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"I live in my land, and land, it lives with me. We live together." Madman Films in Australia has revealed an official trailer for a documentary film titled Journey Home, David Gulpilil, made by filmmakers Maggie Miles & Trisha Morton-Thomas. It premiered at the 2025 Sydney Film Festival last month, and next plays at the Melbourne Film Festival in Australia. Everyone in cinema knows his face - Aboriginal actor David Gulpilil, who famously starred in Nicolas Roeg's Walkabout. Gulpilil passed away in 2021 (at age 68) but it was important to return his body back to his homeland up in Northern Australia. Gulpilil's life & work were previously explored in his own words in Darlene Johnson's Gulpilil: One Red Blood and Molly Reynolds's My Name Is Gulpilil; in this final chapter of his singular story, narrated by Hugh Jackman and Yolngu hip-hop artist Baker Boy, the filmmakers portray the man through the eyes of his community.

As the format continues to gain traction, here’s our regularly-updated list of upcoming 4K Ultra HD disc releases in the UK.

Sitting alongside our list of upcoming DVD and Blu-ray releases (that you can find here), we’re also keeping a calendar for those who support the 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray disc format. As we learn of new UK releases, we’ll add them to this list.

We have started adding shopping links too. We’d be obliged if you clicked on them, as it really helps us in our quest to make the Film Stories project of magazines, website and podcast profitable. We’re a 100% independent publisher, and we quite like drinking coffee. It’d be lovely to afford some more.

Without further ado, here are the titles we know about…

Out now

30th June: Flow

30th June: The Death & Return Of Superman

30th June: Superman: Man...

Nicholas Cage in The Surfer. Courtesy of Roadside Attractions

Nicholas Cage continues his recent exploration of the weird end of the cinematic pool, with The Surfer, a paranoid tale of crazy, nightmare-like incidents that takes the form of a recreation of a 1970’s B-movie Australian film, an homage to Australian New Age and Ozploitation films. Oddly, the film was made by a pair of Irishmen, director Lorcan Finnegan and screenwriter Thomas Martin, although it was shot on location in Australia. The writer and director share a love of Australian New Wave, also known as Ozploitation, and includes horror, comedy and thrillers examples, a style that includes both Walkabout and Mad Max. The Surfer is an ambitious film, referencing a John Cheever story, “The Swimmer,” and drawing on a real-life incident of a bullying gang of surfers in Southern California, who terrorized a public beach they claimed as their own, and...

Cheryl Gates McFadden was a dancer before she was an actress. She studied theater in college (she has a Bachelor of Arts degree) and lived in Paris for a spell, performing with the celebrated movement coach Jacques Lecoq. In New York in the 1970s, she taught dance at various colleges, and formed her own theater troupes and comedy companies. In the 1980s, she landed a few high-profile gigs serving as a choreographer and movement coach on "The Muppets Take Manhattan" and "Labyrinth." She can be seen giving her commentary in a making-of documentary on the "Labyrinth" DVD. 

McFadden, however, exploded in popularity in 1987 when she was selected to play Dr. Beverly Crusher, the chief medical officer on board the USS Enterprise on "Star Trek: The Next Generation." McFadden (who was just going by Gates back then) didn't get to do much dancing on "Star Trek," but she was given a mature,...

Nicolas Cage is putting the rumble and tumble into surf and turf.

The iconic actor leads psychological thriller “The Surfer,” which centers on a man fighting local surfers in a turf war to reclaim his beachfront home.

Cage stars as an unnamed character who brings his teenage son (Finn Little) to the Australian beach where he was raised. His character is an Australian who moved to California when he himself was a teen after his father was found dead on the same beach. Now, he wants to reestablish his Aussie roots in town — the only issue is that the locals are less than thrilled to welcome him back.

The synopsis reads: “A man returns to the idyllic beach of his childhood to surf with his son. But his desire to hit the waves is thwarted by a group of locals whose mantra is “don’t live here, don’t surf here.

Quick Links What is The Edge About? The Edge Is a Different Adventure For David Mamet Alec Baldwin Brings a Career Best Performance

It's always impressive when a movie manages to elicit genuine emotional distress from audiences, but it's even more impressive when they manage to accomplish this on a small scale. Most of the greatest thrillers of all time, from Seven and Children of Men all the way to Chinatown and North By Northwest are absolutely massive in scale and feature intense and meticulous world building across cities, states, and countries. While these films are huge in scale, they sit on the thriller genre Mount Rushmore because they manage to make massive worlds feel small, claustrophobic and isolated through ingenious tension creation. At the opposite end of the spectrum, there are small-scale films like Coherence and Green Room that manage to feel huge and sprawling despite their mostly singular setting.

Warning: There are spoilers ahead for From season 3.

Since debuting in 2022, From has gained increasingly more acclaim, and garnered comparisons to another hit series – Lost. The comparisons are partly due to the creative talent involved in both series. Harold Perrineau, who played Michael Dawson in Lost, leads From's cast of characters in the role of Boyd Stevens. Lost's Jack Bender, who was one of the show's executive producers and a director of iconic episodes like "Walkabout" and "The Constant," is also an executive producer and frequent director of From.

Beyond the overlap in creative talent, there are similarities between From and Lost's premises and their overall narrative approaches. There is an overarching sense of mystery and intrigue, and while many Lost and From mysteries are solved, the answers often lead to more questions. Both series also have ensemble casts, and as seen in From season 3's ending, both...

Lost was a groundbreaking TV show that quickly became a cultural phenomenon in the '00s. The science fiction drama series starts with a seemingly straightforward premise: a group of airplane crash survivors find themselves stranded on a mysterious island somewhere in the South Pacific Ocean. However, as Lost's storyline progresses, the characters confront numerous challenges, including supernatural and scientific mysteries that they need to contend with. With its genre-bending and ahead-of-its-time narrative structure, Lost is a series that also incorporates profound philosophical themes in its story, such as existentialism, free will and the search for meaning.

These elements also fostered a dedicated Lost fanbase, where viewers engaged in extensive discussions and theorized about the show's mysteries, fundamentally altering how entertainment media is consumed. However, the series also boasts intellectual richness in its philosophical themes, seamlessly woven into the narrative through flashbacks and interactions with the island. Lost's island...

Warning: There are spoilers ahead for From season 3, episode 8, "Thresholds."From is providing its own take on a major twist from Lost. The two series already share a great deal in common between the creative talent involved and the stories themselves. Harold Perrineau, who leads From's cast of characters as Boyd Stevens, played Lost's Oceanic 815 survivor Michael Dawson. Jack Bender, who is a From executive producer and a director of numerous episodes, was also an executive producer and frequent director for Lost, including his direction of the acclaimed "Walkabout," "Through the Looking Glass," and "The Constant" episodes.

From and Lost's stories also contain many literal and thematic parallels. Both From and Lost revolve around an ensemble cast of characters who are stranded and looking to escape a mysterious, isolated location that is revealed to be increasingly supernatural. A mystery box storytelling approach is used in which many overarching and complex mysteries are introduced,...

Quick Links Who Was Christian Shephard in Lost, and Why Was He Important? How Christian Shephard Appeared on the Island, Explained Why the Smoke Monster Chose to Impersonate Jack's Father How Jack Shepard Was Able to Reunite With His Father

Some 20 years after its debut, Lost is known for its nuanced storytelling. However, sometimes it was very "on the nose." For example, the ghostly figure guiding both island leaders was named "Christian Shephard," which isn't very subtle. He was Jack's father, who died in Australia, but what really happened to him is one of Lost's most interesting mysteries. At times, Jack's father wasn't actually Christian Shephard.

One of the most enduring pieces of Lost trivia is that, originally, Jack Shepard was supposed to die in the pilot episode. Series co-creators J.J. Abrams and Damon Lindelof wanted to kill off the obvious hero of the show, so the audience would...

I hate you, Butler! But you’ll almost certainly love the selection of new things to listen to on the Film Stories Podcast Network. Here’s a menu:

This week on the Film Stories Podcast Network, our shows have been busy bringing you an array of film and TV conversation.

Here’s what we’ve been up to…

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Britcom Goes to the Movies

Joining the network for its third season, Rob Heath and Guy Walker are joined by Smersh Pod funny man John Rain to discuss 1971’s big screen version of On The Buses. You’ll never see Reg Varney in the same way again…

The Magic Box

One of Lost's most iconic hours is on the agenda this week as Kurt North is joined by Darren Mooney to dissect 1×04 ‘Walkabout’. Just don’t tell them what they can’t talk about…

Modern Horror Podcast

Anthology horror series V/H/S...

Few films are as haunting, strange, and unforgettable as Nicolas Roeg's Walkabout, which is now available to watch on Max. One of the earliest examples of what would later become known as the Australian New Wave, it tells a story of three unnamed children from two very different walks of life, and how their inability to overcome their differences leads to tragedy. As Roger Ebert wrote in his Great Movies review, it concerns "lives that are destroyed, in one way or another, because two people could not invent a way to make their needs and dreams clear." In that way, it works as a metaphor for our broader issues to communicate with one another across barriers of language, race, and culture.

The lineup of new movies and TV shows on Max in October 2024 is just as packed with known Warner Bros. and HBO classics as ever, alongside a steady stream of slick recent releases. After launching in 2020 as HBO Max, the primary streaming home for Warner Bros. titles, Max changed its name and rebranded in 2023. While the name change also comes with some changes to subscription tiers, Max will still release new hit titles every month, which in October includes yet more highly acclaimed movies and the most anticipated TV shows.

Max features a varied collection of new releases and returning favorites for Max users to enjoy in the coming month. The long-delayed adaptation of Salem's Lot will finally be making its debut on Max while there are also some big horror movies from 2024, including MaXXXine and Trap. October 2024 will also see Max adding a number of classic horror movies to...

Alfre Woodard, John Benjamin Hickey, Makenzie Leigh, Lewis Pullman, and Jordan Preston Carter in ‘Salem’s Lot’ (Photo by Courtesy of New Line Cinema/Max)

Max’s October 2024 lineup includes a new adaptation of Stephen King’s bestselling vampire novel Salem’s Lot and the premiere of the eight-episode comedy series The Franchise starring Himesh Patel. Jordin Sparks hosts and Johnny Weir and Terrell Ferguson judge the new competition series Roller Jam debuting on October 10th. And Dylan O’Brien stars in Caddo Lake, a mystery thriller premiering on October 10th.

The streamer’s October calendar of new series and films also includes the documentaries I Am Not A Monster: The Lois Riess Murders, Louder: The Soundtrack of Change, and Breath of Fire. Writer/director M. Night Shyamalan’s Trap starring Josh Hartnett makes its streaming premiere on October 25th, and Maxxxine with Mia Goth debuts on October 18th.

The third and final...

Twenty years later, Lost season 1 is still an outstanding piece of television, but there are some notable flaws that are worth examining. While it's largely debated what the best season of Lost is, the first is often a strong contender, known for introducing the show's premise and characters and creating an enormous cultural phenomenon. When the Lost pilot aired on September 22nd, 2004, all of its ideas were fresh, exciting, and brought a level of prestige quality that's scarcely been rivaled on network television.

Love it or hate it, the Lost finale is undoubtedly divisive, and the reasons for that stem from season 1. In retrospect, it's easier to spot aspects of the show that weren't planned well or weren't planned at all. That shouldn't detract from one's enjoyment of an excellent TV season, but it's fun to consider the aspects of season 1 that work and don't work when rewatching it, given...

As the cinematic landscape, particularly in America, changed drastically through the early 1970s, the onset of exploitation films became a cheap and schlocky yet strangely entertaining and stylistic alternative for many viewers. Throughout that same period, the Australian film industry experienced something of a high point in terms of international interest, propped up by such successes as Picnic at Hanging Rock and Walkabout.

Lorcan Finnegan’s “The Surfer,” screening at Taormina Film Festival following its premiere at Cannes, promises to be one of the year’s cult films. A bizarro mix of Kafka and Ozploitation, the film boasts a late phase Cage performance and a psycho-comedy that appears all the darker for its sunbaked setting. The Irish director of “Vivarium” and “Nocebo” spoke with Variety as the Mediterranean glittered tantalizingly in the distance.

Were you familiar with surfing culture before making the film?

I wouldn’t call myself a surfer, as I’m more of a skateboarder, and so I didn’t really know much about that culture. And this whole toxic masculinity stuff never really appealed to me, but I didn’t want to reject something, just because I didn’t know about it. It’s an interesting challenge.

Why did you choose Australia as the setting?

It was going to be California,...

Daniel Brühl went to “Eden” and survived to tell the tale.

“I can’t compare it to any of my films. I’ve never done anything like it,” he says, teasing Ron Howard’s upcoming thriller. “Two days ago, I was doing the dubbing and saw Jude Law giving me a hard time on screen. We are both giving each other a hard time in this film.”

Shot in Australia – “We shot in nature, in the wilderness. All of it!” – it also features Ana de Armas, Vanessa Kirby and Sydney Sweeney as a group of people heading to the Galápagos Islands. Hans Zimmer composed the score.

“Tonally, it’s very eerie and very influenced by its setting. Ron and I, we have been talking a lot about Peter Weir’s films and the wonderful ‘Walkabout’ by Nicolas Roeg. There is this connection to nature, which is similar to [Howard’s previous film] ‘Thirteen Lives.

Days of Play starts May 29 with new Ps Plus games for Extra and Premium members, offering a wide variety for all players. Ps Plus subscription now includes PS2 Classics, PSVR2 titles, and more, enhancing value for subscribers and targeting a wider audience. Free trial of WWE 2K24 for Ps+ Premium members, along with speculation of more PS2-emulated games coming soon to PS5 and PS4.

Sony's annual "Days of Play" promotion is returning May 29, with new challenges, offers, and more, with several new games also being added to PlayStation Plus. This promotion spans PlayStation Plus, PlayStation Stars, PlayStation Store, PlayStation Gear, and other participating retailers and lasts until June 12.

As revealed in a PlayStation Blog post, several new PlayStation Plus offerings will become available during the Days of Play celebration. On top of the standard Ps Plus monthly games available to all Ps Plus members, which includes SpongeBob Squarepants: The Cosmic Shake,...

What is the best Australian movie ever made? Walkabout? Wake in Fright? The Piano? Picnic at Hanging Rock? The Babadook? All worthy contenders, no doubt, but they’re all wrong answers. The only acceptable response regarding the best movie from the Land Down Under is Mad Max, George Miller’s marauding motorist mania that celebrated its 45th anniversary in 2024. Never mind the billion-dollar franchise it spawned, the creative ingenuity and low-budget DIY filmmaking of the original remains one of the most impressive cinematic feats on record.

A true independent movie with a rebellious spirit, Mad Max was made in just 12 weeks for a paltry $350,000 yet went on to gross $185 million worldwide. The film introduced the world to Mel Gibson, who would go on to play the badass road-racing Main Force Patrol officer Max Rockatansky twice more en route to becoming a bona fide Hollywood action star. Now, with the law-enforcing...

There’s no point in hiring Nicolas Cage if you’re not going to let him rip with a wackadoodle, Ott performance, and he duly delivers in the sly psychological thriller The Surfer. Calibrating his character’s descent into mental and physical disarray so that it happens by evenly distributed degrees, Cage is in only moderately demented form overall here. That suits director Lorcan Finnegan (Without Name, Vivarium) and screenwriter Thomas Martin’s ambitions to call back to and yet also spoof vintage Australian New Wave films like Nicolas Roeg’s Walkabout (1971), dreamtime stories about alienated outsiders.

Toxic masculinity, the Big Bad de nos jours, also seems to be on their mind although the performances and cinematic quirks (zooms, jump cuts, all that jazz) are so hammy and gestural there’s nothing subtle about the critique. But that’s what makes it fun.

Unfolding largely on a beach and its...

Irish director Lorcan Finnegan – already behind “Vivarium” – returns to Cannes with “The Surfer.” Starring Nicolas Cage, it follows a man who just wants to surf on a beach next to his old childhood home in Australia. But he is not a local anymore and he will have to fight for it – or lose his mind.

Nic’s character actually references “surfing as a metaphor for life.” Why did you want to explore – and maybe also mock – this philosophy?

I met Thomas Martin, who wrote the film, years ago. We wanted to do something together and then he mentioned “The Surfer.” It was about this one man, trying to deal with who he thinks he is and what he actually wants over the course of five days. It felt very contained, challenging and appealing to me as a filmmaker.

At the beginning of the film, The Surfer says: “You either surf,...

Edward Bond, the Oscar-nominated Blow-Up screenwriter and playwright whose Saved and Early Morning were banned in the UK, fueling a legal review that led to the end of stage censorship in the country, has died, his agency said. He was 89.

Casarotto Ramsay and Associates said he died Sunday but did not reveal the cause.

“Edward was one of the greatest dramatists of the 20th century,” the agency tweeted. “He made his mark upon the theatrical world with radical, thought-provoking, and unerringly original work.”

Bond’s first screenplay was the English-language dialogue for Blow-Up, Michelangelo Antonioni’s 1966 classic that starred David Hemming and Vanessa Redgrave. Earning him an Original Screenplay Oscar nom, it was the first of about a dozen film credits including Walkabout (1971) and Laughter in the Dark (1968).

Born on July 18, 1934, in London, Bond quit school as a teenager and would see his debut play, The Pope’s Wedding, produced...

The dystopian sci-fi film "Logan's Run" is set in a supposedly idyllic future society where residents above 30 mysteriously disappear. The hedonistic metropolis is enclosed by a dome, and those who choose to explore the world outside — and the secrets that it holds — are labeled "runners." Michael York stars in the film as the titular protagonist, an undercover police officer who infiltrates the runners only to find that he, too, opposes the laws that he once worked to uphold and helps them lead an uprising.

"Logan's Run" was nominated for its cinematography and set decoration in the 1977 Academy Awards. It even received a special achievement award for its visual effects. The futuristic set and costume design were almost identical to the smash-hit sci-fi adventure film "Star Wars: Episode IV -- A New Hope," which was released the following year. It's possible that "Star Wars" even drew inspiration from the 1976 film. However,...

Carrie Fisher took the virginity of Indiana Jones. At least, that's how she told it while she was alive. Specifically, that's what she told me. In her own words: "I wrote it with George [Lucas.] We wrote Indiana Jones losing his virginity to Mata Hari. It went very well."

I had been asking about her work on the "Star Wars" prequel trilogy, so this answer came a bit out of left field. However, it's a little-known fact that Fisher worked as a writer on many George Lucas projects, doing an uncredited polish on the scripts for the prequels and even coming up with adventures for Indiana Jones to go on in his TV series, "The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles." 

So, how did Indiana Jones actually lose his virginity, and what part did Fisher play?

Read more: The 18 Best Action Movie Actors Ranked

Bigger Than Life

"She was a bigger-than-life character and...

Nicolas Roeg was an English director who hit his creative peak in the 1970s. He started as a cinematographer before transitioning to directing with the Mick Jagger-starring Performance in 1970. From there, he quickly made a name for himself with his dark, violent narratives as well as his fragmented and disorienting visual style, including disruptive editing. His most well-known movies are his influential horror Don't Look Now, outback thriller Walkabout, and the Roald Dahl adaptation The Witches.

The feature debut of director Barnaby Clay, Magnet Releasing’s The Seeding centers on a hiker who gets lost in the desert and seeks refuge with a woman who is living alone.

He soon discovers that she might not be there willingly…

Today, as the film releases in theaters and on PVOD, Magnet has exclusively provided Bloody Disgusting with a sneak preview clip that you can watch below.

Clay tells us, “The film has been gestating for a long time, so it’s thrilling for people to finally get to experience it. I say ‘experience’ because I set out to make The Seeding as immersive as possible. It’s not a film to feel removed from, it’s an experience that drags you though the sand, the heat, the decay, and also natural beauty of the world it takes place in.

“I had a similar feeling watching certain films from the ’70s,...

Ghosts! Giant monsters! Terrifying trunks and deadly deserts! This week’s new horror releases bring various threats into the final days of January, and we’ve got the full rundown for you.

Here’s all the new horror releasing January 23 – January 28, 2024!

For daily reminders about new horror releases, be sure to follow @HorrorCalendar.

This year’s first new theatrical release for the horror genre was Universal, Blumhouse and producer James Wan’s Night Swim, which is now available to rent/purchase at home.

You can rent the film for $19.99 or purchase it (digitally) for $29.99.

Direcred by Bryce McGuire, Night Swim was released into theaters on January 5, 2024. To date, the film has managed to scare up $36 million at the worldwide box office.

Meagan Navarro wrote in her review for Bd, “McGuire’s feature expansion [of his short film, also titled Night Swim] showcases more ways to mine terror from the aquatic concept, buoyed by a great cast,...

U.K. sales and distribution outfit Blue Finch Films has boarded worldwide rights, excluding Australia and New Zealand, to thriller “Birdeater.”

The debut feature from filmmaking duo Jack Clark and Jim Weir follows a bride-to-be who is invited to join her own fiancé’s bachelor party on a remote property in the Australian outback. But as the festivities spiral into beer-soaked chaos, uncomfortable details about their relationship are exposed, and the celebration soon becomes a feral nightmare.

Blue Finch describes the film as “an unapologetic look at how Australia’s iconic masculine identity has become incompatible with contemporary gender politics.” The film stars Shabana Azeez (“Run Rabbit Run”) and Mackenzie Fearnley (“Operation Buffalo”) as the soon-to-be-wedded couple. Written by Clark, the film is produced by Stephanie Troost and Ulysses Oliver of Breathless Films. The Australian and New Zealand rights are with Umbrella Entertainment.

The film screened at the Melbourne International...

Barnaby Clay has directed music videos for the likes of Yeah Yeah Yeahs and Take That, created unique art installations, won awards for making short films, and crafted the documentary Shot! The Psycho-Spiritual Mantra of Rock. Now he has made his narrative feature directorial debut with the horror film The Seeding, which is set to reach theatres and PVOD on January 26th. With that date just one month away, a trailer for The Seeding has arrived online and can be seen in the embed above.

Starring Scott Haze of Venom and Jurassic World: Dominion and Kate Lyn Sheil of The Sacrament and She Dies Tomorrow, the film has the following synopsis: When a hiker gets lost in the desert, a gang of feral children propelled by haunting legacies traps him in a sadistic battle for survival with a frightening endgame. Here’s an alternative synopsis: A hiker lost...

The feature debut of director Barnaby Clay, Magnet Releasing’s The Seeding centers on a hiker who gets lost in the desert and seeks refuge with a woman who is living alone.

He soon discovers that she might not be there willingly…

Ahead of the film’s release in theaters and on PVOD January 26, 2024, Magnet has exclusively provided Bloody Disgusting with the trailer and poster for Clay’s The Seeding.

The filmmaker tells us, “The film has been gestating for a long time, so it’s thrilling for people to finally get to experience it. I say ‘experience’ because I set out to make The Seeding as immersive as possible. It’s not a film to feel removed from, it’s an experience that drags you though the sand, the heat, the decay, and also natural beauty of the world it takes place in.

“I had a similar feeling watching certain films from the ’70s,...

Lost continues to stand as an iconic TV series, leaving a lasting impact through its unique elements. Lost used a non-linear narrative structure that was ahead of its time to support its character-driven storytelling. J.J. Abrams, who co-created the show, implemented the mystery box approach, a term he popularized, to Lost.

Almost two decades later, Lost continues to stand as an iconic and culturally transformative TV series, leaving a lasting impact on the modern television landscape through its narrative structure, genre-bending, and character-driven storytelling. The show unfolds as a group of survivors finds themselves stranded on a mysterious island. Realizing they are not alone, they must set aside their differences and work together to survive while facing numerous seemingly scientific and supernatural threats.

Upon its release, Lost was a cultural phenomenon, gaining immense popularity for its innovative storytelling, diverse characters, and mystery. It became known for its watercooler moments, where...

Spoilers are ahead for both Australia (2008) and Faraway Downs.

Faraway Downs rewrites the ending of Australia, killing off Hugh Jackman's character and leaving Nicole Kidman's Lady Ashley alone at the end. Lady Ashley realizes she must let go of her adopted son, Nullah, and embrace her own story, apart from the white savior mindset. The miniseries reveals the Drover's real name as Jack Clancy and emphasizes the importance of claiming one's own story.

It's no secret that director Baz Luhrmann changed the ending of Faraway Downs, the 2023 miniseries that serves as a recut of the movie Australia. Perhaps surprisingly, however, Faraway Downs' ending is different from the feature film in several crucial ways. The new Hugh Jackman and Nicole Kidman show isn't actually that new. During the height of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020, Luhrmann had to pause production on Elvis, leading him to explore a trove of unused footage from Australia,...

The holidays are upon us, so whether you looking for film-related gifts or simply want to pick up some of the finest the year had to offer in the category for yourself, we have a gift guide for you. Including must-have books on filmmaking, the best from the Criterion Collection and more home-video picks, subscriptions, magazines, music, and more, dive in below.

Giveaways

In celebration of our holiday gift guide, we’ll be doing a number of giveaways! First up, we’re giving away My First Movie Vol. 2, a three-part ‘lil cinephile series by Cory Everett and illustrator Julie Olivi, featuring My First Spaghetti Western, My First Yakuza Movie, and My First Hollywood Musical.

Enter on Instagram (for My First Yakuza Movie), Twitter (for My First Hollywood Musical), and/or Facebook (for My First Spaghetti Western) by Sunday, November 26 at 11:59pm Et. Those that enter on all three platforms...

Australian and New Zealand indie distributor Umbrella Entertainment will launch Brollie, a free of charge, ad-supported streaming service later this month. It will lean on Umbrella’s library of classic content and claims to be the first free streaming platform specializing in Australian film and TV content.

Brollie will launch on Nov. 23 with over 300 titles including: “Babadook”; “Two Hands” (dir. Gregor Jordan, 1999); cult classics “Sweat”; “Erskineville Kings”; and “Cut” starring Kylie Minogue.

Brollie will also have a section for Indigenous Australia, including a collection of films starring Aboriginal screen legend David Gulpilil. These include “Walkabout”; “Storm Boy”; and “The Last Wave”.

A documentary slate includes “Servant or Slave” and “Ablaze”.

Subscribers will be invited to be part of the Brollie Film Club, where Brollie’s in-house team handpicks the best of the catalogue twice a month. Members can terrify themselves with the ‘Australian Nightmares’ collection exploring the best of Aussie...

Before Baz Luhrmann took award season by storm with "Elvis," he made "Australia." If you've forgotten about the 2008 epic starring Nicole Kidman and Hugh Jackman, you're not alone; the movie wasn't exactly embraced upon release, and while it made plenty of money at the box office, it also became a bit of a punchline among critics that year. As Stephanie Zacharek wrote in a review for Salon, "The second half of 'Australia,' Luhrmann's attempt to pull off a wartime weeper, is so aggressively sentimental that it begins to feel more like punishment than pleasure."

So what does "Australia" have to do with "Faraway Downs"? Well, everything. The upcoming six-episode limited series set to drop on streaming next month has been branded as a reimagining of Luhrmann's movie -- a second stab at his Australian "Gone With The Wind." It's an unusual choice from an always-interesting filmmaker, and we'll know...

The acclaimed adaptation of Daphne du Maurier’s short story remains a visually immersive descent and a chilling portrayal of loss

In the opening sequence of Nicolas Roeg’s Don’t Look Now, a little girl in a red raincoat drowns in a pond in the English countryside, as her parents are nestled comfortably in a nearby estate. Roeg cuts frantically between the girl tooling around the pond in her boots and her father John (Donald Sutherland) at work inside, examining a projected image of an Italian cathedral he intends to restore. The cutting works as suspense, leaving the audience utterly helpless to stop this inevitable tragedy from happening, but it has a much more sophisticated agenda than goosing our emotions. Through color and montage effects, tied to shots like a spill that bleeds over John’s slide, Roeg dramatizes the present and predicts the future all at once, signaling the heartbreak and terror to come.

In the first of a new monthly Observer column on his favourite film-makers, Mark Kermode salutes the elliptical vision of the director of Don’t Look Now, Walkabout, Performance and so much more

This month marks 50 years since the release of Nicolas Roeg’s Don’t Look Now, a personal touchstone movie (adapted from a story by Daphne du Maurier) that is at once an occult chiller, a poignant portrait of married love, a heartfelt meditation on grief and a shaggy dog story with a grisly sting in its tail. The anniversary offers film fans an excuse to dust off this classic, alongside other hallowed 1973 movies such as Enter the Dragon, The Exorcist and The Wicker Man, which was originally the supporting feature for Don’t Look Now (how’s that for a double bill). It also allows me to kick off my new column, focusing each month on a different director, with...

In the 1960s, there were few cameramen who shared Nicolas Roeg’s ability to render sirenic, jittery sensuality at 24 frames per second—and this was an era whose dominant culture arguably cracked open and redefined the sensual palate. Even more impressively, Roeg’s gift often manifested itself most lucidly while serving the orgiastic gimmicks of Roger Corman’s The Masque of the Red Mask and the bucolic splendor of John Schlesinger’s Far from the Madding Crowd with the guarded glee of a merry prankster spiking a corporate water cooler with LSD.

But it’s not just that Roeg successfully snuck timely art into the mise-en-scène of those and other studio-centric films, it’s that he seemed incapable of recording anything but subtle art within whatever limitations his aspect ratio enforced. And so while Walkabout may have been his proper directorial debut, it’s far more significantly his final cinematographic statement.

Whenever a producer in recent times has exited their partnership with a star, quite often said producer’s output is not as robust.

It’s a different situation for Bruna Papandrea, who after peeling off from Reese Witherspoon’s Pacific Standard Production Company has been on quite a roll with such TV hits as HBO’s The Undoing, Netflix’s Anatomy of a Scandal and Luckiest Girl Alive, Hulu’s Nine Perfect Strangers and now the Prime Video limited series The Lost Flowers of Alice Hart based on Holly Ringland’s novel. This is all under Papandrea’s six-year-old production banner Made Up Stories, which is devoted to female-centric stories.

On today’s Crew Call podcast, we talk with Papandrea about why she went solo with Made Up Stories, the genesis of The Lost Flowers of Alice Hart, and more.

Lost Flowers of Alice Hart follows the story of the title protagonist.

"Lovely, Dark, and Deep" is an atmospheric slow-burn horror-thriller with a haunting and mysterious story set in the vastness of nature. The film focuses on a park ranger named Lennon who becomes obsessed with a beautiful yet eerie area where people have disappeared, including her own family member. "Lovely, Dark, and Deep" is less about clear resolutions and more about delving into the dark night of Lennon's soul, resulting in a character study that leaves a lasting impression.

Of the several types of conflict in storytelling, 'humanity vs. nature' is both one of the most interesting and one of the most underutilized. Most of these stories devolve into basic survival thrillers and dramas about someone or some group attempting to prevail against the harsh cruelties of nature. From Dersu Uzala and Walkabout to 127 Hours and The Revenant, 'humanity vs. nature' conflicts can result in some astounding films.

Sometimes, though,...

Warning! Contains Spoilers for Run Rabbit Run.Although Run Rabbit Run is a streaming success on Netflix, its bad reviews, low Rotten Tomatoes score, and audience feedback paint another picture entirely. The Australian horror movie follows the intriguing story of Sarah (played by Succession's Sarah Snook), a fertility doctor whose young daughter mysteriously claims to be the woman's long-lost sister. Throughout its first week of release, Run Rabbit Run was frequently Netflix’s #1 movie, implying that it was a big hit with subscribers.

Run Rabbit Run did not fare well when it came to reviews, however, and even the reception from general Netflix viewers has been negative. The movie has a 38% critic score on Rotten Tomatoes and only a 26% audience score. Run Rabbit Run’s ending and the slow-burn tone of the movie have been the main targets of criticism, although some defenders note that it is at least anchored...

Criterion has just announced its additions to its collection coming during September, and it includes an acclaimed documentary, international cinema and a timeless classic. Moonage Daydream, last year's masterpiece about the life and art of David Bowie will be added to the collection, joined by Luis Valdez's notorious biopic of a Mexican American musical trailblazer, La Bamba. Added to that, one of the most beloved fantasy comedies of all time, The Princess Bride, will be headed to the prestigious catalog. The final entry in the month of September will be Walkabout, the story of two children who are left to fend for themselves in the Australian outback.

Physical media buffs, it's that time of the month: The Criterion Collection has announced their releases planned for September 2023.  Nicholas Roeg's Walkabout in 4K is the standout title for me, though it may be that Brett Morgan's trippy tribute to David Bowie, Moonage Daydream, also on 4K, will ring your bell. Orson Welles' The Trial should look outstanding in 4K, if that's more your taste. Or Rob Reiner's The Princess Bride, written by William Goldman, also in 4K, should look lush and beautiful, even if you've already committed every line to memory.  As a Mexican-Irish person, I must shout out to La Bamba, though I wonder why it is only available on Blu-ray? It's a 4K digital restoration, so perhaps a 4K edition will be forthcoming. If you aren't set up...

[Read the whole post on screenanarchy.com...]...

In 1962 Orson Welles directed The Trial; in 1993 the music video for David Bowie’s “Jump They Say” paid tribute in a characteristically pop-art fashion; in 2022 Brett Morgen’s Moonage Daydream gave a small window into the video’s making; and in 2023 both films––by extension bits of “Jump They Say” to boot––arrive on 4K from Criterion. For Welles it’s all about the deep blacks and luminescent grain; in Morgan’s case (but also Bowie’s) it’s the wealth of archival material and DTS-hd.

Their September slate also boasts two 4K upgrades, one recent and one legacy: The Princess Bride jumps to 2,160 pixels just five years after its Blu-ray edition, while longtime favorite Walkabout ought to look flaberrgastingly sharp. Meanwhile, La Bamba arrives on Blu-ray.

Find artwork below and more at Criterion.

The post The Criterion Collection’s September Slate Brings Orson Welles, David Bowie, The Princess Bride,...

Nothing can look pretty gorgeous in widescreen, and there was quite a lot of it in the Australian New Wave of the '70s. The daunting expanse of the Outback provided the canvas for several classic films of the period, such as two masterpieces that were roughly analogous to the folk horror genre emerging in Britain around the same time: Nicholas Roeg's "Walkabout" and Ted Kotcheff's controversial "Wake in Fright." In these movies, the stark setting created a dislocating sense that white settlers don't belong in such a harsh and humbling environment, adding to their aura of unease.

Most of the notable films of the Aussie New Wave were set in the past or present but, as the '80s beckoned, the biggest hit of the bunch looked to the future in George Miller's "Mad Max." Unlike "Walkabout" and "Wake in Fright," which were both shot in the heart of the Outback,...

Lady in a Cage: de Heer’s Dystopia Explores the Enduring Echoes of Colonialism

Dutch-born director Rolf de Heer has been a mainstay of Australian cinema since the mid-1980s, though his most well-traveled films dealt specifically with a reclamation of the country’s Indigenous population. Titles like Ten Canoes (2006) and Charlie’s Country (2013) featured Aboriginal actor David Gulpilil. Gulpilil died at the age of sixty-eight in 2021, which seems to have led de Heer to his most distressing film to date with The Survival of Kindness, a more experimental take on racism and colonialism featuring newcomer Mwajemi Hussein.…...

It is probably Australia. But it could be anywhere where the sun is hot enough to bake the earth into boundless stretches of cracked crazy-paving. It is probably an alternate recent past. But it could be any period in human history when mankind has divided itself into categories of oppressor and oppressed. The most remarkable aspect of Rolf de Heer’s elegiac, elemental “The Survival of Kindness” is that it is an allegory so direct as to be obvious, told in a style so spartan as to be opaque. Not one syllable of intelligible language is spoken, but the choral anguish of generations subjugated to colonial cruelty rings loud through every wordless frame.

In a forbiddingly desolate desert landscape, shot with Dp Maxx Corkindale’s elegantly unadorned realism, the only evidence of humanity is the very definition of inhumanity: a crude iron cage in which is locked a woman (an...

Fans of “The English Patient” will soon get their wish to see Ralph Fiennes and Juliette Binoche reunite on screen for the first time in 25 years. The pair will star in a new take on Homer’s ancient classic “The Odyssey” called “The Return” as directed by Uberto Pasolini. Bleecker Street has acquired the rights to the film for a planned release in 2024.

“The Return” was first announced in April with both Fiennes and Binoche attached, but the details haven’t firmed up until now. Bleecker Street picked up the North American theatrical rights to the movie out of the European Film Market (EFM) going on now in Berlin. HanWay Films will maintain international rights, and has already locked deals in several territories.

Production on “The Return” will kick off in Greece this spring, filming in Corfu and the Peloponnese, before continuing in Italy.

The film tracks the events at...

In one of the first domestic deals ahead of this year’s Berlin European Film Market, Bleecker Street has picked up North American rights to The Return, an historical epic based on Homer’s ancient classic The Odyssey and starring Ralph Fiennes and Juliette Binoche.

Uberto Pasolini, director of Nowhere Special and producer of The Full Monty, will direct the feature from a script he co-wrote with Edward Bond (Blow-Up, Walkabout) and John Collee (Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World).

After 20 years away, King Odysseus (Fiennes) washes up on the shores of Ithaca, haggard and unrecognizable. Much has changed in his kingdom since he left to fight in the Trojan war. His beloved wife Penelope (Binoche) is now a prisoner in her own home, hounded by her many ambitious suitors to choose a new husband, a new king. Their son Telemachus, who has grown up fatherless, is...