Marry Me is a slick but enjoyable rom-com starring Jennifer Lopez and Owen Wilson. Kat Valdez (JLo) and Bastian (Maluma) are superstars of song … and the hottest couple on the planet. Their social media presence is in the stratosphere and their megahit Marry Me is about to come true in front of 200 million…
Lisa Ellery takes a risk in her debut crime novel Private Prosecution. That is to have a main character who, while his heart is sometimes in the right place, is not particularly likeable. Another is that the story that he is dropped into the middle of can be a little far-fetched. But as long as…
What a thoroughly entertaining showpiece! I last saw The Wedding Singer when it played at the Athenaeum Theatre last May. Now, at the State Theatre, at the Arts Centre, it remains just as fun filled and comedic, but it appears even slicker. The leads are intact among the 20-strong cast and are truly memorable. Collectively, the company sing,…
A family secret is the elephant in the room when three generations of women share luxury hotel accommodation in Copenhagen as one of them prepares to accept a prestigious award. That is Emma (Kate Cole), a middle-aged author, who is about to receive the Hans Christian Andersen Award (the “Little Nobel Prize”) for children’s literature. She is…
Hindsight, they say, is 20-20. But the rose-tinted glasses of nostalgia can distort the lens. In Belfast, director Kenneth Branagh delivers a love letter to his childhood hometown. But I couldn’t shake the feeling his memory might have taken the hard edges off a tumultuous time in Northern Ireland. That’s understandable – after all, the…
Artificial Intelligence turns on its creator in Moonfall. The stakes for Earth and its inhabitants, not to mention the Moon, couldn’t be higher. It starts with an incident in space in 2011. Three astronauts – Jo Fowler (Halle Berry), Brian Harper (Patrick Wilson) and Alan Marcus (Frank Fiola) – are in space on a satellite…
A geriatric Mean Girls? The likeable romantic comedy Queen Bees is set in a retirement home is a moderately entertaining crowd-pleaser that will appeal to older audiences. Helen (played by Oscar winner Ellen Burstyn) is an independent 80 something widow living alone in the house that she and her husband built. But she is becoming…
– Europa! Europa! Film Festival – Sydney and Melbourne 4 – 27 February 2022 We have 2 double passes to a session at the Festival (excluding Opening Night) Note: tickets are digital *(Tickets valid in Australia only)* Festival website HERE From international film festival favourites to star-studded blockbusters and subversive works helmed by Europe’s most…
Paul Howarth’s debut Only Killers and Thieves was a confronting Australian-western that had at its centre the massacre of an Aboriginal community in late 19th Century Queensland. The book focussed on two teenagers, Tommy and Billy McBride, brought into this violent world following the deaths of their parents and sister and realising too late that…
When vastly different publishing firms merge, sparks fly between two key employees. Insults fly. It’s six-shooters at 20 paces in the romantic comedy The Hating Game. The pair – Lucy Hutton (Lucy Hale) and Joshua Templeman (Austin Stowell) – sit opposite one another. He’s neat, cold and ambitious. She’s a people-pleaser. He calls her “shortcake”…
