Fred Schepisi is one of the more considered filmmakers to make it into Hollywood’s top echelons. The Australian made his name through thoughtful renderings of religion (he studied to be a priest himself in his teens) and race, and once in America he would lend a delicate depth to material as potentially farcical as Roxanne. […]
Certified Copy has garnered a lot of attention internationally since its introduction at Cannes back in May. It thus lands in Australia with plenty of critical baggage hanging from its rather slight frame, and the first thing to say is that the film perhaps suffers as a result of that hype. The truth is that
Another month and yet another comic book adaptation. At least that’s the way it probably feels to the casual cinemagoer when regarding Thor. But look a little closer at this film and there are a number of interesting details. Kenneth Branagh is the most important: it’s his first feature directorial role in four years, and
Neil Jordan’s second film, and first delving into horror terrain, was a curious collaboration with writer Angela Carter. Together they set about adapting various stories from the latter’s famous short story collection, ‘The Bloody Chamber’, a series of very adult reworkings of notorious fairy tales. Central to the film adaptation was the story The Company
Documentarian Errol Morris is renowned for his oddball subjects and in Fred A. Leuchter, Jr. he found another keeper. This compelling 1999 feature offers a detailed portrait of this Massachusetts native who stumbled into a very strange line of work: as a consultant to American prisons in the matter of execution apparatus construction. In the
Mr. Death: The Rise and Fall of Fred A. Leuchter, Jr. 1999 Read More »
When Dennis Hopper passed away last year, he left behind a litany of kooky characters and broiled off-screen stories. It’s how he’ll most often be remembered, despite a late career perspicuity that cast some invaluable truths on the crazier tales of the 60s and 70s. Hopper’s work as a director can go missing in the
This is a tale of sinister motives and the posturing of a ruthless young punk, Pinkie Brown (Sam Riley), who fancies himself ascending the food chain in the dog eat dog underworld of Brighton. Greene’s version of this place was teaming with the seedy excrescence of a expanding underbelly grim faced, cold hearted bit players
Blame is one of the less distinguished local films to hit cinema screens in recent times. A tedious, single location drama that tries to extract tensions from a revenge attack that goes awry, Blame is the work of writer/director Michael Henry. Filmed in Western Australia, the film begins with a teacher, Bernard (Damian de Montemas),
Big screen candy rarely comes sweeter than this shameless throwback to a past era of moviemaking. Directed by JJ Abrams but produced by Steven Spielberg, it’s the latter’s cinematic DNA that ends up being smattered all over Super 8. In set up and setting, plot arc and execution, Super 8 is something of a sequel
There’s a beguiling simplicity to Kelly Reichardt’s films. This is no better exemplified than in her second feature length film, Old Joy (2006), which uses a story by Jon Raymond as its foundation. Essentially a two hander, the film feels like a sort of benign voyeurism in casting a detached, observational eye on a meeting
