I spoke to film critic and stand up comedian Nick Bartlett about the Karl Strauss technique in Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, the mirror gag in Airplane! and the old school effects used to create the beautifully macabre world of Bram Stoker’s Dracula. (…) Continue Reading »

Four kids from the refugee camp in Bethlehem decide to visit the sea for the first time in their life. Ibrahim Handal is a cinematographer and filmmaker living in Bethlehem, who graduated in Cinematography in 2019 from Dar Al-Kalima University. (…) Continue Reading »

In the first instalment of Talking Spectacles I spoke to Matt Houlihan from The Garden Cinema about the drooling aliens of Alien, Event Horizon’s gothic spaceships and the wonderfully absurd animatronics of The Thing. Alien - This is (…) Continue Reading »

One night, while guarding his aunt’s house in a remote Lebanese village, Anis is forced to pretend he is a burglar to save his life during a break-in. An amusing short with a likeable cast. Very impressive debut short by Lebanese (now) filmmaker (…) Continue Reading »

Eissa, a 17-year-old African migrant in Egypt, races to beat the clock and save his loved ones after a violent incident, no matter what it takes. Morad Mostafa has a real knack for telling complex, intimate and three-dimensional stories from (…) Continue Reading »

A woman struggles with the pressures of motherhood and uses a childish game at a local baby group to vent her fury, sparking an unexpected chain reaction. The chaos, misery, elation, isolation and general upheaval - positive or negative - (…) Continue Reading »

A single piece of jewellery holds the story of generations. Director Ruth and her mother go back to Ethiopia and explore her mother’s story as a survivor of the Red Terror genocide. A remarkable and ambitious documentary by Ruth Hunduma. By (…) Continue Reading »

A coming of age drama about the cracks that form in childhood friendships, the vulnerability of youth and the frailty of parental figures. Avoiding didacticism and cliches, Beth Rowland shares a thoughtful, nuanced and well-told story depicting (…) Continue Reading »

In Taliban-controlled Afghanistan, a woman walks into a chadari store in Kabul to buy her first full-body veil and face an uncertain future. OSCAR-shortlisted and BAFTA-longlisted film "Yellow" is a beautiful, sensitive and intimate glimpse (…) Continue Reading »

In our final instalment for World VFX day we spoke to comedian and old school effects fan Chris Lumb about the library ghost from Ghostbusters and the face melting scene in Raiders of the Lost Ark. Ghostbusters - library ghost (Ivan Reitman, 1984) EEG When I about 7yrs old I saw Ghostbusters at the cinema with my brother and was totally blown away by this jump scare at the start, screaming (…) Continue Reading »