Feature Essays
The Best Films of 2018
2018 was a pretty great year for feature films. I remember saying the same thing about 2017, and it's true: it really seems to me ...
REVIEW: Glass (2019)
Security consultant David Dunn (Bruce Willis) secretly boasts super-strength and is close to indestructible, and patrols the streets of Philadelphia in a hooded raincoat. When he tracks down serial killer Kevin Wendell Crumb (James McAvoy) - a man with several competing personalities, one of which is a deranged killer known as the Beast with similar ...
REVIEW: Claustrophobia (2008)
Claustrophobia, a 2008 Hong Kong drama by writer/director Ivy Ho, is a difficult film to summarise. Certainly it's impossible to write about without spoiling the story, since what story it has is extremely slight. Let's just run through its lengthy opening scene. Five co-workers pile into a car and travel one, each being dropped off ...
REVIEW: Udon (2006)
Kosuke (Yusuke Santamaria) returns home to Japan after an attempted stand-up comedy career in New York fails to eventuate. Home is Sanuki in Kagawa prefecture, where udon noodles are a local tradition and where Kosuke's ill-tempered father (Katsumi Kiba) runs a popular udon takeaway restaurant. A chance encounter with a bear introduces Kosuke to aspiring ...
REVIEW: Game Night (2018)
Max (Jason Bateman) and Annie (Rachel McAdams) are a hyper-competitive couple who first bonded over games and who now run a weekly 'game night' with their friends. When Max's loathed and hugely successful brother Brooks (Kyle Chandler) offers to host one of the game nights, Max reluctant accepts. Brooks' attempt at a murder-mystery role-playing game ...
REVIEW: Belladonna of Sadness (1973)
In medieval France, a young couple approach the local lord to request permission to marry. Rather than receive permission, the bride-to-be - Jeanne - is violently raped by members of the court. Abandoning her broken fiancee, Jeanne makes a pact with the devil. Living in the forest, she manifests magical powers and becomes a dangerous ...
REVIEW: Swing Kids (2018)
1951: Ro Ki-soo (Do Kyung-soo) is a rebellious young North Korean prisoner in an American POW camp. He is a troublemaker in the camp and given minor celebrity status by his comrades thanks to his war hero brother. When the American Sgt Jackson (Jared Grimes) attempts to put together a tap dancing revue for the ...
REVIEW: Asako in Ruby Shoes (2000)
U-In (Lee Jung-jae) is a disenfranchised Korean public servant who has a boring life, constantly under-achieves and spends most of his spare time masturbating to Internet pornography. Aya (Misato Tachibana) is a depressed Japanese health centre employee who buys shoes he can't afford and plans to commit suicide by holding her breath. To earn some ...
