The “wrong man” trope has a long cinematic history. It provided the basis for at least three Alfred Hitchcock classics – The 39 Steps, North by Northwest and The Man Who Knew Too Much. But it probably found its most intriguing form in the paranoid thrillers of the 1970s, like The Conversation. Now director Ferdinando…
You don’t have to look hard to see the shadows looming over Lisa Joy’s Reminiscence. The film is essentially a re-working of Roman Polanski’s Chinatown, with futuristic elements overlaying the noirish story. What Joy does with the tale is clever, but it never surpasses the original. Joy is better known as a screenwriter, notably for…
For quite a while now, Disney/Pixar has “owned” the animation space. The decline of Dreamworks Animation has left the field basically open to them. But competitors are emerging, including (relatively) smaller player Sony Pictures Animation. Their first animated musical, Vivo, is a swing for the fences. Vivo sees the storied Lin-Manuel Miranda (In the Heights)…
Topher Grace? Whatever happened to that guy? Well, in 2021, Home Economics happened to him. It’s not like he hasn’t been doing anything (remember BlackKkKlansman?) but his profile is a little lower than it was in his That 70s Show heyday. Home Economics is a perfectly fine but not particularly memorable series about a dysfunctional…
It’s a week of limited cinema releases, and they couldn’t be more different. In contrast to the thoughtful Nine Days, Gunpowder Milkshake lets you leave your brain at the door. This colourful adult fairytale from writer-director Navot Papushado is a rollercoaster ride. It’s shamelessly entertaining in that brutal way favoured by the likes of Quentin…
Once upon a time, cinema was the vanguard of daring ideas. In 1957, for example, Ingmar Bergman had his protagonist play chess with the Grim Reaper. Popular cinema always dominated the box office (then as now), but in the late 2010s, daring films seemed to have been pushed to the very margins. The pandemic has…
Australian director Cate Shortland shot to prominence with her feature debut Somersault in 2004. Since then, she’s directed the feature films Lore (2012) and Berlin Syndrome (2017), as well as television in Australia and the US. Now she springboards into the big time with Black Widow, the latest entry in the Marvel Cinematic Universe canon….
If you’ve been pining for a bit of Parks & Recreation-style comedy, look no further than Girls5Eva. This bright breezy series from Meredith Scardino hits all the right notes in its story of a ’90s girl-band that gets a second shot at fame. Scardino was previously a producer and writer on Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt. Kimmy……
Long merely the sidekick or annoyance to Chris Hemsworth’s Thor, Tom Hiddleston’s Loki finally gets some clear air and deserved screen time. This third series in the Disney / Marvel franchise on Disney + sees the Asgardian trickster thrust into a mind-bending journey. While the series once more uses time-travel as its central device, it’s…
Before Hamilton, there was In the Heights. Cultural phenomenon Lin-Manuel Miranda finally brings his Broadway musical about the largely Latin-American community of Washington Heights to the big screen. He once again collabs with Quiara Alegría Hudes (who wrote the book for the musical) and brings in Jon M. Chu (Crazy Rich Asians) to direct. The…
