People are funny sometimes, and not in a good way. They see that an animated foreign film is playing at a festival, and without doing any research about it, they drag their young kids along.

These days’ documentaries connect and talk to me more than any other genre. I see some amazing films in any given year, and without a doubt, documentaries often make up more than half of them.

Winter Nomads, Bonjour Tristesse, The Shinning and Amour 

When you’re reading the programme for a film festival, and you see that a film won the Palme d'Or at Cannes, you pretty much automatically mark it down as a film to see. This is exactly what I did when I came across this one, and I even decided to read nothing more about the film.

Watching classic films on DVD is one thing, but when you get the chance to see them, maybe for the first time, on the big screen, you can’t turn that down! So that’s exactly what I did when I saw this movie was on the NZIFF schedule!

A good way to get the day started at a film festival is to see a light hearted film, be it narrative, or a documentary.

I’ve been in a nostalgic mood of late when it comes to films, but it’s mainly because I’ve decided to make my way through those top 100 lists you often see in film magazines.

'Shaka Zulu' was a damn interesting and well made show, if not a little dated. Though it still had me often cringing at trying to work out how they managed such a massive production, as every 3rd or 4th shot seemed to be an impressive set piece.

I’m one of the more balanced film reviewers around, as I tend to see the good in most things, and so it takes a really bad film for me to go-to-town on it in my review. So normally I use my 150 words in a positive way, but for this film, I don’t have any positive words to use.

I love me a bit of Hong Kong cinema, but like with any country that makes films, they have hits and misses just like the rest. So when deciding to check out one of their films, it’s bound to be a bit of a lottery sometimes.