Category Archives: 08/10

The Lighthouse

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Two men must spend 4 weeks together maintaining a lighthouse on an isolated island in the late 19th century. Sounds pretty straightforward, right? There’ll be some butting of heads as their personalities clash and cabin fever sets in, but eventually they’ll either become friends, lovers, or they’ll kill each other, but however it turns out, the story will be clear and everything will be resolved, yes? After all, the film is called The Lighthouse, and the primary job of a lighthouse is to reveal what would be otherwise hidden and dangerous, so calling a film The Lighthouse when it’s actually a near-impenetrable sack of confusion would be ludicrous!

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Avengers: Infinity War

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Giant purple glove enthusiast Thanos (Josh Brolin) has a sad back story. His people, the Titans of Titan (which isn’t confusing at all, couldn’t it at least have been the Titons of Titan, or the Titaniums of Titan, or the Titans of Titanic? All viable options) were ravaged by over-population and over-use of natural resources, leaving their home world in ruins. Thanos had proposed an option to prior to this, which would have meant randomly killing half of Titan’s entire population, which was understandably vetoed. Now, in the wake of Titan’s ruin, Thanos has seen the opportunity to enact his plan on a much grander scale, wiping out half of all known life in existence, for which he will need the golden infinity gauntlet and six infinity stones scattered across the galaxy. It’s up to Earth’s mightiest heroes – and a few from some other places too – to try and stop Thanos before it’s too late.
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The Ballad of Buster Scruggs

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A wanted sharp-shooter arrives at a busy saloon. A cowboy attempts to rob a small bank. A young limbless orator travels with his ageing, opportunistic handler. An old prospector searches for a hidden gold pocket. A betrothed woman finds herself travelling alone in a wagon train. Five strangers take a carriage ride together. These six stories make up the latest offering from the Coen brothers, a straight-to-Netflix western anthology of mostly consistent quality and impeccable casting.
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Meet Me in St. Louis

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The Smith family all love living in St. Louis, Missouri in 1903, and deal with regular turn-of-the-century troubles such as courting a man over the telephone, crushing on the boy next door and perfecting the latest batch of ketchup. However, their lawyer father has agreed to take a job in New York, starting just after Christmas, and plans to uproot the family from their comfortable and idyllic lives in favour of heading off to the big city.

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School of Rock

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When wannabe rock star Dewey Finn (Jack Black) gets kicked out of his own band and his room-mate Ned Schneebly (Mike White) needs money for the rent, Dewey fakes his way into a substitute job at a local prep school, only to discover that the genius, upper class kids are also very adept at playing classical music. Dewey sees a chance to finally achieve his rock stardom dreams by moulding the kids into an awesome rock band.
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Hannah and Her Sisters

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This review was originally written for Blueprint: Review.

Set over a two-year period, Hannah and Her Sisters follows the numerous exploits of three sisters living in New York and their various friends and family. Hannah (Mia Farrow) seems to have her life most effectively in place. She is an actress, getting back into her work after taking time to raise her children, and is married to her financial adviser husband Elliot (Michael Caine). Elliot however has been harbouring a long-standing infatuation with Hannah’s younger sister Lee (Barbara Hershey), who is in a relationship with standoffish artist Frederick (Max von Sydow). At the apex of Elliot and Lee’s joint feelings of dissatisfaction with their partners, the pair sleep together, and must deal with the ramifications. Meanwhile the third sister, Holly (Dianne Wiest) is a recovering drug addict turned aspiring actress and restaurateur, self-employed as a caterer alongside her friend April (Carrie Fisher), a colleague and competitor for both acting roles and eligible men. Finally Hannah’s ex-husband Mickey (Woody Allen) is a stressed out hypochondriac, whose latest imaginary malady might turn out to be his most serious, and his last.
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Batman Returns

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33 years after being dumped into the sewers as a baby by his horrified parents, Oswald Cobblepot (Danny DeVito), a disfigured, disgusting man, wants to surface and claim his rights as a human. Meanwhile, shy secretary Selina Kyle (Michelle Pfeiffer) works for business tycoon Max Shreck (Christopher Walken), who constantly belittles her. When she discovers his plans for a power station will actually drain and store Gotham’s surplus energy, he tries to kill her but fails, causing her to seek revenge. Also, there’s a bloke going around dressed as a bat, but clearly, he’s not as important.
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Day of the Dead

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Some months after the zombie outbreak, an underground science base has been established with hopes of developing a solution to the epidemic. Tensions fray between the scientists, civilians and military personnel living there, not helped by the lead scientist, Dr. Logan (Richard Liberty) attempting to “train” a chained up zombie he has named Bub (Sherman Howard).
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Seven Samurai

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Stop me if you’ve heard this one before. A small farming village is routinely looted by a gang of bandits, who steal most of their crops and pillage the town. The farmers are too weak and untrained to defend themselves, so they head into town to find warriors to fight for them, in exchange for food. They are successful, eventually recruiting a team of seven, who return to the village and help train the farmers for an upcoming attack.
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