Archive

The Secret Place

Posted 2:16pm Sunday 26th April 2015 by Bridget Vosburgh

The Secret Place, by Tana French, is a mystery thriller with a peculiarly timeless atmosphere considering how strongly based it is in modern times. The titular secret place is a board that a girls’ private school set up for their students to post their secrets on, in order to provide a Read more...

Samba

Posted 2:08pm Sunday 26th April 2015 by Simon Kingsley-Holmes

Rating: 4/5 People often say the best filmmaking is the sort you don’t notice, where you can just get involved with the characters and story; while that’s not necessarily true, in Samba this philosophy works beautifully. The film’s opening sequence shows the buzz of a tacky, Read more...

Game of Thrones, Season 5 (Episode 1)

Posted 2:04pm Sunday 26th April 2015 by Shaun Swain

TV It is hard to come by anyone who has not seen at least one episode of the high-fantasy TV series, Game of Thrones. While it is often assumed that everyone watches Game of Thrones, whether people have read the books is a completely different story. However, with the highly anticipated dawn of Read more...

It Follows

Posted 2:01pm Sunday 26th April 2015 by Jaxon Langley

Rating 5/5 In a genre so dried up and filled with clichés, It Follows is truly a dark horse. The film first premiered at the 2014 Cannes Film Festival with no trailer, no stars and very little information about the plotline. When I first saw the film, I walked in not knowing what I was Read more...

Woman in Gold

Posted 1:58pm Sunday 26th April 2015 by Ngarangi Haerewa

Rating: 3/5 Having arrived at the cinema with no background information on Woman in Gold, it’s safe to say I had minimal expectations for the film, which I eventually understood is based on the interesting battle between Maria Altmann and the Austrian government. Gustav Klimt’s Read more...

Summer Thieves

Posted 1:54pm Sunday 26th April 2015 by Daniel Munro

Born and raised in the D, the Summer Thieves have been making waves playing on some of the biggest line-ups Dunedin has seen in recent years. They are currently recording their debut album with the help of Tiki Taane and are joining him at Sammy’s this Saturday 2 May. The band is made up of Read more...

Tiki Taane

Posted 1:49pm Sunday 26th April 2015 by Daniel Munro

Tiki Taane is a multi-platinum New Zealand musician who has been involved with the likes of Shapeshifter and Salmonella Dub, as well as having a huge solo career. Critic caught up with Taane to discuss music, politics and even drag-racing ahead of his show at Sammy’s this weekend. Critic: Read more...

Ufomammut Ecate

Posted 1:43pm Sunday 26th April 2015 by Basti Menkes

Rating 4/5 Of all the music I have ever listened to, no band’s name and sound match each other better than Ufomammut’s. As good as “Radiohead” is at capturing a sense of millennial paranoia, or “King Crimson” at implying a sense of magic and majesty, the name Read more...

Hotline Miami 2: Wrong Number

Posted 1:38pm Sunday 26th April 2015 by Lachlan Scown

Rating: 4/5 Hotline Miami 2: Wrong Number is the grittier, more violent successor to the 2013 indie hit, Hotline Miami. Developed by Swedish independent duo, Jonatan Söderström and Dennis Wedin, of Dennaton Games, the game focuses on thirteen different characters over six acts. If you Read more...

Feijoa Cupcakes

Posted 1:30pm Sunday 26th April 2015 by Sophie Edmonds

It’s that time of year when feijoas are in. I don’t know about you, but every time I gain control over my excess feijoa situation, I seem to acquire more as my friends’ mums try to palm them off on me. Want to know a secret? This is just a banana cake with some feijoas thrown Read more...

Laurence Aberhart

Posted 1:23pm Sunday 26th April 2015 by Loulou Callister-Baker

For those familiar with Laurence Aberhart’s work, the current show on at Brett McDowell on Dowling Street doesn’t feel “new” — in multiple senses of the word. And it’s not just because Aberhart refuses the digital through his use of a large-format camera. Planted Read more...

Horoscope | Issue 8

Posted 3:37pm Sunday 19th April 2015 by Madame McMystery

Aries For the entire month of May, drawing hopscotch on the pavement next to Union lawn will have the same effect as drawing a pentagram to summon demons — except instead of Balthazar the Belligerent, you’ll be summoning up new friends! Taurus Ever feel like your friends are Read more...

A Troublesome Inheritance: Genes, Race, and Human History

Posted 3:30pm Sunday 19th April 2015 by Bridget Vosburgh

ATroublesome Inheritance: Genes, Race, and Human History, by Nicholas Wade, attempts to begin a discussion about the genetics of race and the impact of racism on studying them. Wade’s central premise is that the evolution of the human race has been recent, copious and regional, meaning that Read more...

Flight of the Navigator

Posted 3:26pm Sunday 19th April 2015 by Alex Campbell-Hunt

Classic Flight of the Navigator is the best live-action Disney film. It seems routine enough on the surface — a kid has some adventures in a spaceship — but the film is elevated by its dark atmosphere and its slowly unfolding plot. In 1978, 12-year-old protagonist, David Freeman Read more...

Marvel’s Daredevil, Season 1 (Episode 1)

Posted 3:22pm Sunday 19th April 2015 by Mandy Te

TV Following in the footsteps of the CW network, Netflix has recently released 13 episodes of its new superhero show, Marvel’s Daredevil. Created by Drew Goddard, this series takes on Stan Lee’s comic-book character but gives the Daredevil’s story a dark, modern-day twist Read more...

Dior and I

Posted 3:17pm Sunday 19th April 2015 by Maya Dodd

Rating: 4/5 When it comes to documentaries, I’m not a huge fan. It is no surprise then that I went into the cinema with considerably low expectations and the unnerving feeling that I was about to fail miserably at another test for ma classe française. Dior and I follows the Read more...

Furious 7

Posted 3:15pm Sunday 19th April 2015 by Shaun Swain

Rating: 4/5 The make-or-break factor when it comes to high-octane action films is the pacing. Master that, and you can demand all the suspension of disbelief that you want from your audience. The seventh instalment of The Fast and the Furious series proves itself, once again, as a very capable Read more...

Interview: Raiza Biza

Posted 3:06pm Sunday 19th April 2015 by Daniel Munro

Artist Raiza Biza has solidified himself in the New Zealand Hip Hop game with last year’s release of The Imperfectionist album. 2015 is set to be another big year for the talented artist so Critic caught up with him ahead of his show this Thursday night at ReFuel. Critic: To start, Read more...

Carl Barât & the Jackals: Let It Reign

Posted 2:58pm Sunday 19th April 2015 by Oliver Gaskell

Rating: 4/5 Carl Barât is best known as a member of The Libertines, a gang of British rock ’n’ roll rebels who, alongside bands like The Strokes and The White Stripes, were part of the 2000s garage rock revival. Darlings of the English music press, The Libertines captured the Read more...

Rune Factory 4

Posted 2:53pm Sunday 19th April 2015 by Bridget Vosburgh

Rating: 4/5 Rune Factory 4 is a Nintendo eShop-only release in New Zealand. Up until this instalment, the Rune Factory games were subtitled with “A Fantasy Harvest Moon”, as the series is a Harvest Moon spin-off. In the Harvest Moon games you run a farm while repeatedly giving gifts Read more...