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QuickView: Borderlands (2024)

10 May 2025 | | Reading Time: < 1 minute | 0 Comments

“Is there any way out of here that doesn’t involve garbage?”

Lilith

The cartoonishly violent videogame world of Pandora has sufficient space for nuanced narratives, as shown by Telltale’s Tales of the Borderlands spin-off. With a bizarrely accomplished cast (including Cate Blanchett and Jamie Lee Curtis) and colourful wasteland visuals, Borderlands seemed like it might have something interesting to offer; instead, at a time when videogames are being adapted into prestige TV series, Borderlands is a throwback to the Bad Old Days™ of movie cash-ins. It is bizarre to learn that acclaimed fantasy author Joe Abercrombie contributed to Eli Roth’s script, which amounts to a poorly executed superhero origin story that mistakes backstory for character development. It makes more sense to discover that Blanchett accepted the role of bounty hunter Lilith during the pandemic lockdown (COVID-19 is, after all, known to cause loss of taste). Roth’s oeuvre is horror, and his action direction here amounts to little more than gunfire punctuated by explosions. The production design is Borderland’s saving grace, realising the game’s cell-shaded art in a vibrant, solid form. That is unlikely to sufficient even for fans of the games, but it makes clear this production was not lazy but misguided, its energy woefully misdirected.

3/10

QuickView: Another Simple Favor (2025)

5 May 2025 | | Reading Time: 2 minutes | 0 Comments

“Why am I here?”

Stephanie Smothers

It is a fair question seven years after the martini-fuelled comedy/thriller A Simple Favor proved forgettable despite the chemistry between its leads. With Blake Lively and Anna Kendrick returning along with director Paul Feig, the only missing ingredient was a compelling reason to reunite the characters. Two hours later I am none the wiser, other than that these are presumably cheap to make. The sparse setup has Emily released from prison and crashing Stephanie’s book tour with an unexpected request that she join her wedding in Italy as the maid of honour. This provides a reasonably witty half hour of verbal sparring between the leads, if outshone by Henry Golding’s retorts as Emily’s vitriolic ex husband. As the script gives way to its mafia and familial intrigue, however, my engagement rapidly waned. Surprisingly, Another Simple Favor is a more grounded story than its predecessor, which is not to say it is any less far-fetched. Once again, there is nothing for the audience to solve, simply a series of revelations — not even twists since there is no misdirection — to observe. The chirpy voiceover from Stephanie’s mommy vlogging turned true crime podcast is now perfunctory rather than fresh, particularly when the conceit has been explored far more effectively in the intervening years by Only Murders in the Building. Gallingly, the film closes by teasing a continuation (“Yet Another Simple Favor”?) — low-cost sequels are perhaps the ideal fodder for “streaming content” and that, Stephanie, is really why you are here.

5/10

QuickView: Warfare (2025)

29 April 2025 | | Reading Time: 2 minutes | 0 Comments

“Is he peeking or probing?”

Sam

Warfare emerged directly from last year’s Civil War as a collaboration between the film’s director Alex Garland and military advisor Ray Mendoza. Here, they co-direct to portray a single encounter Mendoza experienced in Iraq in 2006, reconstructed from the memories of his Navy SEAL platoon. Warfare is unadorned in its depiction of modern conflict (like the Afghanistan battle sequences of the even more sparingly titled A War), avoiding crane shots in favour of handheld cameras shooting with wide lenses up close to give the impression of the viewer moving amongst the soldiers. The occasional drone view serves to heighten the distance of anyone not immediately on the ground. Unfolding in near-realtime, Warfare captures the staccato rhythm of a firefight punctuating long periods of silence, the waiting being most tense. The sound design is Warfare’s strongest weapon, from the lack of music (other than a deliberate diegetic pop song in the opening) to the subjective depiction of silence after an explosion or the cacophony of radio chatter overwhelming with distortion. It highlights the sonic impact of modern weaponry on its own troops. Most striking is the use of wounded screaming not as a punctuating moment but an ongoing, inescapable sound, amplified each time the injured are knocked or moved. Warfare is singular in its perspective other than a brief coda with the locals at the end. This all serves to make viewing Warfare an intense — at times overpowering — experience rather than an enjoyable one, but one that will certainly stay with you.

8/10

QuickView: Civil War (2024)

14 April 2025 | | Reading Time: 2 minutes | 0 Comments

“Once you start asking those questions you can’t stop. So we don’t ask. We record so other people ask.”

Lee

Alex Garland’s timely depiction of a USA descended into civil war will hit too close for some, while not engaging in sufficient reflection for others. Garland makes a deliberate choice to sidestep party politics — the secessionists Western Forces are led by red and blue states and the President’s affiliation is never confirmed (some Trumpian rhetoric in the opening scene notwithstanding). This understandable decision leaves a void in the fictional world building, with little explanation or examination of how the nation collapsed. Yet watching Civil War just a year after release, one finds these gaps at least partially filled by real events. Instead, the war-torn country provides a backdrop for a road trip movie as a group of journalists make a dangerous journey to attempt to interview the President before he is deposed. Photojournalist protagonists allow for real immediacy in the action as they (and the cameras) move in amongst fighters as well as justifying more beautiful cinematography than might be considered appropriate for violent subject matter. Kirsten Dunst excels as Lee (her name a nod to acclaimed WW2 photographer Lee Miller), a veteran war photographer who unwillingly takes on a young protégé, torn between the desire to nurture talent and protect her from inevitable trauma. Dunst succeeds in depicting this through Lee’s hardened shell, her face usually stern, eyes searching and analysing. Cailee Spaeny, who evidently impressed Garland in Devs, provides a fresh and eager audience perspective. I found the film frequently reminiscent of Monsters with its personal story unfolding against the backdrop of a dangerous journey and threatening environment. Although the plot amounts to little more than a series of vignettes along the trip, we find significant depth in each of the central characters as events unfold. Civil War is routinely nerve-wracking, with its final assault on the White House as tense as any war film. Like the Homefront videogames, it is the surreality of placing military violence within the USA the proves particularly arresting for a Western audience — by turns tragic and disturbing, emphasised by the familiarity.

8/10

QuickView: Witches (2024)

18 March 2025 | | Reading Time: < 1 minute | 0 Comments

“In school, I learned about the women who had been murdered in the Medieval witch trials. Some of them were healers and midwives. Some of them had lost their minds.”

Elizabeth Sankey

Something of a bait and switch, Elizabeth Sankey’s documentary is a fascinating personal examination of postpartum psychosis and recovery presented through an artistic veil that draws parallels with witch trials to address society’s treatment and control of women. Elizabeth Sankey illustrates her narrated essay with footage from a dozen cinematic portrayals of witches over the past century, presenting a sort of archival film history alongside the the documentary’s true subject. It is the direct and open discussion of oft-hushed — even shameful — difficulties for new mothers that makes Witches so powerful, matching Sankey’s own brutally honest experience of severe psychosis (resulting in her being institutionalised) with those of several other contributors in talking heads, the most recognisable being Sophia di Martino (of Loki fame). Indeed, the personal stories are far more engaging than the meandering essay theorising about historical accusations of witchcraft, yet that angle may have been necessary to broaden the audience for this important work of advocacy.

7/10

QuickView: Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga (2024)

9 March 2025 | | Reading Time: 2 minutes | 0 Comments
Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga quad poster

“You fabulous thing. You crawled out of a pitiless grave, deeper than hell.”

Dementus

Returning to the wasteland with a revenge-fuelled origin story for Fury Road’s Furiosa, George Miller delivers a solid prequel with more of the same visual spectacle. The vibrantly oversaturated desert and high octane action are still arresting if not as if not quite as astounding as they were a decade ago. Although the marketing pushes Anya Taylor-Joy, she does not appear until almost an hour into the film; prior to that it is Alyla Browne who impresses as the child Furiosa. Both Browne and Taylor-Joy succeed in matching the intensity and determination of Charlize Theron’s performance in Fury Road, and Taylor-Joy ably demonstrates her prowess as an action hero with a character of very few words. The narrative is driven largely by Chris Hemsworth’s Dementus, a theatrical villain in a cape and a codpiece who rides a three-bike chariot, injecting perhaps a little too much levity into the proceedings. We are are largely treated to the same wasteland locations — most of the battles taking place between Immortan Joe’s Citadel and Gastown — which hurts a film that relies on fresh spectacle. Indeed, even with a large screen and rumbling sound system, the vehicular violence can begin to feel repetitive as Furiosa stretches to nearly two and a half hours. It is undeniably assured action filmmaking of the highest technical calibre, but it has little new to show us.

7/10

QuickView: A Real Pain (2024)

2 March 2025 | | Reading Time: 2 minutes | 0 Comments

“Look at what happened to our families, look at where we came from. I mean, who isn’t — you know, who isn’t wrought?”

David Kaplan

Jesse Eisenberg’s second directorial outing is a low-key exploration of grief and family through two cousins on a Holocaust tour of Poland to honour their recently deceased grandmother. Eisenberg’s background in writing for the stage is evident from the dialogue-heavy approach to character exploration, and he has an ear for naturalistic language as people talk in tangents that reinforce meaning on an emotional level. Inspired by Eisenberg’s own family and a trip that he took with his wife, ending at the same house, the conversations occur against a series of beautiful Polish vistas — for a small budget film the constantly shifting location shoot must have been perilous. Eisenberg’s David is his familiar brand of conflict-averse neuroses, lending A Real Pain the familiar air of a Woody Allen movie, particularly as most of the characters are American tourists despite the setting. Kieran Culkin also plays to type as the charming and antagonistic Benji, but there is more nuance to his damaged character, grieving more than just the loss of his grandmother. Culkin’s performance is deserving of the recognition it has received, and together these characters present a contrast between feeling and suppression. There is no artificial catharsis shoehorned into the 89-minute runtime, instead focusing on the attempt (and often the inability) to connect — both with history and with other people. Through his script, Eisenberg expresses self-awareness that his own pain may be unexceptional, even banal, yet the intensity with which we experience it is entirely personal.

8/10

QuickView: Nosferatu (2024)

1 March 2025 | | Reading Time: 2 minutes | 0 Comments
Nosferatu posters

“Does evil come from within us, or from beyond?”

Ellen Hutter

I was surprised that an auteur like Robert Eggers would choose to remake an existing film, but unlike the plethora of creatively bankrupt recent remakes he has gone back 100 years to F.W. Murnau’s 1922 silent film, blending it with a dash of Tod Browning’s Dracula. The original Nosferatu adapted Bram Stoker’s novel for German audiences, but Eggers was apparently drawn to its story granting greater agency to Ellen, the female lead, in her ending of the vampire curse. His goal in remaking it was for the whole film to be told from her perspective, not merely the final act, and the physicality of Lily Rose Depp’s performance sells this choice. The city of Visburg remains Germanic but its inhabitants all have decidedly London sensibilities. There are some peculiarities in the casting that will amuse fans of vampire cinema — Nicholas Hoult switches sides from his recent outing in Renfield, while Eggers regular Willem Dafoe previously played a fictionalised version of the 1922 film’s star in Shadow of the Vampire. Eggers has always been inspired by older styles of filmmaking which he uses to craft atmospheric worlds, but here the storytelling feels as ponderous as it does ominous. The gothic visuals are sublime, like the black and white castle approach with Hutter a silhouette at a white snowy forest crossroad. Bill Skarsgård may be relegated to the shadows for most of the film but he embodies Count Orlok magnificently, from the asthmatic, rhotic accent to the spidery fingers and smooth movements, behind the most noticeable change to the iconic bald vampire — a bushy, Vlad Tepes moustache. Nosferatu is evocative and frequently absorbing but one is left feeling that Eggers is perhaps stronger without the unnecessary constraints that come with respectfully retreading old ground.

7/10

QuickView: The Outrun (2024)

1 January 2025 | | Reading Time: 2 minutes | 0 Comments
The Outrun

“I miss it. I miss how good it made me feel.”

Rona

The Outrun is a layered depiction of alcohol rehabilitation, adapted from Scottish journalist Amy Liptrot’s memoir, with a focus on resilience rather than trite lessons. Elevating The Outrun are writer-director Nora Fingscheidt’s cinematic choices and Saoirse Ronan’s captivatingly raw central performance. Opening with the myth of the selkie is an apt metaphor for the restless Rona who has returned from London to her family farm on the Orkney Islands. Although Rona’s alcohol dependency is signposted at the outset, she is already in recovery in the film’s present day and Fingscheidt uses overlapping storytelling gradually to reveal Rona’s past as a graduate student in London. A third layer is Rona’s mind, showing her current focus which might include new information she is absorbing or ruminations about her childhood. In the first half, these feel chaotic but they become more grounded as time progresses. Rona’s bi-polar father seems to serve as a constant reminder of what she could become (“if you go mad in Orkney, they just fly you out”) while her mother offers religious support that Rona cannot accept. The colour and momentum of London sequences are contrasted with the desaturated, cloudy light of the islands — often Saoirse’s eyes are the most vibrant thing on screen. This use of colour appears to reflect Rona’s connection with life, warmer tones only arriving late in the film. The sound design also deserves a mention, from the ever-present wind rising and falling to the unorthodox juxtaposition of island nature with dance music through Rona’s headphones, perhaps a vain attempt artificially to inject old energy into her new life. There is no shortage of films which tackle alcoholism and many offer greater drama through devastating tragedy or feel-good catharsis; instead The Outrun blends the elements of its film-making into a very personal experience of recovery, trusting that Rona’s resilience alone will prove edifying.

9/10

QuickView: Aporia (2023)

31 December 2024 | | Reading Time: < 1 minute | 0 Comments

“There is no undo button.”

Jabir Karim

All time machine movies are essentially about grief or regret, the two things that drive people to change the past. Aporia embraces this entirely with its focus on a woman who has the opportunity to prevent her husband being killed by a drunk driver but becomes obsessively guilt-ridden over the resulting impact on the driver’s family. The title’s reference to doubt resulting from philosophical objections without proffered solutions is apt for the conundrum faced by the three main characters, ordinary people collectively seeking to decide what to do with a power they now wield without fully understanding. This is lo-fi garage-engineering in the vein of Primer, with a small-scale focus on the human impact like About Time. These choices allow the audience to accept Aporia’s flawed characters and imperfect logic, its atmosphere aided by the underappreciated Judy Greer’s subdued performance as the grief-stricken Sophie. The script may be a little overwrought and weepy, but Moshé has succeeded in crafting a thoughtful and moving addition to the time machine canon.

7/10

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