Amon Warmann
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Film Review: ‘Dredd 3D’
★★★★☆ Approximately 35 years after John Wagner and Carlos Ezquerra created him, Judge Dredd is now one of the most popular comic book characters of all time. Unfortunately, he has fared significantly less well on the big screen, with the 1995 Sly Stallone debacle failing to capture the character effectively. Thankfully, that’s not the case…
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Interview: Karl Urban and Alex Garland talk ‘Dredd 3D’
Native Kiwi Karl Urban has been lucky enough to be a part of many popular movie franchises during his 20-year career, including The Lord of the Rings and, more recently, J.J. Abrams’ Star Trek reboot. Next year, Urban will return to the Enterprise for the eagerly-anticipated sequel, but this month audiences will get to see…
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Film Review: ‘Salute’
★★★★☆ The Olympics have long proven to be an excellent stage for socio-political statements. At the 1968 Mexico Olympics, American 200m sprinters Tommie Smith and John Carlos both raised a black-gloved fist during their medal ceremony to show their support for racial equality. Despite being on the podium that day, Peter Norman’s role in the…
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Film Review: ‘Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter’
★★★☆☆ What if Abraham Lincoln, esteemed 16th President of the United States, was a vampire hunter? This is the laughable premise on hand in Timur Bekmambetov’s faux-historical 3D action movie, imaginatively titled Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter (2012), based on the novel by Seth Grahame-Smith (who also wrote the screenplay).Bekmambetov’s film chooses to put Lincoln’s (an…
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Film Review: ‘The Five-Year Engagement’
★★★★☆ Prolific man-child director Judd Apatow is back in the producer hot-seat for The Five-Year Engagement (2012), an entertaining romantic comedy which will please Apatow fans as well as appeal to broader audiences. Directed by Nicholas Stoller, the plot follows Tom (Jason Segel, reuniting with Stoller) and Violet (Emily Blunt) who become engaged after a…
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Film Review: ‘The Dictator’
★★★★☆ Following last year’s impressive performance in Martin Scorsese’s critically-acclaimed Hugo (2011), British comedian Sacha Baron Cohen is back doing what he does best with yet another satirical caricature to add to his ever growing list. For his latest endeavour, The Dictator (2012), Cohen has once again reunited with director Larry Charles (Borat, Bruno), in…
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Film Review: ‘Dark Shadows’
★★★☆☆ Long has esteemed character actor Johnny Depp been large-haired filmmaker Tim Burton’s muse for the director’s brooding visions, with many of those team-ups little more than tinkering with already established characters. Predictably, Burton and Depp’s latest outing, the horror-comedy Dark Shadows (2012) – their eighth collaboration together – doesn’t even try to buck that…
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Film Review: ‘Fury’
★★★☆☆ Next week, Samuel L. Jackson will be hitting UK screens as Nick Fury in Marvel’s Avengers Assemble (2012), to which many minds may wander when they learn that he is also starring this week in Fury (The Samaritan, 2012). This is no Marvel spin-off however; Jackson stars as Foley, an ex-con eager for redemption…