Archive for 'Film Reviews'
[FILM: Review] The Hunt
When we can’t find anything to pin on the donkey, we search for a tale. Danish director Thomas Vinterberg hurtles down the slippery slope of doubt and accusation in his Cannes award-winner The Hunt.
Posted: May 1st, 2013 under Arts, Brag 510, Film Reviews.
Tags: Shannon Connellan, The Hunt
[FILM: Review] Kon-Tiki
In 1947, Norwegian explorer Thor Heyerdahl drifted nearly 5,000 nautical miles across the Pacific Ocean on a balsa wood raft with a crew of fellow adventurers. Why? To prove his theory that ancient South American settlers had journeyed to Polynesia from thousands of miles to the east.
Posted: April 22nd, 2013 under Arts, Brag 509, Film Reviews.
Tags: Kon-Tiki, Lisa Omagari
[FILM: Review] Warm Bodies
The zombie bubble must surely be close to bursting – along with BBC series In The Flesh, Warm Bodies might be the flagship film for the zombie-rehabilitation trope. R (Nicholas Hoult), a zombie who used to be a very handsome twenty-something, spends his days shuffling around an airport exchanging grunts with a ‘friend’ (Rob Corddry) and occasionally shuffling out in packs in search of delicious brains. His inner monologue is smart and self-aware, however when he spends some time with the beautiful human Julie (Teresa Palmer) – whom he rescued from an attack on her scavenging group by his own undead buddies – his language skills start to improve. As a result, the sense of humour and kindness he shows in the few syllables he can manage challenge the assumptions the human survivors have been making about the zombies for the eight years since they took over.
Posted: April 15th, 2013 under Arts, Brag 508, Film Reviews.
Tags: Caitlin Welsh, Warm Bodies
[FILM: Review] Identity Thief
Melissa McCarthy is a funny, likeable actress with perfect comic timing, and Jason Bateman is a funny, likeable mensch – the perfect straight-man foil for the pratfalls of others, in Arrested Development, The Switch, The Change Up, Couples Retreat, Horrible Bosses (director Seth Gordon’s previous film), and many, many other films. Put these two together in a plot that mashes up Planes, Trains & Automobiles and its modern permutation Due Date with The Hangover series, and you have a recipe for success – which accounts for how much money Identity Thief has taken at the US box office. And it’s hard to begrudge either of its stars that success.
Posted: April 8th, 2013 under Arts, Brag 507, Film Reviews.
Tags: Dee Jefferson, Identity Thief
Sydney Film Festival 2013: Highlights
Sydney Film Festival flashed their program bits last week with a teaser lineup of 25 films in their 2013 program. So we did the Smart Thing: we asked the experts what we should see. Here’s what they said… Rear Window This is one of Alfred Hitchcock’s most daring experiments, taking place as it does entirely [...]
Posted: April 7th, 2013 under Arts, Film Reviews.
Tags: David Stratton, Dee Jefferson, Kate Jinx, Margaret Pomeranz, Mathieu Ravier, Sydney Film Festival