Originality doesn’t blast through the cinematic vaults often from an industry oversaturated with remakes, reboots and the like, but director Dan Bush has broken free from the mould with his horror/heist hybrid, a combination of these two worlds stands up well on paper but slightly misses the boat, in reality, dipping in and out of scenarios that are all too familiar.
Read MoreFilm Review: Wind River
After the success of his scripts for Sicario (2015) and Hell and High Water (2016), Taylor Sheridan’s Wind River promises to be an innovative mix of genre and social commentary. Despite a timely premise and two charismatic actors playing mismatched heroes in a remote and divided community, Wind River is a frustrating misfire of loose plot threads, confusing editing and a palpable sense unhelpful changes were made to the film’s…
Read MoreFilm Review: God’s Own Country
Fresh from wowing the crowds at this year’s Edinburgh Film Festival and going on to win the award for best British Film in the process, Francis Lee’s God’s Own Country finally sees its nationwide release this week. This deeply touching and thoroughly charming first feature has garnered the greatest amount of good will from critics and film fans alike, making it one of the most awaited British films of the…
Read MoreFilm Review: Patti Cake$
Coming literally out of nowhere to win hearts and souls this summer, Geremy Jasper’s brilliant first feature Patti Cake$ is everything you would want it to be and more. This coming of age story which sees an unlikely white female rapper from New Jersey find her voice, has a punk rock spirit with a power ballad soul and everything else in between. Patti Cake$ is 8 Miles if 8 Mile…
Read MoreReview: UNA By Benedict Andrews
The repercussions of telling a story of child grooming and abuse and its subsequent fall out in the years after will always be a sensitive and agonising road to venture down. First-time feature film director, Benedict Andrews, has bitten off more than he can handle in his adaptation of playwright David Harrower’s stage drama Blackbird, failing to build the intensity it cries out for. Andrews gives a valiant effort in…
Read MoreFrightFest Film Review: 3rd Night
The dark opening sequence hangs heavily over the rural idyll shown in 3rd Night. Somewhere between B-movie and video nasty, a little girl is running around the woods, with the industry standard grisly event; but the soundtrack is brilliantly disturbing and unearthly, and the pace is well-judged. The nursery rhyme the child is singing drives everything else that unfolds in this movie.
Read MoreFrightFest: Radius
Making its European premiere at this year’s Horror Channel Frightfest, Radius is a new horror scifi feature directed by Caroline Labrèche and Steeve Léonard. Although offering an intriguing premise and a genuinely promising storyline, the film sadly fails to live up fully to expectations, but don’t let that put you off too much, because there is plenty more to like in this ambitious production which is likely to please genre…
Read MoreFilm Review: Logan Lucky
It wasn’t so long ago that Steven Soderbergh was talking of retirement and the need to move on to something new. Luckily for us, the director is back with a film which is set to be one of his most well received to date. Yes Logan Lucky is yet another heist movie, and yes the jokes are a little on the predictable side, but make no mistake, this brilliantly well…
Read MoreFilm Review: Detroit
Chartering the events that took place during the Detroit race riots of 1967, Kathryn Bigelow’s harrowing new film Detroit maybe a hard watch for most, but is nevertheless as essential today as Alan Parker’s Mississippi Burning was almost 30 years ago. Written by Mark Boal and staring some of the most impressive young actors working in Hollywood right now, the film carries with it a strong message which nobody can…
Read MoreFilm Review: A Ghost Story
Once in a while a film comes along which affects you in more ways than you could have ever imagined. Heralded by some as one the best movies to come out of Sundance this year, David Lowry’s A Ghost Story is an incredibly well executed exercise is subtly and an engenoius masterclass in clever filmmaking. Centring around ideas of loss, legacy and the need for human connection, the film is…
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