Kathryn Bigelow made history on Saturday night when she became the first woman to receive the Director’s Guild of America Award for Oustanding Achievement in Feature Film for her 2009 Iraq War thriller The Hurt Locker. Bigelow beat off stiff competition in the form of ex-husband James Cameron (Avatar), Quentin Tarantino (Inglourious Basterds), Jason Reitman […]
Absurdity & Carnage: A Coen Brothers Profile (Part 1)
Trevor Hogg profiles the careers of filmmaking siblings the Coen brothers in the first of a four part feature… Using a Super 8 camera, Joel and his younger brother Ethan were inspired to remake the Hollywood movies being broadcasted on television; their naivety about motion picture production did not hinder their innovative spirit when shooting […]
Avatar to receive Academy Award for Best Moneymaker?
As of this morning James Cameron is a mere $6 million away from smashing his own twelve year record at the peak of the all-time global box-office chart, with 3D motion capture epic Avatar set to overtake Titanic’s mighty haul of $1.842 billion. It truly is testament to the man’s film-making genius that Cameron has […]
R.I.P. Jean Simmons (1929-2010)
Golden Globe and Emmy Award winning British actress Jean Simmons has passed away yesterday Friday 22nd January aged 80. Born in London in 1929, Simmons made her screen debut alongside Margaret Lockwood in Give Us The Moon (1944) before working with legendary directors David Lean (Great Expectations, 1946) and Laurence Olivier (Hamlet, 1948). Her work […]
Director Profile: Lynne Ramsay (Part 2)
Amy Flinders profiles Scottish director Lynne Ramsay in the second of a two-part feature… read part one here. With three critically acclaimed shorts and a mantelpiece full of awards, Ramsay won another cluster of prizes, including a BAFTA for most promising newcomer, for her first feature Ratcatcher (1999). When asked how the idea of Ratcatcher […]
Rendering Reality: A Robert Zemeckis Profile (Part 3)
Trevor Hogg profiles the career of visionary director Robert Zemeckis in the third of a three part feature… read part one and part two. Adapting Winston Groom’s story of a simple-minded man who meets various historical figures from the twentieth century, while wandering in and out of the life of his childhood sweetheart, served as […]
Director Profile: Lynne Ramsay (Part 1)
Amy Flinders profiles Scottish director Lynne Ramsay in the first of a two-part feature… Despite only having two features and a handful of short films to her name, Lynne Ramsay has managed to captivate audiences and critics alike and is well respected as a prolific and innovative director. It is perhaps the inspired combination of […]
British Cinema: Nowhere Boy (2009)
Nowhere Boy, 2009. Directed by Sam Taylor Wood. Starring Aaron Johnson, Kristen Scott Thomas and Anne-Marie Duff. SYNOPSIS: This is the story of teenage John Lennon and his three loves – his music, his Mum, and his Aunt. The sign of a really good film is when you walk out of the cinema and into […]
Ten Essential Star Wars Bit Parts
Gary Collinson selects his Ten Essential Star Wars Bit Parts… George Lucas’ space fantasy Star Wars is renowned for producing a host of classic characters and pop culture icons – Luke Skywalker, Han Solo, Princess Leia, Chewbacca, droids R2-D2 and C-3PO and of course the ultimate villain, Darth Vader. But the beauty of Star Wars […]
Rendering Reality: A Robert Zemeckis Profile (Part 2)
Trevor Hogg profiles the career of visionary director Robert Zemeckis in the second of a three part feature… read part one here. When Bob Gale wondered what it would have been like to have been a high school classmate of his father, Robert Zemeckis decided to develop the concept with him. The main character was […]