All posts by Jess Dunne

Director: Steven Spielberg Starring: Meryl Streep, Tom Hanks, Sarah Paulson, Bob Odenkirk Runtime: 116 minutes Steven Spielberg’s name has long been synonymous with the Great Hollywood Blockbuster. When we hear the name Spielberg, we imagine runaway boulders, we feel the ground quiver under the weight of reptilian feet, we choke on seawater. Hearing that Spielberg…

Director: Jake Kasdan Runtime: 119 mins Starring: Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnston, Kevin Hart,  Jack Black, Karen Gillan, Nick Jonas Don’t adjust your screens, that is not a typo. Jumanji: Welcome to The Jungle is a disappointment. But it’s not for the reasons you might expect. We’re used to sequels coming years after their originals these days,…

Each week, we recommend films directed by women with the aim of celebrating and highlighting female achievements in cinema. Our rec for this week is The Hitch Hiker directed by Ida Lupino in 1953 during the swells of Golden Age Hollywood.

Director: Hany Abu-Assad Starring: Kate Winslet, Idris Elba, Austin the Dog, Raleigh the Dog Running time: 103 mins The Mountain Between Us opens on Alex Martin (Kate Winslet) with a skilled American accent and an arsenal of questions, a complete contrast to Ben’s (Idris Elba) British stoic suave. They are total strangers, thrown together by bad weather…

Director: Hallie Meyers-Shyer Starring: Reese Witherspoon, Candice Bergen, Nico Alexander, Nat Wolff, Jon Rudnitsky Running Time: 97 minutes First off, Home Again is not a rom-com. Don’t listen to what the critics want to tell you. It follows Alice, played with aplomb by Reese Witherspoon, who has recently left her man-child husband (Michael Sheen) in New York and returned…

Director: Stephen Burke Starring: Tom Vaughan-Lawlor, Barry Ward, Martin McCann Running Time: 92 minutes Maze tells the story of the mass breakout of 38 IRA prisoners from the HMP Maze prison, which was built specifically for them, in 1983. Maze‘s efforts to humanise all sides of the Troubles, including those suffering on the side lines, make it a…

Gender Equality is becoming a bit of a buzz phrase to gain good PR in the entertainment industry. But when the BBC published their pay gap, and with film stars regularly coming out about their struggles for pay parity, it’s clear that we still have a long way to go to reach true equality. Creative…

Although the craggy Yorkshire landscape could easily have dominated this film, instead it provides an excellent backdrop to the delicate human story at play. God’s Own Country tells the story of Johnny Saxby, a man who exploits his position on an isolated country farm to impose emotional distance on everyone he meets. Until Gheorghe, a…

With the year that’s in it, it’s perhaps easy to imagine that we have reached gender parity in the film industry (or in Hollywood at least), what with Patty Jenkins behind the biggest blockbuster of the year and the success of female-driven stories like Atomic Blonde and The Beguiled. But considering Jenkins hadn’t directed a…

Budding female cinematographers will be glad to hear that on Saturday the 12th of August, Women in Film & Television Ireland are bringing a DOP masterclass to Brooks Hotel. The event will run from 11am to 12pm.