The budget is minuscule. There are no big names. Set pieces are delivered infrequently, and on a small scale. And if it's monsters you're after, there are precious few ghouls, goblins, ghosts or gremlins.

Pitch Perfect was hilarious, feel-good fun, and one of the surprise hits of 2012.

Latest iteration of a well-worn concept doesn't lack for one-liners.

There is a hierarchy of acceptable deaths in the gaming world. The safest bets are robots, and families have enjoyed slaughtering billions of them with not the slightest moral code bent.

There’s a pretty comprehensive range of Monteith’s on tap, and we were preparing for a long evening of cricket viewing, so we opted for a pint each of Radler and Golden to begin.

Kiwi screen star Tandi Wright looks death in the face in her first American series. She talks to Lydia Jenkin.

Are videogames too expensive in New Zealand? Siobhan Keogh investigates.

A new documentary about Kurt Cobain may change the way you think about the troubled Nirvana frontman. Director Brett Morgen tells Chris Schulz about his labour of love.

On the surface, one might say that Wilder Mind, the third album from the London quartet, has seen Mumford & Sons change from waistcoats and plaid to leather and denim. But that's a bit misleading really, a hokey oversimplification.

I enjoyed Morgan Spurlock's Super Size Me, even as I shrank from its outrageous contrivance.

If you're wondering what J. K. Rowling did after finishing up with the Harry Potter franchise, here's your answer: she went to war.

Documentary that captures small-town, rugby-mad culture enthrals.

Australian film-maker Robert Connolly, known for Balibo and Underground: The Julian Assange Story, enters new territory with this sweet family drama about a 12-year-old boy from rural Western Australia.

Do you ever find yourself overwhelmed by the huge amount of music available to you in the online world? Good news is at hand.

It started with a one-off special about a rough East End teen joining the army. But the popularity of that one-off episode, which aired in the UK in 2013, led to a five-episode season that begins on TV One this Sunday.

In 1892, American woman Lizzie Borden was acquitted of killing her father and stepmother.

The second instalment of a two-parter, this play proposes a solution to the mystery of what happened to the play that matched Love's Labour's Lost by assuming it was (and then delivering) Much Ado About Nothing.

Miles Allen was a struggling actor in LA when his Breaking Bad impressions went viral, making him one of the hottest tickets at this year's Comedy Festival. He talks, in many voices, to Chris Schulz.

We couldn't go past the idea of slowly sipping an Old Fashioned this chilly autumn evening, perfectly smoky, finished with a big berg of ice.

The wonderful choristers of the American Boychoir School (is "boychoir" even a word?) in Princeton, New Jersey, are the heart and soul of this production. But all the star power at the top of the bill cannot save a sentimental paint-by-numbers film.

Sean Penn makes a rare foray into action movies in The Gunman. He tells Russell Baillie why.

Rising star Princess Chelsea finds inspiration in cosmic imagery and retro music. She talks to Lydia Jenkin.

A shellshocked veteran creates the Chester Zoo as the world recovers from the horrors of WWI.

Do you really need to watch The Bachelor? Or can you catch the controversy in tweets, Facebook posts and news reports? Lydia Jenkin and Joanna Hunkin choose a rose...

Taika Waititi is returning to the small screen in Brown Eye, a satirical look at the news with a Maori perspective which is starting on Maori Television next month.

Diaz Grimm doesn't muck around. With just a handful of singles to his name, the Cambridge MC kicks off his debut album with his best song yet, a walloping combination of futuristic thuds and cascading choirs that would make Kanye West cry out in envy.

I always thought Blur got more interesting towards the end of their time.

It was a scream that startled the neighbours. I'd been fumbling around a blackened basement looking for the power switch when something grabbed my ankle. It didn't have any legs. And it was trying to eat me.