Top 5 Sleeper Hit Films: The Ones That Got Away
Whilst we always keep you up to date with the latest blockbusters and chart topping movie goodness, there are some gems which just seem to slip through the net.
Case in point, the Philip Seymour Hoffman-starring Synecdoche, New York (out on DVD Monday 12th October – win DVDs and more at our comp here) which is a masterclass in creativity, humour and intelligent film-making. But, of course, no-one actually went to see it.
Generic Hollywood Blockbuster No 327 was on instead. Sigh.
So here are our selection of movies that we think are awesome but didn’t quite achieve the commercial success at the box office, as well as the ones that truly exploded when they hit DVD…. Read More…
Morris: A Life With Bells On Green Carpet Premiere Report
September 28, 2009 by Sean Marland
Filed under - Home, Features
Those who regularly frequent the streets of Soho will have seen every irregular costume going in their time.
But even the most flamboyant patrons of the West End might have raised an eyebrow when a group of Morris Dancers jangled into town.
It has taken several months to get Morris: A Life With Bells On to a central London premiere and on their big night, the promoters didn’t miss their chance to bring a memorable slice of the country to the middle of the city.
This was a great night for director Lucy Akhurst and her hubby and leading star Charles Thomas-Oldham, as they watched their creation finally make it to the big screen. Read More…
5 Movie Rules of the Road
September 22, 2009 by Leonie Mercedes
Filed under - Home, Features
As well as Fox, Twinkies, and Oprah Winfrey, the US of A is blessed with thousands of miles of open road.
With the open road comes the grand tradition of the road trip, inevitably followed by the road movie.
Since Dorothy trotted down the one of yellow brick fame, the open road has been the setting of many a formative experience for the folk on screen, and if we look hard enough, there’s plenty to be learned from their god-awful experiences.
This week sees the release of the delightful Away We Go, about an expectant couple taking to the road to find the perfect place to raise their baby. It got us thinking; what has the road got to offer us, and what have movies taught us?
OTB got their motor running and headed out on the celluloid highway to find out, creating the five movie rules of the road trip. Read More…
Jamie Jay Johnson Interview: Sounds Like Teen Spirit
September 15, 2009 by Sally McIlhone
Filed under - Home, Features
When our chief film reviewer Sally McIlhone gushes over a heart-warming movie, it’s not really that uncommon a thing.
“Oh it was wonderful,” she’ll weep as she tucks into her lunch. “It touched me…. but not in the soiling way that Terminator Salvation did,” she’ll argue.
Yet her frenzied and passionate adulation for Sounds Like Teen Spirit (on general DVD release from Monday 14th September) took it to a new level. A film of which she said: “If I could roll this film out like a blanket and wrap myself up in it for eternity, I’d do it in an instant.” You can also grab that quote on the DVD box, by the way.
So when we got an opportunity to interview the Director of the movie, Mr Jamie Jay Johnson himself we knew there was only one person who could take the reigns on quizzing the man on a movie that tackles the teenage Eurovision Song Contest with surprising sincerity and warmth.
But our Editor was busy, so Sally had to do…… Read More…
Three Miles North Of Molkom Interview
September 15, 2009 by Sean Marland
Filed under - Home, Features
It’s common knowledge that organising a group of hippies is about as easy as herding cats.
So instead of attempting to harness the love that was going around at Ängsbacka festival, Rob Cannan and Corinna Villari-McFarlane decided to simply follow these tree bothers around for a week.
Three Miles North Of Molkom, the highly-acclaimed documentary which records the events in the fields of Northern Sweden, is their directorial debut and opens nationwide this Friday with special preview screenings on 16th September.
When they spoke to OTB they revealed that even film crews need to do a bit of tree-hugging from time to time… Read More…
The Most Infamous Movie Bosses Of All Time
September 10, 2009 by Leonie Mercedes
Filed under - Home, Features
Anna Wintour somewhat confirmed her reputation as a fearsome boss in The September Issue, which had us all thinking… Who are the scariest bosses we’ve ever had?
Though we’ve had a few tyrants, none are as infamous as the ones we’ve seen on screen.
Infamous bosses come in many breeds, you have the conniving ones, the spineless ones and the ones that will hurl stationery at you.
Join us for a run down of the most infamous movie bosses, and thank your lucky stars that you still get desk ornaments and weekends. Read More…
Where The Wild Things Are Video Feature
Be still our beating hearts.
Childhood opus Where The Wild Things Are is coming to the big screen and unbelievably, magically, Spike Jonze seems to have done the unthinkable.
This is looking as magical as we imagined when we read it as kids.
We’ve got this exclusive behind the scenes peek with mini-interviews with the book’s creator Maurice Sendak and the director himself.
Where The Wild Things Are is on general release across the UK from Friday 11th December.
5 Quirky Indie RomComs You May Have Missed
September 3, 2009 by Emily Moulder
Filed under - Home, Features
We know you’re probably sick of (500) Days of Summer pimpage by now but until you see it, you won’t know what you’re missing.
And we know you’re also sick of people using the word ‘quirky’ to describe movies. Well suck it up because another one is coming your way in the shape of Adventureland.
If any movie is slightly funny and has a character that isn’t clad in Topshop’s finest then it gets called quirky.
The Urban Dictionary describes the word quirky as meaning ‘unconventional, surprising, odd.’ But in terms of films the word quirky takes on a life of it’s own.
A quirky character generally displays a number of typical traits such as Picking your nose? Find out if we’re kidding…
Teasing Titles: Top 10 Misleading Movie Names
August 28, 2009 by Emily Moulder
Filed under - Home, Features
Remember those old Ronseal adverts on the tellybox?
They proclaimed that it did exactly what it said on the tin and we think movies should be the same.
We’re not saying that we want movies to be called, ‘Moderately Funny Romcom’ or ‘Pretty Crap But Good Explosions’, though that would make deciding what to see on a Friday night much easier.
For example, we would expect a movie that has a title of ‘Big Booby Sex Aliens’ to at the very least have C cup action.
All we’re asking for is a title that tells us a little bit of what we’re in for and we don’t think that’s too much to ask.
If you hop on over to our review of Funny People you’ll see why we’re a little annoyed at its title. It’s just not that funny, well, not funny enough to warrant the word funny in it’s title.
So we’ve taken it upon ourselves to tell you the other movies that can’t Look us in the eye in the morning?
In The Loop Interview: Jesse Armstrong
August 27, 2009 by Sean Marland
Filed under - Home, Features
Mr. Jesse Armstrong has been providing us with top notch comedy for longer than you might realise. Before he was tickling us with the politically-charged delights of In the Loop and The Thick of It with Armando Iannucci, he co-wrote Peep Show with pal Sam Bain, and even penned an episode of CITV favourite My Parents Are Aliens.
As the DVD form of the lauded In the Loop flies into stores this week (win it here!), we caught up with him for the skinny on swearing consultants, James Gandolfini and the future of The Thick of It.
And a jolly nice chap he was too. Enjoy. Read More..
