Review originally published for Exposure magazine in 2018. Dystopia, ancient myth, period drama. Genres with tropes and motifs bound in time and place that penetrate The Lobster, The Killing of a Sacred Deer and most recently, The Favourite. An informal trilogy from director Yorgos Lanthimos that resonates with dynamics that…

“It is widely known, after all, that real life takes place in movement”. — Our world has stopped. This much is observable. It can be heard or rather, not heard in the empty skies, the clear roads and the absence of commute chatter. In Olga Tokarczuk’s Flights, each short story — which run from a few economical paragraphs to long passages of rich narrative…

A brief history of the most overpowered bird of all time. Contributors: Paul Kerr and Abby O’Reilly At some point in time, pigeons were invented. According to Darwin and almost every scientist on the planet, they invented themselves by accident over many many years. Maybe some form of god did…

Just before my sixth birthday, my little sister was born. Months and then weeks preceding, doctors warned my mother that it was increasingly likely that Lucy would be born with Downs Syndrome and that my mother would die. She almost did. I barely knew this at the time, I just…

Originally published with The Simple Cinephile, here. You’ve had a hard day at work. You’ve been shovelling coal into the smug mouth of a furnace, barely clothed as the hairs on your chest are singed by the flame that pays your wages. You maintain a lighthouse. Shrugging out of clothing…

Spoilers for Honey Boy (2019) and my own life below. Before I was aware of my own heartbeat, I used to believe that the thumping pulse in my ear was the sound of heavy, male footsteps climbing the stairs up to my bedroom or worse, my mothers. I would wince…