Issue 39: Confined Spaces

Lebanon

Confined Spaces: From tanks to locked rooms and futuristic cubes

As the powerful war drama Lebanon, which is entirely set in a tank, is released this month, we look at confined spaces, with articles on bird-watching British thriller The Hide and metaphysical horror film Cube as well as Krzysztof Komeda’s soundtrack for Knife in the Water.

This month’s new movies include Herzog’s demented Bad Lieutenant, charming punk sci-fi tale Fish Story and the documentary American: The Bill Hicks Story. We also review Kafkaesque Estonian drama The Temptation of St Tony and we have an interview with Teddy Chen.

In the DVDs, we look at Paradjanov’s lyrical film poem Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors and Australian cannibal drama Van Diemen’s Land. We have a comic strip review of Dario Argento’s The Card Player and our online movie is Girl Number 9.

We are very excited to present our very first Colonial Report from the Dominion of Canada from Careful producer Greg Klymkiw and we also have a feature on Magic Lanterns. In the Blog, we have a preview of the Terracotta Film Festival, and reviews of the Nippon Connection, American backwater documentary Zoomer, Iceland’s first horror film Reykjavik Whale-Watching Massacre and Joe Dante’s rarely seen pop culture film collage The Movie Orgy.

In the Short Cuts, we look at Georges Pal’s puppet animation while Lali Puna pick their favourite movies in the Film Jukebox. And you can read the winning review of Battle Royale in our April film writing competition.

PODCASTS: Until the End of the World: In the latest Electric Sheep podcast, we’re looking at apocalyptic movies: Virginie Sélavy talks to John Hillcoat, director of the film adaptation of Cormac McCarthy’s The Road in an interview recorded at last year’s London Film Festival, plus Alex Fitch talks to Helen McCarthy, a British expert on manga, anime and Japanese visual culture, in a Q&A recorded before the Electric Sheep screening of Kinji Fukasaku’s Battle Royale at the Prince Charles Cinema.