Archive

New this week

Posted 6:57pm Sunday 23rd February 2014 by Adrian Ng

Welcome to the 2014 Critic music section. I’m Adrian Ng, a songwriter and producer based in Dunedin. What qualifies me to write about music, let alone curate a section around it? Not much, really. I’ve realised that when it comes to music, the person you should pay the most attention to is yourself; Read more...

Artist Profile: Brown

Posted 6:57pm Sunday 23rd February 2014 by Adrian Ng

Brown are a four-piece alternative pop band based in Auckland and Dunedin. From confrontations with boy racers to recording an acapella covers cassette, Michael Cathro, AKA Skinny, talks to Critic’s Adrian Ng about his approach as a songwriter, his memories of Dunedin life, and also gives us an Read more...

Broken Bells - After The Disco

Posted 6:57pm Sunday 23rd February 2014 by Adrian Ng

Grade: B Broken Bells is comprised of James Mercer (The Shins) and Brian Burton (Danger Mouse), who team up again following their 2010 debut. After The Disco is an album of very well crafted songs, merging elements of new-wave and disco with Mercer’s trademark pop sensibilities. The Read more...

Warpaint - Warpaint

Posted 6:57pm Sunday 23rd February 2014 by Adrian Ng

Grade: A- From start to finish, the sophomore effort from this Los Angeles-based four piece emanates a dense atmosphere, each track transitioning beautifully to the next. Soaked in a somewhat ethereal splendor, the record is held together by a subtle, carnal groove which comes across as Read more...

Broken Age

Posted 6:57pm Sunday 23rd February 2014 by Baz Macdonald

Grade: A As consumers, we are at the mercy of what sells. When what you like is “what sells,” that’s a wonderful fact. However, when something you like is niche, then it can be the worst. However, the last couple of years have given gamers the opportunity to directly influence what they like Read more...

Fridge Pizza

Posted 6:57pm Sunday 23rd February 2014 by Sophie Edmonds

That O-Week time of the year is a week full of good flat intentions, like doing the first flat shop full of nutritious food, drafting up the cleaning roster and vowing to never screw the crew. But, as we all know, the week’s charming side effect – also known as the week-long bender – renders all of Read more...

The Wolf of Wall Street

Posted 6:57pm Sunday 23rd February 2014 by Alex Wilson

Grade: A+ In recent years, economic disparity has permeated society’s political zeitgeist, questioning whether it is ethical for such a small percentage of the population to control so much wealth and power, while so many struggle on the way side. Wolf of Wall Street gives a face to Read more...

Inside Llewyn Davis

Posted 6:57pm Sunday 23rd February 2014 by Rosie Howells

Grade: A- Inside Llewyn Davis follows our title character as he desperately attempts to make a name for himself in the Greenwich Village folk scene of 1961. Plagued with a homeless cat, an empty wallet and bad attitude, Llewyn (Oscar Isaac) fumbles through his increasingly disastrous life to Read more...

American Hustle

Posted 6:57pm Sunday 23rd February 2014 by Rosie Howells

Grade: B Goddamn, did American Hustle have a good trailer! Through a grandiose string of clips, one was treated to dancing, boozing, screaming in toilet cubicles, Jennifer Lawrence in a leotard and the phrase “only in America” punching onto the screen in sassy block letters – all in perfect Read more...

Her

Posted 6:57pm Sunday 23rd February 2014 by Baz Macdonald

Grade: A- Every romantically focused film made has tried desperately to capture the events, thoughts and emotions associated with love. But no film, in my opinion, has ever captured the essence of it quite as poignantly as Spike Jonze’s Her. The film traverses all of the ups and downs of Read more...

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks

Posted 6:57pm Sunday 23rd February 2014 by Imogen Davis

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks is a pertinent, well-constructed slice of the creative non-fiction genre. Written by Rebecca Skloot in 2010, the book takes its readers back to 1951 when a 29-year-old African American housewife and mother died from ovarian cancer. Her death led to an instance of Read more...

Hotere Culbert

Posted 6:57pm Sunday 23rd February 2014 by Hannah Collier

Ralph Hotere and Bill Culbert Exhibited until 9 March 2014 This whole exhibition could be the result of Dan Flavin meeting Ad Reinhardt in Port Chalmers for a couple of arty hours by the beach. But, in fact, the Hotere and Culbert exhibition, currently at the Dunedin Public Art Gallery, Read more...

App of the Week | Issue 26

Posted 4:26pm Sunday 6th October 2013 by Raquel Moss

In the haze of information overload that is study week, it’s easy to be overwhelmed by all the shit you’re meant to know. Sometimes, putting it into order in a way that makes sense to you can help to soothe the hysteria. Time to make your Year 9 English teacher proud and create some sweet Read more...

Behind the Meme

Posted 4:26pm Sunday 6th October 2013 by Raquel Moss

Remember your horrible high school class photograph? Or the embarrassing childhood picture that your Mum posted to her Facebook? (Thanks, Mum.) What happens when the Internet gets hold of those photos and, based on that one photograph, assigns you a personality? Do you roll with it? Exploit it? Or Read more...

2013’s Best Tracks

Posted 4:26pm Sunday 6th October 2013 by Basti Menkes

1. Sigur Rós - BrennisteinnThe opening number of the Icelanders’ gothic and gorgeous seventh LP Kveikur is a masterpiece of the juxtaposition of light and darkness. Trembling with volcanic basslines and glimmering with Jónsi’s peerless falsetto, “Brennisteinn” is the finest song both of Sigur Rós’ Read more...

2013’s Best Albums

Posted 4:26pm Sunday 6th October 2013 by Basti Menkes

2013 has seen some fantastic releases in the music world, from sonic veterans returning to the game after a long absence to new artists making waves with their impressive debuts. To celebrate another great year for music, Basti Menkes gives you his favourite albums and songs released this year. Read more...

MGMT - MGMT

Posted 4:26pm Sunday 6th October 2013 by Lisa Craw

Rating: 2/5 As someone who’s followed MGMT peripherally for a while, I had high expectations for their latest album. I expected a new slick experience, a return to the clever and commercially viable pop of their first album Oracular Spectacular. After their brief foray into self-indulgence on Read more...

Lorde - Pure Heroine

Posted 4:26pm Sunday 6th October 2013 by Basti Menkes

Rating: 4.5/5 No matter how many times I hear the Lorde story, it never fails to amaze me. In 2008, Ella Yelich-O’Connor was just another North Shore 12-year-old. After a video of her singing at a school talent show made its way to Universal Records scout Scott Maclachlan, she was Read more...

Scribblenauts Unmasked: A DC Comics Adventure

Posted 4:26pm Sunday 6th October 2013 by Baz Macdonald

Rating: 8.5/10 As a gaming advocate it is my job to point out that games can have a variety of positive effects on gamers, including the development of cognitive skills. I wholeheartedly believe that this is true, particularly for young gamers. However, it has been a long time since I Read more...

Beetroot Chocolate Cake

Posted 4:26pm Sunday 6th October 2013 by Kirsty Dunn

This cake is gorgeous. It comes out a rich cocoa-burgundy colour, has a moist but light texture, and tastes great – it’s not too sweet. If, however, you want to up the ante on the sugar count, I’d ice the top (adding a little berry jam to regular icing makes a nice change and turns it a lovely pink Read more...

The Warriors

Posted 4:26pm Sunday 6th October 2013 by Baz Macdonald

I have never understood the point of gangs. Violently defending an area of land that is not yours to begin with strikes me as rather absurd. While Walter Hill’s 1979 cult classic The Warriors doesn’t convince me of gangs’ validity, I doubt that a cooler vision of the concept has ever been created. Read more...

One Direction: This Is Us

Posted 4:26pm Sunday 6th October 2013 by Tamarah Scott

Rating: 3/5 One Direction: This Is Us explores obsession. Society seems to crave celebrities that seem attainable, or somehow normal, just like us. “The American Dream” has been twisted into an obsession with being famous. We have seen other films produced about the lives of Read more...

Rush

Posted 4:26pm Sunday 6th October 2013 by Lyle Skipsey

Rating: 4/5 Rush, starring Chris Hemsworth and Daniel Bruhl, chronicles the intense rivalry between drivers James Hunt and Niki Lauda. The film covers the early stages of the rivalry, but is mainly focused on the 1976 Formula One World Championship. Far more than just a story about sport, Read more...

The Best Offer

Posted 4:26pm Sunday 6th October 2013 by Rosie Howells

Rating: 4.5/5 This film could not be more appropriately named – it is literally The Best Offer at Rialto this week, the Rekordelig on a shelf full of Scrumpy. Geoffrey Rush stars as the wealthy, brilliant and just-a-bit-sad auctioneer Virgil Oldman, who becomes entangled in the mystery and Read more...

Beautiful Ruins - By Jess Walter

Posted 4:26pm Sunday 6th October 2013 by Feby Idrus

Beautiful Ruins opens with its hero, Pasquale, first laying eyes on the sumptuously beautiful Dee Moray, an American actress who comes to Pasquale’s tiny Italian village by boat, borne across the Mediterranean like a Botticelli Venus. You then cut to Hollywood 40 years later, to a bored studio Read more...

Let Us End With Some Porn

Posted 4:26pm Sunday 6th October 2013 by Charlotte Doyle

There is a deeply-felt anxiety, shared by many girls, about the need for a “perfect” vagina. For many, this necessitates spending 50 dollars on a braz or bikini wax (that will last less than a fortnight) in the hope of fulfilling the desires – or even expectations – of their male counterparts. Read more...

Interview: Sonja Urban (Animal Rights Activist)

Posted 2:29pm Sunday 29th September 2013 by Baz Macdonald

Sonja Urban is a German-born human and animal rights activist who became a New Zealand resident last year in order to study Environmental Organisation at Otago. Baz Macdonald spoke to her about her latest cause, Shave It or Save It, which aims to raise money for animal welfare by letting donors Read more...

Web Trick of the Week: The Wadsworth Constant

Posted 2:29pm Sunday 29th September 2013 by Raquel Moss

The Wadsworth Constant: Noun. An axiom stating that the first 30 per cent of any video can be skipped because it contains no worthwhile or interesting information. Popularised by Reddit user Wadsworth in 2011. (knowyourmeme.com) It’s true though, isn’t it? Pretty much any how-to video Read more...

Checking in on Yahoo!

Posted 2:29pm Sunday 29th September 2013 by Raquel Moss

It has been a year since overachieving, Silicon Valley poster-girl Marissa Mayer (formerly of Google) took over as CEO of Yahoo! There has been a lot of buzz about Yahoo! recently, what with Mayer’s acquisition of several start-ups, the re-vamp of Flickr, and a logo change. I decided it was time to Read more...

Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin - Fly By Wire

Posted 2:29pm Sunday 29th September 2013 by Tom McCone

Rating: 4/5 With the slow onset of the sunnier half of the year, the musically-inclined are already building up their summer playlists, soundtracking lazy drives to the beach, rooftop sunbathing sessions and afternoon backyard drinking sessions that segue into crisp starlit evenings. Read more...

Kings Of Leon - Mechanical Bull

Posted 2:29pm Sunday 29th September 2013 by Basti Menkes

Rating: 3/5 What a strange tale the Kings Of Leon story has been. Though ever-adored by the British music press, it wasn’t until album number three, their magnum opus Because Of The Times, that they broke into the mainstream consciousness. Even after several monster hits and two more albums – Read more...

Kingdom Hearts - 1.5 Remix

Posted 2:29pm Sunday 29th September 2013 by Baz Macdonald

Rating: 6/10 The jump from standard definition (SD) to high definition (HD) has created a chasm between gaming generations. It has created a culture in which SD games belong to a past age while HD games belong solidly to the future. But it is also about more than how we perceive Read more...

Fried Rice

Posted 2:29pm Sunday 29th September 2013 by Kirsty Dunn

Good old fried rice. Whilst it’s a simple takeaway staple, it can be surprisingly hard to adequately replicate at home. Therefore, I now impart to you my own tried and true recipe, inspired by my Mama’s version. It’s another great way to use up bits and pieces in the fridge and freezer – I often use Read more...

Spirited Away

Posted 2:29pm Sunday 29th September 2013 by Tamarah Scott

After receiving the devastating news that the king of animation, Hayao Miyazaki, may possibly be retiring from film making, I thought it would only be right to review Spirited Away (2001). Miyazaki co-founded Studio Ghibli, which has never made a disappointing film. Miyazaki enjoys a huge Read more...

What Maisie Knew

Posted 2:29pm Sunday 29th September 2013 by Rosie Howells

Rating: 3.5/5 I fully understand that divorces are never fun, carefree events that come with smiles and free popsicles, but I could not have predicted the messiness, nastiness and general glumness depicted in What Maisie Knew. The film follows the bitter separation of ageing rockstar Susanah Read more...

Riddick

Posted 2:29pm Sunday 29th September 2013 by Baz Macdonald

Rating: 3/5 It’s hard to believe, but despite his brawny machismo and horrific repertoire of films, Vin Diesel is a gigantic nerd. It is Vin’s inner geek that has driven him to champion the Riddick franchise, in which he plays the central figure, Richard B. Riddick. At the start of the Read more...

Stoker

Posted 2:29pm Sunday 29th September 2013 by Tamarah Scott

Rating: 4/5 Chan-Wook Park’s Korean films are beautifully pieced together masterpieces with brutally twisted elements. Stoker (2013) is his first attempt at an English-directed film. Do not judge Stoker through the strict lens of realism; rather, treat it as a cinematographic journey into Read more...

The Third Policeman by Flann O’Brian

Posted 2:29pm Sunday 29th September 2013 by Lucy Hunter

The opening sentence of this book describes a brutal murder. An old man is first knocked down with a bicycle pump and then beaten to death with a spade. The one-legged, unnamed narrator, however, doesn’t want to explain his crime right away; more important to him is his friendship with John Divney, Read more...

The Deconstruction of a Gallery Opening’s Mystique

Posted 2:29pm Sunday 29th September 2013 by Charlotte Doyle

The Dunedin art “scene” is often considered to be “underground.” Seen as the realm of the city’s “alty” citizens, there is a widespread public perception that few students would go out of their way for an artistic experience. However, for the entirety of last week Dunedin art pervaded the Read more...

Interview: Isaac McFarlane (Two Cartoons)

Posted 1:47pm Sunday 22nd September 2013 by Loulou Callister-Baker

The lead singer and guitarist of Dunedin band Two Cartoons, Isaac McFarlane is preparing to head off to London for a record label-sponsored soujourn. Loulou Callister-Baker caught up with Isaac after his final Dunedin show to ask about the big move and how he got into music. Let’s start from Read more...

App of the Week | Issue 24

Posted 1:47pm Sunday 22nd September 2013 by Raquel Moss

With semester two’s end now in sight, some of you might be thinking about your entrance into the working world. It’s going to be a little tough. Someone is going to expect you to be reasonably dressed and coherent by 9am, and to labour for eight hours toward vague and mystifying goals. You may have Read more...

Turning the Self Into a Statistic

Posted 1:47pm Sunday 22nd September 2013 by Raquel Moss

“I was surprised to find myself so much fuller of faults than I had imagined, but I had the satisfaction of seeing them diminish.” – Benjamin Franklin Benjamin Franklin, noted Renaissance Man of the American Enlightenment, was a well-known advocate of self-improvement. He famously kept Read more...

The Weeknd - Kiss Land

Posted 1:47pm Sunday 22nd September 2013 by Basti Menkes

Rating: 2/5 An arsehole. A genius. Troubled. The second coming of Michael Jackson. Abel Tesfaye, known better by his stage name The Weeknd, has been called many things during his young career. After dropping his first mix-tape House of Balloons in early 2011, claims that the Canadian would Read more...

Forest Swords - Engravings

Posted 1:47pm Sunday 22nd September 2013 by Basti Menkes

Rating: 4/5 In the infancy of the twenty-first century, electronic music is really establishing itself as an unorthodox medium of expression. As the grind and excess of EDM declines in popularity, so grows acclaim for more reserved styles of electronic music. Among these new, more calculated Read more...

Grand Theft Auto V

Posted 1:47pm Sunday 22nd September 2013 by Baz Macdonald

Rating: 10/10 I subscribe to the idea that art should be entirely inclusive. True art should never alienate or exclude people, but rather should create ways in which cater to everyone. For some, this may entail being able to analyse every moment in relation to its thematic significance; for Read more...

White House Down

Posted 1:47pm Sunday 22nd September 2013 by Rosie Howells

Rating: 3/5 In my opinion, White House Down belongs to the same family as titles such as Snakes on a Plane, Tropic Thunder and Iron Sky – it’s a big, silly action film that understands that it’s a big, silly action film. John Kale (Channing Tatum, in his second film playing an army Read more...

Blue Jasmine

Posted 1:47pm Sunday 22nd September 2013 by Basti Menkes

Rating: 4/5 Forty-eight years since Woody Allen’s film debut What’s New Pussycat? and the reedy-voiced director is still bloody going. His latest film, Blue Jasmine, was promised by early reviews to be one of the best of his career. Though I doubt I’ve seen even half of his work, Blue Jasmine Read more...

Paranoia

Posted 1:47pm Sunday 22nd September 2013 by Tamarah Scott

Rating: 1.5/5 I wish I could provide an understandable synopsis of Paranoia, but I still have no idea what it is about. I think it is about Adam Cassidy (Liam Hemsworth), an intern at a large corporation that sells and distributes SmartPhones. Cassidy somehow gets his whole team fired Read more...

Salinger

Posted 1:47pm Sunday 22nd September 2013 by Baz Macdonald

Rating: 3/5 J. D. Salinger is perhaps one of the most enigmatic figures of the twentieth century. The author of one of the period’s most infamous novels, The Catcher in the Rye, Salinger exploded onto the literary and pop culture scene of the 1950s and 60s. Then, as fast as he had appeared, Read more...

Fruit Bread

Posted 1:47pm Sunday 22nd September 2013 by Kirsty Dunn

This recipe is really an anything-goes kinda deal; it’s a great way to make use of those icky brown bananas you’ve been avoiding, the ripening apples sitting alone in the fruit bowl, the dregs of forgotten dried fruit mixes in the pantry, and those various other bits and pieces you’ve got crammed at Read more...