Renowned physicist Stephen Hawking is such a towering figure he has moved beyond the cloistered world of science and academia to become a pop-cultural icon. He has even earned the occasional appearance on the Big Bang Theory where he regularly taunts Sheldon. The Theory of Everything dramatises Hawking’s (Eddie Redmayne) life during what is arguably his most productive and tumultuous
Read moreWith its factual story of a troubled young woman trekking through rugged wilderness, the engrossing drama Wild evokes immediate comparisons with Sean Penn’s Into The Wild and the recent Australian film Tracks. While not quite as moving as Into the Wild, this film is much more successful than Tracks in conveying a story of a young woman’s quest for fulfilment
Read moreThis week on “Built For Speed” we take a look at two Oscar contenders which feature stand-out performances from their lead actors, the Stephen Hawking biopic The Theory of Everything starring Eddie Redmayne and the adaptation of Cheryl Strayed’s account of her cathartic trek across the Pacific Crest Trail in Wild which stars Reese Witherspoon. There’s also plenty of fine
Read moreIf there’s a more puerile film than The Wedding Ringer this year, God help humanity. This mindless and mirthless variation on the 80’s party animal movie formula makes Adam Sandler‘s films look like the works of Noel Coward. Admittedly, this film stars Kevin Hart of Ride Along infamy so we shouldn’t have expected much. Hart plays Jimmy Callahan a man
Read moreThe Oscars are rapidly approaching and this week ‘Built For Speed’ reviews one of the big hopefuls, Alejandro Innaritu’s Birdman. We also take a look at a film that will probably not win any Oscars, The Wedding Ringer. There’s also our usual selection of fine music with new and classic tracks from Australia and overseas with The Go Team, Sun
Read moreAlejandro González Iñárritu’s idiosyncratic serio-comic take on the machinations of theatre, the decline of cinema and the fickleness of celebrity, Birdman, has been the toast of international film festivals meaning it has arrived on our shores carrying the weight of enormous expectation. That sort expectation often leads to disappointment and that is to some extent the case here. While this
Read more