Latest from Entertainment Reviews

Review: Family Feud feels like a winner
Will the Dai Henwood-hosted Family Feud make winning a car cool again? Calum Henderson says yes.

Review: Unravel an entertaining little yarn
A little ball of wool just made my son burst into tears. And it was completely my fault.

Review: Rom-com's lesson fails to deliver
Director Christian Ditter has already tackled rom-coms with British film Love, Rosie, but in How to Be Single he goes from riffing on one relationship to wrangling a clutch of them, with the ensemble piece getting the better of him.

Review: Will Smith can't save Concussion
Viewed from here, where American football remains, for most of us, a curiosity, this film about a doctor who challenged the sports-entertainment industrial complex behind the game is something of a revelation.

Review: Kanye's ego finally implodes on Pablo
"I added a couple of tracks." Did he what! Just two days before the extravagant release of The Life of Pablo, West's tweet revealed the addition of eight extra songs, taking his seventh album from a relatively concise 10 tracks to a whopping 18.

Steve Braunias reviews DJ Max Key
REVIEW: Haters were hoping Max Key would make a dick of himself on his radio debut. Instead, the Prime Minister's son was quietly determined to have a party.

Classical review: Tennant-Austin Duo
A Sunday afternoon recital by the Tennant-Austin Duo provided a stylish launch for Auckland's concert year.

Review: Heteroperformative, Basement
This intriguing solo Pride show is misleadingly billed as "Real Housewives meets Krishnan's Dairy," Janet writes.

Theatre review: Polo, SkyCity Theatre
Cast of nine ensure laughs come thick and fast in satire on city's moneyed classes, Paul writes.

Our review of 'frivolous' Zoolander 2
There was little about 2001's Zoolander that warranted a sequel, and yet here it is.

Oscar nominated movie a 'masterpiece'
When Patricia Highsmith wrote The Price of Salt in 1952, its subject matter was so taboo that she needed to use a pseudonym, Claire Morgan.

Review: Phantom of the Opera a lavishly romantic spectacle
Fine lead performances in revival of clasic Lloyd Webber musical help make local production a huge achievement.

Britpop band recapture majestic melodrama
TimeOut reviews new albums from Suede, Elton John, Jackie Bristow and Bloc Party.

This video game will defeat you
You could cheat. That's the one downside of a game that includes so many visual puzzles: if you get stuck, they're all readily available and easily accessible online.

Sick of superhero movies? This is the movie for you
You have to wonder how this exchange slipped past Deadpool's financial executives.

OJ Simpson drama impossible to resist
In June 1994, Orenthal James Simpson had been a football hero, then a film star and an American icon, one of the most famous and admired men in the country.

Review: Little Room to move
Warning: If you missed the book and don't know what the room is in Room, what follows may contain more spoilers than you need.

Review: Chris Pine's sea rescue story 'lacks urgency'
Chris Pine and Casey Affleck play two real-life US Coast Guard sailors who saved 32 men from a sinking oil tanker off Cape Cod in the winter of 1952.

Rihanna's new album rules, despite botched release
TimeOut reviews new albums from Rihanna, Panic! At The Disco, Sia and Savages.

Why are Seven Sharp's hosts giving dietary advice?
On Seven Sharp, they put cinnamon and turmeric root in their coffee. That might explain something, suggests Calum Henderson.

You need to see this film
Journalists are constantly exasperated by the depiction of journalism in the movies: crusading reporters who never take notes write their own (very bad) headlines for stories based on hunches, improbable disclosures, lucky breaks and dramatic confrontatio

Handler's heavyweight ego delivers hit-and-miss doco
Chelsea Handler changes tack in new Netflix documentary series that promotes slickness over substance, writes Karl Puschmann.

Concert review: Gillian Welch at the Civic
Gillian Welch and Dave Rawlings proved quietly magical in their first Auckland show in more than a decade last night.

Review: Raunchy road trip makes for 'pointless' comedy
Other than starring in David O. Russell films, in recent years seven-time Oscar nominee and two-time winner Robert De Niro has taken to appearing in lightweight films reassuring baby boomers they're relevant, and can still party large.

Review: Love conquers sexual politics
Predictably and understandably, this film about one of the first known people to undergo a surgical sex change has been criticised for tweaking the historical record and, more sophisticatedly, for its heteronormative approach to a transgender story.

Review: Heartbreaking game sparks emotion
That Dragon, Cancer is an autobiographical game about the life and death of a boy with cancer. Joel, who was diagnosed at age one, died four years later in 2014. He was survived by his parents, Ryan and Amy Green, who made the game.

Do these tattoos hold all the answers?
Calum Henderson reviews new Sunday night crime drama Blindspot that features just as many tattoos as the mid-00s NZ's metal scene.

Chris Schulz:
Girls is back with severely awkward encounters and truly revolting sex scenes. Chris Schulz is watching and loving it. So why is no one else?