Birth of the Living Dead is a documentary detailing the production of the George A. Romero’s 1968 film Night of the Living Dead which is widely regarded as inventing the modern zombie genre as discussed in the film; directed by Rob Kuhns.
Support Indie Film – Dealt (Documentary – 2015)
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Dealt
Dealt is documentary about the life & works of Blind magician Richard Turner; ‘One of the world’s greatest card magicians…’
“Richard Turner’s colorful, often bizarre and always entertaining life is one a filmmaker could only dream to script, but this is not a story of fiction. Tracing all the way back to Richard’s childhood as he struggled with losing his vision, to his discovery of magic and being mentored by Dai Vernon – known as “the only man to fool Houdini” – this film will explore Richard’s seemingly impossible journey of overcoming obstacles and the relentless dedication it took to achieve his dream.“
Documentaries or Shockumentaries? 5 of the best.
The trend in popular documentary film-making of recent years has been the ‘shock and awe’ approach. These are almost (anti)propaganda films in their use of music, graphics and shocking images and boldly covering a wide range of provocative subjects.
It is now also an acceptable and widely used device to include the film-makers difficulties during production in the film itself. Popularised by Michael Moore & Nick Broomfield this technique even forms the basis of MTV’s ‘Catfish: The TV Show‘.
The Corporation (2003)
-A classic of the genre this film describes the concept of a corporation as a person in a way that all can understand and uses a series of well documented examples, interviews (including Moore & Noam Chomsky), excellent polished production and graphics.
Directed by Mark Achbar & Jennifer Abbott. Continue reading
Doctor Who – 51 Years On
Written by Lewis Mainwaring
First broadcast on 23rd of November 1963 at 17:16 (on BBC One) with William Hartnell taking the role as the mysterious Doctor Who – fast forward 51 years and you have 812 episodes, 13 actors who have taken on the iconic role (Hartnell included), a whole host of ‘companions’ helping along the way and is ultimately the world’s longest-running sci-fi show with the worlds most loyal fan base (which bridges generations). Continue reading
The Hunger Games: Mockingjay, Part 1 – Midnight showing Review
Written by Lewis Mainwaring & Benjamin Gummery
Spoiler Free
Mockingjay, Part 1 is the follow up to the 2013 The Hunger Games: Catching Fire and is based on the Suzanne Collins‘ novel, Mockingjay, the third and final instalment in The Hunger Games trilogy.
Directed by Francis Lawrence (who also directed Catching Fire) the film stars Jennifer Lawrence as the captivating Katniss Everdeen, Josh Hutcherson as Peeta Mellark and Liam Hemsworth as Gale Hawthorne. The film also sees the return of Donald Sutherland as President Coriolanus Snow – The tyrannical President of Panem who reigns with a ‘cold fist’ (insert laugh here), Philip Seymour Hoffman as Plutarch Heavensbee and introduces Julianne Moore to the franchise as President Alma Coin.
This film follows on directly from the previous film with Katniss waking up to the realisation that District 12 no longer exists and that she is now at the heart of the new rebellions base located in the ruins
of District 13. Continue reading
Review: The Lookalike (2014)
From director Richard Grey and writer Michele Davis-Gray, The Lookalike is a gritty noir thriller starring Justin Long (also a Producer on the film), Gillian Jacobs, John Corbett & Steven Bauer.
This plays like any other drug deal gone bad, mixed-morals thriller. I did however find the plot baffling and hard to follow at times. The screenplay seems to assume you will figure out the back story as you go along as there are no real exposition scenes at the start of the film. It uses that old device of introducing us gradually to the characters intertwining tales; but this has been done better by others many times before.
Justin Long plays
Holt, the socially-conscious flatmate of drug dealer Joe who sparks up a romance with junkie Lacey (Gillian Jacobs); but as the story develops we see there is more to this interaction than meets the eye. Long turns in his usual quirky performance. Continue reading
Blu-Ray Review: Withnail & I (Limited Edition)
Arrow Films is releasing a new limited edition Blu-Ray set of the British cult comedy 
classic Withnail & I (1987) from Writer/Director Bruce Robinson and starring Richard E. Grant , Paul McGann & Richard Griffiths. This exclusive limited edition set will come packaged as a hardback book and includes new writing on the films, reprints of key press articles, deleted scenes and more over 200 pages and features original production stills.
Continue reading
Blu-ray Review: X-Men: Days of Future Past – Empire Magazine Edition
Written by Lewis Mainwaring
After seeing this film on opening night way back in May, I had this on pre-order straight away. 
Available exclusively on Amazon.co.uk this limited edition Blu-ray comes packaged as a hardback book and features the exclusive promotional tie-in covers from Empire Magazine.
Cardiff Film & Comic Con – Sunday 9th Nov ’14
Event Reporters – Ben Gummery & Lewis Mainwaring
This was our first ‘con’ as ‘Official Press’ thanks to Showmasters !!!! This was our third overall convention (having attended CFCC ’13 & LFCC Summer ’14). Held at the Cardiff Motorpoint Arena for the third time in a row.
Guests that attended today’s event included:- Harry Melling (Harry Potter Film Franchise), Catrin Stewart (Doctor Who – Revived series), Finn Jones (Game of Thrones), Jeremy Bulloch (Star Wars Film Franchise) & Sylvester McCoy (Doctor Who – Classic series & The Hobbit Trilogy).
Continue reading
Horror ‘B’ Movies – Bats (1999)
In the run up to Halloween this year; I’m looking at some horror ‘B’ movies that are watched mostly for the sheer comic value of the laughable story, production & performances. Horror is a genre which continues to deliver this type of film in spades.
These films have picked up a cult following over the years however.
Bats (1999)
IMDb 3.6/10 – Rotten Tomatoes 17% – Budget £6.5 Million / Opening $4.7 Million
The eponymous ‘batastrophe‘ from director Louis Morneau is a comedy of errors right from the start; but not intentionally so. It also deserves some kind of award for the number of times the characters say the name of the film. The ludicrous plot borrows heavily from many stereotypes of the small town horror/disaster genre and the result is only worth watching for the comic value. It did manage to spawn a TV movie sequel ‘Bats: Human Harvest (2007)‘ for the SyFy channel. The bats here are a poor patchwork of CGI, animatronics and real bats. Continue reading
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