MONSTERS– tag –

(Neo, Uncooked Media) Thanks to his friend, Ryo, the sensitive, weepy Akira is merged with a demon in a blood-drenched orgy. Now he transforms into the berserk hero Devilman, created to save humanity. Or was he? Now on Netflix, Devilman ...

(Judge Dredd Megazine, Rebellion) Stake Land is a zombie apocalypse picture. The undead may burn in the sun, and they may be dispatched by pointy sticks rather than headshots, but the film still belongs on the “Z” side of the library, no...

(Sight & Sound, BFI) In 2153, a space probe discovers Tanis, an Earth-like planet which can support human life. A giant spacecraft, the Elysium, is launched towards it, carrying thousands of humans in artificial hibernation. Some tim...

My review of the Netflix series Love, Death and Robots is on the AlltheAnime website (although the series itself isn't an anime).

(Judge Dredd Megazine, Rebellion) I saw Ruben Fleischer's comic Zombieland expecting little and enjoyed immensely. True, there's a big problem with the concept; it's a zombie pic where the two key characters are a college-age maybe-coupl...

(Neo, Uncooked Media) Ajin is Tokyo Ghoul meets 24. That’s not a subtle analysis, but then this horror-action-thriller isn’t in it for the subtlety. It’s about grabbing the viewer early and propelling you through chases, story rug-pulls,...

(Judge Dredd Megazine, Rebellion - I also have an interview with the director Gareth Evans about the film on the MangaUK blog.) Monsters is already the subject of much buzz, although it’s one of these films where the punditry blurs two t...

(Neo, Uncooked Media) Grimgar does something unusual and impressive. It tells a fantasy adventure story that’s a small story of everyday, mundane, universal life and death. It’s about kids in a world of magic and monsters, one of the mos...

(Judge Dredd Megazine, Rebellion) The Cabin in the Woods (out now), produced by Joss Whedon, directed by his former Buffy collaborator Drew Goddard, and written by both of them, has had a favourable reception from reviewers. The film is ...

(Sight & Sound, BFI) Denmark, AD 507. The ageing Norse King Hrothgar holds debauched revels in his drinking hall. These disturb a monstrous giant in the hills above, who attacks the hall and slaughters many of Hrothgar’s people. Hrot...

(Judge Dredd Megazine, Rebellion) After the accomplished Carriers at the end of last year – the one in which Star Trek’s Chris Pine was an utter bastard on a plague-emptied world – it’s heartening to see another earnest apocalypse that d...

(Judge Dredd Megazine, Rebellion) “John Carter of Earth? John Carter of Mars sounds much better.” So the titular hero of the planetary-romance screen blockbuster John Carter renounces his birthworld and homo sapiens peers, as Sam Worthin...

(Neo, Uncooked Media - I also add further observations in an article on the AllTheAnime website.) Schoolgirl Hitomi is whisked to Gaea, where there be dragons, princesses, cat-girls and a war waged by an enemy fixated on fate. Protected ...

(Sight & Sound Magazine, BFI) New England, the present. In the town of Blithe Fell, eleven year-old Norman sees ghosts wherever he goes, while his family and schoolmates think he’s deranged. Norman is pestered by his eccentric uncle ...

(SFX Magazine, Future Publishing) A century ago, some of the first stop-motion cartoons were goofy caveman comedies by Willis O'Brien, who later animated King Kong. Now Britain's favourite stop-motion colossus, Nick Park, offers a plasti...

(Sight & Sound, BFI) Disney’s new version of The Jungle Book remakes a 49 year-old cartoon – the 1967 Jungle Book – using post-Avatar technology. Directed by Jon Favreau (Iron Man), the film was largely made in CGI, with the live-act...

(Judge Dredd Megazine, Rebellion) The cannily populist Attack the Block, by new director Joe Cornish, is about an interstellar first contact with the most feared life-forms in the universe. We are talking, of course, about London hoodies...

Clash of the Titans is a throwback to a throwback, not unusual for a fantasy film, but less predictable than the revivals of Star Wars and Indiana Jones for new generations. The first Clash of the Titans opened in summer 1981, on the sam...

(SFX Magazine, Future Publishing) How do you solve a problem like Godzilla? We’re not asking how you kill the King of Monsters. Don’t be silly; he shrugs off bullets, treads on tanks and eats nukes sunny-side up. And as the original 1954...

(Sight & Sound, BFI) Following a hostile response to The Golden Compass (2007), the last big fantasy film, the fleet-footed The Spiderwick Chronicles has enjoyed a much warmer reception in America. The film is produced by the Nickelo...

(Neo, Uncooked Media - I also wrote a review of the first live-action Parasyte film for the MangaUK website.) (Volume 1) Parasyte starts with its money shot. A middle-aged husband and wife face each other in a dimmed room; then the man’s...

(SFX Magazine, Future Publishing) The sign on the soundstage door warns, “Wolves on set.” Within, the fairy-tale forest is darkened. This is a night scene, in which scared peasants are trying to lure one of the predators into a trap. A h...

(Judge Dredd Megazine, Rebellion) Let Me In (out now), as readers of this column must surely know, is the English-language remake of the hugely acclaimed Swedish film, Let the Right One In. It’s a lyrical tale about a tender and bloody l...

My article on the original Japanese Godzilla is on the MangaUK blog. https://youtu.be/KNDH2mX8wf4 [amazon_link asins='B000CFX5M8' template='ProductAd' store='anime04c-21' marketplace='UK' link_id='d0ced917-9c4a-11e8-80d7-4d46f2def6d7']