Filmmakers and audiences – indeed Australian arts and screen culture more broadly – owe a deep debt of gratitude to Gough Whitlam and the government he led. Although the foundations had been laid by Whitlam’s…
In a production office far, far away someone has decided to turn the 1970s BBC sitcom Dad’s Army into a film. Its cast features some of Britain’s finest acting talent – and Catherine Zeta-Jones. But this…
The film Gone Girl (2014) is dividing critics along gender lines. Men see it as a gripping, fresh thriller while women have expressed alarm over a range of issues. Chief in recent days is criticism of…
Showbusiness is about entertainment, right? Film-going should be fun. We want to laugh or squeal or sigh as emotion arises in us when the music swells and the camera zooms in for an extreme close up…
The Alan Turing story brings us face-to-face with many contrasts. None is more striking than that between this week’s red-carpet Gala premiere of The Imitation Game at the BFI London Film Festival, with…
Lighting is a fundamental property of cinema. So called “writing in light”, photographed images, whether live-action or cell animation, need illumination. It is the most essential part of a cinematographer’s…
It was a matinee screening in a small town in Massachusetts. I’d stayed for the credits, feeling an odd need to confirm that I’d heard Dido on the soundtrack. Only one other person had been in the cinema…
Think of what you skip reading a novel: thick paragraphs of prose you can see have too many words in them. So said Elmore Leonard, prolific author of westerns, short stories and crime novels. He died last…
The current independence referendum presents the film-making community in Scotland with an unprecedented opportunity to develop a film culture befitting a modern nation state. They should seize it without…
Did watching 101 Dalmatians instill you with a burning desire to fill your home with dozens of monochrome puppies? A new study suggests that may often be the case. The research suggests that all those…
In a largely unknown aspect of the 1984-5 Miners’ strike, gay activists from London gave much needed help to an embattled South Wales community. Their story is told in Pride, a film released in the UK…
Cultural imperialism is alive and well. The desire of successive governments of the United States to destabilise governments in Latin America that are too far left for Washington’s taste is well and truly…
The recently released Obvious Child has been dubbed the first “abortion rom-com”. Donna, played by Jenny Slate, is a 20-something Brooklyn comedian pregnant after a post-breakup one-night-stand. She even…
Yes, some vampires like to live in looming, crumbling, cobwebby castles. But some, the vampires of What We Do in the Shadows, a New Zealand film released today, like to live in flats in Wellington. This…
I’ve often felt depressed going to the cinema recently, but this all came to a head when I went to see Sin City 2: A Dame to Kill For in Montreal. I rather loved the film; loved how the hushed heightened…
Much of the excitement of fantastical and science fictional worlds is the sense of history they have, their depth, and the joy of sharing them with others. Whether it be Star Trek, Star Wars, or Back to…
As violence flared between Israelis and Palestinians in Gaza recently, a BBC thriller about the conflict, The Honourable Woman, was airing. It’s a classy, beautifully shot, taut tale of espionage, counterespionage…
The top selling music album in the USA is currently Guardians Of The Galaxy: Awesome Mix Volume 1 – and has been for three weeks. Those who have seen the film will know that the track listing is based…
How to Train Your Dragon 2 has flown to the top of the foreign box office, raking in US$37.7m from 28 markets. This success was principally driven by China, which brought in US$25.9m, and comes right on…
The idea that entertainment has an effect on our politics might seem ludicrous to some. Many would scoff at the notion that the Star Wars saga might have influenced the political socialisation of Generation…