’s something we could all do a little more of.”

There are films about chosen family – and then there are films that gently ask whether your biological family might be something you can choose, too. In Jimpa, acclaimed director Sophie Hyde (Good Luck to You, Leo Grande) returns with a tender, funny and quietly radical portrait of three generations negotiating love, identity and the…

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Film Review: War Machine; sharp and muscular actioner leans into the tradition of macho action cinema of decades past

There’s something deeply comforting about a movie that knows exactly what it is. War Machine doesn’t pretend to be elevated sci-fi or a meditative treatise on artificial intelligence. It’s here to drop you in the wilderness with a squad of Army Rangers, unleash a skyscraper-sized battle droid, and let the bullets – and biceps –…

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Margot Robbie and Jacob Elordi bid farewell to Wuthering Heights with Queensland homecoming

There’s something undeniably poetic about two Queensland kids coming home with a windswept romance in tow. After months of globe-trotting premieres, red carpets and breathless international press stops, Margot Robbie and Jacob Elordi quietly returned to where it all began, surprising Valentine’s Day audiences with unannounced appearances at multiple Brisbane screenings of “Wuthering Heights”. And…

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Film Review: The Rose: Come Back To Me is a touching look at the power of connection and a reminder that genuine talent can be rewarded

One of the great things about documentaries such as The Rose: Come Back to Me is that it both provides further insight into a rock outfit for the legions of fans, as well as introducing uninitiated viewers into a world that proves endlessly fascinating.  I am personally of the latter, as going into this film,…

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Series Review: Long-awaited Marian Keyes adaptation, The Walsh Sisters celebrates the sisters we know and love

If you’ve been following the adventures of the Walsh sisters since 1995’s “Watermelon,” then you’ll know that these are five sisters who have been through a lot together. There’s heartbreak, infidelity, addiction, struggles with fertility, grief, depression, and, to top it all off, their mother – affectionately known as Mammy Walsh – is blunt, over-involved,…

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Win a double pass to see Olivia Colman in the tender drama Jimpa

Thanks to Kismet Movies, we have 3 double digital in-season passes (Admit 2) to see Olivia Colman and John Lithgow in the tender drama Jimpa, in Australian theatres from February 19th, 2026. From acclaimed director Sophie Hyde (Good Luck to You, Leo Grande), JIMPA is an uplifting multi-generational family story starring award-winning favourites Olivia Colman and John Lithgow. Hannah…

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Skip the obvious this Valentine’s Day: Five romantic comedies you haven’t already rewatched

Every Valentine’s Day, the same titles trend. The Julia Roberts megahits. The Kate Hudson comfort rewatches. The Reese Witherspoon charm offensives. The Sandra Bullock slow-burns. And, if you’re feeling windswept and literary, perhaps another brooding dive into “Wuthering Heights” and its stormy declarations of doomed love. But what if this year you skipped the obvious?…

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Film Review: “Wuthering Heights”; Emerald Fennell’s horny and indulgent adaptation is a bold reclamation of Emily Brontë’s misunderstood prose

Few novels have been simultaneously romanticised and misunderstood as thoroughly as “Wuthering Heights“. Emily Brontë’s 1847 fever dream of obsession, cruelty, class resentment and emotional sadism has, over time, been softened into windswept yearning and tragic soulmates. Emerald Fennell’s “Wuthering Heights” arrives not to preserve that illusion, but to tear it open. This is not…

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