Why The Modern Superhero Film Failed Tom Bond May 20, 2014 Analysis, Features, Opinion 5 Comments Last week I wrote an article explaining why the modern superhero film succeeded, and now here I am telling you the exact opposite. A bit hypocritical, right? But as much as the genre has wowed audiences and...
Why the Modern Superhero Film Succeeded – The Origin Story Tom Bond May 16, 2014 Analysis, Features, Opinion 2 Comments We live in a golden age for the superhero film – a period that will go down in cinematic history for its unprecedented levels of productivity, creativity and popular acclaim. The comic books where these...
X-Men: Days of Future Past – Review Tom Bond May 13, 2014 Reviews 2 Comments Empire. X-Men. 25 covers. 1 issue. It was more worrying than exciting. How on earth would Singer combine two franchises into one coherent film? Answer: very, very well. The cast serve the story, not their...
The Wind Rises – Review Christopher Preston May 11, 2014 Reviews 4 Comments Hayao Miyazaki’s films have always been bathwater cinema; warm and comforting and so enchantingly illustrated that we never truly want to leave them. The grief of being hoisted out of The Wind Rises,...
The Canyons – Review Stephen O'Nion May 11, 2014 Reviews 1 Comment With The Canyons, it was always going to be near-impossible to separate picture from production: born of publicity and crowd-funding, scandal and scrutiny. Saddled with a "story" boiled down to glassy-eyed...
The Citizen Kane of Awful: Star Wars – The Phantom Menace Tom Bond May 10, 2014 Features, Nostalgia, The Citizen Kane of Awful 1 Comment Cast: Liam Neeson, Ewan MacGregor, Natalie Portman, Jake Lloyd Director: George Lucas Writer: George Lucas Estimated Budget: $115 million U.S. Gross: $474 million Do I have impeccable...
CEL Mates: The Illusionist (2010) Conor Morgan May 7, 2014 CEL Mates, Features, Independent 2 Comments The Illusionist is Sylvain Chomet’s long-awaited follow up to The Triplets of Belleville, based on a controversially unproduced script written by French comic Jacques Tati and released in 2010. It was...
The Case Against 8 – Sundance London Review Christopher Preston May 6, 2014 Reviews The Case Against 8 is a never-more-than-ordinary documentary about a never-less-than-extraordinary series of events. Needless, theatricality proves to be its main undoing. In one scene, Ted Olson reads back...
CEL Mates: Fear(s) of the Dark Conor Morgan April 28, 2014 CEL Mates, Features, Independent CEL Mates is a new feature about alternative animated films you may not have seen, but probably should; all outside of the Disney/Pixar, Dreamworks and Studio Ghibli fare that dominate the world of animation....
Dinosaur 13 – Sundance London Review Tom Bond April 27, 2014 Reviews 1 Comment The dusty world of fossil digs might seem boring, but Dinosaur 13 is a documentary that gives heart to those weathered bones. You’re drawn in by the passion and excitement of Pete Larson & co. as they...
Obvious Child – Sundance London Review Tom Bond April 26, 2014 Reviews 1 Comment Have you ever been to one of those stand-up gigs where the comedian succeeds through sheer force of personality? That’s Obvious Child, and its lead, Jenny Slate. The story is insubstantial and the humour...
Blue Ruin – Sundance London Review Tom Bond April 26, 2014 Reviews 1 Comment Macon Blair is crazy and a tramp as the shell-shocked hobo with a shotgun seeking vengeance. His beginnings as a bearded vagrant are brushed over too quickly, but Blair is excellent, a wide-eyed bag of nerves...
The Trip to Italy – Sundance London Review Tom Bond April 26, 2014 Reviews 1 Comment La bella Italia, La Dolce Vita – it’s all on display in this glorious Grand Tour, full of good friends and good food and, most of all, full of laughter. Brydon, and Coogan in particular, are less...
Under the Electric Sky – Sundance London Review Christopher Preston April 25, 2014 Reviews Under the Electric Sky is a ridiculous film which exhibits ridiculous people. Shot during 2013’s Electric Daisy Carnival it offers zero accessibility and little of interest to anyone not already associated...
Frank – Sundance London Review Christopher Preston April 25, 2014 Reviews 1 Comment “What goes on inside that head?” Michael Fassbender goes one better than Karl Urban’s Judge Dredd in the bizarrely sublime (or is that sublimely bizarre?) Frank. This is a film which, given a chance...