The Century 16 massacre of 2012, where a lone gunman, James Holmes, entered a packed cinema auditorium in Aurora, Colorado during a midnight screening of The Dark Knight Rises and began shooting – leaving 12 people dead and another 70 injured – forms the stimulus from which indie writer/director Tim...
After a recent run of lacklustre form, the Judd Apatow brand has finally found its mojo again thanks to this tenderly handled rom-com from stand-up comedian Michael Showalter. While in recent years the output of Apatow’s production company – Trainwreck, This is 40, The Five-Year Engagement – has become synonymous...
You wish to hear a tale that’s as old as time itself? How about the saga of a film studio desperate to recapture the magic? We’ve seen Sleeping Beauty from the perspective of the antagonist; had Mowgli’s adventures in the jungle painstakingly retold to us with photo-real clarity; and found...
Those who have been charmed by the wily confidence of George Blagden’s libidinous King Louis XIV in Versailles may find themselves taken aback by Jean-Pierre Léaud’s frail and reclusive incarnation of the Sun King, whom we are introduced to at the start of The Death of Louis XIV: Albert Serra’s...
Terrence Malick has seemingly become so committed to his own self-aggrandising brand of philosophically indulgent, freeform filmmaking that one could arguably be justified in calling him the Michael Bay of arthouse auteurism. Granted, it’s impossible not to be intrigued by the output of a director who’s driven solely by his...
Invigorated with a refreshingly ebullient zeal, the films of Edgar Wright have never been known to suppress their influences. His feature debut – A Fistful of Fingers, “the greatest western ever made… in Somerset” – was dedicated to Sergio Leone, amongst others, and delighted in imitating the gritty, sun-scorched design...
This weekend saw the 50th Anniversary re-release of The Graduate, Mike Nichols’ seductive black comedy that followed Dustin Hoffman’s naïvely disillusioned college graduate, Ben Braddock, as he grappled with his ardent attraction for the sultry Mrs. Robinson (a captivating Anne Bancroft), and his sentimental adoration for her daughter, Elaine (Katherine...
With a brazenly cocksure attitude, cult Belgian filmmaker Bavo Defurne’s disappointingly innocuous sophomore feature, Souvenir, begins with a credits sequence that plays against a lively backdrop of sparkling effervescence. Coupled with the starry-eyed score, composed by American pianist Thomas Lauderdale’s ‘Pink Martini’ music group, it’s a film that promises its...
Clare (Teresa Palmer) travelled to Berlin in search of an unforgettable life experience, but one suspects that such plans didn’t involve being held captive in an airless apartment by a mentally unhinged local (played here with a sinister twitch by German actor Max Riemelt). Unfortunately for her, that’s exactly the...