Julie and Julia (Review)

I feel it important to state up front that the kitchen and I do not get along. While we inevitably cross paths from time to time, I try not to make eye contact let alone a meal.  This might explain why Julie & Julia didn’t remotely appease my appetite. The film spends so much time celebrating the art of cooking, it forgets to be dramatic, romantic or funny.

It’s not a drama, as there is hardly a [...]

We Are from the Future [My iz budushchego] (Review)

It seems to be that stories of war, whether they are films, history books or otherwise, focus on one of two perspectives: the Anglo-American, or the German. It’s either English speaking diggers and GIs, or it’s blonde-haired, blue-eyed Nazi’s sauntering around and Heil-ing Hitler. It’s not often that Russian participation is considered, nor is the impact that World War II may still be having on the current generation of young Russians.

But We’re From The Future [...]

Interview: ‘Stone Bros.’ director Richard Frankland

The issues facing the Aboriginal population of Australia have seldom been a laughing matter until Indigenous writer/director Richard J. Frankland came along. “Every other culture in the world laughs at themselves, so why can’t we?” asks Frankland in regards to his new film Stone Bros., a stoner comedy that knows how to have a good time. In fact, Stone Bros. breaks new ground by being the first Aboriginal comedy ever in Australia, arriving just after the critical and [...]

Hipsters [Stilyagi] (Review)

Within the doom and gloom of today’s economy and the decreasing quality of life as a result, people increasingly enjoy reminiscing about earlier times. Going back to a more carefree period in history for the purposes of a film often signifies a lack of satisfaction with where someone is and often who someone is, and a director’s objective is often to express that notion with regards to their homeland. Valeriy Todorovskiy’s Russia certainly has identity issues to this day after [...]

Shorts (Review)

Be wary if you ever come across Shorts director Robert Rodriguez on the street. Depending on whether he’s in Spy Kids or Grindhouse mode, he’d either cheerfully greet you and your children with digital rainbows spurting from his fingertips, or he’d run at you, foaming at the mouth, clutching a bloodied machete (which coincidently is the name of his next film).  Catch him in Shorts mode however, and you’ll get a bit of both. One on hand, it’s [...]

Van Diemen’s Land (Review)

It’s astonishing that Van Diemen’s Land is the first Australian convict film since 1927’s For the Term of His Natural Life, when you consider that this country was largely founded by settlements for UK prisoners. So as foundation of our past, the question of why this part of our history remains largely untold begs to be answered. The state of Tasmania has had its fair share of notoriety that stretches across the 19th and 20th centuries, but there has only [...]