The Diabolical first published by Little White Lies “Not again.” This opening line – coming after the camera has reeled unnaturally (POV-style) through a darkened house, after electrical devices have started and stopped of their own accord, after there has been an eerie flash of light and a pen has moved across a table by itself…
Avatar first published by EyeforFilm Pandora, the jungle moon at the centre of James Cameron’s Avatar, has a lot of waterfalls. In one scene, protagonist Jake Sully (Sam Worthington) leaps from the top of a waterfall to evade being devoured by a ferocious leopard-like beast known as a Thanator, thus separating himself from his human…
Hard To Be a Goid first published by FilmLand Empire “This is not Earth, it’s another planet,” announces the voice-over at the beginning of Aleksei German’s Hard To Be a God (Trudno Byt Bogom), “About 800 years behind.” That might sound like a minor variant on “A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away”…
The House at the End of Time (La casa del fin de los tiempos) first published by Grolsch FilmWorks “I have told you many times before that the only ones here are your little brother, you, me – and dad.” With these words, Dulce (Ruddy Rodriguez) is trying to comfort her son Leopoldo (Rosmel Bustamante), who…
Review first published by Grolsch FilmWorks “You’ve been feeling strange lately, Barbara, confused. This confusion has been transmitted to you from another time, another place, beyond human knowledge and understanding.” The benign, bearded old man who utters these words goes by the name of Jerzy Colsowicz (John Huston), although one suspects that it is his…
Coherence first published by Grolsch FilmWorks “I just got here. You know what, I need to parallel park and I’m not on my earpiece. Are you good?” Pulling in outside the house of friends Lee (Lorene Scafaria) and Mike (Nicholas Brendon), Em (Emily Foxler) is on her smartphone to boyfriend Kevin (Maury Sterling) – when…
The Congress first published by Grolsch FilmWorks “People call RRR science fiction, but I just say it’s not, it’s documentary.” So says actress Robin Wright in a televised promotional interview about Rebel Robot Robin, the kickass, whip-wielding heroine whom she plays in an action franchise. Though live-action (in an otherwise animated world) and played by the…
First published by Sight & Sound Struggled Reagans (2013) 13th Sci-Fi-London: the London International Festival of Science Fiction and Fantastic Film, 24 April-4 May 2014 2014 is a big year for science fiction in the UK. In August, for the first time since 1965, the annual World Science Fiction Convention will be taking place in…
Review first appeared in Sight & Sound, January 2011 Synopsis: Marina Del Ray, LA. In town to celebrate his old friend Terry’s birthday, New Yorker Jarrod is torn between news that his girlfriend Elaine is pregnant, and an offer to join Terry’s successful VFX company. In the early morning after Terry’s party, a full-scale alien…
Under the Skin first published in movieScope 37 We first meet Laura (Scarlett Johansson) near the beginning of Under the Skin in a room of uncannily pure white. Dressing her own naked body in the clothes that she has just stripped from a dead woman, she pauses, in a circumstantially odd, unexpectedly tender gesture, to…