Olivia Wilde

News, Reviews & Features
  • Review: Booksmart is all that was good about Superbad and more

    Movie Review | Ali Gray | 6th May 2019

    The ten years since Superbad have passed in a heartbeat, that's a long time to leave between checking in with youth culture. I'm sure everything is still exactly as it was in 2009, right? [weakly] Fo' sho. Booksmart, the fantastic debut directorial effort from Olivia Wilde, is proof that while things change, they've very much stayed the same: today's high schoolers might be newly woke and progressive and tolerant, but they're still all about end of term ragers and macking with hotties. Kids still say all of those words, I assume? Am I so out of touch? No, it's the children who are wrong.

  • Rush

    Movie Review | Ali | 11th September 2013

    It is a sad fact of life that, more often than not, the extrovert will receive attention while the introvert goes unnoticed – the loudest person in the room will overshadow the most interesting. From a distance, Ron Howard's F1 biopic Rush appears to be magnetised towards race driver/rock star James Hunt (played by undeniable hunk Chris Hemsworth) as he tussles on the track with rat-like rival Niki Lauda (Daniel Brühl wearing a prosthetic overbite). Hollywood has hard-wired me to believe that beautiful rule-breakers deserve more screen time than unglamorous by-the-bookers, but I'm happy to report that Rush is a surprisingly balanced account of two men who, for two hours at least, make Formula 1 look like the most noble of gladiator sports, and not just a giant Scalextric being played by a bored millionaire.

  • Rush premiere cleavage swap

    Movie News | Ali | 3rd September 2013

    Not that you can actually notice any difference.

  • The Incredible Burt Wonderstone

    Movie Review | Neil | 12th March 2013

    In order to raise this review to an intellectual level beyond all others, I learned the word 'prestidigitation', which means 'sleight of hand': the cunning technique by which magicians fool you into thinking you really do have a neverending supply of loose change behind your ears. That done, all I need to do now is slip it casually into my prose, like, oh, I don't know, a magician employing prestidigitation. That was pretty smooth, right? (*runs away in a puff of smoke*)

  • People Like Us

    Movie Review | Ed Williamson | 9th November 2012

    It's fair to say Disney's been getting a little edgier in the films it distributes in recent years. But here's a new one on me: People Like Us, a likeable enough cookie-cutter 'douchey guy learns to be less douchey' flick, is at its core a film about incest. You heard.

  • The Change-Up

    Movie Review | Rob | 11th September 2011

    Ah, the ol' body switcharoo routine – the calling card of a writer short on ideas. Having featured in (*glances quickly at Wikipedia*) 38 different movies (!), it's safe to say the body swap schtick has been well and truly done to death.

  • Cowboys & Aliens

    Movie Review | Ali | 12th August 2011

    In his role as executive producer, Cowboys & Aliens represents Steven Spielberg's fourth alien movie this year, after Super 8, Transformers: Dark Of The Moon and his cameo in Paul (and that's not mentioning his TV series, Falling Skies). Throw in the rest of the year's extra-terrestrial activity (get bent, Battle LA) and it's no surprise the genre is starting to look a little fatigued. More Western than sci-fi, Cowboys & Aliens at least has a hook, but when push comes to shove comes to "we have to destroy the invaders' conveniently accessible power source", it's Just Another Alien Movie like all the rest.

  • We respectfully invite the girls of House to put 'em on the glass

    TV Feature | Ed Williamson | 3rd August 2011

    With new girl Odette Annable signing up for a major role in House season eight, I thought to myself: "Gold dust! She has a silly name! My razor-sharp wit will make short work of this!" and hit the laptop, only to run out of steam after about a minute. OK, so one daft name's not enough for a whole feature, but throw in some chicks in their pants ... CHA-CHING!

  • The Next Three Days

    Movie Review | Ali | 23rd December 2010

    The Next Three Days is kind of a throwback to the classic action movies Hollywood put out in the mid-nineties - the 'one man versus the world' era of thrillers, in which lantern-jawed heroes like Harrison Ford or Mel Gibson fight to save their family against improbable odds and injustice. At one point, the lead character - a stoic, possibly stubbled everyman forced into action against his will - is likely to growl "Give me back my wife" or something, before killing eight thousand terrorists in the name of love. Brilliant.

  • Tron: Legacy

    Movie Review | Matt | 5th December 2010

    I love Tron. So much so that, when I was growing up, 'lightcycle' featured regularly on my Christmas list (just below 'lightsaber' and just above 'Glaive'). But no amount of blind childhood adoration can escape the fact that the concept of the film doesn't hold up well to closer inspection. In that respect, this sequel is the perfect follow-up because it makes just as much sense i.e. it's utter bobbins.