Tagged Five Stars 2015

Don’t be put off by the title inspired by a Disneyland ride – The Haunted Mansion this certainly isn't. Like the glittering, space-age utopia it takes its name from, Brad Bird’s sci-fi adventure is a...

There aren't enough expletives or adjectives to express quite how much you need to see Fury Road. Its brutal war-torn world, built on the liquid viscera of blood, milk and oil, is a dystopia; but the future...

The Water Diviner is a poignant, beautiful and captivating film, showing the ongoing ravages on both sides after WW1’s Gallipoli campaign. The extraordinary courage needed from a man who lost everything...

“The undeniable pleasure of losing control.” Damián Szifron’s brief description of the underlying ethos behind Wild Tales’ irrefutable catharsis perfectly demonstrates the mellifluous nature of his...

Every now and then a film comes along that is so powerful, bold and admirable in its aims and ambitions that you feel the world must sit up and take notice. Joshua Oppenheimer has done it once before with The...

Alex Garland is in confident control from Ex Machina’s boldly brisk beginning to perfectly-pitched end. Carefully composed shots, swift cuts and succinct dialogue bestow the tumultuous pace and visual...

A quickening tension squeezes every frame of A Most Violent Year, tautened by Alex Ebert’s needling score. Chandor directs with a vice-like grip and, with DoP Bradford Young, frames the broken silhouettes...

The Thai master of suspense returns, after smash hit Laddaland, with his latest horror that dredges the murky depths of thriller cinema. The Swimmers at its core is a teen love-triangle horror. Sukdapisit...