May, 2012

Wiping away cobwebs from the moth-eaten genre of the haunted hotel story, writer/director Ti West nails the elusive combo of levity plus genuine scares in his restrained but punch-packing The Innkeepers. The title and marketing materials suggest a conventionally creepy period piece but the setting is contemporary and so, to a point, is West’s approach. [...]

Click here to listen to the latest episode of The Parallax Podcast In this episode of Crikey’s fortnightly movie podcast, myself and co-host and Rich Hardy discuss two new cinema releases (Men in Black 3 and The Dictator), two new DVDs (The Cave of Forgotten Dreams and The Yellow Sea) then have a chat with cult [...]

He was an adorable and precocious child, plump and wide-eyed, with a room-filling presence that warmed the bitterest of hearts. His cheerfully naive demeanour, so sweet and earnest, had a way of assuring adult company that the world was a pleasant place after all and that every human being is born fundamentally decent. This tender-minded [...]

When news broke that divisive Australian filmmaker Baz “Moulin Rouge!” Luhrmann was about to direct a new big screen 3D adaptation of The Great Gatsby, admirers of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s seminal book — set during the roaring ’20s and credited by many as the ‘Great American Novel’ — had every reason to be concerned. Luhrmann’s [...]

To inject some energy into a franchise that ran out of gas a decade ago, dribbling whatever it had left onto the asphalt of asinine ancillary-reaping mega fare in the woebegone Men in Black 2 (2002), Men in Black 3 — the sequel nobody asked for, wanted or expected — arrives as an unofficial Back to the [...]

A quick question, before we go further: why do you think Warner Bros’ wholesome 2011 family adventure Dolphin Tale — “the amazing true story of a brave dolphin and the compassionate strangers who banded together to save her life,” thank you official synopsis — generated disappointing results at the US box office? Your answer, if [...]

The shape-shifting scenery-chewing Sacha Baron Cohen is back, flaunting the world stage, defecating on standards of public decency and injecting his trademark brand of in-ya-face parody in The Dictator, which marks his fourth collaboration with ex-Seinfeld brains trust Larry Charles. Charles’ first film, Masked and Anonymous, was released in 2003 but has already been lost [...]

Maintaining collaborative relationships with film publicists is a must for every professional film critic, and Clint Morris — long-time reviewer and founder of popular movie website Moviehole — is no exception. Where Morris differs from the pack is in his innate understanding of the PR industry and issues publicists face. After all, he used to [...]

It’s not every day you get to watch a movie about Nazis from the dark side of the moon who come down to invade Earth, and certainly not every day you get to speak to the filmmaker who made it happen. Iron Sky (currently playing in Australian cinemas) aka the ‘Nazis from the moon movie’ [...]

In the dimly lit ornately adorned gusty hallways of gothic-esque “out there” cinema, once crazy-cool auteur Tim Burton (Beetlejuice, Batman, Mars Attacks! etc) has not so much jumped the shark as splattered it in ghoulish make-up and rocket launched himself into a thick cloud of unintentional parody from whence he may never emerge. The veteran [...]

Click here to listen to the latest episode of The Parallax Podcast In this episode of Crikey’s fortnightly movie podcast, myself and co-host and Rich Hardy discuss two new cinema releases (Dark Shadows and Wish You Were Here), two new DVDs (Hugo and Young Adult) then invite cult film guru Zak Hepburn to pluck a [...]

#Avengers fans, NY Times critic AO Scott needs a new job! Let’s help him find one! One he can ACTUALLY do! Those were the “them’s fightin’ words” shot down the barrel of the Twitterverse last week. They reverberated across the geekosphere with the force of a Hulk smash to the nads and spawned blog and [...]

To mark the Australian theatrical release of Trishna, from acclaimed director Michael Winterbottom, Cinetology offers readers the chance to win one of 20 in-season double passes valid nationwide from May 10. To enter the competition follow these steps: 1) became a fan of Cinetology on Facebook (if you already are, skip this step) and 2) email me with your [...]

Infidelity, drugs, violence, car crashes, betrayal, sordid secrets and dingy bars where unspeakable acts take place behind beaded curtains. No, not the One Direction crew a decade from now (boom tish) but the tumultuous soul-sucking events that enflame the lives of a group of Aussies on holiday in Cambodia in writer/director Kieran Darcy-Smith’s Wish You [...]

To mark the Australian theatrical release of Iron Sky, director Timo Vuorensola’s Nazis-from-the-moon schlockbuster, Cinetology offers readers the chance to win one of ten in-season double passes valid nationwide from May 10. To enter the competition follow these steps: 1) became a fan of Cinetology on Facebook (if you already are, skip this step) and 2) email me with your [...]

The latest gung-ho Hollywood war movie to disembark on Australian shores is predictably chocked to the gills with guns, explosions, beefcake soldiers and petrified looking foreigners. But Act of Valour, from directors Mike McCoy and Scott Waugh, new kids on the explosives-laden blockbuster block, is distinguishable from the rest of the “fire in the hole” [...]