The American historian Richard Hofstadter wrote The Paranoid Style in American Politics, but if you want some truly paranoid style – one which gives equal weight to the paranoia and the stylishness – you have to go to Italy. Late twentieth century Italy, in particular, saw a strange collision of […]
Reviews
Potwash (2026, Short) An Intriguing and Enveloping Tale of Work, Music, and Escapism
Potwash, the latest film by East Anglian based filmmaker Josh Trett, is a portrait of initially familiar tropes, that receive an intriguing treatment. The titular Potwash, Isaac (Kyle Malan), is a shy pub kitchen worker. His employment and work colleagues occupy most of his time, and the film embraces this […]
Blood of Revenge (1965) A Yakuza Tale Characterised by Beautiful Compositions
It’s a privilege to be sitting down today to write about Blood of Revenge, Radiance Films sixth release from overlooked genre master Tai Kato. 2025 was a year of disruption for me, a seemingly never-ending time of upheaval that left no energy to write about films. Luckily for me, as […]
Tim Travers and the Time Travelers Paradox (2024) The Grandfather Paradox Gets a Splatter-Comedy Makeover
‘Wibbly wobbley, timey whimy’, as a famous Doctor once said, quite accurately sums up the vastly complicated intricacies of time travel. While many of us would enjoy the supposed benefits of jumping through history, seeing the dinosaurs, meeting our favourite historical figure, tasting that sweet, sweet Dodo meat – the […]
The Strange Dark (2024) A Cosy Thriller Where The Twilight Zone Invades a Hallmark Movie
Whether in the age of Star Wars, The Avengers or something smaller, Sci-fi has always been overshadowed by spectacle, which is an odd state of play for a genre fundamentally concerned with ideas. Even if the likes of Star Trek reign supreme on small screens, yet even as spectacle dominates, […]
Hamnet (2025): A Quietly Devastating Portrait of Grief
On August 11, 1596, a small coffin was laid to rest in Holy Trinity Church in Stratford-Upon-Avon. Famine and bubonic plague were sweeping through Warwickshire and though the cause of death was not listed on the burial register, it has been widely theorised that the eleven-year-old Hamnet was one of […]
28 Years Later: The Bone Temple (2026) A Sequel That Gains Focus and A Whole Lot More Darkness
By arriving just six months after the previous instalment, The Bone Temple might have unknowingly set itself up for a fall. Those who weren’t particularly keen on 28 Years Later, and particularly its bizarre cliffhanger, might not like a follow-up that dives headfirst into the cult that were responsible for […]
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Trilogy (1990-1993) Putting the 90’s original to the Ultimate Test
In 1984 Kevin Eastman and Peter Laird released a little known black and white comic on their very own Mirage label, following the adventures of four teenaged mutant ninja turtles and their surrogate father, a Rat named Splinter, only 3000 copies were produced of that initial run, hoping to cover […]
István Szabó: Mephisto/Colonel Redl/Hanussen (1981-1988) Faustian Pacts & A Landmark Trilogy on Complicity
Released to Blu-ray by Second Run this week is a boxset of films from acclaimed Hungarian director István Szabó. Made between 1981 and 1988, these three films (Szabó himself is loathe to term them as a trilogy, though they have thematic- to say nothing of geographic and historical – similarities) […]
City on Fire (1987) How Ringo Lam Defined Hong Kong’s “Heroic Bloodshed” Genre
In the early 80s there was a new breed of action film starting to plant roots. A genre that kept a lot of the righteous chivalry of old but now it was no longer the pursuit of mastery in the martial world, it was the gun that ruled supreme. Stories […]