Stephen King is one of the finest writers of this generation, and although his stories are heavy on elements such as horror and thriller, his writings have been praised by one and all. Over the years, he has written several brilliant novels and short stories, but The Dark Tower continues to be …
What is a “feel-good” movie? Is it just an uplifting story? Or something even more? That’s a tricky question that doesn’t have a distinct answer. Something that may be heartfelt to one person may be found schmaltzy and manipulative to another. Adding that idea to 2025 films makes the prospect …
There is a certain charm in looking back at a film that you watched as a kid. 1995’s A Kid in King Arthur’s Court, from director Michael Gottlieb and writers Michael Part and Robert L. Levy, was an easy choice for family movie night. It stars Thomas Ian Nicholas as …
It’s inevitable. With every new live-action remake released by Disney, the same cycle of controversy, ridiculous boycotts, and deafening noise from hate groups and internet users who can’t handle any deviation from the established norm repeats itself – even if that “norm” is just their highly romanticized childhood memories. Casting …
Stories about colonization seldom humanize the colonizers, and for good reason. Focusing on the victims of abuse should always be the priority. However, there is value in examining a colonizer’s motivations. In his film The New Boy, writer and director Warwick Thornton examines some of those motivations through the lens of …
The Semaine de la Critique (Critics Week) is a crucial sidebar at the Festival de Cannes. It focuses on debut and sophomore films. A Useful Ghost (Pee Chai Dai Ka) by the Thai director Ratchapoom Boonbunchachoke is another hyped first-time directorial effort. The semaine is responsible for unveiling buzzy titles …
BBY 1 is here. Concluding Andor’s second season with the events of Rogue One imminent was always going to happen, but it takes an explosive set of events to get news of the Death Star to the Rebellion’s headquarters on Yavin, and thus to send Cassian (Diego Luna) off with …
Once again, Andor Season 2 moves one year later. When the clock rolls forward to BBY 2 at the start of Episode 7, Messenger, Cassian (Diego Luna) is on Yavin itself, working with organised and rapidly mobilising Rebel forces rather than just as the mercenary of Luthen (Stellan Skarsgard). Of …
In its second week, Andor’s second series has again jumped a year forward, covering a span of mere days in BBY 3. The jump can be disorientating at first, as the cast of characters finds itself in largely new configurations. However, the show is confident enough to hint at what …
A lot has changed in the two and a half years since Andor first landed on Disney+ screens in autumn 2022 in the wider world, and the return of possibly Star Wars’ most overtly political and subversive entry was highly anticipated. While always in production as a two-season show, the …
After strike-induced delays, the second series of Andor arrives on 22 April 2025, almost two and a half years after the first series first appeared on Disney+. This time, it will deliver its twelve episodes over a might-tighter release window (twelve episodes over four weeks rather than ten). Revisiting Andor’s …
In his essay Defense of an Adaptation, French film critic and co-founder of the historical film magazine Cahiers du Cinema André Bazin states that a literary adaptation for the cinema is impure. He points out how dependence on another medium affects filmmaking and how leaning over another source material, either …
In The End, Joshua Oppenheimer turns his camera from documentary towards fiction while continuing his exploration of the lies people tell themselves. The film opens with a young man (George Mackay) painstakingly painting miniature figures and landscapes onto a large diorama; on closer inspection, the diorama seems to encapsulate a …
Bong Joon-ho is one of the most fascinating filmmakers of the century. From The Host to Parasite, not forgetting Snowpiercer or Okja, the writer-director jumps from genre to genre, blending distinct tones with remarkable balance and efficiency. Joon-ho fits into that special category of filmmakers who simply cannot make a …
At the beginning of Parthenope, the protagonist reflects on the concept of beauty, saying that it lasts only for 10 minutes and all that is left after that is just boredom. Interestingly enough, that is exactly how I ended up feeling about the entire film after the first few scenes. …
Nosferatu may be a renowned film for its experimental Expressionism techniques, unsettling settings examining the Occult and its controversial backstory, which led to all copies of the original 1922 silent film by F.W. Murnau being destroyed due to copyright infringement of Bram Stoker’s novel Dracula. Ensuing restoration efforts resulted in …
J. R. R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings saga struck such a colossal nerve when it was first published because it was a reaction to the loss of the first World War. The displacement of the muddy, modern conflict into a deliberately regressive story of magic and magical creatures …
Musician and filmmaker H.P. Mendoza’s newest release The Secret Art of Human Flight looks like a B-movie and has an absurd premise usually seen in average-quality YouTube shorts. Known for his skill directing small-budget movies, Mendoza manages to take a film that even at its premise, teeters toward collapse and …
DC Comics has no shortage of quality animated material. This includes numerous direct-to-DVD films (the most recent being the Justice League: Crisis on Infinite Earth trilogy). While those have offered mixed results, one corner of DC that has remained popular is its animated television content. HBO Max’s shows, such as …
2017’s The Greatest Showman is a musical drama whose popularity I struggle to understand. For all its huge setpieces and hyper-stylised choreography its narrative and thematic substance was cloying and often faux, with overwhelmingly bland songs – minus Rewrite the Stars – to boot. Director Michael Gracey at last returns …