Film
Blu-ray Review: Graveyards of Honor
The Yakuza play a role in Japanese culture which can only really be compared with that of the Mafiosi in Italy. The origins of today’s crime syndicates reach back over hundreds of years, to the Edo period in Japan. However, the post-war era was fertile ground for these organisations to flourish, establishing footholds within local …
Film Review: Waiting for the Barbarians
2020 has not been a good year for the British Empire. The Black Lives Matter movement has only served to highlight the abuses, bloodshed and oppression which was integral to Britannia ruling the waves. However, merely removing symbols of our past will not magically improve the present. We need to address all aspects of our …
Fantasia Festival Review: Legally Declared Dead
Ever since the principle of insurance was conceived, there have been people willing to try and exploit the system. In America alone, the insurance industry is worth over a trillion dollars and employs almost three million people. Whilst there’s a huge workforce tasked with sales and customer service, there’s also a large number of investigators …
Fantasia Festival Review – Jesters: The Game Changers
South Korean cinema has built up a reputation, across Europe and North America, for exciting and exhilarating film-making. If you’re after a creepy child in an atmospheric horror or a madcap detective hunting down a killer, then there’s nowhere better to look. However, whilst they may not translate as easily, Korea has produced some great …
Film Review: Bulletproof
Regardless of the current political climate, being a cop in a large American city is a difficult, and often dangerous, undertaking. Whilst there’s undoubtedly a huge problem with institutional racism, it’s certainly not an easy or simple job. This has been so thrillingly documented on film by the likes of Antoine Fuqua’s Training Day and …
Fantasia Festival Review: Me and Me
There’s a tendency with filmmakers to want to tie up loose ends. Even if the story has been intentionally vague, they often eventually crack and shoehorn explanations in at the end. Where directors hold firm and, for example, leave their endings open, they can be pressured by producers or studios to dot all the I’s …
Fantasia Festival Review: Bring Me Home
Is there anything which causes more anxiety for parents than the fear of losing a child? Whilst this can often lead to overly protective or cosseted behaviour, the miniscule chance that something bad will happen can become all-absorbing. The trauma caused by the disappearance of a son or daughter is hard to quantify, but it’s …
Blu-Ray Review: Koko-Di Koko-Da
One popular conceit which film-makers love to play with is throwing their main character(s) into a situation and watching them replay a scenario over and over again. Groundhog Day or Happy Death Day are probably the most famous examples, but there have been many variations on a theme. Johannes Nyholm combines this premise with one …
Film Review: Watch List
As part of his election campaign in 2016, Rodrigo Duterte was adamant that he was going to crack down on drug dealers. Whatever your feelings are about the president of the Philippines, he has certainly been true to his word. The ‘war on drugs’ has resulted in the deaths of thousands of Filipinos. Extra-judicial executions …
Fantasia Festival Review: Wildland
Blood is thicker than water and families have to stick together. You can’t choose the clan you’re born into but sometimes it can provide you with a safety net when all else fails. That’s not to say that everyone likes their relatives. The fact you come from the same lineage doesn’t mean you have anything …