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Screen Best - by Andrew McMurtry

 
I'm a journalism student just looking to publish some movie reviews. I love movies and want to share my thoughts with the blogosphere. I hope you like my reviews and please comment, positive or negative, any are welcome. All images are found on Google images and all ideas are my own and based on things I've read.

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REVIEW: Storm Surfers: New Zealand (2010)

Rating: $12.00

Just watching any surfer dumped by normal size wave is usually a cringe worthy event. So when renowned surfer Ross Clarke-Jones is dumped by a massive 25ft monster at the Pedra Branca break off the coast of Tasmania warming up for a trip to New Zealand, you fear for his life and safety. But this is all part of the life he and surf life partner (and two-time world champ) Tom Carroll has chosen. These two, with trusty meteorologist Ben Matson, make up the Storm Surfers. Their goal: to search the world for the biggest waves possible, usually during massive storms (hence the name, and the meteorologist).


Storm Surfers: New Zealand is the latest doco by the legendary daredevil surfers and is filled with giant waves and even bigger laughs. These guys do not take themselves too seriously and it helps the whole film feel very relaxed. It’s not all about the waves and the boys though. New Zealand provides an almost cinematically exquisite backdrop with glorious snow capped mountains, brilliant bays and fickle weather, making this a more complex surfing documentary than meets the eye. Storm Surfers: New Zealand is required viewing for anyone who even remotely enjoys surfing.


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August 9th 2010 @ 05:25

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REVIEW: Strength and Honour (2007)

Rating: $9.50

Strength and Honour begins on a sad note. However, it sets up the Irish drama for the next 90 minutes. And although rather predictable, it is a well-made, yet simplistic film. Michael Madsen plays Sean Kelleher, a widowed ex-boxer, who finds out his son Michael will die if he can’t raise $300,000 needed for an experimental surgery in America. On top of that, he has to sell his house and become part of a traveller’s caravan community. His last hope is taking up boxing again to fight in a tournament, where he will come up against sinister six-time champion Smasher O’Driscoll (Vinnie Jones


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August 9th 2010 @ 05:14

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NEWS: Battle of Fighting Piracy Falling to Filmmakers (Edited Version found at FILMINK.com)


An exciting new Aussie film is set to revolutionise the way films are distributed in an attempt to combat the threat of internet piracy.

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June 28th 2010 @ 13:32

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REVIEW - The Horseman (2008)

Rating: $9.50

Tense and unflinching, The Horseman is everything you’d expect from a hardcore revenge thriller. Set in Queensland, it follows Christian (in a commanding physical performance by Peter Marshall) seeking retribution for the drugging and rape of his only daughter on a porn video, culminating in her murder. We first meet Christian brutally torturing and murdering an accomplice to the shoot. And it doesn’t hold back, as Christian beats, tortures and murders his way through the hierarchy of a gang’s porn syndicate until he gets to the top. It’s ultimately a revenge story in the same vein as Taken and Edge of Darkness


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June 14th 2010 @ 12:59

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DVD REVIEW: The Final Destination (2009)

ScreenBest Rating: $2 in 2D, $4 in 3D

Death can’t come fast enough for this unnecessary extension to the successful franchise. As with the others in the series, the fourth instalment has a group of people cheating death, before Death comes after them, killing each in an incredibly coincidental way. This story follows Nick (Bobby Campo), Lori (Shantel VanSanten), their friends and a few unlucky NASCAR fans who Nick saves from a grisly death at the race track due to a premonition


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June 14th 2010 @ 10:17

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REVIEW: Going Vertical: The Shortboard Revolution

Rating: $10.00

David Bradbury isn’t the kind of filmmaker you’d expect to make a surfing documentary. Having been hired by the ABC as radio journalist in 1972, David has since made over 20 documentary films, mostly exposing political oppression and environmental vandalism. He has won five AFI awards and has twice been nominated for the Best Feature Documentary award at the Academy Awards for his films Frontline in 1980, which followed war cameraman Neil Davis, and Chile: Hasta Cuando? in 1986, which looked at life in Chile under the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet and had to be filmed covertly


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May 5th 2010 @ 04:56

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2010’s 82nd Annual Oscar Nominations


2010 has been a year which has produced some actual competition for the major awards for the first time in several years. We all knew that Slumdog Millionaire had it in the bag before last years ceremony but this year is less easy to pick. Whether we have the sheer originality of “District 9” and “Inglourious Basterds” or the gloss and spectacle of “Avatar” and “Up”, the grittiness of “The Hurt Locker” or wit of “Up in the Air”, there are plenty of films and dazzling performances in all nominated movies that make this a truly unique and wonderful year in movies. Here are the nominees:

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March 5th 2010 @ 12:25

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Just a Side Note

I know I haven’t written that many blogs lately but I’ve been busy doing work experience at the Australian film magazine FILMINK. Hopefully with what I have learned there I can deliver some better reviews and more illuminating features as well as some editorials in the weeks and months to come. I am going to try and get some new stories as well as the old reviews to make this a more illuminating site so please bear with me for a while.

For starters I am changing the rating scale to the money scale. So from now on, and because I get student rates as a Uni student, I am going to rate on a scale of $0 to $14 which is the price I have to pay to go to a movie at the Event Cinemas in Sydney as of the beginning of March


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March 4th 2010 @ 13:30

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REVIEW - Percy Jackson and the Lightening Thief


Brilliant visuals of Greek mythology hit you right from the opening scene of the new franchise book adaption of Percy Jackson and the Lightening Thief. Under the bleak, dark sky of New York’s Empire State Building (of course America is home to the gods), a war is brewing after the world’s most powerful weapon, Zeus’ mighty lightening bolt, is stolen.

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February 12th 2010 @ 13:44

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Golden Globes 2010


Well, the Golden Globes have come and gone for yet another year. The Globes are generally a good predictor for the Academy will choose for the Oscars. And we have a pretty eclectic group this year. It probably reflects the diversity and brilliant movie-making of this year as we move into the second decade of the 21st century.

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January 18th 2010 @ 13:26

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