film reviews, interviews, features | BRWC

Category: REVIEWS

Here is where you would find our film reviews on BRWC.  We look at on trailers, shorts, indies and mainstream.  We love movies!

  • Cult: Review

    Cult: Review

    By Alex Purnell. Director Luke Ibbeston’s feature debut is funny yet disturbing, a whimsical mockumentary with a distinctly British charm.

    Reminiscent of Louis Theroux’s The Most Hated Family in America (2007), Cult explores a strange fictional 90’s cult with all the cultish bells and whistles.

    Following a camera crew into the depths of a religious compound known as F.A.T.E, or Friends At The End, who believe that a comet that flies by the earth every 40 years is in fact a spaceship manned by extraterrestrial beings. F.A.T.E’s members consist of a medley of quirky, enrobed individuals, including Manaus (Althyr Pivatto), who took a dodgy LSD tab and somehow ended up on the compound, Beck (Marriane Chase), the groups disturbed cook hell-bent on sacrifice, and Comet (Calvin Crawley), the excitable, innocent and childlike centrepiece of the film who falls in love with new recruit Rachel (Elizabeth Sankey), who the cult pick up from a local rehab centre. With numbers waning, crops dying and the end of the world scheduled in a couple of days, we watch F.A.T.E’s final few months from the perspective of the bewildered camera crew.

    Cult’s mockumentary style works wonders, it’s fantastically absurd black-comedy is brilliantly entertaining, poking at fun at the wackiness of real-life religions, yet also posing deep questions about the public understanding of often misunderstood cult members.

    However, the film leans too into its low-budget style, in which some questionable casting options and location decisions more or less break the documentary-style spell.

    Moreover, in a jarring change of pace and tone, the final few scenes of the flick change to present-day with a more sombre retrospective of the cult, seemingly out of place in this otherwise playful comedy.

    Cult is fun, charismatic and at points, dead strange. Brimming with cultish stereotypes and unusual song parodies, its unique take on a typically considered depressing subject matter is a breath of fresh air.

  • My Summer As A Goth: Review

    My Summer As A Goth: Review

    Joey Javitts (Natalie Shershow) has just lost her father and is grieving. Her mother, Carissa (Sarah Overman) is an author, so despite recent events and prior commitments, she has to drop Joey off at her grandparents for the summer while she goes on a book tour.

    Then one night as Joey is getting unpacked, she spies a boy in a house across the street about to do something dangerous. Running across the street and into his house, Joey realises that Victor (Jack Levis) was only being melodramatic and is reassured as he explains to her about his goth lifestyle and how his outward appearance is a reflection of his inner self.

    After a somewhat romantic encounter that night, Joey goes to see Victor and meets his friends; Pen (Jenny White) and Cob (Carter Allen) who are also goths and after being enticed by their lives, Joey is convinced to undergo a dramatic goth makeover. However, as Joey and Victor get closer, Victor’s intentions may not be all that they seem.

    My Summer as a Goth is a coming of age comedy drama and feature debut by writer/director Tara Johnson-Medinger. Clearly taking inspiration from teenage coming of age dramas such as The Lost Boys and Heathers, Johnson-Medinger’s movie seems like a loving throwback to those films of the 80’s where teenage girls were enamoured with boys only to learn an important lesson about themselves in the process.

    The trouble is that these influences make the film a little dated and so does the goth aesthetic which may have better suited a movie over 30 years ago, but wouldn’t quite wash with teenage audiences today.

    In fact, a lot of the jokes are even about goths dressing differently, doing unusual things and listening to different kinds of music which feels counterintuitive to today’s messages of inclusion and acceptance that teenagers would know.

    Also, the older members of the audience may recognise Victor’s behaviour much faster than the younger ones, which isn’t so bad as it’s the point of his character. However, the script hammers the message home so much during the final few scenes it feels like the audience is being lectured by somebody older and wiser. My Summer as a Goth may know what kind of movie it is and who the audience are, but it feels like a shade of the much better movies that it mimics.

  • Crossing Shaky Ground: Review

    Crossing Shaky Ground: Review

    Aaron (Sean Mcarty) is at a business retreat in Astoria Oregon when an earthquake hits the state. The damage is said to be huge and a lot of people are stranded without any food, water or means of transport including Aaron himself.

    Deciding that he has to get to Portland besides a journey that’s over 700 miles, Aaron tries to get a lift from a passing car. However, he has trouble as people are starting to panic and the mentality of ‘every man for himself’ sets in.

    Eventually though, Aaron does meet a group of people who at first are reluctant to help, but as they continue on their journey, they find that despite their differences, they can still find a bond.

    Crossing Shaky Ground is an earthquake movie on an extremely limited budget written and directed by Paul Bright. Like a lot of natural disaster movies such as Twister, Dante’s Peak and San Andreas half of the reason for an audience to see a film like that is to be in awe of the spectacle and special effects that occur during the movie while the characters bond while trying to survive.

    The problem is that although an ambitious project, Crossing Shaky Ground has no choice but to focus on the characters, which is usually the least interesting aspect of films like this with much bigger budgets.

    It also doesn’t help that there are a lot of grey moral areas in the characters, which may lend a bit of depth to them in an attempt to try and flesh them out, but doesn’t give the audience anybody to root for besides Aaron and that’s just because he’s the lead of the movie.

    There is an attempt at showing the initial earthquake which is also a mistake because of the low budget and unfortunately this may raise a smile or two in the audience as the camera shakes back and forth. However, after nearly two hours they may not be smiling so much because of the consistent shaking of the handheld camera which keeps going even when the ground is still.

  • Love In Dangerous Times: Review

    Love In Dangerous Times: Review

    Jason (Ian Stout) is a budding actor who works in a restaurant, but his real dream is to become a successful playwright. Then a few months ago the pandemic swept across the world and although initially he doesn’t think it would be so bad, over time Jason becomes more aware of the serious problem affecting the world right now.

    On the one hand this left him more time to do the things that he always wanted, but on the other hand he lives by himself and it feels like if the world was going to end, he would die alone. However, Jason soon decides to do something about it and joins a dating site and that’s where he meets Sorrell (Tiffany Groben) and they hit it off after an awkward first date.

    As things get worse and internet dating becomes more and more difficult, Jason and Sorrell find that love in dangerous times is more complicated than they ever thought it would be.

    Love in Dangerous Times is a rather timely film written and directed by Jon Garcia. Whereas some may find the film and its release somewhat opportunistic, Love in Dangerous Times could very well be considered as a time capsule.

    The film does manage to capture the moment and a lot of people will be able to find themselves relating to Jason and his situation, but whether they would feel comfortable watching a film like that right now will be up to them.

    Personally, watching a film at home on my computer where a man sits at home watching his computer may be the most meta film experience of my life and I don’t know whether I liked it or not.

    Love in Dangerous Times hits all the right notes and maybe in future will be considered a very accurate portrayal of an unusual time in our history when we all thought we were untouchable. However, being filmed so early on in the pandemic, it isn’t really thorough enough and feels like the film is in a bubble. There’s more going on right now than anyone could encapsulate in one movie and although a valiant effort, maybe Love in Dangerous Times would settle better in a few months.

  • Luxor: Review

    Luxor: Review

    By: Beth Widdicombe

    Written and directed by British-born Zeina Durra, Luxor is a love story, a meditative look at healing and also a beautifully shot postcard trip around the mystical ancient ruins and sites in the city and deserts.

    Set in the beautiful city of Luxor in modern day Egypt, we follow Hana a British war trauma doctor, played exquisitely by Andrea Riseborough, on a solitary break in the ancient city seeking healing, re-birth and regeneration.

    On arriving we start our trip in the ‘Winter Palace’ hotel, a relic from the old Hotel days, visually reminiscent of the Agatha Christie, Merchant Ivory days. As she ventures into the city, we are aware from her interactions with the taxi driver that this is a familiar haunt for her, which is substantiated when she bumps into a past lover Sultan, an archaeologist played by Karim Saleh. As the film progresses, we are immersed in the spirituality of the location, the effects it has on healing Hana’s dark traumatised soul, which slowly reveals as the film progresses on. 

    The sense of past, present and future in her life are perfectly mirrored by the juxtaposition of modern-day and ancient dig sites, although much of her emotions are insular, they are ever-present. The rhythm of the film is slow, the heightened sounds of footsteps and doors clicking in the hotel are key in the overall feeling of solitude and displacement felt by Hana. Although she is from a scientific background, she often questions the energy felt from the city and visits a witch doctor to ease her trauma.

    Towards the end in a climactic release during a dance scene, she finally let’s go, and we discover Hana’s dark past and her anxieties ease, leaving us hopeful that she has a future with hope of happiness, and potential to pursue a deep and meaningful love for both herself and Sultan.  

    A truly beautiful film, with stunning shots of the city and desert, and a journey of one woman’s past trauma to future happiness.