Flux Gourmet (2022) - Movie Review

Just in case it wasn’t weird enough that The Invitation and After Ever Happy, two films that fall under the same niche category of ‘hilariously awful fanfiction as cinema’, are both in cinemas at the same time as I’m writing this, we now have a film that fits into another niche that would’ve been weird enough to have one feature representing it in theatres. Much like Crimes Of The Future, the latest from Peter Strickland (who also did the excellent Duke Of Burgundy some years back) is heavily fixated on performance art culture and the politics surrounding it, refracted through the director’s unique sensibilities. However, where Cronenberg used it as a vehicle for his usual musings on the limits of the human body, what Strickland has in mind here is far less heady than that. It is downright silly, in fact.

Greed (2020) - Movie Review

The latest collaboration from the winning team of writer/director Michael Winterbottom and actor Steve Coogan, Greed is an obvious if fitting title for a film all about the inner workings of the greedy and the ruthless in the world of business. Specifically, the world of high fashion, where Coogan’s Sir Richard McCreadie has made an infamous name for himself. And shortly after being brought up on official hearings for his shady business practices, he sets off for Mykonos to host a perversely-lavish 60^th birthday party.

The Space Between Us (2017) - Movie Review

The plot: In the near-future, NASA has teamed up with Genesis Electronics, led by CEO Nathaniel Shepherd (Gary Oldman), to colonize Mars. Gardner (Asa Butterfield) is the first human to be born on Mars and for the past 16 years, it’s the only life he’s ever known. However, when he decides to leave for Earth, he soon finds himself having to adjust to life on this alien planet. With the help of teenager Tulsa (Britt Robertson), the only Earthling he’s had regular contact with, they set out to find Gardner’s father, his only living relative.

Miss Peregrine's Home For Peculiar Children (2016) - Movie Review

Sometimes, a film comes out where the filmmaker(s) and subject matter match each other that well that you start to question why it’s only now that such a connection was made. On one hand, you have director Tim Burton, a man whom has made a career out of telling stories of pale-skinned outsiders and giving them their rightful place in the world. On the other, we have the modern YA adaptation sub-genre, which has latched onto the public consciousness through teenaged empowerment fantasies of going against the system that wronged them. Add to this screenwriter Jane Goldman, whose work with Matthew Vaughn embodies that same air of acknowledging and celebrating the abnormal, and you have probably the most ideal combination of any film this year… in theory, at least. After all, as much I like Burton, Goldman and some of the higher-profile YA adaptations (I maintain that The Hunger Games is still an amazing film series), none of the above are immune from being rubbish. Last year’s me may argue this point, but I hadn’t yet seen Mars Attacks at that point; this year’s me knows that this guy is capable of making crap. So, even with all the right pieces in place behind the scenes, how does the final product look?

X+Y (A Brilliant Young Mind) (2015) - Movie Review

When a person is discovered to have what is considered above-average intelligence, there is a certain expectation that they will fulfill their potential. Now, to a degree, this is understandable: Knowing how many truly stupid people exist in the world, it really would be a shame if someone with genuine intellect would just let it go to waste. But then, there’s the side effects that that kind of expectation can have on the person in question. I remember my last day of Year 10 excruciatingly well, as probably one of the best and one of the worst of my entire school career. Somehow, and I still don’t know how, I managed to top the class in my English School Certificate. The next year, I was “heavily advised” to go into the Advanced class, despite my best wishes. This would end up culminating in my HSC two years later, which officially broke me because not only was it clearly beyond my abilities, but that I was expected to pass it by my teachers. Sure, hindsight is a miracle worker and let me understand that all that work really doesn’t mean jack shit later on in life, but in a vacuum it is a horrific experience. Keep that idea of the supposed responsibility to one’s own intelligence as we get into today’s subject.