As the feature debut of writer-director Adrian Apanel, Horror Story pulls off a nice little magic trick. When fresh-faced finance graduate Tomek (Jakub Zajac), rents a room in a crumbling boarding house that’s straight out of the horror cinema interior decorating textbook, we expect things to go full-blown supernatural (or […]
Black Comedy
Dreamland (2019) Canadians can be rather quirky people (Review)
Cold Pursuit: A film that’s hard to warm to (Review)
Donbass: Episodes of lunacy in Eastern Ukraine (Review)
Under the Tree (2017) Icelandic Black Comedy fails to live up to its early promise (Review)
Released in cinemas by Eureka Pictures, Hafsteinn Gunnar Sigurđsson’s Icelandic black comedy Under the Tree begins with an inspired contemporary take on an old joke. Atli, played by Steinthór Hróar Steinthórsson, is watching a sex tape of himself with his ex-girlfriend when his wife walks in. Panicked, he closes the […]
Men & Chicken (2016) Alienating and repugnant but ever so funny with it (Review)
Scandinavian comedies are perhaps some of the strangest films you’ll ever see, but also magnetic in their charm and quick wit. Whether that would be Stellan Skarsgård as a snow-plough driver going on a killing spree, or a 100-year-old explosive expert escaping from a retirement home for his own adventures […]
Cinema Eclectica 71 – Werner Herzog: King of the Internet
This week it’s official, Werner Herzog is the king of the internet. In Off The Shelf we look at Michael Mann’s “Thief”, 1976 horror “The Premonition”, Peter Watkins’ docu-drama “Edvard Munch” and Cristi Puiu’s debut “Stuff and Dough”. Our feature film is Shane Black’s comedy thriller “The Nice Guys”. “You […]
Escape from the Liberty Cinema (1990) intoxicatingly rebellious riff on the Purple Rose of Cairo (Review)
Second Run are one of the more remarkable labels operating in the UK, focusing on forgotten and obscure Eastern European films during the past decade. There is one concurrent theme common in many of the titles they pluck from obscurity, their political awareness. The by-product of this is a dual-pronged […]
Kumiko, The Treasure Hunter (2015) Sobering portrait of Japanese loneliness (Review)
Greatful Dead (2013): Twisted Amelie turned Gallows Battle Royale (Review)
Emotional neglect is a significant problem in Asia, proven how suicide has inflated to epidemic levels on more than one occasion. With cinema reflecting the world we live it, emotional neglect, isolation and despair have gone on to become prevalent subtexts and thematic discourse within much of Asian cinema. So […]