oddball

Writer-director Aaron Schimberg has created a diverting, if contrived, noir satire-parable about the faces we prepare to meet the faces that we meet. I’m not sure that, finally, it says as much as it thinks it’s saying, and I’m also not sure if the resemblance to early Woody Allen is intentional or not. But it is arresting and challenging with an exhilarating performance from Adam Pearson, from Jonathan Glazer’s Under the Skin, and whom Schimberg has in fact already directed in his previous feature Chained For Life.The…

At Sundance, a festival geared towards acquisition with unsold films going for the hard sell, there’s something intriguing about those that withhold. While for mysterious romance Love Me, the involvement of the Oscar nominees Kristen Stewart and Steven Yeun was enough by itself to vault the film to the top of many wishlists, its logline was less of a sure thing. A post-apocalyptic love story between a buoy and a satellite was something that people would have to see to understand and so there was an unusual sense of…

Get our free weekly email for all the latest cinematic news from our film critic Clarisse LoughreyGet our The Life Cinematic email for freeThere is a lot of “furious jumping” going on in Yorgos Lanthimos’s Poor Things. This is the phrase its heroine Bella Baxter (Emma Stone) uses to describe sex. Once she’s first stuffed a cucumber inside what she calls her “hairy business”, a new world of adventure and tragedy opens up for her.Lanthimos’s screenwriter Tony McNamara adapted the film from the novel by cult Scottish author…

German mobility startup Dolas eBike has unveiled a modern utility take on a tandem bike with the launch of the Defender 250. The odd-looking ride features three motored wheels, 4-inch fat tires, a 180-kg battery and a load capacity of 250 kg.The designers introduce the Defender 250 by saying that it "surprises not only with its appearance, but also with details that you won't find on other bikes." That certainly seems to be the case, starting with front, middle and rear wheels each built around a 250-W brushless hub motor…

Super Mario RPG MSRP $60.00 “Super Mario RPG isn't necessarily an improvement over the 1996 version, but it's at least a more approachable experience for kids.” Pros Same great base game Delightful new cinematics Excellent music More approachable combat Cons Lack of new voices…

“Benefit fraud,” someone jokes when I ask what it takes to sustain a music career in 2023. I am huddled in a flat overlooking south-east London’s Surrey Quays docks with a small cross-section of Gob Nation – the collective name for a universe of bands based mostly in these parts. If it weren’t for the fact that they’re made up of rotating combinations of the same dozen or so musicians, the 10 acts within Gob Nation would seem totally disparate. The omnivorous jangle palette of the Tubs’ recently acclaimed album Dead Meat…

Journal Reports: LeadershipCompanies Get Creative When Employees Go on Parental LeaveBy Tara WeissJuly 27, 2023 at 4:00 PM ETEmployers increasingly see parental leave as a way to give other employees, or people who have been out of the workforce, a chance to strengthen their skills. Journal Reports: LeadershipCompanies Get Creative When Employees Go on Parental LeaveBy Tara WeissJuly 27, 2023 at 4:00 PM ETEmployers increasingly see parental leave as a way to give other employees, or people who have been out of the…

While PlayStation continues to thrive thanks to big-budget games like God of War Ragnarok, two recent events show how much Sony’s video game brand is changing. The first came when the Sony-owned studio Media Molecule would end support for Dreams, a PS4-exclusive experience creation tool allowing players to build and share games with one another, later this year. Shortly after that news, PixelOpus — another Sony-owned studio — announced it would be shutting down on June 2 after publishing just two titles: Entrwined in…

The day of reckoning is fast approaching: The Nintendo 3DS and Wii U eShop isclosing down on March 27. When that happens, you’ll no longer be able to make any digital purchases on those systems. Considering that several games on each platform only ever got digital releases, it’s creating a bit of a preservation nightmare. Hidden gems that never came to another platform, like Affordable Space Adventures, will be totally lost to time. But it isn’t just obscure indies that are impacted by that change: One of Nintendo’s…

At both the Baftas on Sunday night and the Oscars next month, there’s a strong chance that the award for best animated feature will go to Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio, an astonishing stop-motion animation that uses a beloved fairytale as a springboard for a deep dive into themes of death, fascism and Catholic guilt. Yet there’s another contender that has also been dazzling audiences with its ability to blend philosophical profundity with stop-motion whimsicality – a gently absurdist mockumentary about the inner life of…