Content note: This review includes discussion of rape. Pained gargles ring out over a black screen and before colours fade in, the image of a brutal attack already conjured. So begins Elle, Paul Verhoeven’s multilayered and genre-defying latest offering. Dark rape revenge thriller, black comedy, or cutting social commentary? Well, that all depends on who…
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With the 24th Mardi Gras Film Festival kicking off in Sydney this week, Lip’s Eden Faithfull chatted with Queer Screen President Lisa Rose about this year’s program. The festival runs from 15 February – 2 March and includes screenings in Sydney, Canberra, and regional NSW. Find out more at queerscreen.org.au. You have created an…
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With the 24th Mardi Gras Film Festival kicking off in Sydney this week, Lip’s Eden Faithfull takes a look at two featured films. Presented by Queer Screen, the festival runs from 15 February – 2 March and includes screenings in Sydney, Canberra, and regional NSW. Find out more at www.queerscreen.org.au. Bad Girl (Australia) Fin Edquist’s…
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Nora Niasari is an Iranian-Australian film writer and director. Her latest film is Waterfall. Lip’s Rosie Hunt recently talked to Nora about her work. What can you tell me about Waterfall? Waterfall is a short film about a 14-year-old Iranian girl who goes on a road trip with her mother and her mother’s Australian fiancé….
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When I first heard that A Series of Unfortunate Events was to be turned into a Netflix series I was ecstatic— a word that here means jumping on the furniture with glee. The books and the very good film which came out in 2004 were a fundamental part of my childhood, so much so that…
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Allied opens in Casablanca, 1942, where Canadian intelligence officer Max Vatan (Brad Pitt) and French Resistance fighter Marianne Beauséjour (Marion Cotillard) meet to work undercover. The pair pretend to be husband and wife, and befriend a group of Nazis in order to gain access to an event attended by the German ambassador. While working together,…
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With university holidays upon me, the luxury of leisure time unfurled, lovely and inviting. Finally, time to catch up on all the music, books and films that had been stockpiling. A little behind the eight ball, I immersed myself in Andrea Arnold’s epic 163-minute Cannes Jury Prize winner American Honey. I had heard little about…
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Discouraged by another failed audition, La La Land’s Mia (Emma Stone) takes the high, albeit hopeful, road to produce a one-woman show and forge her own luck in life. At one point, daunted by the feat, she worries to her lover Sebastian (Ryan Gosling): ‘It feels too nostalgic to me. Are people going to like…
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As 2016 comes to a close, Lip’s film writers share their screen highlights for the year. Unsurprisingly, Netflix is well-represented – perhaps more interestingly, no one chose a film they had seen in an old-fashioned cinema. In 2016, it seems that TV and streaming reigned supreme. What were your favourites? Let us know in the…
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This review contains spoilers for all four episodes of Gilmore Girls: A Year In The Life. A couple of Saturdays ago, my Mum and I sat down with a large pizza, a bottle of wine, and Gilmore Girls. I could barely contain my excitement. Eight years after the original series had wrapped up, we would…
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When it comes to Christmas rom-coms, only two are of any importance. These films are of course Love Actually and The Holiday. Both films give you a slight guilty feeling about watching a rom-com, which quickly dissipates as you become emotionally involved. But why should we feel guilty about our emotional entanglement with such…
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Sometimes films can take you by surprise: you think you know what you’re in for, but in the safety of the cinema they knock you out of your comfort zone and leave you reeling. For me, I, Daniel Blake was one of those films. While I expected a story of struggle, I certainly didn’t prepare…
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The year is 1926. Our new protagonist Newt Scamander (Eddie Redmayne) arrives in New York from Britain with a suitcase full of magical creatures. But a dark force is terrorising the city, threatening to reveal the magical world to the ‘No Majs’ (read: American Muggles) and…. did someone just say Dumbledore, my god I’m so…
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We found love in a hopeless place. It’s a familiar refrain for the millennial generation, and one that provides the soundtrack to key moments in Andrea Arnold’s latest film, American Honey. Rihanna’s We Found Love is the perfect music to capture the heart of this film, a winner of the Jury Prize at The Cannes Film…
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