High-concept films are so called because they have a premise that can be easily summed up (and sold) in one sentence or so, and many of the most successful comedies of recent years fall under that banner. A group of friends must retrace their drunken night in order to find their missing friend. A laidback…
Read More
With home viewing gradually becoming most viewers preferred way to see movies, digital downloads are understandably increasing in popularity. Two great upcoming options for digital download this month are indie comedy Happy Christmas and Bad Grandpa .5, an unrated and extended version of last year’s Bad Grandpa, with over 40 minutes of extra footage, outtakes and interviews. Happy Christmas boast an incredibly…
Read More
Rise of the Planet of the Apes was a huge surprise hit for Fox back in 2011. Tim Burton’s 2001 re-imagining of the 1968 original was a creative disaster, and no-one really expected the reboot to be a success. But the genius decision to cast performance capture legend Andy Serkis in the role of Caesar the…
Read More
It is impossible to deny that we are currently experiencing a golden age in television. Viewers can choose from a ridiculous amount of high quality programs, and tv shows seem to be taking over from films as the dominating medium of popular culture. Shows like Game of Thrones, Breaking Bad and Mad Men have been thrilling audiences for years, and…
Read More
Now in its 13th year, the Arab Film Festival is back for 2014 and lucky viewers in Sydney, Melbourne and Canberra will get the chance throughout August to see some of the best films coming out of the region. Kicking off in Sydney from August 14th to 17th, the Festival will move to Melbourne from August…
Read More
After debuting last week with the biggest opening weekend of the year with an incredible $8.80 million, Transformers: Age of Extinction has repeated at the top of the Australian box office by taking another $4.84 million over the past weekend. Even with strong competition from returning hits How to Train Your Dragon 2 and 22 Jump Street and relatively strong openings from Rio…
Read More
The Travelling Film Festival, an inititative of Sydney Film Festival, is returning in August. The Festival will be held in the town of Casula in NSW from August 1st until August 3rd and will bring with it five diverse feature films from around the globe, as well as two short films. The program will take…
Read More
The Possible Worlds Film Festival is coming back in 2014, and this year’s program looks better than ever! Celebrating its ninth year, the Festival presents an incredible selection of the best new independent films from the US and Canada. The Festival is presented by Cosmos Tours and run by non-profit The Festivalists. This year’s Festival…
Read More
Well we all knew Transformer: Age of Extinction would open big, but did we know it would open this big? The fourth film in Michael Bay’s action franchise took $8.8 million in its Australian opening weekend, giving it the biggest Aussie opening of the year by overtaking May’s X-Men: Days of Future Past. The film also had the biggest US…
Read More
Fans of Billy Elliot and stage musicals in general will have the incredible chance to see a live performance of the internationally celebrated stage show Billy Elliot the Musical. A special performance of the show will be filmed live on September 28th in London’s West End, and broadcast in cinemas across Australia on Sunday October 5th. The show,…
Read More
Community fans rejoice! After hearing the devastating news in May that NBC were cancelling the brilliant and clever Community, things did not look promising. Even though the show was being shopped around various studios in the hope of finding it a new home, it was never certain that we would ever get another season of the show. But…
Read More
Horrible Bosses was a huge surprise when it was released in 2011. The film came out of nowhere and ended up being one of the funniest films in recent years, due largely to its creative and somewhat dark premise: what if three friends decided to kill each others bosses? The film was a hit critically and…
Read More
Marvel will be taking their biggest cinematic risk so far when they release Guardians of the Galaxy next month. The epic space adventure is set to expand the Marvel Cinematic Universe to the far reaches of space, and looks like the most exciting and different Marvel film to date. Clearly confident of the high quality of the…
Read More
In the lead up to this year’s Tropfest, Tropfest Australia is holding the fourth annual Tropfest Roughcut event on July 26th in Sydney. The engaging and interactive film industry event will include networking sessions, panel discussions, and conversations with industry greats, such as actor John Jarratt (Wolf Creek) and comedian Dan Ilic. The full day…
Read More
This past weekend saw the release of two sequels of much loved originals, with 22 Jump Street and How to Train Your Dragon 2 finally being released on Australian screens. Both of the original films have gained a strong fanbase in the years since they were released, so the sequels were always going to be a big deal. 22…
Read More
The Hollywood Reporter broke the story earlier today that Ralph Fiennes (The Grand Budapest Hotel), Channing Tatum (22 Jump Street) and Tilda Swinton (We Need to Talk About Kevin) have signed up to appear in the next film directed by Joel and Ethan Coen, Hail, Caesar! The Coen Brothers, whose films include Fargo, The Big Lebowski, and Best…
Read More
This is massive news. Ever since JJ Abrams was announced as the director of Disney’s Star Wars: Episode VII, most people assumed that Abrams would stick around for Episode VIII and IX, which are scheduled for release in 2017 and 2019 respectively. But according to Deadline, Disney is currently in the process of closing a deal for Rian Johnson to…
Read More
It’s been five years since we last saw Robert Downey Jr in an entirely dramatic role, when he appeared in the critically panned The Soloist. While he is now best known for the role of Tony Stark in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, it is easy to forget that Downey Jr is one of the most…
Read More
Publicity for the upcoming sequel The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 1 is starting to heat up, and the first lot of teaser posters are quite incredible. Lionsgate really don’t need to put this much effort in to promote Mockingjay Part 1. Each Hunger Games movie so far has been a mammoth hit and audiences around…
Read More
Adaptations of the novels of Nicholas Sparks have been a mainstay of romantic cinema ever since A Walk to Remember and The Notebook warmed and broke everyone’s hearts in the early 2000’s. Since then a new Sparks adaptation has hit the big screen every couple of years, including Dear John, Safe Haven and The Lucky One. The…
Read More
When it was first announced a few years ago that Channing Tatum and Jonah Hill would be starring in a comedy reboot of the popular 1980’s TV series 21 Jump Street, sceptics around the world raised their eyebrows. To put it bluntly, it sounded like a stupid idea. No one was really holding out for a…
Read More
After the stunning finale to the incredible fourth season of HBO’s Game of Thrones, fans all over the world are hungry for any way to return to Westeros, and now it is possible. To celebrate the release of Season 4 on Google Play, HBO and Google Play are bringing Game of Thrones: The Exhibition to…
Read More
Well it looks like you just can’t keep those pesky teenagers away from the cinema, as young adult adaptation The Fault in Our Stars has topped the Australian box office chart again over the past weekend. The novel is a publishing phenomenon and fans are clearly loving the film. To be fair, Fault has received very strong reviews as…
Read More
Village Roadshow Pictures Asia and Warner Bros. Pictures have signed on as co-financiers and co-producers of Desen International Media’s Chinese 3D fantasy adventure Zhong Kui: Snow Girl and the Dark Crystal. Directed by Zhao Tianyu (The Law of Attraction, Deadly Delicious), Zhong Kui: Snow Girl and the Dark Crystal stars Chen Kun (The Painted Skin),…
Read More
Last night saw the end of the 61st Sydney Film Festival, with the festival’s prestigious awards handed out at the Closing Night Gala at the State Theatre. Of the 12 films competing in the Official Competition, the Sydney Film Prize was awarded to the French film Two Days, One Night, directed by Jean-Pierre and Luc…
Read More
Quickly cementing his status one of the most talented actors of his generation, Tom Hardy is currently undertaking one of his most challenging roles yet. Or rather, two of his most challenging roles yet. Hardy has started shooting period biopic Legend this week, in which he portrays real-life twins Reginald and Robert Kray. To mark the start of shooting,…
Read More
Brad Pitt is one of those actors who can drum up a huge amount of buzz for any project that has his name attached to it. He always delivers solid performances and is endlessly watchable. Next up for Pitt is WWII drama Fury, which sees him leading a tank crew through the tail end of the war. Joining…
Read More
The 61st Sydney Film Festival comes to a close this Sunday, but you still have a chance to see some incredible films before the festival ends. Particularly exciting is the terrifying program that the Festival has in store for tomorrow, which just happens to be Friday the 13th! The Festival presents a packed program of…
Read More
20 years after they first hit the big screen in the much-loved comedy classic Dumb and Dumber, Jim Carrey and Jeff Daniels are returning as Lloyd Christmas and Harry Dunne in the upcoming sequel, Dumb and Dumber To. The first full trailer for the film has just been released online, and it is such a treat to see these characters again. The…
Read More
It can be a bit frustrating to read about all of the awesome films that are screening at film festivals over the world if you are unable to get to any of them, and it’s a feeling that most film fans would have felt at one time or another. It’s great to hear then, that just…
Read More