Cinema has long been home to inspirational “true story” interpretations, operating as a vessel through which filmmakers can translate fact into fiction. There’s an audience for it, so the biopic genre and its various filtered offshoots continue to be a mainstay of mainstream movies. There’s a seemingly endless collection of personalities and adventures to choose…
There is a certain tension when it comes to reviewing comedy-horror. Criticize its more risible aspects and there’s an inherent get-out-of-jail-free card in the fact that it’s spoofing that which we usually take seriously. Therefore, what use is serious criticism? And serious Ugly Sweater Party is not. The blooper reel at the end of Aaron…
A spooky seaman’s tale, The Isle screened at Norwich Film Festival in 2018 with an introduction from co-writer and director Matthew Butler-Hart. Butler-Hart describes the film as influenced by slow-burn horror of the 1970s, and he also spoke about the inspiration for the story — Eilean Shona, an island off the coast of Scotland that…
The Light of Hope (La llum d’Elna), a Spanish-language film directed by Silvia Quer from a script by Margarita Melgar, begins in a celebratory mood, as Pat, a boy of nine or ten, runs through the grounds of an old estate in the French countryside, threading his way through a beehive of activity. What is…
Write When You Get Work starts off with promise. The opening image is that of a young couple, rolling about on the beach, caught up in their own little sensual bubble. This is a good enough tease, where we are invited into their relationship but not bogged down with details, the movie excelling in the…
Dismissed, in a nutshell, is every teacher’s nightmare made flesh: A psychopathic student seeking revenge because he was given a poor grade (in this case a B+). Sidenote: I wish I could inspire such soaring ambition in my own students. In trying to sell this nightmare, the teacher becomes incredibly stupid. He does asinine things…
From North America to Scandinavia, from southern Europe to the Middle East, from the Himalayas to Australia, local myths are a common cultural feature. From the Jersey Devil to the Loch Ness Monster, from the Bunyip to the Yeti, people in particular areas perpetuate tales of mysterious creatures that appear and disappear. While never fully…
