Category: Genre: Action
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Snakes on a Plane. Dir. David R Ellis. New Line Cinema. 2006.
‘At 30,000 feet, snakes aren’t the deadliest thing on this plane.’ From the taglines to the soundtrack, Ellis’ 2006 action-horror film depicts a sensationalised binary between humankind and snakes. Whilst the cold-blooded creatures are undeniably presented as hostile antagonists driven by instinct, the abundance of human violence amplifies the capacity of humankind to commit unnecessary…
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Fünf Freunde 3. Dir. Mike Marzuk. Constantin Film. 2014.
The movie “Fünf Freunde 3“ is the third filming of Enid Blyton’s book series “The Famous Five”. It is summer, and George and her dog Timmy travel to Thailand, following her father, who works on a project with an old friend concerning greenhouse gas. As usual, George brings her cousins Dick, Anne, and Julian with…
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Nope. Dir. Jordan Peele. Universal Pictures. 2022
Jordan Peele’s latest film nope follows siblings OJ and Emerald Haywood in the aftermath of their father’s unexpected death. The siblings ‘We ain’t got no more problems’ is the foreboding line said by Otis Haywood moments before his untimely death and the supernatural haunting begins on the Haywood family ranch. Jordan Peele’s latest film Nope…
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Kubo and the Two Strings. Dir. Travis Knight. Laika. 2016
Figure 1: Kubo lifted in the air by wings made of origami birds. Kubo and the Two Strings follows a boy whose life is made even more extraordinary when a perilous adventure, which his mother has tried to save him from, accidentally finds him. Kubo can tell stories using the magical music of his shamisen…
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Sonnie’s Edge. Dir. Dave Wilson. Netflix. 2019
That fear of death. Do you feel it? Are you scared now? – Sonnie Content warning: sexual assault, female violence, abuse Netflix’s animated anthology, Love Death & Robots, first aired in 2019, enticing viewers through a display of episodically unique art styles and stories. Created by David Fincher and Tim Miller, the series provided a creative leeway…
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Hoodwinked!. Dir. Edwards, Cory. Kanbar Entertainment, Blue Yonder Films. 2005.
A retelling of the folktake Little Red Riding Hood as a police procedural, using backstories to show multiple characters’ points of view.[1] Hoodwinked! follows the classic who dunnit trope, deconstructing the fable of Little Red Riding Hood with a modern twist to narrate the mystery of the Goody bandit. It entertains basic animal stereotypes to translate the…
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Train to Busan. Dir. Yeon Sang-ho. Next Entertainment World. 2016.
Content warning: This article contains images of real animal death. The opening of Yeon Sang-ho’s action-horror film Train to Busan (2016) interprets the circumstances that lead to the epidemic at the centre of the ‘zombie apocalypse’ genre through an incident with a farmer and a deer. Considering the film’s narrative is characterised by a linearity…
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Mason’s Rats. Dir. Carlos Stevens. Netflix. 2022.
“Like World War fucking IV.” The Love, Death and Robots’ episode, Mason’s Rats, centres around conflict regarding control and the co-existence of humans and animals, specifically rats, in a world dominated by technologically advanced humans. Significantly, the identities of the two clashing forces – the rats and Mason – are used to portray the errors of internecine fighting, with…
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Red River. Dir. Howard Hawks. Monterey Productions. 1948.
American expansionism and the frontier myth – the romanticisation of prosperity found in claiming the ‘wilderness’ and the forceful expansion of the American border – pillars of the Western genre [1]. From Jan Troell’s The New Land (1982), John Ford’s Wagon Master (1950) to Charlie Chaplin’s Gold Rush (1925); Western cinema has constantly glorified the rich…
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Togo. Dir. Ericson Core. Walt Disney Studios. 2019
What does he bring to the breed? The heart of a survivor. [1] The relationship between men and dogs is often explored within film. The contrast between rambunctious, troublesome animals and dominant, controlling men is a source of comedy, drama and widely popular with audiences. Seen in the likes of Beethoven[2] and Marley and Me[3],…