Short Reviews

Curse of Chucky

Despite a decent turn from Fiona Dourif (daughter of Chucky’s voice actor Brad), Curse of Chucky is pretty lame. Lacks scares, laughs & efforts to link back to original fall… Read More
Miss Zombie

Sabu’s latest is a bleak, expressionistic, low budget retelling of Kim Ki-Young’s The Housemaid. With zombies. Read More
Coherence

Reminiscent of the comedy It’s A Disaster, as reimagined by Shane Carruth. A dinner party disintegrates into mind bending science-fiction, from their may be no escape. Utterly gripping stuff. Read More
To Be Or Not To Be

A troupe of sub-par stage performers square off against the Nazis in occupied Poland circa 1942. By applying their skills of performance, disguise and suspension of disbelief they attempt to… Read More
Diana

Largely unwarranted biopic is less interested in the Princess’ final years than in punishing its audience with risible dialogue and obsessing over non-events. Read my full review here Read More
Arabian Nights

2 hours+ of beautifully shot, brilliantly conceived, yet pitifully acted sex, poetry and slapstick. It can only be Pasolini. Is there a Pasolini supercut anywhere of characters laughing at each… Read More
The Servant

Excellent psycho-drama pitting James Fox’s young toff against Dirk Bogarde’s working class manservant. Tony (Fox) moves into a new London townhouse, and employs Barrett (Bogarde) to tend to his affairs.… Read More
Rush

Thrilling chapter in F1’s chequered history with dull business & techspeak stripped away to give the crowdpleasing human drama a clear run. Hemsworth is suitably charismatic as playboy James Hunt,… Read More
Blue is the Warmest Colour

Adele Exarchopoulos and Les Seydoux are both fantastic in this beautifully told story of young love, sexual exploration and the search for your own identity. Perhaps it didn’t need to… Read More
Detective Downs

This breezy yet cineliterate noir tale is unique in that its central protagonist has downs syndrome. Fortunately the film avoids either poking fun at this or using it to emotionally… Read More
Blue Jasmine

Woody Allen is on top form here & Cate Blanchett is at the height of her powers. An utterly believable, sympathetic, loathsome performance. A clear awards favourite. Read More
A Band Called Death

This music documenatary about an obscure black punk band from the 70s, is less about punk rock and more about wrestling with how best to honour the wishes of the… Read More
Gravity

Pure cinema. Fantastically staged, inventively shot and robustly performed. Epic, intimate, claustrophobic & thrilling. See it BIG. Read my full review here. Read More
The Kings of Summer

The spirit of Rob Reiner’s Stand By Me lives on in Jordan Vogt-Roberts’ coming-of-age drama, in which two best friends abandon civilisation and opt to spend the summer living on… Read More
Beautiful Creatures

I had no interest in watching what appeared to be yet another post-Twilight supernatural romance actually turned out ot be one of the best examples of the genre. Aidan Ehrenreich… Read More
Can’t Hardly Wait

After being introduced to Ethan Embry by his Cheap Thrills director Evan Katz, I made a mental note to myself to watch his breakthrough role in 90s teen comedy Can’t… Read More
Timecrimes

I’ve enjoyed and shared Nacho Vigalondo’s debut feature many times but this was the first time I had seen it on the big screen. Fantastic Fest had a special screening… Read More
Blue Ruin

An excellent tale of family feuds and bloody revenge. Great direction and a knockout performance from Macon Blair. Read More