Taking on a film adaptation of a text as Epic as The Odyssey is no small feat. The director of The Return (2024) Umberto Pasolini seemed well aware of this and was wise in his choice to adapt only a small section of Homer’s ancient Greek text for the screen. Focusing solely on Odysseus’s return to his home island Ithaca after 20 years of absence – spent fighting in the Trojan War (on the winning side) for ten years and then another ten trying to make his way back home – The Return omits any and all supernatural and divine elements of The Odyssey and instead attempts to portray a deeply human story.
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Nosferatu (2024) is Robert Eggers’s striking and tenebrous gothic horror passion project. A twenty-first century adaptation of the 1922 F. W. Murnau silent German expressionist film of the same name, Eggers’s version of the classic vampire tale pays homage to its predecessors whilst also delivering something new and in turn helping to remind modern viewers that vampires are monsters and should be feared as such.
The plot of Nosferatu is based on Bram Stoker’s 1897 novel Dracula, the 1922 silent version changed the title and character names because of copyright reasons. Since then, Nosferatu has grown into its’ own separate entity within the vampire genre; aided by the first adaptation of Murnau’s version titled Nosferatu the Vampyre directed by Werner Herzog and released in 1979.
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In a film full of bursting bodies and giant needles who would’ve thought that a man eating shrimp would be the scene that got the most visceral reaction out of me. Coralie Fargeat’s body horror film The Substance, made waves at Cannes before opening to unsuspecting audiences worldwide. You may have noticed two things if you were lucky enough to see this in a cinema. One, being that a couple probably left halfway through because they couldn’t hack it and two, that this is a messed-up rollercoaster of emotions that not-so-subtly bludgeons the audience with its themes of beauty standards, stardom and addiction – in the best possible way.
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Marvel fans, rejoice! Deadpool & Wolverine is the crossover you didn’t know you needed but now can’t imagine living without. Packed with more surprises than a Kinder Egg, this film delivers a good time from start to finish, despite a few hiccups along the way. It also gets the MCU largely back on track after a few less than stellar films since Endgame. But just how good is it? Let’s find out.
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In 1996, only one film outperformed Twister at the box office: Independence Day. That’s how popular this tornado-chasing movie was. The 1990s saw a surge in disaster flicks, with at least one released each year, satisfying audiences’ appetites for big budgets and even bigger destruction.
From Deep Impact (a personal favourite of mine) to Dante’s Peak (another top-tier option for fans), the decade was filled with blockbusters that delivered on their promise. Twister too was a standout, catapulting its leads, Bill Paxton and Helen Hunt, into Hollywood stardom.
Did it need a sequel? Probably not. But 28 years later, we have Twisters. The plural promises even more tornado-chasing excitement. But does it deliver?
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Back in 2018, Stranger Things fever was sweeping the globe with audiences around the world lapping up the sci-fi horror alien vibe the series brought to Netflix. The perfect opportunity then, for Hollywood mega couple John Krasinski and Emily Blunt to release their own take on the genre.
A Quiet Place was a critical and commercial success, becoming one of the most successful sci-fi horror films ever made. People loved the experience of watching a film in almost silence, and that novelty didn’t wear off for its 2020 sequel, which, while being bigger in scale, showed this new series had legs.
Fast forward four years and Krasinski hands over directorial duties to Michael Sarnoski – whose only other feature film is Pig, starring Nicolas Cage. Was this a masterstroke by Krasinski or the franchise’s undoing?
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Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga, directed by the visionary George Miller, continues the high-octane tradition of the Mad Max franchise with a fresh yet pleasingly familiar face.
Starring Chris Hemsworth as the villainous Dementus, and Anya Taylor-Joy stepping into the titular role of Furiosa, the film promised a journey through desolate wastelands and chaotic action. However, while it delivers on certain fronts with aplomb, it also stumbles in crucial areas, leading to a somewhat mixed experience.
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For a series that’s lasted more than five decades, Planet of the Apes has proven to have remarkable staying power. Following the conclusion of Matt Reeves’ impeccable War for the Planet of the Apes though, many thought it was the perfect conclusion to one of the greatest trilogies of our time. But that wasn’t to be.
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Zendaya, Josh O’ Connor and Mike Faist are caught in a psychosexual tennis trifecta of desire in Challengers, a film that plays out as an erotic thriller set to the framework of high-stakes professional tennis. It’s a strange mix of genre and style, but Challengers is an excellently crafted film that explores the complex relationships of its three central characters.
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In Alex Garland’s dystopian action-thriller Civil War, a group of photojournalists are pinned down in a game of cat and mouse between two sniper shooters. One of the journalists asks “What side are you fighting for?” to which the laser-focused soldier replies, “Someone is trying to kill us. We are trying to kill them”. This is nearly all the context we are given in this war-torn vision of modern day America. Civil War isn’t concerned with politics and ideologies, instead the focus is on the conflict itself and those involved, specifically the journalists risking their lives to tell the truth.
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