Van Morrison: Pay the Devil (2006)
Despite the fact that only three of the songs here are composed by him – or perhaps because of it – Pay the Devil is the most distinctive of all Van Morrison’s 2000s [...]
Wu-Tang Clan, The W (2000)
I found the Wu-Tang Clan’s sophomore effort, Wu-Tang Forever, a bit of a disappointment. There are moments of real greatness and at least one song where each member of the [...]
Miller & Ogilvie: Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome (1985)
Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome is every bit as different from Mad Max 2 as The Road Warrior was from the original film. The residual 70s naturalism of Mad Max is entirely absent [...]
Moorhouse: The Fabulous Four (2024)
One of the recurring film tropes for Baby Boomers has been the old gang getting back together. As early as The Group, The Return of the Secaucus 7 and The Big Chill, the [...]
Van Morrison: Blowin’ Your Mind! (1967)
Although Blowin’ Your Mind! is technically Van Morrison’s first solo album it feels more like a work in transition. In his short work with Them, Van had pushed to the [...]
Alvarez: Alien: Romulus (2024)
The two iterations of the Alien franchise each possess a distinct conception of the xenomorph, despite their internal differences. Alien, Aliens, Alien 3 and Alien [...]
Chung: Twisters (2024)
Of all the recent efforts to reboot 80s and 90s cinema properties, Twisters is one of the most successful, and really exceeded my own expectations. Written by Mark L. Smith, [...]
Miller: Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior (1981)
The Road Warrior is a huge leap forward in the Mad Max franchise and in some ways feels like the film that George Miller wanted to make all along. The opening is mythic and [...]
Miller: Mad Max (1979)
Mad Max is Australian cinema’s defining dystopian mythology, a primordial fusion of man and machine. It takes place almost entirely on Australian highways and continually [...]
McGuire: Night Swim (2024)
Bryce McGuire’s first feature, Night Swim, is an adaptation of his award-winning short film of the same name, and it has a disarmingly brilliant premise: what if a swimming [...]