Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse (2023) Directors: Joaquim Dos Santos, Kemp Powers, Justin K. Thompson Screenwriters: Phil Lord, Christopher Miller, Dave Callaham Starring: Shameik Moore, Hailee Steinfeld, Oscar Isaac, Jake Johnson, Issa Rae, Bryan Tyree Henry, Luna Lauren Velez After four long years, the sequel to the “electric, atmospheric festival of colour” that was Sony Pictures Animation’s Oscar-winning, genre-defining, form-shaping Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse has arrived. The film that fought against a tried and tested formula, that rewrote the lore of a studio staple, that wa ..read more

The Little Mermaid (2023) Director: Rob Marshall Screenwriter: David Magee Starring: Halle Bailey, Johan Hauer-King, Daveed Diggs, Awkwafina, Jacob Tremblay, Noma Dumezweni, Art Malik, Javier Bardem, Melissa McCarthy For months leading up to the release of The Little Mermaid, Disney promoted their 2023 iteration as being a bold, feminist update of its 1989 animated classic. This tactic is nothing new for Disney. For nearly 10 years, beginning with Cinderella in 2015, Disney has been steadily working toward remaking all of its animated movies, justifying their existence by saying they were cor ..read more

Pam Grier is known as one of the most sought-after female action stars, with her roles in prison and crime movies prompting a legendary status within the blaxploitation boom of cinema. Blaxploitation oversaw independent, low-budget, grindhouse films primarily directed by black filmmakers, become an integral part of American cinema. These films included Scream Blacula Scream (1973), Sheba, Baby (1975), Bucktown (1975) and Friday Foster (1975), all of which Grier held lead roles in. Common facets of this movement included funk and soul scores, urban settings, and, most prominently, there was an ..read more

Fast X (2023) Director: Louis Leterrier Screenwriters: Dan Mazeau, Justin Lin Starring: Vin Diesel, Michelle Rodriguez, Tyrese Gibson, Chris “Ludacris” Bridges, John Cena, Nathalie Emmanuel, Sung Kang, Alan Ritchson, Brie Larson, Jason Momoa The Fast and Furious franchise has never remained stagnant. The films began with a cop infiltrating a gang and then becoming friends with them, and generally stuck to crime and tuner culture around the world before becoming a new beast with Fast Five. Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson’s first installment took the action-oriented franchise to a new level of absurd ..read more

“The more films our audiences come to watch, the more likely it is that we will survive. It’s that simple.” The UK’s last surviving newsreel theatre, the Tyneside Cinema in Newcastle upon Tyne, has launched a fundraising campaign to save it from closure. The North East’s only full-time independent cinema, an 86-year-old cultural institution and a registered charity, faces a stark future due to a slump in post-COVID audience numbers, the cost of living crisis, public sector spending cuts, and soaring energy bills. Specifically, Tyneside Cinema is combatting a 300% hike in energy costs and a ..read more

Thank you for playing The Film Magazine’s video game movie quiz. Remember to tell us your scores @thefilmagazine on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. Director Ari Aster has just released his third feature film Beau Is Afraid. What are the titles of his two other films?  A/. Hereditary; Midsommar Which Fast and Furious film featured a heartfelt goodbye to deceased star Paul Walker?  A/. Furious 7 The Super Mario Bros movie has set the record as the highest-grossing release in the history of its animation company. Which company made it?  A/. Illumination Entertainment (Univer ..read more

Frances Ha (2012) Director: Noah Baumbach Screenwriters: Greta Gerwig, Noah Baumbach Starring: Greta Gerwig, Mickey Sumner, Adam Driver, Michael Zegen, Michael Esper, Charlotte d’Amboise, Grace Gummer Frances Ha will strike differently in different seasons of life. A teenager might find the titular Frances (Greta Gerwig) insufferable. She does, to be fair, lament about being “poor” as she rockets around the streets of Manhattan, and she has a way of turning any situation into a story in which she is the main character. But, if you’ve suffered through your twenties, Frances Ha is gratingly rel ..read more

Plan 75 (2022) Director: Chie Hayakawa Screenwriters: Jason Gray, Chie Hayakawa Starring: Chieko Baisho, Hayato Isomura, Stefanie Arianne, Yumi Kawai, Taka Takao, Hisako Okata, Kazuyoshi Kashida What do you do when a population becomes too old to sustain itself? The idealist would argue that you find a way to look after everyone, no matter how difficult it is. Of course, good intentions aren’t always as substantive as we’d hope, and there are multiple factors which contribute to whether or not that is even possible. In Plan 75, the Japanese government has chosen to introduce a programme where ..read more

A young girl lying on her side in a field, drenched in blue dawn. Neon city lights through the distortion of a car window, its smudged colors cool and isolating. Sunlight streaming through the leaves of a Virginia wood, silent and unnerving. A marble countertop, strewn with diamonds and pink lipstick. These and countless more are the images that come to mind when you think of the movies of Sofia Coppola. They invoke a flurry of emotions and snapshots of memories. The heartbreak of first love and the loneliness of living in a foreign city. Sexual repression bubbling just below the surface. Mate ..read more

The Adventures of Robin Hood (1937)Directors: Michael Curtiz, WIlliam KeighleyScreenwriters: Norman Reilly Raine, Seton I. Miller, Rowland LeighStarring: Errol Flynn, Olivia de Havilland, Basil Rathbone, Claude Rains, Una O’Connor, Patric Knowles, Eugene Pallette, Alan Hale Sr., Melville Cooper, Ian Hunter, Herbert Mundin, Montagu Love Before Russell Crowe and Ridley Scott played it as a gritty class uprising blockbuster, and every other attempt became grey and indistinct, Robin Hood films used to be fun. Incredibly, now 85 years old, The Adventures of Robin Hood was a crown jewel in the 1930 ..read more