Produced in association with our mates at Pretty Shady.
In celebration of this summer’s new Pretty Shady campaign and their chic new range of limited edition sun protection products that you can win now on www.prettyshady.com, the next few months will see us slip, slop and slap before paddleboarding into the endless blue for a series of summer guides uncovering everything from the songs of the summer, essential beach reads and the season’s best social events. But first, to the air conditioning movies!
PEDESTRIAN’S TOP SIX SUMMER MOVIES
INTERSTELLAR
Filmmaker: Christopher Nolan.
Starring: Matthew McConaughey, Anne Hathaway, John Lithgow, Michael Caine, Casey Affleck, Jessica Chastain, Topher Grace, Matt Damon.
Synopsis: A team of explorers travel through a wormhole in an attempt to find a potentially habitable planet that will sustain humanity.
Opens: Right now.
Filmmaker: Christopher Nolan.
Starring: Matthew McConaughey, Anne Hathaway, John Lithgow, Michael Caine, Casey Affleck, Jessica Chastain, Topher Grace, Matt Damon.
Synopsis: A team of explorers travel through a wormhole in an attempt to find a potentially habitable planet that will sustain humanity.
Opens: Right now.
Why you should watch it: Reasons abound: it’s set in space (duh!), looks divine and involves the McConaissance, but the real drawcard here is Christopher Nolan. The twist-prone film auteur behind The Prestige, The Dark Knight Trilogy and Inception has produced only gold since Memento and we doubt he’ll stop now.
MOMMY
Filmmaker: Xavier Dolan
Filmmaker: Xavier Dolan
Starring: Anne Dorval, Antoine-Olivier Pilon, Suzanne Clément.
Synopsis: A widowed single mother, raising her violent son alone, finds new hope when a mysterious neighbor inserts herself into their household.
Opens: Sometime in early 2015.
Why you should watch it: Québécois auteur Xavier Dolan’s preoccupation with how the burden of parenthood affects both parent and child continues in his Cannes Jury Prize winning film, Mommy. Dolan’s second film where he doesn’t also star (the other being his operatic ode to the complexities of identity, Laurence Anyways, please watch that if you haven’t already) straddles with aplomb the divide between heart-swelling art house experiment and heartbreaking domestic drama.
Opens: Sometime in early 2015.
Why you should watch it: Québécois auteur Xavier Dolan’s preoccupation with how the burden of parenthood affects both parent and child continues in his Cannes Jury Prize winning film, Mommy. Dolan’s second film where he doesn’t also star (the other being his operatic ode to the complexities of identity, Laurence Anyways, please watch that if you haven’t already) straddles with aplomb the divide between heart-swelling art house experiment and heartbreaking domestic drama.
THE LOOK OF SILENCE
Filmmaker: Joshua Oppenheimer
Filmmaker: Joshua Oppenheimer
Synopsis: A family that survives the genocide in Indonesia confronts the men who killed one of their brothers.
Why you should watch it: You’re a human being. In his Oscar nominated documentary opus The Act Of Killing filmmaker Joshua Oppenheimer offers widescreen catharsis – for audience and subject alike – in an audaciously conceived documentary-slash-art-project unspooling the perpetrators, justifications and motivations of genocide. In its sister film, The Look Of Silence, he switches camp and follows the victims, pulling tight on a family of survivors who discover the identity of the men who killed their son. A must watch.
Why you should watch it: You’re a human being. In his Oscar nominated documentary opus The Act Of Killing filmmaker Joshua Oppenheimer offers widescreen catharsis – for audience and subject alike – in an audaciously conceived documentary-slash-art-project unspooling the perpetrators, justifications and motivations of genocide. In its sister film, The Look Of Silence, he switches camp and follows the victims, pulling tight on a family of survivors who discover the identity of the men who killed their son. A must watch.
UNBROKEN
Filmmaker: Angelina Jolie
Starring: Jack O’Connell, Domhnall Gleeson, Miyavi, Garrett Hedlund, Finn Wittrock.
Starring: Jack O’Connell, Domhnall Gleeson, Miyavi, Garrett Hedlund, Finn Wittrock.
Synopsis: World War II hero Louis “Louie” Zamperini, a former Olympic track star, survives a plane crash in the Pacific, spends 47 days drifting on a raft, and then more than two and a half years living in several Japanese prisoner of war camps.
Opens: January 2015
Opens: January 2015
Why you should watch it: Have you read the synopsis?
FOXCATCHER
Filmmaker: Bennett Miller
Starring: Steve Carell, Channing Tatum, Mark Ruffalo.
Synopsis: Wrestler Mark Schultz forms a relationship with his new sponsor, millionaire John du Pont, as they train for the 1988 games in Seoul – a union that leads to unlikely circumstances as both men feel inferior to Mark’s revered brother, Dave.
Opens: January 29th, 2015.
Why you should watch it: Steve Carrell goes dramatic. We’ve seen him do dour before (Little Miss Sunshine and this heartbreaking Office scene) but not like this. With the aid of a bulbous nose prosthetic and perfectly chilling voice work his dramatic acting chops facing their toughest test yet in the form of convicted murderer, John du Pont. Judging by early reviews, they definitely stand up.
Synopsis: Wrestler Mark Schultz forms a relationship with his new sponsor, millionaire John du Pont, as they train for the 1988 games in Seoul – a union that leads to unlikely circumstances as both men feel inferior to Mark’s revered brother, Dave.
Opens: January 29th, 2015.
Why you should watch it: Steve Carrell goes dramatic. We’ve seen him do dour before (Little Miss Sunshine and this heartbreaking Office scene) but not like this. With the aid of a bulbous nose prosthetic and perfectly chilling voice work his dramatic acting chops facing their toughest test yet in the form of convicted murderer, John du Pont. Judging by early reviews, they definitely stand up.
INHERENT VICE
Filmmaker: Paul Thomas Anderson
Starring: Joaquin Phoenix, Josh Brolin, Owen Wilson, Katherine Waterston, Reese Witherspoon, Benicio del Toro, Jena Malone, Maya Rudolph, Martin Short.
Synopsis: In 1970, drug-fueled Los Angeles detective Larry “Doc” Sportello investigates the disappearance of a former girlfriend.
Opens: February 5th, 2015.
Why you should watch it: Working best within an ensemble framework – see Magnolia and Boogie Nights – the American film auteur returns to the freewheeling, whip-happy visual style abandoned for a more ponderous feel in his more recent work. It would be a welcome return. Other things to look out for include: another score provided by Radiohead multi-instrumentalist Jonny Greenwood, how he handles his first bonafide book adaptation and his work’s debut appearance of his partner, Maya Rudolf.
Why you should watch it: Working best within an ensemble framework – see Magnolia and Boogie Nights – the American film auteur returns to the freewheeling, whip-happy visual style abandoned for a more ponderous feel in his more recent work. It would be a welcome return. Other things to look out for include: another score provided by Radiohead multi-instrumentalist Jonny Greenwood, how he handles his first bonafide book adaptation and his work’s debut appearance of his partner, Maya Rudolf.
Pretty Shady encourages young Australians to be part of the generation that stops skin cancer, one summer at a time, by providing them with the tools and means to do it including five limited edition ridiculously good looking sun protection products. This year’s ambassadors include Isabelle Cornish, Robbie Maddison, Mitch Revs and Veronica Manock. Enter to win the Pretty Shady collection here.
