2010

December is the month in which film reviewers look back over their notes and critiques for the year, catch up with movies they missed and pump out their annual “best of” lists. These lists often numerically rank films from one to ten, which, as we established last year at the school of Cinetology, is an [...]

It’s rare for a film to employ a non-linear multi timeline narrative as effectively as director Derek Cianfrance’s equal parts heart warming and heart wrenching story about a couple (Michelle Williams and Ryan Gosling) meeting and falling in love in one time period and enduring a bitter falling out in another. In hindsight Blue Valentine [...]

Set during the 1930s, when the British royal family were slowly making peace with the realization that the monarchy was no longer about ruling and governance but about stage managing media representations, The King’s Speech is the story of King George VI’s transition from a blubbering stutter-stricken wreck to a smooth spokesperson for the throne. [...]

There is something truly despairing about following Robert DeDiro’s transition from a great dramatic act to a goofy, asinine comic. It feels like watching a loved one slowly deteriorate into madness and ill health; at first it might be amusing – forgettfulness, unpredictable faux pas, weird behaviour like fruit oranges under the bed, reading books [...]

Music’s over-the-hill ambassador for sexy freaky, Cher, returns to the big screen looking evermore like a mythical creature invented to scare small children in director Steve Antin’s magnificently awful Burlesque. Cher belts out a few wailing numbers and stars alongside fellow singer-cum-actor Christina Aguilera as Tess, a jaded straight talkin’ owner of a dingy burlesque [...]

Writer/director Sofia Coppola’s slow moving slice of life drama Somewhere follows the day-to-day routine of a Hollywood star as he drifts between hotels, press junkets, floozy women and juggles the duties of being a father. Stephen Dorff plays Johnny Marco, a big name Hollywood actor forever whisked between photo ops, publicists and gushing fans. The [...]

Nearly three decades after Disney’s junky classic Tron (1982) torpedoed into cinemas with a blast of screen-buckling speaker-crushing sound and fury the time has arrived for audiences to once again trip the neon light fantastic in director Joseph Kosinski’s belated sequel, which arrives at a point in history much more capable of realising the original’s [...]

Fresh from a win at the AFI Awards last weekend, veteran Australian actress Jacki Weaver has received a Golden Globe nomination for her frame chewing performance as a crime family matriarch in director David Michod’s acclaimed Melbourne-based drama Animal Kingdom. Weaver has had a very good fortnight: on top of winning an AFI she was [...]

In August I blogged about the bizarre marketing materials for the upcoming Yogi Bear 3D movie, which arrived lathered with homosexual innuendo. Now the second gust of weird Yogi related controversy has arrived in the form of a glorious unofficial alternate ending inspired by Andrew Dominik’s The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert [...]

Writer/director David Michod’s Melbourne-set crime drama Animal Kingdom ruled the roost last night at the 2010 Australian Film Institute Awards, winning 10 gongs from a record 18 nominations. The result surprised nobody, other than perhaps those who thought it might’ve won a couple more awards given the tsunami of Animal Kingdom acclaim that’s been flooding [...]

For anyone who ever bought into the idea that stories about superheroes and super villains make perfect foundations for metaphors, social allegory and commentaries on this ‘ere human condition, it was a glorious moment: in a resounding slice of gotcha-tainment the hero’s assistant in M. Night Shyamalan’s Unbreakable (2000) reveals after much soul-searching that he has at [...]

What to buy for the teenage boy who hates everything? The claims-he’s-cool uncle? The tweens who don’t know any better? Just about everybody likes to sit back and watch a movie from time to time. DVDs can make great gifts but selecting which one to gift-wrap for your fun-loving aunt or your ‘I hate everything’ [...]

Director John Erick Dowdle’s two parts psychological one part supernatural thriller Devil has been billed as coming “from the mind of M Night Shyamalan.” That’s a good start, because the dire quality of Shyamalan’s recent work (The Last Airbender, The Happening, Lady in the Water) suggests ideas have been coming out of quite a different [...]

Last weekend it was a special treat to be invited as the guest reviewer for an excellent monthly film podcast called Hell is For Hyphenates, which is “designed for cinema addicts who have absolutely no plans to kick the habit.” The podcast is hosted by Lee Zachariah of The Bazura Project (check it out, it’s [...]

In a gutsy venture into the realm of skinflint science fiction writer/director/cinematographer/penny pincher Gareth Edwards stretches every thread of a shoestring budget to try to trick audiences into believing they’re watching a “big” movie. The tale of photographer Andrew (Scoot McNairy) and his boss’ daughter Sam’s (Whitney Able) dangerous trek to America at a time [...]