Awards Season, Reviews / 22.02.2024

For the second year, you can catch this year's Academy Award nominees for Best Animated Short Film and Best Live Action Short Film on the big screen at select Australian cinemas. For full location details and screening dates, click here. Here are my reviews of this year's contenders. BEST ANIMATED SHORT FILM Letter to a Pig An elderly Jewish man recounts his experiences during the Holocaust to a classroom of seemingly uninterested high school students. As he recalls his tale of surviving the Nazis by hiding in a filthy barn filled...

Awards Season, Reviews / 20.01.2023

After delivering three films in a row that all garnered endless praise and awards season success, it's clear director Damien Chazelle has reached the point in his career where he's being given carte blanche to make whatever the hell he wants. And rightly so. But that freedom proves to be both a blessing and a curse with his latest film Babylon; an overstuffed, 3-hour-plus epic that's equally dazzling, dizzying, disgusting, and discombobulating. Whether Chazelle falls under the weight of his own excess and ambition will be up for you...

Awards Season, Reviews / 17.11.2022

The fall of the once-almighty and all-round piece of sh*t film producer Harvey Weinstein in 2017 started a domino effect we're still seeing to this day. His long-overdue reckoning kickstarted the #MeToo movement and systemic female sexual harassment was finally getting the attention it deserved. It permeated practically every industry around the globe, but those events centred in the world of show business grabbed the biggest headlines. Weinstein was just the tip of the iceberg, but it was a damn large one at that. It was only a...

Awards Season, Reviews / 19.09.2022

Hollywood loves a good comeback; few people deserve one more than Brendan Fraser. While it's true Fraser was never a mega movie star in the same realm as your Brad Pitts or Tom Cruises, he was a consistent staple of late 90s and early 00s cinema in films like The Mummy, Gods and Monsters, and the wildly underrated Blast From the Past. His disappearance from the limelight due to mental and physical health issues and an industry that seemingly turned its back on him was deeply disappointing. With...

Awards Season, Reviews / 17.09.2022

It's been more than 90 years since Lewis Milestone's film adaptation of Erich Maria Remarque's iconic novel All Quiet on the Western Front. It still stands as one of the best war movies ever made and among the most deserving Best Picture winners of all time. The film's anti-war sentiment was so powerful, it was denounced by Adolf Hitler and ultimately outlawed in Germany. It was a landmark moment in the early days of cinema that has stood the test of time. As brilliant as Milestone's work may be, it's...

Awards Season, Reviews / 15.09.2022

In 2008, writer/director Martin McDonagh announced his arrival in a major way with the delicious black comedy caper In Bruges. As far as directorial debuts go, it's up there with the best. The film also proved quirky indie films were where Colin Farrell truly belonged, particularly after a series of disappointing big-budget blockbusters (remember Alexander?). The pairing of Farrell and veteran character actor Brendan Gleeson was a match made in heaven and fans of this modern cult classic have been clamouring for a reunion ever since. Their prayers have...

Awards Season, Reviews / 14.09.2022

We've all experienced eating a meal across from an insufferable "foodie" at some point in recent times. You know the type. The ones who use words like "fusion," "umami," and "artisanal" to sound uber-knowledgable in the world of fine dining. They're as quick to pull out their phone and snap an Insta-worthy pic of the dish in front of them as they are to praise a chef for their bold use of bizarre ingredients once more likely to be found on the back of a dog food packet....

Awards Season, Reviews / 11.09.2022

It's the simplest films that often hit you the hardest. It's what occurs when a filmmaker is confident enough to trust the power of the written word and the strength of their cast to create something special. There's no gimmick or twist. Just an impeccably crafted screenplay delivered by actors at the top of their craft and a director who knows how to get the best out of them. That's precisely the case with Sarah Polley's Women Talking; a raw, intimate, and utterly compelling chamber piece you won't...

Awards Season, Reviews / 18.02.2022

Despite all the inroads of studios like Pixar, Disney, and Sony Pictures, feature-length animated films are still mostly considered a genre of cinema made for children. It's a moderately fair generalisation for a style of film that began as pure family entertainment. That's why it's always such a thrill to see a filmmaker utilise animation in a decidedly adult manner. A brilliant fusion of documentary filmmaking and striking animation to uniquely deliver a compelling true story, Flee is simply extraordinary. It's not just an exceptional documentary or an...

Awards Season, Reviews / 12.02.2022

A film that runs for three hours can be a test of endurance, especially if it's doing little to validate the need for such an extensive running time. In most cases, it's a textbook example of a director failing to grasp the concept of editing. Less can sometimes be more. Then a filmmaker like Ryûsuke Hamaguchi comes along and somehow three hours float by without one even noticing. Such is the case with Hamaguchi's Drive My Car. A perfectly paced and exquisitely crafted masterpiece, this is an astonishing...

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