Roberto Urbina plays Angel Waters, a man working for the US Border Patrol. He has a strong moral code but one that has been overwhelmed by witnessing a plethora of horrible events. He also has an innate sense of care for the co-workers and family that surround him. In a time of stress he makes a decision that will have have long reaching consequences for all those around him.

The knock on effects of this action cause his two closest workmates, Ray Hitchcock (McCaul Lombardi) and Salomé Veracruz (Julieth Restrepo) to slowly become unraveled. Angel is effected by this as well and as things progress for the three, the lines between truth and fiction become very blurred. Add the arrival of his long lost father and Angel becomes close to his breaking point.

As things progress to the extreme, the film never really settles in to either the mystic nor the real. It tries to make its point a unique one by virtue of your participation in the sensibilities presented. Real or imagined trauma has affected all the players to the extent that they have created their own state of being. The final reveal ties things in the physical world together while leaving the other realm as enigmatic as ever.
Rob Hudson

Deadland is available now on Digital, including Apple TV, Prime Video and Google Play in Australia & New Zealand.
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Yellowstone star Cole Hauser headlines alongside Stephen Dorff (Old Henry, TVS True Detective) and Jack Kilmer (Body Brokers, Detective Knight: Independence) in the action-packed western DEAD MAN’S HAND from director Brian Skiba (The 2nd, Pursuit).

A gunslinger, headed west for a quiet life with his new bride, accidentally kills a group of outlaws when their stagecoach is ambushed. When he discovers that one of the men he slayed is the brother of the ruthless town mayor, he turns to the U.S. Marshal for help… but the mayor will not let his brother’s death go unpunished.

A gripping story of vengeance and wrath, DEAD MAN’S HAND is based on the story of popular graphic novel, “No Rest of the Wicked – Dead Man’s Hand”, written by Kevin and Matthew Minor (who also scripted the film).

When they premiered the film in U.S. cinemas last month Grindstone’s Barry Brooker said “DEAD MAN’S HAND is a compelling western with visceral, thrilling action. The movie raises the stakes in a story of righteous but ferocious revenge that will keep audiences riveted.”

DEAD MAN’S HAND launches on Digital and DVD September 13!
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Left out on the vacant plains with only her young son and newborn daughter is Hattie McAllister played by Gina Carano (of Deadpool fame). She is one tough lady and when the Captain and his crew roll up on her homestead, she provides more resistance than they could have ever imagined.

What ensues is a standoff in the grand tradition of Westerns. The Captain and his men were on the losing side of the American Civil War and lost family and friends to the marauding Northerners after the war. The Yankee’s actions spur them on to exact revenge with little consequences to their mortal souls.

As more hard truths are revealed, it changes your perception of the motivations of the Captain and his crew. It’s to the film’s advantage that Hattie is shown to be the backbone of the family and her strength is paramount to her family’s survival.
Rob Hudson

Terror On The Prairie is out now on DVD and VOD (Fetch TV, Google TV, Apple TV, YouTube Store, Telstra Store, Microsoft Store).
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Lucky Prescott (Isabela Merced AKA Dora the Explorer) is a free spirit who has lost her mother at an early age and grown up full of vigour for the world around her. Concern from her family for her future cause them to relocate her to the sleepy town of Miradero. The town is also the home of her absent father Jim (Jake Gyllenhaal). He disappeared from her life in reaction to the overwhelming grief of losing his wife, Lucky’s mother.

At first, the relaxed lifestyle of the town drives Lucky to distraction until she bonds with the wild horse Spirit. From this point forward her life becomes filled with purpose and she fights to save the wild animal and its herd from a group of rowdy wranglers led by Hendricks (Walton Goggins). This transforms the film into an epic tale of female-led heroism.

Taking full advantage of the animator’s art, the computer-generated landscapes are impressive as is the level of danger to be overcome. It treads the fine line between immediate harm and overwhelming danger and provides just the right level of thrills for the little ones. As always with films like this, it provides adult amusement as you try to figure out which character is attached to which star’s voice. You’ll be surprised by how few you get.

Rob Hudson
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Lucky Prescott (Isabela Merced, Dora and the Lost City of Gold) never really knew her late mother, Milagro Navarro (Eiza González, Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw), a fearless horse-riding stunt performer from Miradero, a small town on the edge of the wide-open frontier.

Like her mother, Lucky isn’t exactly a fan of rules and restrictions, which has caused her Aunt Cora (Academy Award® winner Julianne Moore) no small amount of worry. Lucky has grown up in an East Coast city under Cora’s watchful eye, but when Lucky presses her own luck with one too many risky escapades, Cora picks up stakes and moves them both back with Lucky’s father, Jim (Oscar®nominee Jake Gyllenhaal), in Miradero.

Lucky is decidedly unimpressed with the sleepy little town. She has a change of heart when she meets Spirit, a wild Mustang who shares her independent streak, and befriends two local horseback riders, Abigail Stone (Mckenna Grace, Captain Marvel) and Pru Granger (Marsai Martin, Little). Pru’s father, stable owner Al Granger (Emmy winner Andre Braugher, Fox’s Brooklyn Nine-Nine), is the best friend of Lucky’s father.

When a heartless horse wrangler (Emmy nominee Walton Goggins, FX’s Justified) and his team plan to capture Spirit and his herd and auction them off to a life of captivity and hard labor, Lucky enlists her new friends and bravely embarks on the adventure of a lifetime to rescue the horse who has given her freedom and a sense of purpose, and has helped Lucky discover a connection to her mother’s legacy and to her Mexican heritage that she never expected.

Spirit Untamed will be released in Australian cinemas from May!
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Universal Pictures is proud to present Tom Hanks starring in News of the World, a moving story written and directed by Paul Greengrass, reuniting for the first time with his star from their 2013 Best Picture nominee Captain Phillips.

Five years after the end of the Civil War, Captain Jefferson Kyle Kidd (Hanks), a veteran of three wars, now moves from town to town as a non-fiction storyteller, sharing the news of presidents and queens, glorious feuds, devastating catastrophes, and gripping adventures from the far reaches of the globe.

In the plains of Texas, he crosses paths with Johanna (Helena Zengel, System Crasher), a 10-year-old taken in by the Kiowa people six years earlier and raised as one of their own. Johanna, hostile to a world she’s never experienced, is being returned to her biological aunt and uncle against her will.

Kidd agrees to deliver the child where the law says she belongs. As they travel hundreds of miles into the unforgiving wilderness, the two will face tremendous challenges of both human and natural forces as they search for a place that either can call home.

News of the World is directed by Greengrass (the Bourne films, United 93) from his screenplay with Luke Davies (Lion), based on the National Book Award finalist and best-selling novel by Paulette Jiles. The film is produced by Gary Goetzman (Mamma Mia! franchise, Greyhound), Gail Mutrux (The Danish Girl, Donnie Brasco) and Gregory Goodman (22 July, 8 Mile). The executive producers are Steven Shareshian and Tore Schmidt. The film’s music is by eight-time Academy Award® nominee James Newton Howard.

News of The World is set for release in Australia on 14 January, 2021.

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Five years after the end of the Civil War, Captain Jefferson Kyle Kidd (Hanks), a veteran of three wars, now moves from town to town as a non-fiction storyteller, sharing the news of presidents and queens, glorious feuds, devastating catastrophes, and gripping adventures from the far reaches of the globe.

In the plains of Texas, he crosses paths with Johanna (Helena Zengel, System Crasher), a 10-year-old taken in by the Kiowa people six years earlier and raised as one of their own. Johanna, hostile to a world she’s never experienced, is being returned to her biological aunt and uncle against her will.

Kidd agrees to deliver the child where the law says she belongs. As they travel hundreds of miles into the unforgiving wilderness, the two will face tremendous challenges of both human and natural forces as they search for a place that either can call home.

News of the World is directed by Greengrass (the Bourne films, United 93) from his screenplay with Luke Davies (Lion), based on the National Book Award finalist and best-selling novel by Paulette Jiles. The film is produced by Gary Goetzman (Mamma Mia! franchise, Greyhound), Gail Mutrux (The Danish Girl, Donnie Brasco) and Gregory Goodman (22 July, 8 Mile). The executive producers are Steven Shareshian and Tore Schmidt. The film’s music is by eight-time Academy Award® nominee James Newton Howard.

News of the World will be released in Australian cinemas in 2021!
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The film directed by Alejandro González Iñárritu (Birdman and Babel) tells a story based on a book by Michael Punke called The Revenant: A Novel of Revenge. The book was inspired by the life of a 19th century fur trapper named Hugh Glass. The trapper profession during Glass’ lifetime was highlighted by an existence of extreme hardship from both the harshness of the land and the extremes of the weather.

During an excursion collecting fur pelts in the unsettled wilderness of the Louisiana Purchase, Glass is mauled by a bear and basically left for dead. He clings to life and thus begins an amazing journey back to the land of the living. He faces dangers at every step of the way. You as an audience member get to the point where you think that he just can’t catch a break as he encounters life-threatening moments from the flora, fauna and human elements in his surrounds.

The acting performances are stunning, the direction spot on and the landscape never short of awe inspiring, this is a story that needs to be seen twenty metres wide in a dark room. It’s work but the rewards are real.

Rob Hudson
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When the rumours of Tarantino tackling the Western genre first surfaced, what a hundred years ago, it provided a number of great movie conservationist’s topics. Could his make cowboys look and sound cool? Could he recharge careers and get superlative performances from his regulars? Could he make an increasingly jaded audience stand up and cheer? In almost all categories the answer is a resounding yes.

Few are unaware of the film’s basic synopsis after another nuanced series of trailers but suffice to say Tarantion molds both history and a take on slavery into a very modern tale. Jamie Foxx gets to become the ultra badass he always seemed capable of, Christoph Waltz continues to place focus on how criminally underrated actors from anywhere other than America actually are in big budget bonanzas and Leonardo DiCaprio chews up and spits out every line of his dialogue, which culminates in a ferociousness not seen from him in a long time.

Django is a long, wordy trip down the memory lane of one of modern cinema’s most iconoclastic auteur and it’s a joy to behold. One wonders where Tarantino will go next but rest assured we will have a long time to ponder it.

Rob Hudson
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The film’s title is quite the misnomer as this is a highly stylised account of Ned Kelly and his family. Some of the creative choices yield engrossing scenes while others feel forced and dissipate momentum. This includes not capitalising on the acting of Nicholas Hoult who persuasively plays against his nice guy persona as the sadistic Constable Fitzpatrick. Odd that the chemistry between him and George MacKay’s Ned Kelly is so under-utilised.

Their scenes together hint as something substantial but their characters’ arcs jump too many steps at a time. The mental breakdown of Kelly also feels like it’s missing quite a few beats. He goes from a lucid and introspective man to a dress wearing loon much too quickly. In a film with a generous running time of 124 minutes, it feels like another missed opportunity.

During the final 20 minutes, as events conspire to bring a conclusion to the tale that most are familiar with, the filmmakers make their boldest moves yet. It will challenge the audience with its overt symbolism and visual attempt to recreate the claustrophobic last minutes of life for the Kelly gang. The success of this approach is completely subjective and one that cinema goers will have to make up their own mind about.
Rob Hudson

True History of the Kelly Gang is currently playing at Dendy Cinemas for a limited time – head to www.dendy.com.au for more information and tickets.