fantasy
X-Men: ApocalypseTuesday, 17 May 2016
It's getting mighty crowded in the superhero lounge. After the underwhelming Batman v Superman and the overwhelming Captain America: Civil War, here's the X-Men posse back on the warpath, once again under the bombastic helmsmanship of Bryan Singer.... Read more... |
DVD: Mysterious Object at NoonTuesday, 19 April 2016
“By their beginnings, you shall know them” is a useful motto for cinematic rediscovery. Rather than predicting how a director’s creative path may develop in the future, you go in the opposite direction to see which way, starting from his or her... Read more... |
A Midsummer Night's Dream, Lyric HammersmithSaturday, 27 February 2016
Shakespeare’s plays have proved remarkably resilient to everything that’s been thrown at them down the years, including – in the case of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, with its flowery bowers and fairies – cloying Victorian whimsy. Peter Brook’s white... Read more... |
The Mighty Handful, ROH Orchestra, Pappano, Royal Opera HouseTuesday, 09 February 2016
What fun it must have been to attend any of the St Petersburg Free Music School concerts during the second half of the 19th century. Balakirev, idiosyncratic mentor of the group briefly together as the "Mighty Handful", and his acolytes – Borodin,... Read more... |
Jessica Jones, NetflixThursday, 26 November 2015
After the roaring success of Daredevil this year, Marvel brings us the next instalment in the TV rendering of their universe – or part of it at least. Jessica Jones, created by writer Brian Michael Bendis and artist Michael Gaydos in 2001, is a... Read more... |
BlockQuestFriday, 02 October 2015
Since Crossy Road took mobile devices by storm, every developer seems intent on copying its success. Largely by copying its cute isometric retro visual approach and grafting it onto other genres. Even Crossy Road's makers are at it – Shooty Skies... Read more... |
Ravel Double Bill, GlyndebourneSunday, 09 August 2015
Ask opera-lovers to name their favourite one-acter and chances are the choice will be L’enfant et les sortilèges. Colette’s typically off-kilter fable of a destructive kid confronted with the objects and animals he’s damaged is set by Maurice... Read more... |
The Trial, Young VicSaturday, 27 June 2015
Kafka and Jones, the names above this little shop of horrors, would be a marriage made in off-kilter theatreland had the Czech genius written any plays. He didn’t, so Nick Gill has made a well-shaped drama out of the assembled fragments of which The... Read more... |
Gotham, Series 1 Finale, Channel 5 / Daredevil, NetflixTuesday, 26 May 2015
Finally reaching its concluding 22nd episode, delayed further by the "mid-season break" fashionable with American shows, Gotham [****] stands tall as a distinctive contribution to the seemingly inexhaustible superhero universe. Instead of relying on... Read more... |
The Witcher 3: Wild HuntFriday, 22 May 2015
In short, Game Of Thrones the videogame. The Witcher 3 sees this epic role-playing fantasy series truly rival its key competitor, the Elder Scrolls series. The Witcher 3 particularly scores on delivering a huge, credible and complex world with... Read more... |
Avengers: Age of UltronFriday, 24 April 2015
Joss Whedon’s Avengers sequel loses much of the original’s exhilarating freshness. It begins in the middle, doesn’t really end, and regularly makes you wonder just how long the Marvel box-office bonanza can continue. The moment when its Cinema... Read more... |
Le Roi de Lahore, Chelsea Opera Group, QEHMonday, 02 March 2015
Now that opera houses mostly lack either the will or the funds to stage the more fantastical/exotic pageants among 19th century operas – the Royal Opera production of Meyerbeer’s mostly third-rate Robert le Diable was an unhappy exception – it’s... Read more... |
