Set Fire To The Stars, directed and co-written by Goddard with actor Celyn Jones, is visually impressive, but also immeasurably more lyrical and thoughtful than you might be expecting. This is less of a surprise considering its subject matter: the story of Dylan Thomas’s first visit to New York (his death in the city was dramatised in the recent BBC drama A Poet in New York, with Ewen Bremner playing the same role Elijah Wood does in this film)....
While chatting to Bryan Fuller about plans for Hannibal season three, we couldn’t fail to bring up the forthcoming TV version of Neil Gaiman’s American Gods, which Fuller is currently adapting for Starz with Heroes’ Michael Green. On why American Gods [which HBO originally had the option on adapting] proved so tricky for HBO to get right: I wasn’t part of any of the creative conversations when the property was at HBO....
They’re not wrong about that title, Emma Banville really is one tough cookie. Bundled into a van and physically threatened by a suspected terrorist to hand over Miriam’s SIM card, she barely blinked. Buzzed by SO15, who recently broke down the door to her house, she sanguinely soldiered on. Menaced, lashed in the press and told by all corners to get her nose out of this whole business, she stays at it like a dog with a bone....
6.3 Oathbreaker One of the things that Game Of Thrones hasn’t really done much is flashback moments. We got one of young Cersei last season, and this season, thanks to the adventures of Bran Stark and the Three Eyed Max Von Sydow, we’ve been getting flashbacks pretty regularly. Bran Stark, as we saw previously, got to see his father when he was Bran’s age, fighting with Benjen in a Winterfell training session while Lyanna rode around on horseback being charming....
2.1 Damned If You Do On the one hand, the grim discussion between Jim, Bruce and Alfred that sometimes the only ‘right way’ is also the ‘ugly way’ lends itself to a darker, Frank Miller-inspired, Nolan-esque portrayal of Batman’s origin tale. The opening shot of the season – a bolt of lightning above Wayne Manor – certainly supports this idea, conjuring memories of seminal moody Miller comic book run, The Dark Knight Returns, where a violent and vengeful Batman re-embraced the cowl on a dark, stormy night....
Green Room sees Saulnier dive head-first into horror territory, yet his second feature contains much of the creative fingerprints of his debut: there’s the same grubby, faded texture to this nightmare scenario about a punk band unwittingly drawn into the middle of a tense stand-off at a club frequented by far-right skinheads. There’s also a fine thread of dry wit running through the entire movie; a quiet cynicism that seeps from the dialogue into the story itself: Green Room’s about strangers thrown into a nightmare situation, sure, but they don’t necessarily bond through their predicament or somehow become better people because of it....
Grimm Season 6 Episode 4 It was a challenge not viewing “El Cuegle” through the current political lens of human rights, boundaries and expectations. If one had the ability to leapfrog several years in advance, would more people consent to sacrificing newborns and toddlers? Most parents love their children, even those who grow up to disappoint, become sociopaths, serial killers, and politicians. Viewers remain in the dark about the meaning and consequences of the stick, the cloth, and an increasing number of symbols....
Oh the best laid plans of mice and men. How often they go awry. Well, only if you are a buffoon like Mason. As we might have guessed, the meal he planned for his piggly wigglies does not work out as intended. This week sees the return of the devastatingly lovely Du Maurier. Crawford managed to hunt her down so that they might use her as a witness against Hannibal....
2.10 Naka-Choko Now, I’m not about to argue that Will Graham and Hannibal Lecter are secretly sleeping together or anything like this. But what I do find fascinating is the different spin that the Graham/Lecter relationship is putting on this connection between male friendship and violence. In the more usual version of this phenomenon, men will be bonding—having a moment of emotional intimacy—when they both realize that they are getting dangerously (according to societal standards) close to raising some doubt about their feelings for each other and will shift gears to “correct” any misperceptions....
2.8 Su-zakana Each episode of Hannibal this season has been named after a dish in the Japanese banquet dinner Kaiseki. The meal overall is a tour of Japanese haute cuisines balancing taste, appearance, and colors to emphasize seasonal themes. Each dish is beautifully arranged and decorated with flowers and edible garnishes designed to resemble animals or plants. Su-zakana is a traditional palate cleanser before moving into a second round of larger dishes, and episode eight, Su-zakana, serves that purpose exquisitely....
The thing that makes it even more confusing is that I’m a cynical old git – I enjoy watching babies cry, for instance, and have a track record of stealing over-sized novelty lollipops and kicking puppies, especially cute ones for which I put on my special puppy stomping boots – but I sit down to watch Heroes and I just get sucked in. The thing is, I’ve actively tried to dislike the show as I’m starting to feel like some kind of cheery freak flying in the face of all this criticism....
Shall we all enroll, take notes on our laptops and figure out How To Get Away With Murder? Are we stepping inside a three-ring circus with Annalise as the ringmaster, or are there multiple tents that will compete for our attention? We have the central mystery of solving how Professor Keating’s psychology professor husband ended up inside an area rug. Annalise is undoubtedly not who and what she presents to the world....
Skating a line as thin as any triple-axel landing, I, Tonya mischievously balances itself at the odd angle between gallows humored satire and a pointed tragedy that is just as quick to indict its audience’s appetite for blood as it is to blame Harding for surrounding herself with buffoons. Both a black comedy and a lamentation over the personal and communal signals that doomed Tonya to punchline-status, even I, Tonya’s title underscores the dueling elements of its premise: here is an athlete whose self-aggrandizement would place her trials on the same footing as ancient Roman epics like I, Claudius—and yet it’s still as bitterly sad as any other opera about a swift rise and crashing fall....
Where’s Ted Hastings when you need him? A bent copper was at the heart of In The Dark’s second half, and AC-12 was nowhere in sight. If Line Of Duty’s crack-squad had been around, perhaps this thriller finale may have stood a chance of being thrilling. As it was, the twist waddled into view with all the grace of a nine-months-pregnant detective, and the denouement unravelled largely in explanatory dialogue after the event....
Hands up if you think David Collins killed his wife. Those of you with your hands still up, what made you draw that conclusion? Was it the Cape Fear-style press-ups we saw David (Lee Ingleby) doing on the floor his brother’s coastal cabin? Or the efficient manner in which he set about punching a former pal at the boatyard? Perhaps it was the serial killer vibe he gave off when he let himself into his ex-best-friend’s place and awaited his arrival in darkness....
However, evidence suggests that another game may have beaten both of those titles to the historic punch. “That was the first and only game that I ever programmed and I think it was maybe one of the first games with a backdoor in it,” said Miner. “I didn’t tell people about this, even within Atari, for at least 30 years, but I had some code in there that if you did a certain sequence of controls it would say ‘Hi Ron!...
The Next Three Days is a film which takes place prior to the titular 72 hour span. 127 Hours only lasts 93 minutes. Season Of The Witch, without spoiling anything, is also a misnomer. And into this maelstrom of benevolent false advertising comes It’s Kind Of A Funny Story. Because it’s really not. That’s not to say it is a bad story. It’s just not exactly the type of film you’d expect with that title, and Zach Galifianakis amongst the credits....
iZombie Season 2, Episode 12 iZombieis full of supporting characters doing heroic things, and tonight’s episode — “Physician, Heal Thy Self” — really highlighted that fact. In one storyline, we have Peyton, literally risking her life to bring down Boss. In another, we have Major, literally risking his life to save the zombies on Max Rager’s hitlist. And then we have Liv… trying to figure out her zombie love life. (#ItsComplicated)...
Still, by then we’d already had a ‘previously on Jason Bourne recap’, giving a brief overview of the first three films in the series. And we’d had further evidence that director Paul Greengrass – returning with Matt Damon, after the pair (wisely) skipped The Bourne Legacy – has an unmatched ability to make gazing at computer screens the most thrilling and tense thing in the world. For the umpteenth time in Greengrass-directed movies, I nearly yanked the armrests off my seat, as little graphics blipped across a monitor....
Killjoys Season 3 Episode 2 “Welcome to the revolution.” eFor the second week in a row, showrunner/writer Michelle Lovretta skillfully weaves seemingly disparate story lines into a finely crafted tale presenting the initial days of the war about to begin. Director Andy Mikita employs arresting, stark white visuals at the Livio facility to drive home the horrific reality with which Johnny must contend. And on so many levels this season, Killjoys explores not only the search for identity with which so many of the characters continue to struggle, but also that search for meaning in a world seemingly devoid of a moral compass....
