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Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes Of Grindelwald (2018) – Crucio

Released: 15th November
Seen:15th November

Official Trailer For Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald (2018)

For most of my life, I’ve been a huge fan of the Harry Potter franchise. I got the first two books from my grandmother for Christmas long ago, just before the third one came out in 1999 (FEEL OLD YET!?) and since then I was that person who had to get the new one on the day it went on sale. I was such a fan that I preordered a copy of the final book and still was in line outside the store before 6am on the day that it went out (Because Australia didn’t do a midnight release) just so that I could get my hands on it. I devoured the last book in 2 days. Every movie I went to see with another one of my grandparent’s, the same one who I mentioned taking to see Christopher Robin a while ago, and we always would go on opening day to see it with a packed theatre and enjoy the absolute glee that came with seeing these books that we loved being brought to life. I was there watching as these major elements of my childhood became reality but when they announced they were doing Fantastic Beasts And Where To Find Them, I wasn’t interested. By the time that movie came out I was in my late 20s and was cynical about so much, I believed it to be nothing but a cheap cash grab created by Warner Brothers because they were desperate to have a steady income since their superhero movies kept turning out to be giant steaming piles of excrement littering the cinematic pavement. Since I knew I would be reviewing the sequel today, last night I decided to finally watch the original Fantastic Beasts movie and I found it to be genuinely delightful. Sure, I was right about it being a cash grab designed to rake in obscene amounts of money from a reputable brand name but at least it tried to be entertaining. It had a charm to it, a warmth that emanated throughout the film that was infectious. It was basically Pokemon but with wizards in it and I was excited to see where they were going to take this story, maybe it was going to be more than just a cheap excuse to slip a hand into my wallet and extract a few bucks.

…so, I’m back to being a cynic again.

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Venom (2018) – Like A Film, In The Wind

Released: 4th October
Seen: 13th November

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So today we lost one of the greatest creators who ever lived. The incomparable Stan Lee passed away, leaving behind him a universe of characters that have spent the last decade changing the film landscape. If you’ve been to a cinema to see a film in the last 10 years, chances are that Marvel’s logo popped up and so did Stan in one of his iconic cameo’s. The most recent in the tidal wave of films to come out is Venom, the last theatrically released Marvel film during Stan’s lifetime and it seemed appropriate for me to see it the day the news broke… for the record, he has a cameo in this one, and I won’t pretend I didn’t tear up a little. While I was doing that though, I was also thinking “Damn… I wish this was a better film right now”

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A Star Is Born (2018) – Come On Everybody, Shout Out Loud

Released: 18th October
Seen: 9th November

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There is probably no movie that’s been remade more times than A Star Is Born. It started as a film called “What Price Hollywood” back in 1932 before it got the iconic title we now know in 1937 when Janet Gaynor took on the lead role. It was an episode of the TV series Robert Montgomery Presents back in 1951. 1954 brought us the Judy Garland version of this story. Barbra Streisand had her turn at it in 1976 and now it’s Lady Gaga’s turn to take on the role of a young songwriter who falls for an older alcoholic who slowly pulls her into the spotlight and might end up taking her down with him… I look forward to the remake in 2035 when a sentient AI that sings will star in the new version.

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Boy Erased (2018) -You’ve Got To Hide Your Love Away

Released: 8th November
Seen: 8th November

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In 2016, Gerrard Conley released a memoir titled “Boy Erased” about when his family enrolled him into conversion therapy in hopes of turning their gay son straight. Conversion therapy is a non-scientific form of therapy (As in, it’s not actually therapy) that claims to be able to make someone straight, something that the American Psychiatric Association says you can’t do but since when has religious fundamentalists ever listened to science? This film is an adaptation of that memoir and is meant to be a deep exploration of what happens during conversion therapy in an attempt to educate the masses of its real dangers… they have the best of intentions, I’ll give them that.

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Halloween (2018) – No More Days Till Halloween, Silver Shamrock

Released: 25th October
Seen: 31st October

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In 1978, an unknown director named John Carpenter was given the chance to make a movie about a man in a mask who stalks babysitters. He worked with Debra Hill, who he had worked with on the film Assault on Precinct 13, and together they created Halloween. The original movie not only launched the career of Jamie Lee Curtis but it also created one of the longest running franchises in horror movie history and, effectively, created the slasher genre. Yes, there were films before Halloween that we now count as slashers, but Halloween popularised it and created a very basic formula that dominated the horror landscape for decades. If you see a horror film today, the odds are good that someone at some point will cite the original Halloween as an inspiration. It’s also a series with a timeline so confusing that it can really be impossible to follow. Say what you will about series like Nightmare on Elm Street or Friday the 13th, those series were relatively good at keeping a consistent story between films. Halloween has had several story changes, major plots dropped, main characters die only to come back in the next film, a full-fledged reboot and even a departure to tell a story about witches. Hell, even THIS film is confusing enough since it shares an identical title with two other films in this franchise. It’s confusing, so let me try and ease that confusion.

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Bohemian Rhapsody (2018) – Mama, just saw a film…

Released: 1st November
Seen: 26th October (Advance Screening)

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I want to start with a simple declarative statement of fact. Everyone’s favourite band is Queen. I know you’re going to say “Mine isn’t, mine is (Insert the wrong answer here)” but just be honest, every single person on the planet loves Queen in some form. You know at least 5 of their songs, you’ve sung We Will Rock You on the school bus, you bang your head to the song that this movie borrows its title from, they’re everyone’s favourite band and that’s the end of that discussion. This leads us to ask why it’s taken so long for Hollywood to make a biopic out of them, this film has been stuck in development hell for eight years. Sacha Baron Cohen was going to be Freddie, but he bailed due to creative differences, then it was going to be Ben Whishaw but he was also replaced by Rami Malek who gets the honour of saying that he brought Freddie Mercury to the screen and god damn it did he bring him to the screen.

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Bad Times At The El Royale (2018) – The Royale Without Cheese

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Released: 11th October
Seen: 12th October

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Right on the borderline between California and Nevada, there stands a hotel that’s perfectly divided between the two states. That hotel is called the El Royale and it has one heck of a bad history, a history that’s been meticulously recorded on orders from the Management. One particularly dreary night, a bunch of strangers walk into the hotel. Each one hiding a secret that they are unwilling to share with anyone, but the night is young and there is no telling just what secrets will be revealed at the El Royale tonight.

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Mandy

Released: 21st September
Seen: 21st September

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There are some horror movies that work best if you’re already a fan of the genre. Movies like Scream or Cabin in the Woods are films that mostly work for people who aren’t complete horror nuts but fans appreciate them on a very different level and get a whole different kind of enjoyment out of them because they are familiar with what those films are referencing and, therefore, get a better surprise when those films subvert the tropes that they’re referencing. Mandy is a film that definitely fits into that group, it might work wonderfully for non-genre fans but for fans of Horror and especially fans of 70’s-80’s horror, it’s something special.

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The Nun

Released: 6th September
Seen: 19th September

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The Conjuring cinematic universe started as a 2013 low budget horror film about Ed and Lorraine Warren, a pair of paranormal investigators who were basically highly effective charlatans (in my opinion) and from there the franchise has exploded to include a sequel and two spin-offs, one of which also got a sequel of its own. There’s no sign that this series is going to stop any time soon, with a third Conjuring film on the way, another Annabelle film being released next year and even a film called The Crooked Man being planned which will follow another monster from the movies. The marketing behind these movies is genius, just slip a monster into one of the main movies in the franchise and then let the spin-off movies explain it’s origin story. That’s how we got The Nun because that was the big bad of Conjuring 2 so therefore we need to know how The Nun became The Nun… apparently.

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