Live By Night

‘Live By Night’ Poster

The classic gangster flick is back, and Live By Night, adapted from Dennis Lehane’s novel and written, directed and produced by Ben Affleck, is a perfect source to return to the days of the 1920’s and 30’s criminal underworld and the dark world of bootlegging and organised crime. With the immaculately dressed mob bosses, and their nefarious plans carried out by teams of equally morally corrupt henchmen, the era is ripe for creating engrossing gangster flicks, and there’s a reason that it holds such a continued fascination with writers and filmmakers alike. Live By Night is the latest feature to take on this fascinating period of American crime history, but the crime genre has borne some of cinema’s most compelling and renowned films, and as such, there is a lot of competition against which to stand out and to be remembered. Does Live By Night stand up against the genre classics that influence it? Can it match it with the bosses of the crime movie world?

Batman vs Superman: Superhero Season is Back

‘Batman vs Superman’ Poster

It’s that time of year again, when the superheroes take to the screens, and offer audiences another slice of their blockbuster universes with their blends of action, humour and kick ass special effects. With Deadpool sneaking his anti-hero movie into the February-March slot, it is up to two of the biggest names in comic book folklore to kick off the superhero season in earnest, with DC’s Batman vs Superman: Dawn of Justice. A battle between two of the granddaddies of the comic book world seems like a safe bet to grab the collective attention of global audiences, and the respective worldwide box office returns would seem to suggest that that has very much been the case. Nevertheless that somewhat masks the fact that this has proven something of a divisive film overall, which has set critics against fans against dissenting fans, in a discussion which suggests that all is not as rosy in DC-ville as it is across the way at Marvel’s Studios.