Tag: Australia

Who’s The Wolf in Dead Howling? Sure, Survival is Important, But ….

The zombies won’t be answering that in this film, which is more about pack building and survival during a zombie apocalypse that could use a faster pulse. Dead Howling is a work that is different.

Dead Howling DVD CoverKaleidoscope Home Entertainment
UK Premiere: Oct 31, 2026
Tubi FrightFest Halloween
Home Video & VOD Release: Nov 2, 2026

Between pulp and a serious tale, just where John V. Soto’s Dead Howling fits seems uncertain. I feel it leans more towards family drama rather than be a full on challenge between species. That’s because there can only be one werewolf against a massive horde of zombies! Also, when the set design suggests an abandoned present-day world with lots of rust, just where it fits when marketing describes a post-apocalyptic setting is certainly subject to interpretation!

After a zombie virus devastates the world, Carter (Joel Jackson) lives alone, spending his nights hunting the living dead for sport with the help of a tremendous power. He finds a new purpose after saving two siblings, Megan (Téa Heathcote-Marks) and Billy (Riley Stiles), who are seeking a rumoured safe zone. Unsurprisingly, this loner agrees to protect them on their search for sanctuary. Along the way, they must dodge encounters with the walking dead, random or otherwise, meet other survivors and hopefully make it out alive. This Australian-made film evokes the frontier in a few scenes. We just need more desert than suburban sprawl.

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The Fox Is Fur-Real: Mix Romance with the Supernatural and Nobody’s Safe!

A talking fox promises to fix Nick’s love life, but getting exactly what he wants comes with sinister consequences. Dario Russo’s The Fox mixes a strong cast, surreal humour and supernatural meddling into one of the oddest parables I’ve seen brought to life.

The Fox 2025 Movie Poster
Played at Toronto After Dark Festival on. Oct 18th, at the Cineplex Scotiabank Theatre

Dario Russo‘s hell-bent-for-leather feature debut, The Fox, has to be one of the oddest parables I’ve ever seen brought to life. After a documentary-style introduction narrated by Olivia Colman (Paddington in Peru), who also voices the titular animal, we meet Nick (Jai Courtney), a fox catcher who helps his father look after their rural property in the Australian outback. But that’s not quite where the film begins. Instead, the narrator suggests that any animal living out there might love to be human for a day, if not longer. After seeing how these people behave, I wonder if they’d reconsider!

Nick’s relationship with Kori (Emily Browning) is going nowhere, even after he proposes marriage. He thinks everything is fine, but she’s deeply unhappy and secretly sleeping with Derek (Damon Herriman), the husband of her best friend Diana (Claudia Doumit). It’s a messy arrangement, and Nick is the last person to recognize just how doomed his romantic future might be.

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We All Swim With The Pout-Pout Fish in the Deep Blue Sea

It’s worth diving in with a yellow submarine to view the life found underwater in The Pout-Pout Fish. This adaptation of the bestselling series by Deborah Diesen and illustrated by Dan Hanna offers plenty of action, along with a thoughtful look at courage in the face of environmental change.

The Pout-Pout Fish PosterThe Pout-Pout Fish had me wondering if Mr. Fish is somehow a distant cousin of Red from Angry Birds. Their personalities are not quite the same, but both characters exist in worlds that seem determined to tell them to cheer up. Here, the glum Mr. Fish (Nick Offerman) has his solitude interrupted by a very chipper young seadragon named Pip (Nina Oyama), who mistakes his home for a safe refuge. When trouble hits their stretch of reef off the Meanjin coast, located off of Brisban, the two have little choice but to work together.

An overgrowth of seaweed drifts in with the tides, turning the area into a maze of thick kelp that leaves the local marine population struggling to navigate. This spreading plant also creates a darkness that other marine life find unsettling.

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When Unhinged Pasts Are Revealed, What’s Diabolic (2026) Is Sure to Scare

Diabolic blends trauma, control, and the supernatural into a hallucinatory folk-horror trip. While the film leans heavily on its past timeline, Phillips’ visceral style shines once the weirdness bleeds into the present.

Diabolic (2025) Movie PosterStreaming on VOD (YouTube, Apple TV+)

Aussie-made films can sometimes lean on the outback, or curiosity about Indigenous culture, but Diabolic takes a different path. Though the story plays out in the proverbial outback of Utah, I couldn’t help wondering why foreign investors were more interested in helping Daniel J. Phillips make this film than backing local creators. It’s not a detail worth nitpicking since the movie was shot in the land down under, but it becomes noticeable when the landscape feels slightly wrong for its intended setting. Maybe that’s part of the hallucinatory effect Phillips is aiming for.

After Elise (Elizabeth Cullen, The Bureau of Magical Things) leaves The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, she thinks she’s safe. She’s moved on, but the nightmares keep coming. Elise has PTSD, and that’s the terrain the film explores more than anything else. Thankfully, her boyfriend Adam (John Kim, The Librarians) and her adoptive sister Gwen (Mia Challis, Outer Banks) are understanding. Trouble starts when they take a camping trip to get away and bring drugs along, hoping to knock down the walls Elise has built so she can finally feel whole and free from her past.

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Lesbian Space Princess Misses Nothing in Its Campy Cosmic Quest for Love

Lesbian Space Princess is a bold, hilarious animated space adventure from Emma Hough Hobbs and Leela Varghese. Mixing camp sci-fi, queer identity, and heartfelt storytelling, it turns cosmic chaos into a surprisingly emotional journey of self-worth.

Lesbian space princess main posterPlease check local listings for theatrical runs

What makes Emma Hough Hobbs and Leela Varghese’s adult animated feature Lesbian Space Princess unique is how it blends self-discovery with queer themes—and sets it all in space! It recalls Lexx, the cult Canadian sci-fi series with strong adult sensibilities. Here, the heroine Saira (Shabana Azeez) heads to the stars not to save her home planet, but to find Kiki, her ex-lover who wants nothing more to do with her. She’s hoping for a second chance—but can that happen?

Like the said series, she steals a “Problematic Ship” (Richard Roxburgh) and takes off in search of her lost love. She leaves the sanctuary of her homeworld, aptly named Clitopolis. If echoes of The Rocky Horror Picture Show don’t come knocking—because I couldn’t help wondering if the planet Transsexual from the system Transylvania might be nearby—then I don’t know what will. No shared universe is implied here, and I’m glad!

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In Vitro Review: Psychological Tension Stuck In Utero

In Vitro delivers psychological tension and haunting atmosphere but feels stuck in utero, never fully realising its broader dystopian potential. Strong character work and an evocative soundtrack drive the film, though uneven pacing and limited world-building hold it back.

In Vitro Movie PosterNow Available on VOD (UK)

In art exhibitions, the words “In Vitro” have often been used for installations and short films that explore the relationship between humans and technology. With this title now attached to a feature co-directed and written by Will Howarth and Tom McKeith, the ideas are explored in a different, unsettling context.

The story is about control. Jack (Ashley Zukerman) runs the household and the business, and his behaviour unsettles his wife, Layla (Talia Zucker). Together, they operate a cloning facility that supplies cows to a country unable to sustain its own livestock. While the premise hints at broader dystopian implications, the narrative keeps its focus tightly on Layla’s personal struggles, leaving the larger world underdeveloped.

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