VIVARIUM (full review at Screen Realm)

Vivarium is a science fiction / horror mystery and is the second feature from director / co-writer Lorcan Finnegan. It’s being released to VOD from 16 April 2020.

Young couple, Tom (Jesse Eisenberg) and Gemma (Imogen Poots), are desperate to get into the housing market, so they go to meet with the agent handling the sales of the Yonder housing estate. Martin (Jonathan Aris), the agent, is a strange individual and their encounter is bizarre. However, in the interests of compromise and with a nothing-ventured-nothing-gained philosophy, Tom and Gemma agree to view a house.

They arrive at the uniformly designed estate and it becomes readily apparent that Yonder is not what Tom and Gemma are looking for. Martin’s strange behaviour culminates in him abandoning the viewing, so Tom and Gemma set off for home, only to find they are unable to make their way out of the estate.  After driving around for hours, they discover themselves back where they started, in front of the house they were viewing. With no other choice available they must spend the night in Yonder. From this point on Vivarium descends into surreal nightmare, as the days become circular and logic defying.


Read the full review at Screen Realm:
https://screenrealm.com/vivarium-movie-review-jesse-eisenberg-imogen-poots/

IMDB: Vivarium

STAR TREK: PICARD (full review at Screen Realm)

Star Trek: Picard is a ten part series created by CBS All Access and is streaming on Amazon Prime Video in most countries outside of the USA, including Australia. The series sees Patrick Stewart returning to the Star Trek universe and to the iconic role of Jean-Luc Picard - the role that made him a household name.

Please note: there are mild spoilers ahead for Picard, and larger spoilers for Star Trek: Nemesis.

In the year 2399, Admiral Jean-Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart) is retired from the United Federation Of Planets (Starfleet) and has taken charge at his family vineyard, Château Picard.

In his final mission for Starfleet, Picard was due to oversee the mass evacuation of Romulus, which was under threat of destruction from a nearby Supernova. At the same time, a violent uprising of synthetic lifeforms on Mars resulted in the banning of all synthetic life and research, and the sidelining of the Starfleet rescue armada. Picard’s alternate rescue plan was rejected by Starfleet and his acrimonious resignation was the result. 

Then, many years into retirement, Picard is contacted by a young woman named Dahj (Isa Briones) who has been attacked by agents from the Romulan secret service, the Tal Shiar. Not knowing why she was targeted, Dahj turns to Picard for protection and help in finding her twin sister Soji (also played by Isa Briones). This sets the series in motion as Picard must come out of retirement, put together a crew and head out on a mission that involves a captured Borg Cube, a shadowy Romulan black ops unit known as the Zhat Vash, and in the grand tradition of The Next Generation, some philosophical pondering on human nature and what it means to be alive.


Read the full review at Screen Realm:
https://screenrealm.com/star-trek-picard-season-1-review/

IMDB: Star Trek: Picard

THE PLATFORM (EL HOYO) (full review at Screen Realm)

‘There are three types of person: Those at the top, those at the bottom and those who fall.’ So begins The Platform (El Hoyo), a Spanish science fiction horror movie and the debut feature from director Galder Gaztelu-Urrutia. Proving to be a fan favourite at the 2019 Toronto International Film Festival, The Platform is now streaming globally on Netflix.

Goreng (Ivan Massagué) wakes up in a cell. Opposite, his cell mate Trimagasi (Zorion Eguileor), an older man who seems to have been there for a while, explains the situation. The facility is known as The Hole and its grey, brutalist architecture is divided up into an unknown, but massive number of levels. They can be observed via an opening in the centre of the cell through which a platform travels daily. The platform contains the inmates’ food allowance. The catch? There is only one serving for the entire facility. So the inmates’ only source of food is what those above leave for them.

Read the full review at Screen Realm:
https://screenrealm.com/the-platform-movie-review-netflix/

IMDB: The Platform