Archive

Otherness

Posted 3:48pm Sunday 1st September 2013 by Kajsa Louw

Otherness is an anthology of science fiction short stories that is likely to leave its readers impressed by its boldness and originality. The book comprises a collection of 13 stories and is the winner of the LOCUS award for Best Collection of 1995. Notable contributions include “Warm Bodies” and Read more...

Gaga and the Art of Empty Pretention

Posted 3:48pm Sunday 1st September 2013 by Charlotte Doyle

Lady Gaga’s recent nudist escapades are currently the cause of a social media frenzy many of you will have witnessed in some form or another. In the video The Abramovic Method practiced by Lady Gaga, she exposes her body for a supposedly artistic cause: rising to Marina Abromovic’s extended Read more...

Elysium

Posted 3:48pm Sunday 1st September 2013 by Baz Macdonald

Rating: 4.5/5 Neill Blomkamp is still making science fiction film as it should be. His 2009 film District 9 proved that he could provide highly intelligent yet action-packed and highly accessible science fiction to mainstream cinema, and with his latest film Elysium he is once again pushing Read more...

Before Midnight

Posted 3:48pm Sunday 1st September 2013 by Rosie Howells

Rating: 4/5 Before Midnight is the third (and presumably final) instalment of Richard Linklater’s romantic series following the love of fiery French humanitarian Celine (Julia Delpy) and American writer Jesse (Ethan Hawke). The first in the series is the 18-year-old Before Sunrise, in which Read more...

Critic’s Film Festival Awards 2013

Posted 3:48pm Sunday 1st September 2013 by Rosie Howells

This year’s International Film Festival was the biggest Dunedin has ever seen, presenting the greatest selection of movies our branch of the Festival has ever been privy to. Based on critical response, whispers on the street and my own personal opinion, here are Critic’s official Festival awards: Read more...

Only Lovers Left Alive

Posted 3:48pm Sunday 1st September 2013 by Jonny Mahon-Heap

Rating: 3/5 Only Lovers Left Alive is a slim and idiosyncratic film that has received more of a mixed bag of reviews than the Film Festival itself. A darkly funny take on the tired vampire genre, it documents the centuries-old romance between vampires Adam (Tom Hiddleston) and Eve (Tilda Read more...

Child’s Pose

Posted 3:48pm Sunday 1st September 2013 by Tamarah Scott

Rating: 4.5/5 The most memorable films are those that emotionally sap you dry; those that force you to become immersed in their worlds because the subject matter, images and storylines are so powerful you cannot escape till you actually leave the cinema. Child’s Pose puts you through so much Read more...

The Bling Ring

Posted 3:48pm Sunday 1st September 2013 by Baz Macdonald

Rating: 3/5 Sometimes real life events feel like they happened purely in order to be made into movies. The Hollywood Hills burglaries of 2009 were one of those events. A bunch of teenagers robbing the houses of celebrities is clearly the premise for a great film, and the stage was well set Read more...

Pervert’s Guide to Ideology

Posted 3:48pm Sunday 1st September 2013 by Alex Wilson

Rating: 4/5 It’s hard to think of a film at this year’s Festival that is so perfectly equal parts educational and offbeat as this small Irish production about a Slovenian philosopher deconstructing some of the most influential films of the past 50 years. Slavoj Žižek is our phlegmatic guide Read more...

Mood Indigo

Posted 3:48pm Sunday 1st September 2013 by Rosie Howells

Rating: 4/5 Let me start by saying that I haven’t enjoyed a film this much in a really long time, which is high praise indeed considering it was my fourth Film Festival movie in a week. Whimsical, surreal and heart-breaking, it was everything you’d expect from Michel Gondry, the director Read more...

Interview: Richard Ley-Hamilton

Posted 4:47pm Sunday 18th August 2013 by Loulou Callister-Baker

At the age of 22, Richard Ley-Hamilton has already created a name for himself as a prominent Dunedin musician, performing and making music for an array of interesting bands. Richard also works part-time at a record store, and by the end of November he will have finished his honours dissertation in Read more...

Loved up and ‘Appy

Posted 4:47pm Sunday 18th August 2013 by Raquel Moss

Don’t you hate it when your significant other plays relationship games with you? Like the ever-popular “figure out why I’m angry, or else” move, or the infuriating “do you think that guy’s hotter than me?” test. Answer correctly, or risk the silent treatment. Forget all that, now there’s an Read more...

Earthbound (1994)

Posted 4:47pm Sunday 18th August 2013 by Baz Macdonald

For our generation, gaming nostalgia is largely related to the console you had as a child. Did you have a Sega or a Nintendo 64? A PlayStation or an Xbox? The answer to this question will likely dictate whether you are a Mario fan, or a Crash Bandicoot fan, or – God forbid – a Sonic fan. Due to the Read more...

Plants vs. Zombies 2 - It’s About Time

Posted 4:47pm Sunday 18th August 2013 by Baz Macdonald

Rating: 8/10 Popcap’s 2009 game Plants vs. Zombies is arguably the greatest casual game of all time. The fact that the game is easy to get into for brief snippets, but also offers increasingly difficult challenges that could have you playing for hours, makes it accessible and loved by Read more...

Asian Dub Foundation - The Signal And The Noise

Posted 4:47pm Sunday 18th August 2013 by Basti Menkes

Rating: 3.5/5 “They’re like a British Rage Against The Machine. They work punk guitars and politically-charged lyrics into dub, reggae, world music and rap. This rainbow-coloured music collective both condemns racial violence and breaks down the walls between ethnic terminology. Shit is Read more...

Moderat - II

Posted 4:47pm Sunday 18th August 2013 by Basti Menkes

Rating: 4/5 Moderat is a portmanteau, both in name and personnel, of Berlin-based electronic acts Modeselektor and Apparat. As its title suggests, II is the supergroup’s second album together, following its eponymous 2009 debut. Like its predecessor, II sees the two outfits marrying their Read more...

Mull It

Posted 4:47pm Sunday 18th August 2013 by Kirsty Dunn

Even though spring is almost upon us, I figure Dunedin still has a few chilly nights up its sleeve during which a bit of mulled action will go down a treat. If you haven’t had a go at making your own (or worse yet, if you’ve never even sampled the stuff – tsk tsk), now’s the time; have a farewell Read more...

Free Will

Posted 4:47pm Sunday 18th August 2013 by Lucy Hunter

Sam Harris explains, in 83 pages, the illogic of free will. Our society functions on the assumption that we all have it: without free will, any claim to justice, morality, personal accomplishment, intimate relationships (and virtually anything else we care about deeply) seems ridiculous. Free will Read more...

Ukiyo-e, The Floating World

Posted 4:47pm Sunday 18th August 2013 by Charlotte Doyle

The woodblock print The Great Wave off Kanagawa by Katsushika Hokusai (1760-1849), which features rolling, white-tipped waves, has become a legendary emblem of Japanese art. Having been heavily appropriated by artists such as Manet, Gaugin and Van Gogh, the influence of the distinctive woodblock Read more...

Now You See Me

Posted 4:47pm Sunday 18th August 2013 by Tamarah Scott

Rating: 2/5 When you watch the trailer for Now You See Me, you get the distinct impression that the film might actually have some merit. The trailer features Morgan Freeman’s melodic voice promising a cryptically intriguing film about illusionists. The film itself, however, could not have Read more...

Only God Forgives

Posted 4:47pm Sunday 18th August 2013 by Baz Macdonald

Rating: 2/5 The crime thriller genre is rarely graced with the artistic flair that Nicholas Winding Refn brings to his films, but his previous works Drive and Bronson are proof that it can be done well. His latest film Only God Forgives, however, is an example of it being done very poorly. Read more...

The House of Radio

Posted 4:47pm Sunday 18th August 2013 by Rosie Howells

The Regent Theatre - Octagon Saturday 24 August 1pm Rating: 3/5 The House of Radio is the newest delight from French documentarian Nicholas Philibert. Philibert spent half a year filming the inhabitants of France’s public radio station, allowing the viewer to gain a better insight Read more...

Which Way is the Front Line From Here?

Posted 4:47pm Sunday 18th August 2013 by Rosie Howells

Rialto Cinema - Moray Place Monday 19 August 4:45pm, 8:30pm Tuesday 20 August 8:30pm Rating: 3.5/5 Which Way is the Front Line From Here? is a documentary that explores the life and work of world renowned war photographer Tim Hetherington. Through Hetherington’s footage, Read more...

The Weight of Elephants

Posted 4:47pm Sunday 18th August 2013 by Rosie Howells

Rialto Cinema - Moray Place Monday 19 August 12pm Rating: 3.5/5 The Weight of Elephants is a dramatic film set in rural Invercargill, directed by New Zealand born and raised but Denmark-based Daniel Joseph Borgman. The story follows 11-year-old Adrian (Demos Murphy), a sensitive and Read more...

The East

Posted 4:47pm Sunday 18th August 2013 by Jonny Mahon-Heap

Rating: 4/5 A rare environmental-political thriller, The East represents one of the bigger-budgeted and more purely enjoyable options from the 2013 film festival. It’s a curious combination of The Departed meets Martha Marcy May Marlene, and combines the best talent from American indie cinema Read more...

Us and the Game Industry

Posted 4:47pm Sunday 18th August 2013 by Baz Macdonald

Rialto Cinema - Moray Place Friday 23 August 6:30pm Rating: 2/5 The video game industry is currently nearing the end of a transitory period. The transition isn’t happening within the industry, but rather in how people outside of the industry perceive it. It is a transition toward an Read more...

Pussy Riot: A Punk Rock Prayer

Posted 4:47pm Sunday 18th August 2013 by Josef Alton

Rating: 3/5 It’s a story that has begged to be told outside of the news media. Maxim Pozdorovkin and Mike Lerner’s Pussy Riot: A Punk Prayer is an intriguing documentary that tells the story of how and why three young activists were arrested and prosecuted for publicly opposing the Russian Read more...

Interview: Gabriela Cowperthwaite

Posted 2:29pm Sunday 11th August 2013 by Aaron Hawkins

The film Blackfish: is it about orcas in captivity, or is it about the SeaWorld empire and their treatment of orcas in captivity, or is the overlap of those two so strong that it’s one and the same thing? Yeah, you know, I told a story. I came in as a mother who took her kids to SeaWorld and Read more...

Interview: Anthony Powell

Posted 2:29pm Sunday 11th August 2013 by Baz Macdonald

Through your film you explore many aspects of Antarctica, but did you have one encompassing goal or message you wanted to communicate? Yeah I guess my initial drive was just trying to articulate the experience, and I guess I had the “a picture tells a thousand words” cliché in my head. I just Read more...

App of the Week | Issue 19

Posted 2:29pm Sunday 11th August 2013 by Raquel Moss

Pixlr is a great web app for quick but thorough image editing. It’s better than Microsoft Paint; it’s not as good as Photoshop. This is not one for graphic designers, and if you use it, your graphic designer friends will cringe. But it does the trick. Open up the web app and you can choose Read more...

Freemium and Subscription Models Making Life Harder for Pirates

Posted 2:29pm Sunday 11th August 2013 by Raquel Moss

Just as with music there is a trend in the gaming industry to offer subscription models to gamers, which has had an impact on gaming piracy. Game purveyors are offering perks for players who opt in to paid subscriptions, such as free games and online multiplayer, while punishing pirates by Read more...

Fuck Buttons - Slow Focus

Posted 2:29pm Sunday 11th August 2013 by Basti Menkes

Rating: 3.5/5 English two-piece Fuck Buttons have spent the last decade crafting their own assaultive brand of electronica. Drawing influence from Aphex Twin and Mogwai, they snub gloss and perfectionism in favour of songs that are loud, coarse and engulfing. Though performed on an impressive Read more...

Zahava Seewald & Michaël Grébil - From My Mother’s House

Posted 2:29pm Sunday 11th August 2013 by Basti Menkes

Rating: 4.5/5 I have had a lifelong fascination with echolocation, the act of mapping an area through the use of sound. The most obvious example is sonar – the technique bats and whales use to gauge their surroundings. Echolocation is also popular among musicians, and is used by artists to Read more...

Cheat’s Tiramisu

Posted 2:29pm Sunday 11th August 2013 by Kirsty Dunn

Tiramisu is Italian for “pick me up” – and after one mere spoonful of this delectable dessert it’s no wonder the creators dubbed it so. Tiramisu contains four of the most awesome ingredients known to humankind: coffee, chocolate, cheese, and alcohol. Boom! (Which, coincidentally, is the cry your Read more...

Pikmin 3 - Wii U

Posted 2:29pm Sunday 11th August 2013 by Baz Macdonald

Rating: 7.5/10 Clearly a new definition is needed for the term “launch window.” At the moment it’s like the phrase, “I’ll be back in a moment” – it has lost any real meaning in terms of the timeframe being dealt with. We were told that Pikmin 3 (and several other Wii U games) would be Read more...

The House of the Dead

Posted 2:29pm Sunday 11th August 2013 by Lucy Hunter

Dostoyevsky’s The House of the Dead, published in 1861, explores life and death in the confines of a 19th-century Siberian prison. The book is based on the journal Dostoyevsky wrote while in prison for crimes of political and religious dissent – namely, for his involvement in the Petrashevsky Read more...

Jay Z: The Modern-Day Picasso

Posted 2:29pm Sunday 11th August 2013 by Charlotte Doyle

For six straight hours one Wednesday afternoon, Shaun “Jay Z” Carter performed the track “Picasso Baby” from his latest album Magna Carta Holy Grail in a New York art gallery. Although the ulterior motive was to shoot a music video for the song, the entire project completely transcends this idea. Read more...

Private Peaceful

Posted 2:29pm Sunday 11th August 2013 by Ashley Anderson

Rating: 2.5/5 The tag line of this movie beautifully and succinctly describes the tumultuous relationship between Tommo (George Mackay) and Charlie (Jack O’Connell) Peaceful, two brothers living in a sleepy English town during World War I. Private Peaceful, an adaption of Michael Morpurgo’s Read more...

Farewell, My Queen

Posted 2:29pm Sunday 11th August 2013 by Jonny Mahon-Heap

Rating: 4/5 1789. The people are rebelling. Versailles is about to fall. Marie Antoinette, wilfully blind to the chaos around her, spends her days perusing the 18th-century equivalents of Vogue and chasing her chambermaids. Proving there is life in the period drama still, Farewell, My Queen Read more...

This Ain’t No Mouse Music

Posted 2:29pm Sunday 11th August 2013 by Tim Lindsay

This Ain’t No Mouse Music is a documentary film that chronicles the career of legendary American song producer Chris Strachwitz. It takes the viewer on an auditory journey through the heartland of traditional American music and showcases some mighty fine artists and their songs along the way. Read more...

Blackfish

Posted 2:29pm Sunday 11th August 2013 by Alex Wilson

Rating: 3.5/5 The American summer draws to an end, and no doubt millions of Americans have now attended “Shamu Stadium,” SeaWorld, to see Orca whales wave their dorsal fins limply, jump through hoops and engage in bizarre aquatic acrobats with their perpetually smiling trainers. However, what Read more...

The Rocket

Posted 2:29pm Sunday 11th August 2013 by Tamarah Scott

Rating: 4/5 Viewers often engage with films in an effort to derive pleasure from an existential experience. The Rocket truly gives the viewer a chance to walk in someone else’s shoes by transporting them directly into young Alo’s (Sitthiphon Disamoe) life and culture in rural Laos. The film Read more...

Antarctica: A Year on Ice

Posted 2:29pm Sunday 11th August 2013 by Baz Macdonald

Rating: 4/5 When the Dunedin International Film Festival schedule was released this year I was excited to see what would be kicking off the festival. Every year the opening film is something unique and spectacular, such as last year’s Moonrise Kingdom (directed by Wes Anderson). I was a Read more...

Much Ado About Nothing

Posted 2:29pm Sunday 11th August 2013 by Lyle Skipsey

The Regent Theatre - Octagon Thursday 22 August 8.30pm Friday 23 August 11am The Guardian has called it “the first great contemporary Shakespeare since Baz Luhrmann’s Romeo + Juliet.” Now Joss Whedon’s take on the Bard’s Much Ado About Nothing is coming to the New Zealand Film Festival. Read more...

The Deadly Ponies Gang

Posted 2:29pm Sunday 11th August 2013 by Amber Pullin

Rialto Cinema - Moray Place Friday 23 August 12.30pm Sunday 25 August 2.15pm This documentary follows very-best mates Clint and Dwayne: the sole two members of the Deadly Ponies Gang. The Deadly Ponies are not exactly a conventional gang. No cars, no motorbikes: these two fellas go Read more...

Interview: E. L. Katz (Director of Cheap Thrills)

Posted 3:50pm Sunday 4th August 2013 by Aaron Hawkins

Rialto Cinema - Moray Place Saturday August 10 8:30pm The Regent Theatre - Octagon Sunday August 11 - 8:45pm Director Evan L. Katz’s latest film, Cheap Thrills, is a devilish morality tale in which a wealthy couple (David Koechner and Sara Paxton) test how far a poor couple (Ethan Read more...

App of the Week | Issue 18

Posted 3:50pm Sunday 4th August 2013 by Raquel Moss

Weebly is a drag-and-drop, no-coding-required platform for creating websites that actually look good. If you need to create a quick website to advertise your tutoring skills, or your Mum’s clothing-swap event, Weebly is the way to go. Think of it as the 2013 equivalent of GeoCities, with nicer Read more...

I Just Want to Watch Game of Thrones, Damnit

Posted 3:50pm Sunday 4th August 2013 by Raquel Moss

Television networks have pulled their socks up over the past few years. The proliferation of piracy online means it is no longer acceptable to air international TV shows in New Zealand months, or even years, after their inception. Not that it was ever acceptable, really – we just didn’t have much Read more...

Bliss N Eso - Circus in the Sky

Posted 3:50pm Sunday 4th August 2013 by Basti Menkes

Rating: 2/5 When their new album Circus in the Sky materialised in the Critic office, I hadn’t the faintest idea who Bliss N Eso were. However, I fell hook, line and sinker for the ludicrously shiny packaging the CD came in, making me just curious enough to find out. For a long time I Read more...

μ-Ziq - Chewed Corners

Posted 3:50pm Sunday 4th August 2013 by Basti Menkes

Rating: 3.5/5 Michael Paradinas, most commonly known as μ-Ziq (pronounced “music”), is an English electronic musician. Though an influential figure in IDM (Intelligent Dance Music) over the last 20 years, he has never received quite the attention or acclaim of his contemporaries, such as Read more...