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ISSUE 74 JUN '16

THE T EMPER TR AP

Deadpool • Ladyhawke • Zootopia

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NEWS EXTRAS

BLACK COMEDY

Issue 74 JUNE 2016

EXTRAS

• The Kills fingered; Jason Bateman gets animated about Zootopia . Pg 4 • Kevin Hart talks Ride Along 2 ; Nicholas Hytner on The Lady In the Van ; counting down to E3. Pg 6 • Hail George Clooney; Triple 9 ; Garbage. Pg 8 •Competition, quiz, STACK Social. Pg 10

FEATURES

TECH Astro: This month we check out the A40 TR headset. Pg 11 DVD/Blu-ray

Russell Crowe and Ryan Gosling have a mutual admiration society going on, bonding on the set of Shane Black’s '70s-set crime caper, The Nice Guys . By Gill Pringle

Deadpool: Director Tim Miller on why he never gave up on bringing the cult comic book to the big screen. Pg 12-13 GAMES LEGO Star Wars: The Force Awakens: A welcome return to the beloved humour of the series. Pg 14-15 MUSIC Ladyhawke: LA-based Pip Brown talks about where the Wild Things are. Pg 16 The Temper Trap: Dougy Mandagi and Joseph Greer on the Aussie rockers’ leaner third album Thick As Thieve s. Pg 18-19 Beach Boys: Graham Reid checks out the 50th anniversary edition of Pet Sounds. Pg 20

God this is just so bad. How can we do this to her?’ But she was totally unfazed and such an incredible kid with such a great perspective, even though we were both very apologetic all the time,” says Gosling, 35, who began his own career as a child actor. “I still remember being pulled from the scene to go to school in the trailer – it’s a weird life to be a child actor. I wouldn’t recommend it unless you feel you have no other choice what to do,” he says. Both actors received their own share of bruises and scrapes on the set, Crowe even breaking his nose. “Oh my God, I crawled to my trailer every night,” says Gosling. “I felt for Wile E. Coyote and everything that he had gone through in those Warner Brothers cartoons. But even though it hurt, I also love that stuff. Falling into a pool, crashing through a plate glass window or getting hit by a car. I couldn’t get enough of it.”

C rowe plays a small-time enforcer to funny the other one was. Crowe has been a Gosling fan since he saw him in Drive five years ago. “I went backwards from Drive to see where he came from and I’ve seen everything he’s done since. We just laughed really easily and that’s not something you could have predicted,” he says, referencing a slapstick scene in a men's restroom where Gosling is sat on the john juggling a magazine, a cigarette and a gun. “That was our first day together on set,“ continues Gosling. “And I had my pants around my ankles sitting on a toilet and Russell is smoking in a corner and we are both laughing because this is so stupid and that was the moment where I felt like this is going to be fun.” If Gosling’s Holland March is a pretty useless PI, then he’s an even worse father – cringing at how he had to treat Angourie Rice, the child actress who plays his screen daughter. “Russell and I were constantly like, ’Oh my Gosling’s clueless private eye, and both actors were surprised to learn how While most actors might turn to the Bible for a movie about the resurrection of Christ, Joseph Fiennes instead checked in at the nearest police station and signed up for gladiator bootcamp. Cast as Clavius, a Roman tribune tasked with locating the post-crucifixion body of Jesus Christ – played by our own Cliff Curtis – Fiennes views Risen as a missing corpse mystery as much as a biblical epic. “My real way into Clavius came from sitting down with a detective and talking about what it’s like to question suspects. Although this is a biblical story, I wanted to be pragmatic about what Clavius needs to do, because I really see this as a noir detective story.” Gill Pringle Risen is out on DVD and Blu-ray on June 29 FINDING JESUS

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REVIEWS

DVD/Blu-ray Zootopia , How To Be Single , Zoolander 2 , Concussion , Steve Jobs , Room , London Has Fallen, Hannibal: S3, and more. Pg 22-26 GAMES One Piece: Burning Blood, No Man's Sky. Pg 27 MUSIC The Temper Trap, Garbage, Flume, Whitney, Tegan & Sara, Terry Reid, Prince. Pg 28-30

The Nice Guys is in cinemas now.

RATINGS GUIDE

All information believed correct at time of printing. All images used for promotional purposes only. Copyright of respective owners is acknowledged. © 2016 Scribal Custom Pty Ltd. No part of this magazine may be reprinted without the written permission of the publisher.

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TRY A LITTLE TENDON-ESS Jamie Hince of The Kills explains why a serious finger injury forced the band to explore new sonic directions on Ash & Ice . J amie Hince is remarkably buoyant for a professional guitarist who almost lost a finger to gangrene. iconoclastic Jamaican producers Lee “Scratch”

Perry and King Tubby, Hince bought a 1968 mixing desk with "old compressors and echo chambers and reverbs", and started experimenting. But writing the songs for Ash & Ice – his fifth record

“It went really dark red,” the sweet Brit explains to us. “The weird thing was there was just no definition on my finger. There were no knuckles or anything, and it just became this cylindrical, painful, throbbing thing.” Although he’s recovered from the deep infection that “rotted [his] whole tendon” (the result of a cortisone injection into a badly broken bone), he can’t play guitar – at least not like he did on The Kills’ previous albums. But that’s OK. “Something like this makes you really stop and re-think everything,” he muses. “I was at a point where I was a bit disillusioned with guitar music. I felt like it was so referential and not doing anything new. I decided I was going to spend more time being a producer, so I put a studio together.” Inspired by the dub methods of

headed your guitar sounds, you can make your music sound like anything. One record I wanted it to sound like The Cramps, the next record Cabaret Voltaire, and then I wanted it to sound like Massive Attack. I always wanted that for my band, to be able to make totally different music that somehow is held together by me and Alison. Even if the song is like a string quartet, it still sounds like The Kills.” Zoë Radas

with bandmate and vocalist Alison Mosshart – occurred far away from that environment. A fan of Russian art and literature (shout- out to Bulgakov!), Hince spent two weeks penning ideas in a carriage on the notoriously barren, almost 10,000 km-long Trans-Siberian Railway.That intensive writing time and Hince’s new studio have given Ash & Ice a powerful, reverberant feel which the musician credits to some kind of consistent thread that’s knotted around himself and his partner-in-musical-arms. “I just love that about programming and drum machines; that no matter how lug-

Ash & Ice by The Kills is out June 10. They're also in NZ next month for two shows; go to thekills.tv for details. BATEMAN IS SLY AS A FOX S urprisingly, Zootopia is Jason Bateman’s first animated movie – but he’s Bateman says acting in an animated film was a unique experience. “It's a completely

EXTRAS

charming but sly con-artist fox who reluctantly helps the city’s first bunny cop Judy Hopp (Ginnifer Goodwin) solve a mysterious crime. The film features 64 different species of animals and the Disney animation team spent 18 months just researching animals and their behaviour – so for Nick, the animators paid careful attention to his elbows and shoulders to ensure they didn't appear too human-like.

certainly no stranger to the genre. ”It's honestly an honour to be a part of a Disney film,” he explains. “They're the only films I get to see nowadays because I've got two little girls, 8 and 3, so I've become a big fan.” In Zootopia he voices the character of Nick Wilde, a

different process," he says. "I just tried to give them as many options as I could dream up, different ways to say each line. The filmmakers make the cocktail later.” Adam Colby

Zootopia is out on DVD and Blu-ray on June 29 and is reviewed on page 22.

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THE MAN WITH A PLAN FOR LADY IN VAN Nicholas Hytner on his latest Alan Bennett collaboration The Lady In The Van . L oosely based on a true story, The Lady In The Van charts the unlikely relationship that develops between writer Alan Bennett (played in the movie by Alex Jennings) and a homeless woman (Maggie Smith), who ends up taking residence in a van outside his home in one of London’s poshest streets, Gloucester Avenue in Camden. It's the third screen collaboration between director Nicholas Hytner and Bennett, and as with The Madness Of King George and The History Boys , it’s based on one of the latter’s plays he had previously directed on stage. For Hytner (pictured below right with Jennings), one of the attractions of the project was the opportunity to shoot where the story actually took place. “They were very accommodating,” Hytner says of the locals. “Although I think they had mixed feelings when they saw the van reappear. The two vans we used – actually, there were four vans, in total – were exactly the models that she had. So when the van reappeared... I think that was pretty horrifying for the many neighbors who remembered her!” In fact, Hytner has his own memories of the van parked in Bennett’s driveway. “Well, I knew Alan Bennett lived in the house and I knew him very vaguely, but not well enough to ask him what was going on. I occasionally wondered, ‘Does he keep his mother in a van?’ And then, when I first went to visit him [in 1989], it didn’t occur to me to ask, ‘Who was that?’ I later discovered that people – even when they visited him during her life – never asked him, either. The English are so polite...” Adam Colby The Lady In The Van is out now

ONE FROM THE HART Ride Along 2 star Kevin Hart talks cops and why his mum was his biggest fan.

R euniting with Ice Cube for buddy movie sequel Ride Along 2 , we see Kevin Hart graduate from security guard to rookie cop. However, he shudders when STACK asks if he researched with any real cops. “No. I know some, but I don’t go out of my way to spend time with cops,“ he laughs, having recently completed three years probation after being arrested on DUI charges in 2013. “I don’t want to be in the back seat of a cop car ever again in my life. I’ve had moments where I had to be because of mistakes I made, and that’s not a place of fun for me.” In Ride Along 2 , Detective James Payton (Ice Cube) takes his soon-to-be brother-in-law, the bumbling Ben Barber (Hart), to Miami to track down a drug dealer who’s supplying the dealers of Atlanta with product. James wants to show that Ben is not capable to being a

cop, but of course things don’t go exactly according to plan. Although Hart doesn't quite enjoy the same high profile in this part of the world, in the US his stand-up specials and comedies like Think Like a Man , The Wedding Ringer and Get Hard have made him a household name. He found his first audience in his mum, Nancy, raising him alone while his cocaine- addicted father spent most of his childhood in and out of jail. “My mom was able to see a glimpse of greatness before she passed away," Hart says. "She was very religious, so she didn’t like to go places where there was alcohol, smoking or swearing, but she totally supported me on every level. She was my rock and the reason why I am who I am today. She raised me with a strong will to succeed.” Gill Pringle

EXTRAS

Ride Along 2 is out on June 22

Counting down to the world's biggest video game convention in Los Angeles. E3: LET THE GAMES BEGIN!

I s it really June already? Yes it is, and for gamers that can only mean one thing: it’s time for E3. What can we expect this year? Well, Nintendo have already dashed any hopes that its enigmatic NX will appear, announcing that it will reveal the console later this year. Will the rumoured PS4.5 or modular Microsoft console make an appearance? E3 will indeed be different in 2016 with EA pulling out from its traditional presence, instead opting to reveal its upcoming slate at a press conference on the Sunday before the show. And Activision, too, will ditch the booth, instead opting solely for behind-closed-doors sessions. Elsewhere it’s business as usual, with Bethesda, Microsoft, Ubisoft and Sony all conducting press briefings. VR will again feature

heavily with more on Sony’s PSVR and its purported slew of titles. Just what Microsoft intends to do with its augmented reality headset remains to be seen, but we’ll undoubtedly view some jaw-dropping game demos featuring the tech. And what about the games? As expected there’s a quality line-up, and we could fill the page here with our most wanted lists but we’ll save that for post-show analysis. Despite EA and Activision removing their booth presences, E3 still is the highlight of the gaming show calendar, exhibiting the very best we can expect to be playing in the lead-up to Christmas and beyond. Paul Jones Keep an eye on www.stack.net.nz and our social media channels for all the up to date coverage from E3

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EXTRAS NEWS

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After the cannibal gore-fest The Green Inferno , Eli Roth is set to tackle a very different sort on man-eater in Meg . CLOONEY DUMBSTRUCK BY THE COEN BROTHERS

Hail Caesar! is out on DVD and Blu-ray on July 29.

Why George Clooney is always happy to play the idiot for the Coen Brothers. S et in Hollywood in the ‘50s, the Coens’ latest quirky hit Hail Caesar! boasts an all-star cast, with George Clooney playing the vain and dim Baird Whitlock, the star of the biblical epic which gives this film its name. The movie is the latest in what he affectionately calls his “idiot” roles for the siblings. But compared with the dimwits he played in O Brother, Where Art Thou? , Intolerable Cruelty and Burn After Reading , he reckons Baird is probably the dumbest character he has played for them yet. “He’s just a clueless movie star, which of course could never happen in real life, now could it?” he grins. Despite the fact that, so far, they’ve only called on him to play doofuses, Clooney willingly packs his bags whenever the Coen brothers reach out. “If you look at the greatest directors of all time, none of them were making their best films 30 years into their career. They generally made them in their early days or in the middle. But these guys are still making unbelievably great films. They will go down in the history books as among the great filmmakers.” Adam Colby

TRIGGER HAPPY “I love genre films and finding a way of reinventing them,” says expat Australian director John Hillcoat ( Lawless ). “I’d been itching to do something contemporary, urban, energetic, and like a commentary of where America is at right now. The idea of the 999 code and the rich moral complexity that it threw up was the key.” Triple 9 is a hard-edged urban crime thriller in which the titular police code for “officer down” is used as a diversion by a crew of corrupt cops and ex-Special Forces soldiers in order to pull off an impossible heist for the Russian-Israeli mob. “I’ve heard of up to 300 police officers showing up after a cop shooting in Atlanta,” he says. “And in LA, I’ve seen a whole area being shut down for a resolved shooting that’s done and dusted. If we’d had more resources we really could have shown how taking advantage of the 999 response in a similar way to the events depicted in the film? “I’m not sure whether people do deliberately use it as a diversion – maybe they will now that we’ve flagged the idea,” he laughs. Scott Hocking Director John Hillcoat talks Triple 9 . crazy it is, but fact outstrips fiction.” So has he also heard of criminals

GROWING OLD GRACEFULLY Garbage’s Marilyn Manson has no fears about being long in the tooth as the band prepares to release their new album Strange Little Birds .

EXTRAS

S inger Marilyn Manson is erudite in explaining her philosophy on being “long in the tooth”; she’s passionate about the magic of getting older, which “you can’t possibly imagine” until that happiness is yours. “Lots of young women tell me how scared they are of ageing, and it makes me feel so sad for them because then I believe that they focus on all the stuff that will determine the very opposite of what they want from getting older,” she says. “That’s a self-fulfilling prophecy. If you’re scared of ageing, you will age poorly. If you embrace ageing, you will be like my dad who is 80 years old and just went off to China by himself the other day and called us, his

daughters, from the Great Wall of China. That’s f-cking badass. I want to be like my dad when I grow up.” Awe and wonder are folded all the way through Strange Little Birds , which Manson and her bandmates recorded at producer icon Butch Vig’s home studio in the Hollywood Hills with the express desire to loosen the bonds of experience. “Anybody using technology today is really in danger of losing the immediacy of performance,” the vocalist says. “It’s something that really great artists, like, say Jack White, are incredibly in-depth at capturing. But we’re not all as gifted musicians, so our temptation when we get behind the console is to really fix performance. This time around, we all decided that we had to make each other feel excited in the room – if we were able to change the molecules in the room at the time, then we’d done our job, because you can translate that to an audience.” Zoë Radas

Strange Little Birds by Garbage is due out on June 10

Triple 9 is out on DVD and Blu-ay on June 8 Visit www.stack.net.nz for the full interview

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EXTRAS SOCIAL / COMPETITIONS / QUIZ

competitions The Hunting Ground DVD Giveaway The Hunting Ground takes audiences straight to the heart of a shocking epidemic of violence and institutional cover-ups sweeping college campuses across America. Head to stack.net.au for your chance to win one of three on DVD. Thanks to Madman

STACK SOCIAL Listening to you lot chatting and interacting with us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram is all kinds of awesome! Make sure you get involved and follow us on: STACK Magazine NZ @STACKMag stackmagazine What you've been loving on social this month:

Win The David Cronenberg Collection This fantastic boxset includes 3 iconic films from master horror director David Cronenberg, and three lucky STACK readers will win the boxed set on DVD. Thanks to Madman

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Q1 Name the two actors who starred in a 1969 musical that have been referred to as "undoubtedly the two most unlikely singers in the history of Hollywood musicals." Q2 And who directed the musical referred to in Question 1? Q3 This 1956 noir thriller – about a man who after murdering his pregnant girlfriend, proceeds to court her sister – was remade in 1991. Title please. Q4 Which 33-year-old actress at the peak of her film career was killed in a plane crash in Nevada, USA? Q5 In 1974, what did the characters played by Ellen Burstyn and Alfred Lutter know? Q6 Which NewYork-born film actor of Russian-Jewish descent once

QUIZ

said to an interviewer, "I would like to do Macbeth – Naked"? Q7 Danny Kaye, Erich von Stroheim, Judith Roberts, Anthony Hopkins and Michael Redgrave. What's the link? Q8 Doris Day appeared in one film with this leading Hollywood actor, which she later described as "one of the few utterly joyless experiences I had in films." Who was the actor? Q9 This horror film, described by its director as "a fairy story for grown ups", bombed at the box office when released in 1983 but is now recognised as a cult classic. Title please. Q10 Which 2012 erotic thriller was based on a French movie titled Love Crime ?

Happy Birthday Johnny Depp born on June 9, 1963 #STACKBirthday Joke of the day: My brother asked me to stop singing Wonderwall by Oasis. I said maybe.

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Did you know? After his breakup with Winona Ryder, Johnny Depp had his tattoo altered from "Winona Forever" to "Wino Forever."

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STACK ’s Fave Movie Quote: “All those moments will be lost in time… like tears in the rain” – Roy Batty/Rutger Hauer in Blade Runner (1982)

A10. Ben Wheatley, who directed Sightseers.

Warner's Hollywood Mansion in 1990.

A8. Anthony Asquith A9. Record producer David Geffen who purchased Jack L.

Virtuosity (1995) and American Gangster A7. Jim Carrey in The Number 23

in Ghost A6. The Million Pound Note

(2007) A5. Unchained, whose theme song was

Unchained Melody which also featured

Washington and Russell Crowe in

(1958) A4. Denzel

(1978) A3. Touch of Evil

A2. Maggie Smith for California Suite

A1. Jason Bourne

Quiz Answers May 2016 (Issue 73) -

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FEATURE TECH

IN THE MIX Are open back or closed back headsets more your style? Porque no los dos? Astro’s latest A40 TR headset, packaged with the MixAmp Pro TR , gives you the choice of either, in addition to a plethora of customisation options. By Alesha Kolbe.

T he A40 TR features swappable mod kit components, a wired connection to your controller (or PC), surround sound, the whole shebang. The TR series is the official equipment of Call of Duty: Black Ops III , so you should make sure you’re sporting a pair when you’re nuking kids on the frontlines.   The A40 TR isn’t just beautiful on the inside; it offers a superior fit and finish, being one of the most comfortable and customisable headsets on offer today. Astro have really pulled out all the stops to provide one of the best quality gaming headsets on the market. Featuring a swappable, precision voice-isolating microphone and surround sound, and compatible with Astro Mod Kits, the A40 TR is perfect whether you’re using it in the privacy of your own home, at a LAN with your mates, or even playing as part of a professional tournament. Almost everything is interchangeable, further reiterating Astro’s position at the top of the headset food chain. Use the Astro Mod Kits to your heart’s content, with the A40 TR offering customisation not seen in other models. Easily swap out the mic, ear cushions and speaker tags – allowing change from open-back to closed-back headgear, and even the headband for a new set; helpful if anything ever happens to break, which it isn’t likely to. Weighing in at only 360 grams, it’s super easy to carry around with you as well. As if the changes on offer for the headset weren’t enough, Astro offers a full suite of

TECH

Pro TR to mix your sound the way you want. The MixAmp is customised for pro gamers and serious livestreamers, whilst still retaining its appeal to those not yet at that top level, and comes re-engineered with all the necessary digital components for streaming free of lag and interference. Use the Command Centre software (included free) to take full control of everything your audience hears, from game sound to voice chat, all with the full immersion of Dolby 5.1 and 7.1 surround sound. You can even “daisy-chain” your MixAmps together with your teammates to create synchronised set-ups. The A40 TR is well-suited to YouTubers, streamers, and podcasters looking to make use of the best audio-recording headsets Astro have to offer. Astro’s A40 TR, coupled with

customisation software to fine tune every aspect of your sound set-up. You’ll have full control over every input and output parameter of the MixAmp

the MixAmp Pro TR, is one of the best rigs on the market if you’re looking for customisable, comfortable headsets. Though they may burn a considerable hole in your hip pocket, you’re getting what you pay for. Use it with your Xbox, PlayStation or PC – quality doesn’t discriminate. Set it up any way you want, and prioritise your gaming sound to suit your needs. Time to set the record straight.

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DVD & BD FEATURE

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Deadpool director Tim Miller explains why he never gave up on bringing Marvel Comics’ foul-mouthed superhero to the big screen. BETTER OFF DEADPOOL

DVD & BD

F or a hardcore comicbook fan like Tim Miller, the opportunity to make your feature film debut with one of Marvel’s cult favourites was a dream come true. However, it almost didn’t happen. Co-founder of Blur Studio, which specialises in visual effects and animation for the film and video game industries, Miller (pictured right with star Ryan Reynold) was taken on as director in 2011 and even went as far as shooting some test footage. However, the project became bogged down in development hell at the studio and for a time Deadpool looked, err, dead in the water. “We got it to a point where it was either make it or not, and Fox decided not,” he recalls. “Hollywood is

full of projects that don’t happen, so it wasn’t like I was shocked – but I was crushed. When it didn’t happen, the writers and I - and Ryan too - we really never gave up. My agent said, ‘dude, just walk away’, but I loved it so much. We kept pushing and two things happened: the footage we’d shot leaked, and Simon Kinberg came on board as a producer. Fox really trusts him, and he’s a real gatekeeper for all the Marvel stuff at Fox. Simon said, ‘look, the script is great, and Tim’s not a total loser. I really think you guys should make this film.'" It proved to be a very smart move. Deadpool is now the highest grossing ‘R’ rated movie in history, with a global box office take of more than $1 billion and unsurprisingly a sequel

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FEATURE DVD & BD

NOT SO SUPER HEROES

has already been greenlit. Adapted from the Marvel character created in 1991 by Fabian Nicieza and Rob Liefeld, Deadpool tells the origin story of Wade Wilson

(played by Reynolds), whose terminal cancer is ‘cured’ by the same Weapon X program that created Wolverine, leaving him permanently disfigured, but impervious to pain and able to regenerate from his wounds.

KICK-ASS A customised wetsuit, a pair of batons and a high pain threshold turns average teen Dave Lizewski into a crimefighter who kicks ass. (Played by Aaron Taylor- Johnson in Kick-Ass , 2010)

Dubbed 'The Merc with a Mouth', this potty- mouthed, amoral superhero is unique among comic book characters in that he can break the fourth wall and Miller had long been a fan. “When I came on board the project, the script was already great,” he says. “It was one of the best scripts I’d ever read, which was why I wanted to do it so much. Plus, I’ve been reading comic books pretty hard-core for the last 35 years or so. If you came to my studio, you’d see a giant two-storey wall of bookshelves that house my years and years of comic book collecting. I’m primarily a Marvel guy, so of course I’d read tons of Deadpool. Captain America’s very serious and the X-Men are very serious, but Deadpool was one of the few that had a real sense of humour about it and didn’t take itself so seriously. In my stack of comic books, it was always the nice palate cleanser to the more serious stuff.” Reynolds shared Miller’s passion for the character and the fledgling director is full of praise for his star. “He’s a brilliant actor, and for a first-timer it’s really interesting to watch him work. We’d done the first week of shooting, and I’m not one of these guys who thinks I have to know everything, and I went over to Ryan and said, ‘dude, what could I be doing better?’ He said, 'Tim, this has been the most satisfying week of filming I’ve ever had. You don’t know everything, but at least you don’t pretend like you do.' We had a really great experience and there was no drama on the set.” Because Deadpool does break the fourth wall, the film is stacked with jokes that poke fun at the whole superhero world – including Fox’s own stable of characters. However, Miller says the studio didn’t interfere and pretty much gave him a free rein. “We got no pushback from Fox at any point,” he says. “Though I think they were little prepared for how weird this movie is! There’s some really odd

THE CRIMSON BOLT Arned with a pipe wrench, short-order cook Frank Darbo tells crime to "Shut Up!" and declares war on the sleazy drug lord who seduced his wife. (Played by Rainn Wilson in Super , 2010)

stuff in there, and tonally it’s all over the map. I think it does a nice job of balancing it, but you go from action to tragedy to weird situation comedy.” And while the long development process was frustrating, the delays probably ended up helping the film: the first wave of superhero movies opened up the world of comic books to a mainstream audience and now they are ready for something different. Miller agrees. “Now people are familiar with it and they’re ready to take the training wheels off the bike and look to something more aggressive, like Deadpool . As much as it’s for the hard-core fan – and I don’t think we ever sold out on who the character is – we’ve also made a real effort to be inclusive and make it accessible to people who haven’t read the comic. Humour, really, builds most of that bridge. We like to laugh, and this one’s funny. We’re not packing it too much with insider references where the audience will feel stupid if they don’t get it. “I want my wife to like the movie, which is why I made sure that Ryan took his shirt off a little bit. There’s a love story there and I think people really respond to Vanessa’s character. I think you care about the characters before they start beating each other up, which is really important to me."

DVD & BD

DEFENDOR Delusional road crew worker Arthur Poppington trades his tools for a bag of marbles and a squirting plastic lime to fight crime and his nemesis, Captain Industry. (Played by Woody Harrelson in Defendor , 2009)

GRIFF THE INVISIBLE Bullied office worker Griff becomes a crimefighter by night, clad in an invisibility cloak that makes him highly visible. (Played by Ryan Kwanten in Griff the Invisible , 2010)

• Deadpool is out on June 3

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“A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away” flashes on the screen, the opening chord of the theme erupts, the opening crawl scrolls... but it’s made out of LEGO?Yes, LEGO StarWars is back, and this time the folks at TT Fusion are tackling The Force Awakens . By Alesha Kolbe

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extra dialogue recorded by the actors exclusively for the game. No brick has gone unturned. Traveller’s Tales and TT Fusion – working together under TT Games – have built the legacy

EGO Star Wars: The Force Awakens will let players immerse themselves in the Star Wars universe and relive

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events from the latest film. With 40 vehicles and over 200 playable characters, featuring those from the new film as well as the original six, you’ll be able to play as the likes of Rey, Kylo, Poe, Han, and even BB-8, as well as pilot TIE Fighters and the Millennium Falcon. The game is the first in the Star Wars series to feature voice acting, and will include voice clips taken directly from the film itself, in addition to

are upon you – so no pressure, right? With the help of Disney and Lucasfilm, the companies are looking to produce the best Star Wars game available, without reinventing the wheel. The new title will feature 18 missions – 11 based on The Force Awakens itself, and seven extra “bridge” levels that add to the ever- growing lore of Star Wars. The additional story will be based on the 30-odd years in between Return of the Jedi and The Force Awakens, giving die-hard fans yet another reason to pick up the game. Wondering just what to expect from the new content? We’ll get a look at things like the origin of C3PO’s red arm, more backstory on Poe Dameron and the Trillia Massacre (mentioned only by name until now), as well as getting to help Han and Chewie wrangle those raucous Rathtars. Of course, staying true to the replayability of the previous LEGO games, there’s shiploads of extras to look for, with character free play returning, as well as character customisation, allowing you to create your own free play characters with

of the LEGO games for over 11 years. A lot of what they can produce today is thanks to the success of the original LEGO Star Wars titles, making the films accessible to both young and old. In developing a game based on such a beloved IP, you know that the eyes of the world

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A welcome return to the beloved humour of the series.

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their own abilities and weapons. Gameplay will see the return, of course, of building, introducing what is called “multibuilds”– multiple constructs from the same allotment of bricks that give you the chance to tackle situations from different angles. LEGO Star Wars: The Force Awakens sees a welcome return to the beloved humour of the series – in gameplay trailers we’ve already seen Poe competing with toast in the cockpit of his TIE Fighter, and BB-8 crashing into a sandcastle on Jakku. There’s always something going on in the background, and plenty of gags that’ll leave

• LEGO Star Wars: The Force Awakens is out June 29

you wishing you’d thought of them yourself. However, The Force Awakens will still tackle the darker scenes of the film, perhaps in a less tragic way; after all, it’s important to stay true to the events of the film whilst still making it accessible for all ages. LEGO Star Wars: The Force Awakens is a great way to keep yourself busy while you

eagerly await the release of Rogue One: A Star Wars Story . Featuring content you won’t get anywhere else, TT Fusion’s latest is a must-have for anyone looking

for a Force fix. In the immortal words of our favourite protocol droid, we “don’t think we’ll ever be accustomed to such excitement.”

FOUR LEGO GAMES YOU SHOULD PLAY LEGO Indiana Jones:

LEGO Star Wars: The Complete Saga

LEGO Marvel’s Avengers A true homage to the Marvel comic universe, LEGO Marvel’s Avengers includes not only characters from the film, but also fan-favourites yet to make it to the big show. Expect to see the likes of Squirrel Girl and Fin Fang Foom as you traipse around Manhattan.

LEGO Pirates of the Caribbean: The Video Game From the film that introduced you to the word “parlay”, the LEGO Pirates adaptation lets you delve deep into the world of Cap’n Jack Sparrow and co., all without worrying about that ridiculous Johnny Depp apology video.

The Original Adventures Pick this one up if only to hear the satisfying crack of Indy’s whip in its LEGO version. The original adventures include everything from Raiders of the Lost Ark, The Temple of Doom, and The Last Crusade.

Relive the original Star Wars stories before the graphics got good. The Complete Saga is just as you’d expect – everything from Episodes I-VI, including the Mos Espa Pod Race and the return of Bounty Hunter missions.

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house, and I’d just look out the window and… I pretended it was this magical place,” Brown says warmly. Residing in LA sometimes feels magical for the platinum-selling and the platinum-selling Kiwi artist, and occasionally feels utterly alien. “Living there has been so good for me, but sometimes I just think it’s so funny I’m here,” she says. “I’m not your typical Hollywood gal. I can walk from my house to the Walk of Fame in five minutes… I know everyone thinks Hollywood is just a plastic place, but that’s just one little aspect of it. There’s the whole tourism thing… I understand because I feel like I’m a lifelong tourist. I’m constantly in different places with my bum-bag and my camera. The important thing is that you have some close friends there, and that’s really all you need.” I'm fascinated by unhealthy obsessions, and how people become unhealthily obsessed with other people The tracks that Brown wrote and recorded for Wild Things were birthed under the guidance of producer Tommy English, whom the musician met through her LA neighbour and tattooist icon Kat Von D. English encouraged Brown to use panpipes in the gorgeous Money To Burn (“We were joking that we had to get some Toto-style flutes into the album”), the cuica in Wonderland (“It’s a Brazilian percussion instrument, it’s in heaps of Paul Simon’s Graceland songs; it sounds like ‘ooh-ooh-aah-aah!’ [imagine a cartoon monkey noise –Ed] ”), and the bongos in Let It Roll . “Percussion is one of my favourite things,” Brown says. “We did a lot of it live as well; we just went to town.” Meanwhile, Sweet Fascination encapsulates

WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE

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Kiwi songstress Ladyhawke’s highly anticipated third album WildThings was written and recorded in Los Angeles. Pip Brown talks to Zoë Radas about how the magic and strangeness of her new home informed her new record.

everything WildThings is about: it has very emotive synth lines (think CHVRCHES), sparse pops of digital keys, and terribly fearless Sky Ferreira-style drums: a ticking hi-hat and a thumping snare that falls in pitch as it lifts the marimba- tinged synths into the chorus. “It’s about obsession, which is one of my favourite things,” says Brown. “I’m fascinated by unhealthy obsessions, and how people become unhealthily obsessed with other people, whether they’re famous or not. You can delude yourself into thinking something is there that isn’t.”

P each’s Castle, 12 Grimmauld Place, Maurice Sendak’s mind; to this list of chimerical locations we can now add another: Hillside Avenue. The difference with Ladyhawke’s imagined ‘safe place’ is, however, that it also exists in reality. “’Hillside Avenue’ is actually a street – it’s basically the street I live on,” the lauded New Zealand singer-songwriter, also known as Pip Brown, tells us. “It is also this place I imagined in my head. I’ve lived in the same [house] for three years, and in the space of my living there, I was in a really dark place and then all of a sudden I was feeling amazing. I went through all this at Hillside Avenue so I felt like that was

my sacred place,” she says. Brown’s fresh new album Wild Things could be most efficiently described as your life’s soundtrack if you lived on Sonic the Hedgehog’s tropical, secret-laden, pixelated Angel Island; as its central spot of importance, Hillside Avenue features pom-pom synths which open out to a calypso beat in the chorus, and a melody full of aspiration and promise. “I’d wake up and the sun was shining every day; it’s so sunny in LA, and there are lots of beautiful trees around my

Wild Things by

Ladyhawke is out on June 3.

She's also touring in July; check ladyhawkemusic.com for details.

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TRIMMING THE TRAP

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Dougy Mandagi and Joseph Greer say the theme of camaraderie came about quite by chance; but it's fitting for a leaner Temper Trap's third record, Thick AsThieves . By Zoë Radas

King's Cross, which is host to the away-from- home studio for Mark Ronson, among other musicians – to the States and in between. “You still want to have the DNA of the band – when we play [a track] together, we're still conscious of it being a Temper Trap song,” says keys and guitar player Greer. Mandagi adds: “There are collaborators that help you come out of your shell or help you write, and there are writers that just want to write for you.” He tells a brief story about an unnamed ‘collaborator’ in LA who asked him to play bass on a song. “He goes, ‘Don’t play it like that, play it like this.’ I’m not even a bass player!” “He thought he was getting a session musician,” Greer chuckles. Mandagi continues, throwing his arms into the air: “What the f-ck, man, I drove all this way, and nearly got into an accident on the freeway ‘cause I’m used to driving on the other side of the road! So yeah, I’ve seen and experienced a whole gamut of different types.” Thick As Thieves ’ songs are an engaging mix, with huge ‘arena-ready’ tracks up at the head of the album ( So Much Sky , Fall Together, and

else to do. I’m not going to start doing vocal acrobatics just ‘cause. I think that each of us should always serve the song, not serve ourselves. There’s an art to understanding that, to being sensitive to the song.”

M ucking with electric knobs, a vocalist refusing to sing, Takeshi’s Castle , Gaga looking good, a studio space next to Mark Ronson, a near-miss on an LA highway, an Instagram snap that became a subconscious conversation with Dougy Mandagi and Joseph Greer about The Temper Trap’s new album Thick As Thieves flows easily, which isn’t a small achievement considering these two just played a sold-out hometown show last night. “We’ve been busy, yeah, the last few days,” vocalist Mandagi smiles wearily over his glass of water. In addition to gigantic singles Fall Together, Thick As Thieves and Burn traversing the airwaves, these shows have given Temper Trap fans – rabid with curiosity – an idea of which direction the now four-piece would take, having shed lead guitarist Lorenzo Sillitto in late 2013. “The objective was to really understand the purpose of each part and be very intentional,” Mandagi explains, “not just have someone do something just because they’ve got nothing symbol, and songs whose skins can be expanded to embrace a stadium: the

Each of us should always serve the song, not ourselves

This deliberate, “leaner” approach coincided with a period of songwriting collaboration for the band, which took them from their own Tileyard studio in London – a creative arts community in

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sudden slide into a romantic half-time beat near the end, with choral voices. “It was probably one of the first songs that we worked on, and it was just Dougy with an acoustic guitar,” says Greer. “We had this person re-create a mellotron, but it’s new – it’s like a digital version but by the same creator as the original. But to be honest, quite often it happens that the most basic thing you come up with is the sound you want to use. When you try and recreate it, it doesn’t have the same character. You can do so much with so little.” Mendagi agrees: “Sometimes you get into the studio with producers and whatnot, and people are all about using vintage gear and this and that. You end up plugging in and you play the guitar and you go, GarageBand sounds better.” The choral effect did involve a weird contraption that emitted frequencies based on which random knob you decided to press or turn. “You just record heaps of samples of f-cking around with the thing,” Greer laughs. “We trigger it live,” Mendagi says. Greer laments that it doesn’t look very dramatic on-stage, and Mendagi suggests a confetti cannon every time a knob is touched. It’s a spectacular idea, but not something The Temper Trap need to invoke its effects – Thick As Thieves will do that on its own.

I sang it; it sounded like dogsh-t. If it ain't broke, don't fix it

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TheTemper Trap: Joseph Greer, Dougy Mandagi,Toby Dundas, and Jonathon Aherne

Thick As Thieves by The Temper Trap is out June 10 via Liberation.

it, but I always wanted Johnny to sing it. But the labels were like, ‘What if it’s a single, and then it’s the first single, and that’s Johnny? People are going to get confused, so you should sing it,’ and I sang it. It sounded like dogsh-t. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” Another which sits in the middle of the album’s divide is Summer’s Almost Gone , which is filled with enchanting keys and an awesome,

the gorgeous Riverina ), and more detailed, introspective tracks towards its tail such as What If I’mWrong and the delicate beauty Tombstone . The latter's dynamic touches are completely unexpected (particularly for such a songtitle), and its lyrics are delivered in an almost half-spoken style. “It’s not me!” Mandagi exclaims triumphantly of those vocals. “It’s Johnny [Aherne, bass guitarist]. I attempted

THE COVER CUBS Y ou might think the album cover’s striking image –

‘cause we wanted to come back with us on the cover: this isTemperTrap, bang, we’re back!” Mandagi says. “Then during a meeting one day we were looking for an image for the single Thick As Thieves , and I said ‘Johnny has an Instagram photo that he took years ago in Hackney,

of these kids wearing wolf masks, and I think that would be amazing.’ I showed Steve, the Art Director, and he said ‘Can that be your album cover?’” “I think

two children in hairy animal masks with their little claws up and bared, which seems to fit so perfectly with the album’s title – was artificially set up. “We went through all this trouble of doing all these photo shoots of the band,

he asked them ‘Can I take a photo of you?’ they didn’t say anything, they just nodded with the masks on.”

it was Halloween and these kids were running around,” Greer adds. “Apparently when

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Its purity of emotion, gorgeous vocal effects and symphonic qualities remain timeless, as do the sentiments of maturing love on That's Not Me , the warmth of companionship on Don't Talk (Put Your Head On My Shoulder) , and how love can wither as people grow apart on Caroline No : “Where did your long hair go, where is the girl I used to know, where it that happy glow... who took that look away...?” Instrumental pieces like the subtle Let's Go Away For a While and the surfer-dream title track – courageous inclusions from a band whose vocal harmonies were their signature – stand as the equal of songs like I Know There's an Answer , which sounds like Wilson's transition from pop writer to masterful creator. Wilson didn't leave the slightly sickly pop sentiments of love songs behind ( Here Today ) but he put them in a new context where the ideas were more thoughtful ( I Just Wasn't Made For These Times ) and elevated them.

Graham Reid goes on a marathon Pet Sounds bender, half a century after its release. tHE SOuND OF POP GENIUS

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Only Knows is his favourite song and – after the step-change of Revolver which they were working on at the time – The Beatles responded with the even more elaborate Sgt. Pepper's.

T here are two reasons to be excited about the 50th anniversary box set of the Beach Boys' classic album Pet Sounds . The first is that it exists at all – a whopping 104 tracks across the five-CD version which includes mono and stereo mixes, instrumental backing tracks and live versions – and we can hear how Brian Wilson's mind worked in the studio. The second reason is there aren't a dozen versions of Sloop John B . These days Pet Sounds is considered one of the great albums of the rock era, but it had a ho-hum reception on release in May 1966. It just scraped into the US top 10 and was one of the few Beach Boys albums in America not to go gold on release (although it went to #2 in Britain). At the time, most rock writers (of whom there were very few) were indifferent about it. In fact, eight years after its release Stephen Davis writing in Rolling Stone went to great lengths to describe it as the first rock record to be a concept album (the vagaries of love and relationships was the theme, aside from Sloop John B) and hail it as soulful, lovely, and “by far the best album Brian has yet delivered." By that time Pet Sounds had been recognised as a glittering star in the musical cosmos, and the album which made The Beatles up their game. Paul McCartney has frequently said God

The reissues – various iterations from a single CD re-release, through vinyl to the massive box set – confirm Brian Wilson's genius, and also that of the Wrecking Crew musicians he used on these sessions which lasted four months. The big box is only for obsessives (count me in) because most people can live without a seven minute stop-start run-through of Wouldn't It Be Nice with Wilson interrupting until the musicians are on the money. But if you're curious about how genius works then Pet Sounds is the album which is worth pulling apart. And, as they say, God is in the details... After this Brian Wilson delivered the peerless Good Vibrations single then had his emotional meltdown, and his next project SMiLE – which he described as “a teenage symphony to God” – never happened in the way he envisioned. But for Pet Sounds his vision was intact. Terrible album cover though.

But where Sgt. Pepper's remains embalmed in the era of hippie psychedelia, Pet Sounds – by being more poppy, soulful and heartfelt – is still fresh today, and its innovations (layering of vocals, orchestration, sonic effects from theremin, bicycle bells and so on) opened the door on how to create pop in the studio. Its gorgeous vocal effects and symphonic qualities remain timeless These days Pet Sounds frequently tops Best Albums Ever lists – as it did in this year's 200 Greatest Albums of All Time in Uncut – or at worst is in the top five (although perversely, in the post-grunge/post-Britpop era, Q magazine in 2003 had it at a lowly 99 out of their top 100).

For more interviews, overviews and reviews by Graham Reid see: www.elsewhere.co.nz

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