Do you know the name “Gladys Glover”? Unfortunately, no one did – which is wildly different from the ambitions held by the young Gladys (Judy Holliday), who wanted nothing more than to be famous. Her move from Upstate New York to the Big Apple was supposed to bring her fame and fortune, and launch her…

We have a seemingly endless supply of films that focus on the intimate lives of priests, ranging from the stark realism of Robert Bresson’s Diary of a Country Priest, to the politically-charged complexities of Paul Schrader’s First Reformed, to the outright terrifying brutalism of Maurice Pialat’s Under the Sun of Satan. We’ve seen many stories…

There were many great filmmakers that defined the screwball film, which dominated the comedy genre in the 1930s and 1940s, but two in particular redefined what these films meant. The first is Ernst Lubitsch, arguably the finest comedic director to ever work in the medium, and the other is Preston Sturges, whose work reflects a…

Seeing the great British comedy Hobson’s Choice labelled as “a David Lean film” is peculiar, since we’ve become so culturally conditioned to thinking of the esteemed filmmaker as one who made enormous historical epics, where their visual scope was only matched by their length and ability to venture deep into particular periods in history. Taken…

I have had a difficult relationship with Wes Anderson, which is something that I believe has been made very evident through my writing. No one would be more willing to put together a passionate response to the underrated genius that is The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou, or rave about the brilliance of Bottle Rocket…

Something that we don’t often talk about when it comes to film is how art can be a form of therapy. Most of the time, we view cinema as either pure entertainment, or attempts to convey a particular message around some broader social or political message. However, there are instances when someone makes a film…

One has to admire films that manage to find the humour in even the most serious of situations, since they tend to be amongst the most well-composed, meaningful projects, subversive where it matters and insightful where we may not expect it to be. This is very true for Risks and Side Effects (German: Risiken &…

Mario (Geronimo Meynier) is a bit of a slacker – he doesn’t particularly like school very much, and he dreads going home to his working-class family, since while they do have his best intentions at heart, their approach to raising him has always been defined by stricter morals, which aren’t compatible with his more rebellious…

Lenny Weinrib (Woody Allen) is a relatively successful sportswriter who specializes in boxing. He leads quite a happy life – he is married to the intelligent and beautiful Amanda (Helena Bonham Carter), who has her own thriving career as an art curator, but has two very bold dreams. The first is that she wants to…

There’s something so compelling about Australian cinema – many fantastic discussions have been had about how their unique perspective and willingness to venture further than many others have resulted in some absolutely fantastic, and often quite provocative, works of filmmaking. Regardless of the specific genre, there is often a spark of genius that underpin these…