Phases follows last year’s My Woman which landed in our top 5 of 2016. So it may be easy to initially take this rarities release as a fans-only, hold-you-over journey. But jumping to conclusions is never a good idea because this record provides great evidence of Olsen’s range that shines regardless if the songs are…
What an ordeal! If Iphigenia in Splott is tough to watch because of the material it covers, just imagine what it would be like for the lone actor on stage who gives one of the greatest performances I have seen. It is 90 minutes of dense verbiage, accented and delivered at a mighty healthy clip. Effie (Jessica…
– Booksmart – Only in cinemas from 11 July 2019 We have 5 double in-season passes thanks to Universal Pictures International Australasia. *(Tickets valid in Australia only)* Watch the trailer HERE On the eve of their high school graduation, two academic superstars and best friends suddenly realize that they should have worked less and played…
Aladdin is loosely based on a tale from “One Thousand and One Arabian Nights”. This lavish production features magnificent sets and costumes. But this live-action version doesn’t measure up to the spectacular 1992 animation. The streets of Agrabah are home to Aladdin (Mena Massoud), a lovable street rat who is eager to leave his life…
White hot rage built in me the longer Todd Haynes’ latest film, Dark Waters, went on. This is a shocking story of corporate greed at the expense of humanity. It’s a slow burn. Nothing happens quickly. Obstacle after obstacle is put in the way of full disclosure and redress. The film has much in common…
J G Ballard’s prescient dystopian 1975 novel High-Rise was a bleak allegory for the class warfare and decline of civilization and the breakdown of society. Ballard wrote the novel in the 70s during a period of tumultuous upheaval in the social fabric of Britain before the economic downturn and rampant unionism drove Thatcher’s conservatives into…
Smile is a genuinely scary and engaging psychological horror movie. It centres around a hard-working therapist in an emergency psychiatric unit, named Dr Rose Cotter (Sosie Bacon). As Dr Cotter is about to leave the facility after a particularly long shift, a young graduate student Laura Weaver (Caitlin Stasey) enters shaking and clearly traumatised. In…
Where have all the indies gone? The days when the likes of Steven Soderbergh or Hal Hartley were delivering idiosyncratic but exciting films seems a world away. With the rise of franchises and “sequel-itis”, a lot of American indie movies seem to have been squeezed out of cinema real estate. But occasionally one sneaks through,…
– A Man Called Ove – Only in cinemas from 30 March 2017 We have 10 double in-season passes thanks to Rialto Distribution. *(Tickets valid in Australia only)* Watch the trailer HERE Based on author Fredrik Backman’s 2012 book of the same name, this endearing movie was nominated for Best Foreign Language Film at the…
Something is not quite right with talented artist Rosalind (Olga Kurylenko) in Paula van der Oest’s The Bay of Silence. One minute the mother of young twin daughters is exuberant and full of life. The next, she’s sullen and suspicious. She sleepwalks and claws at the walls. Then she meets and falls for Will (Claes…
