The Good Nurse (2022) - Movie Review

While it may as well be the national genre of choice for storytelling here in Australia, and I grew up with my mother being especially interested in it, true crime doesn’t hold any inherent interest for me personally. I tend to avoid documentaries on the subject, since I don’t particularly like the idea of choosing to occupy my free time with the stories of people who actually got hurt or killed; this is part of the reason why I cling so tightly onto the more speculative genres like sci-fi and horror, where any injuries are pure fiction. But even with that in mind, I went into this hoping for some good just out of the casting, between Eddie Redmayne seriously impressing with his last film The Trial Of The Chicago 7, and Jessica Chastain’s recent career highlight in The Eyes Of Tammy Faye. And yeah, there’s good to it, but I unfortunately struggled to maintain interest in the whole package.

The Trial Of The Chicago 7 (2020) - Movie Review

After several years as a writer, with a voice so distinctive that it bears his name in common parlance, Aaron Sorkin made his directorial debut with Molly’s Game a little while back. Now, while it showed him having ample ability at bringing his own words to the screen (basically the minimum required of writers-turned-directors), there’s something else about that feature that seems to have been overlooked. I got into it in my review proper, and even brought it up looking at Let Him Go a few days ago, but essentially, his first leap showed him as an astounding director of actors. He managed to squeeze a career-highlight performance out of Kevin Costner, and that kind of rapport isn’t something that just every Joe Bloggs with a camera can pull off. So when he’s handed an even bigger all-star cast for his follow-up, you better believe that effect is amplified.

Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes Of Grindelwald (2018) - Movie Review

J.K. Rowling has an interesting approach to the lore of her own stories. In the rather hefty gap between Deathly Hallows and the theatrical debut of The Cursed Child, she kept on adding little bits and pieces to the characters of one of the most beloved childhood franchises. From Dumbledore's sexuality to Hagrid’s mental health, it seemed like she needed the Fantastic Beasts films to happen, if only to provide an outlet for all the things she never found time to squeeze in before. It's like she's writing her own fanfiction.

Early Man (2018) - Movie Review

The plot: The simple life for Dug (Eddie Redmayne) and his tribe of cavemen is about to be interrupted when the Bronze Age ruler Lord Nooth (Tom Hiddleston) kicks them out of their meadow and leaves them to fend for themselves. Desperate to save his tribe, Dug challenges Nooth to a game of soccer: If Dug and his team win, they get their meadow back. As the tribe practices the ancient sport, and Nooth prepares to make bank from the match, the heat is on to see who will win this battle of the Ages.

Fantastic Beasts And Where To Find Them (2016) - Movie Review

When it comes to looking at any form of media, you’d have a hard time finding a more powerful and influential force than sheer nostalgia. And to help prove this theory, let’s look at the Harry Potter series, a film saga built entirely on nostalgia. Now, I’m not saying this as an immediate negative of the work itself but rather a side effect of the series as a whole. The film series started and concluded at precisely the right times to latch onto the global millennial mindset, creating that rare form of entertainment that people have grown up alongside with. Those who grew up on these films tend to reminisce on them with the same fidelity and clarity as their own real-life schooling experiences. In today’s era of YA films desperately trying to align themselves with teenaged kids, it’s surprising that this series managed to do everything that they have been aiming for without really trying for it. Naturally, with all this in mind, the announcement of a new film set in the same universe was met with the exploding of several animal heads from the shrill levels of squee that were uttered in response. But this is where the flip side of nostalgia kicks in; the thought that what is considered perfect through rose-tinted glasses cannot be improved upon, and any additions to the canon would only sully it. Well, time to put that to the test with today’s film.

The Danish Girl (2016) - Movie Review

After looking at Tangerine last month, I think that my cinematic perspective on transgenderism has been forever altered as a result. It is also going to serve as an interesting contrast to how the more mainstream film scene treats similar subject matter. Now, since I don’t go too far out of my way when it comes to what films get watched/reviewed around here, I don’t want to take any hoity-toity position when it comes to more independent cinema. That said, I can’t help but feel like subject matter such as transgenderism is better suited for the indie scene; the amount of sensitivity required to make a portrayal of such things work shouldn’t be hindered by any kind of company oversight. Then again, if Any Day Now proved anything, it’s that the indies are just capable of screwing up as the Hollywood system, so this could really go either way.

Jupiter Ascending (2015) - Movie Review

As a child of the Internet, I have a tendency to get on the fan-boy defensive when it comes to what I enjoy and as my film-watching has evolved over time, I have started doing the same with some of my favourite filmmakers (albeit, slightly tempered compared to how it used to be). One of the more peculiar examples of this with me is the Wachowskis, a creative duo that hold a very dear place with me mostly because of the Matrix, a franchise that contains some of my earliest experiences with films, anime and video gaming. Don’t get me wrong, I still think that Matrix Revolutions is a confusing and jumbled mess but the first two films and The Animatrix are on very good standings with me. Not only that, their 2013 effort Cloud Atlas is one of the best films I’ve seen in the last 4-5 years. You’d be right in assuming I had rather lofty expectations of this film considering all that, but did they pay off?