The Deadly Spawn, 1983. Directed by Douglas McKeown. Starring Tom DeFranco, Charles George Hildebrandt, Ethel Michelson and John Schmerling. SYNOPSIS: A crashed meteorite brings hostile alien life to Earth. The Deadly Spawn is upfront about its inspirations, taking lead from and citing monster movies from the 1950s such as The Thing from Another World (1951), […]

D.J. Haza presents the next entry in his series of films to watch before you die… Pulp Fiction, 1994. Directed by Quentin Tarantino. Starring John Travolta, Samuel L. Jackson, Uma Thurman, Harvey Keitel, Tim Roth, Amanda Plummer, Ving Rhames, Rosanna Arquette, Eric Stoltz, Christopher Walken and Bruce Willis. Pulp Fiction is the dazzling, highly-stylised and […]

Trevor Hogg chats with Academy Award-winning filmmaker Brad Bird… “In the period before The Iron Giant [1999], when I was trying to get movies made, and running against all the walls a lot of filmmakers run up against, half the projects I had on the runway were live-action,” reveals Oscar-winning American filmmaker Brad Bird who […]

The Grey, 2012. Directed by Joe Carnahan. Starring Liam Neeson, Frank Grillo, Dallas Roberts, Dermot Mulroney, Nonso Anozie, Joe Anderson, Ben Bray and James Badge Dale. SYNOPSIS: In Alaska, an oil drilling team flying home crash on the frozen tundra. Stranded, wounded, freezing and starving – they’re hunted by pack of wolves that see them […]

D.J. Haza presents the next entry in his series of films to watch before you die… Goodfellas, 1990. Directed by Martin Scorsese. Starring Ray Liotta, Robert De Niro, Joe Pesci, Lorraine Bracco and Paul Sorvino. Goodfellas is Martin Scorsese’s big screen adaptation of Nicholas Pileggi’s non-fiction book Wiseguy. The film chronicles the story of Lucchese […]

High School Musical, 2006. Directed by Kenny Ortega. Starring Zac Efron, Vanessa Hudgens, Ashley Tisdale and Corbin Bleu. SYNOPSIS: Two teens decide to buck the status quo and audition for their school musical. Being a mid-twenties heterosexual male who is at least mildly cineliterate, the title High School Musical should result in my top lip […]

Contraband, 2012. Directed by Baltasar Kormákur. Starring Mark Wahlberg, Caleb Landry Jones, Giovanni Ribisi, Lukas Haas, Ben Foster and Kate Beckinsale. SYNOPSIS: Mark Wahlberg is Chris Farraday, an expert in the field of smuggling, who left the profession for the sake of his family, but finds himself pulled back in by his brother-in-law Andy (Caleb […]

D.J. Haza presents the next entry in his series of films to watch before you die… Heat, 1995. Directed by Michael Mann. Starring Al Pacino, Robert De Niro, Val Kilmer, Jon Voight, Tom Sizemore, Ashley Judd, Mykelti Williamson, Wes Studi, Ted Levine, Dennis Haysbert, William Fichtner, Natalie Portman, Danny Trejo and Jeremy Piven. Heat is […]

John Carter, 2012. Directed by Andrew Stanton. Starring Taylor Kitsch, Lynn Collins, Willem Dafoe, Mark Strong, Samantha Morton, Ciarán Hinds, Dominic West, Thomas Haden Church, James Purefoy and Bryan Cranston. SYNOPSIS: Former Confederate Captain John Carter (Taylor Kitsch) has abandoned civilization for life alone on the American frontier searching for gold. He’s confronted by a […]

Blake Howard on the first two seasons of the BBC crime drama Luther… Luther follows the cases of a troubled yet brilliant English police detective, DCI John Luther (Idris Elba), and his squad assigned to serial / unusual murders. Now I know that when you hear about another detective show / crime procedural your initial […]