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Credit: David Blandy, Atomic Light, installation view, John Hansard Gallery, 2023. Courtesy the artist. Photo: Reece Straw

Atomic Light review: Solar astronomers rescue an uneven installation

22 March 2023

Four films make up Atomic Light by video and installation artist David Blandy, a work marred by overstatement, but saved by the story of two solar astronomers who drew the sun on the day of the Hiroshima blast


THE LAST OF US takes place 20 years after modern civilization has been destroyed. Joel, a hardened survivor, is hired to smuggle Ellie, a 14-year-old girl, out of an oppressive quarantine zone. What starts as a small job soon becomes a brutal and heartbreaking journey as they both must traverse the U.S. and depend on each other for survival.

The Last of Us review: An excellent example of fungal horror

18 January 2023

From Hannibal to Whitechapel and now this fine adaptation of a bestselling video game, why do fungi so often steal the show in TV thrillers, wonders Bethan Ackerley


DOWN TO EARTH WITH ZAC EFRON. Zac Efron in DOWN TO EARTH WITH ZAC EFRON. Cr. Courtesy of Netflix ?? 2022

Down to Earth with Zac Efron review: Eco-doc series makes green sexy

30 November 2022

Down Under, season two of Zac Efron's Down to Earth series, pulls off the trick he was after in the first season - making the pursuit of a greener, fairer world more desirable, finds Bethan Ackerley


The Silent Sea review: South Korean series is a slice of space horror

The Silent Sea review: South Korean series is a slice of space horror

7 September 2022

From a parched Earth, Song Ji-an joins a lunar mission to find out how her sister died. With nods to the 1972 Solaris and Alien, word-of-mouth hit The Silent Sea is an intriguing show, says Bethan Ackerley


Dr Alex Hoffman is launching VIXAL-4 to investors - an AI-driven system that exploits fear in the financial markets and operates at lightning speed to make big returns. The promise is billions, the rich are ready to get richer... but this is not the day Alex and Hugo had planned. What follows is a high-octane journey through the worst 24 hours of Alex???s life - cutting across reality, memory and paranoid fantasy, forcing him to question everything he sees with his own eyes. In the pulse of Geneva???s financial district, Alex???s sanity is shaken after he is viciously attacked at his home by a man who knows all of his security codes. After more unexplained occurrences, Alex becomes convinced he???s being framed. But as secrets surface from his past, will anyone believe that he isn???t just losing his mind? Detective Leclerc (Montel), assigned to Alex???s case, struggles to work this former CERN scientist out. Hoffman???s talented artist wife, Gabby (Farzad) might just be losing patience this time, whilst Hugo???s only concern is the billion-dollar business on the line. Invention can be lonely, and in a modern world of AI, capitalism and technological breakthroughs, Dr Alex Hoffman is about to learn the hard way how destructive his creation might be???

The Fear Index review: A psychological thriller with a dash of AI

9 February 2022

When a wealthy technology entrepreneur invents an AI-driven system capable of predicting how human fear affects the world's financial markets, nothing turns out quite as he planned


Station Eleven review: An uplifting vision of a post-pandemic world

Station Eleven review: An uplifting vision of a post-pandemic world

19 January 2022

A TV adaptation of the hit 2014 novel by Emily St John Mandel shows that culture and humanity can survive even the collapse of civilisation


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