REVIEW: Jungle Cruise (2021)
As one ride ends, another begins. It might be the cousin wanting to line up for the Mad Tea Party after disembarking Splash Mountain. Or, in this case, it might be Disney handing its flagship action-adventure attraction-based baton from Pirates of the Caribbean to Jungle…
REVIEW: The Green Knight (2021)
Medieval Knights, especially Arthurian ones of the Round Table, come with certain expected traits – honour, loyalty, chivalry, heroism, bravery… and Sir Gawain of the original epic poem is no exception. You may be surprised then, by the Gawain you find in David Lowery’s new…
TV REVIEW: Kingdom – Ashin of the North (2021)
It’s not only the undead populating Kingdom’s Joseon who have a craving for blood and guts. For two seasons now, members of the Haewon Cho clan have proven themselves to be the scarier ghouls — also drawn to carnage, but never thoughtlessly or rampantly. Just…
First Trailer For Valdimar Jóhannsson’s Twisted Folktale ‘Lamb’ Released
– A childless couple (Noomi Rapace and Hilmir Snaer Gudnason) in rural Iceland make an alarming discovery one day in their sheep barn. They soon face the consequences of defying the will of nature, in this dark and atmospheric folktale, the striking debut feature from…
Latest Reviews
REVIEW: Ride the Eagle (2021)
Through writing and starring in Digging for Fire (2015), Win it All (2017) and starring in Drinking Buddies (2013), all directed by Joe Swanberg; as well as Safety Not Guaranteed (2012), directed by Colin Trevorrow – Jake Johnson has established and maintained his schlubby manchild…
REVIEW: Jungle Cruise (2021)
As one ride ends, another begins. It might be the cousin wanting to line up for the Mad Tea Party after disembarking Splash Mountain. Or, in this case, it might be Disney handing its flagship action-adventure attraction-based baton from Pirates of the Caribbean to Jungle…
REVIEW: The Green Knight (2021)
Medieval Knights, especially Arthurian ones of the Round Table, come with certain expected traits – honour, loyalty, chivalry, heroism, bravery… and Sir Gawain of the original epic poem is no exception. You may be surprised then, by the Gawain you find in David Lowery’s new…
REVIEW: Here After (2021)
There is no good way to start this one, I’m afraid, as one could turn Here After back to front and still not find much worth highlighting. Cristina Ricci comes to mind, being the promotional team’s royal flush, but is barely in it for more…
REVIEW: The Last Letter From Your Lover (2021)
A cosy romance may be the last thing you would expect as a follow up to the hedonistic Never Goin Back (2018) from director Augustine Frizzell, but it’s good that a new director is already showing range, especially when you consider that she’s also directed…
REVIEW: Old (2021)
A mind-twister, indeed, when strange things of the M. Night Shyamalan kind also exist beyond Philadelphia and Pennsylvania. Entranced and thus inspired by the premise of the graphic novel Sandcastle written by Pierre-Oscar Lévy and drawn by Frederick Peeters, Old sees the filmmaker travel to…
REVIEW: Kandisha (2021)
It was a shock to the system to realise how, before the yet-set rollout of their novel and anticipated The Deep House, French filmmaking duo Alexandre Bustillo and Julien Maury have another film for horror fans — Kandisha. Perhaps with the extreme brains behind the…
REVIEW: Broken Diamonds (2021)
The thing about so many ‘mental health movies’ is that they ultimately resort to extreme examples of behaviours or situations in order to build and maintain drama. But, for so many people with mental health issues, there isn’t anything particularly cinematic about the day to…
Latest Features
No Sudden Move and Soderbergh’s Prolific Post-Retirement Period
After making Behind the Candelabra in 2013, Steven Soderbergh expressed frustration with the film industry and ‘retired,’ spending the next few years on a TV show – The Knick – instead. In 2017 he came out of retirement with aplomb and has gone on to…
A Journey Through Ryan Gosling’s Filmography – Part 1: 2000 – 2010
As part of the JumpCut Charity Initiative this year I decided to marathon the filmography of JumpCut’s unofficial official mascot, Academy Award-nominee Ryan Gosling, in order to rectify my blindspots in his career so far. Shockingly, I hadn’t seen much of his earlier work and…
Spectacular Spectacular – ‘Moulin Rouge!’ at 20
At the very first Moulin Rouge test screening, 20th Century Fox did not tell the audience that the film was a musical. Studio executives were worried. Looking back, it feels impossible that anyone would have worried about Moulin Rouge. It was the final installment of…
Hampton v Hollywood
As ever, this year’s Academy Awards consisted of a strange celebration of trauma from the perspective of the elite, from the trial of Brock Turner in Promising Young Woman to the murder of George Floyd in Two Distant Strangers. The collective agony of the masses…
TCMFF 2021: Humphrey Bogart and Jimmy Stewart in early Anti-Fascist Works
Black Legion (1937) and The Mortal Storm (1940) It is always fascinating and astonishing to look at works of art that come out of war time or political turmoil while the events are still ongoing. If you look at the war films made during World War…
“Somebody’s Gotta Save Our Skins!”: On Star Wars’ Death Star Escape Sequence
From space battles to superhuman fistfights, adventure has become one of the most prevalent elements for sculpting blockbuster entertainment. Big-budget spectacle was arguably kicked off by George Lucas’ original Stars Wars, and while its macro-structure depends on some winning storytelling archetypes to anchor its visionary…
It’s Called Fashion, Look it Up!
As today is the first Monday in May, we should be enjoying the red carpet photographs from the Met Gala, one of the biggest fashion events of the year. Unfortunately last year’s event, which had one of the most exciting sounding concepts in years –…
The Queer Question Mark – Should Straight Actors Play Gay?
In a welcome change of pace, the 93rd Academy Award nominations featured some of the most diverse choices in recent Oscar history. However, the acting nominations continued to contribute to a well-established trend, namely straight performers being nominated for their portrayals of queer characters. Some…