Jacob Powell
Jacob Powell has been reviewing film, writing on cinema and other topics both online and occasionally in print since 2005. He also works as an Auckland-based university librarian specialising in digital AV media and research collections. Follow him on Twitter @jacobunny.
Everything By: Jacob Powell
Without love to temper them, disappointment turns to blame and frustration to vitriol in Andrey Zvyagintsev’s stark depiction of one family’s implosion and the tragic after-effects.
Jacob Powell reviews Gaylene Preston's documentary on Helen Elizabeth Clark
Consisting of seven short films from Māori and Pasifika filmmakers, 2017’s Ngā Whanaunga programme boasts a strong line-up that explores modern city, country, and island life for indigenous people. With a focus on the challenges of youth, the selection offers thoughtful comment on a wide range of topics including culture, whanau, gender and sexuality.
While some (male) mid-life crises come calling in the form of a clichéd sports car and a significantly younger romantic partner, in Kirsten Tan’s Pop Aye, jaded architect Thana reconnects with his youth via the ministrations of an aging elephant and a rural karaoke queen.
Jacob Powell on the infectious and electric Florian Habicht, the films and the maker.
Join Doug Dillaman and Jacob Powell – joined by Metro film writer David Larsen – as they go head-to-head for the Best Worst Podcast wrap-up of the Festival in 2016.
Jacob Powell reports back from week two of the NZIFF, with The Wounded Angel, Wild, Sieranevada, The Greasy Strangler, The Lure, Paterson and Johnny Guitar
An exquisite and gleefully modern German ‘reunification’ tale, Toni Erdmann brings together a daughter who’s forgotten how to laugh and a father who doesn’t know when to let the joke die.
Decisions made in heat of the moment can have unintended, far-reaching consequences. A War presents a confronting tale of a good man who makes a grave mistake and asks: who pays the costs?
If 1960s Hollywood fever-dreamed in Farsi, it might get halfway to the Pollock-like ‘pour it and see’ genius of Mani Haghighi’s A Dragon Arrives!
Jacob Powell reports back from week one of the NZIFF, featuring Radio Dreams, Neruda, Chevalier, The Eagle Huntress and I, Daniel Blake.
Jacob Powell reviews Robert Greene's dizzingly unconventional new documentary, Kate Plays Christine.
A shot of pure nostalgic joy, Tearepa Kahi’s Poi E: The Story of Our Song unearths the vision and struggle that drove a te reo Māori song into 1980s New Zealand pop culture.
