Fiction Machine
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FictionMachine is an ongoing collection of essays. They were initially about science fiction, fantasy and horror cinema, but non-genre films are gaining increased coverage. Each essay takes on an individual film and submits it to closer examination. It explores the making of the film, using quotes by the filmmakers and actors where available. Ultimately it is an appreciation of both a genre and a medium: celebrating the biggest hits while shining a light on under-seen and under-rated gems.
Since February 2017 the site has also published short-form reviews of current and past feature films, as a supplement to the main essays.
The website is primarily written by Grant Watson. Since 2000 Grant has been writing film criticism, beginning with his William Atheling Jr award-winning column in Borderlands and continuing through his podcast Bad Film Diaries and more than 2,000 posts on The Angriest. This is the latest iteration of his critical writing project. He also writes for FilmInk and VCinema. In 2018 he served on the Fipresci Prize jury at the Taiwan Golden Horse Film Festival. Source
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| Scope | Consumer |
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| Language | English |
| Country | Australia |
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Recent Articles
Search ArticlesREVIEW: Hoppers (2026)
The needle keeps moving back and forth on the quality of Pixar Animation Studios’ suite of animated features. While some releases of recent years – like Turning Red (2022) – proved exceptional, others have been perhaps less effective in capturing an audience’s affections. The legendary ‘can do no wrong’ run of 1995 to 2004, taking in two Toy Storys, Monsters Inc, and Finding Nemo, is well into the studio’s past these days.
TV REVIEW: Doctor Who (2005), 7.13 “The Name of the Doctor”
First broadcast 18 May 2013. Some of the best ideas that Steven Moffat ever had for Doctor Who are played out in this, the final episode of its seventh season. Saul Metzstein directs with flair, but the execution of Moffat’s concept wobbles terribly. The best bits of “The Name of the Doctor” feel exceptional, but it does keep pulling its punches. To confuse things even further, Moffat then drops the single-biggest cliffhanger in Doctor Who history. What is a fan to do?
FANTASIA REVIEW: Foxing: Kitsuné-tsuki (2026)
Shinano (Wataya Miho) works as a character designer for a Japanese animation company. Miserable and disconnected, she worries she has been possessed by a fox spirit. Not simply any spirit either, but Koyami: a mocking and excessively critical character that she designed herself. As she slips further into depression and loneliness, Shinano begins to be overwhelmed by the characters she created coming to life around her. Foxing: Kitsuné-tsuki is a 14-minute anime short directed by Shinozuka Takeru.
REVIEW: Project Hail Mary (2026)
It is quite a feat to feel slightly hollow and a little bloated at the same time, but Phil Lord and Chris Miller’s Project Hail Mary somehow achieves the feat. Coming to this amiable, crowd-pleasing science fiction film after its theatrical run means missing the hype of one of 2026’s most popular motion pictures, but it also means avoiding the risk of being caught up in it. This is highly enjoyable populist entertainment, but it is far from flawless.
FANTASIA REVIEW: Tunnels: Sun in the Dark (2025)
Some years ago I had the opportunity to visit the Ho Chi Minh City Museum of Fine Arts. Among its exhibits was a series of loose sketches made during the Vietnam War by a member of the Viet Cong armed forces. They depict various men and women in the forest, some eating and talking with one another, some simply waiting. They present a sharp contrast to the anonymous angry masses depicted in countless American war films. They showcase ordinary people forced into a great and terrible conflict.
REVIEW: The King’s Daughter (2022)
Blame it on a thrift shop find and an incessant curiosity for cinema car wrecks. I stumbled upon a DVD of Sean McNamara’s 2022 film The King’s Daughter last week and felt compelled to give it a look. Well, it was released in 2022 at any rate. This teen-oriented historical fantasy was actually filmed all the way back in 2014, but then languished in anonymity while a succession of film companies and distributors bought and sold the rights.
TV REVIEW: Doctor Who (2005), 7.12 “Nightmare in Silver”
First broadcast 11 May 2013. The Doctor (Matt Smith) and Clara (Jenna Coleman) take the children Angie (Eve de Leon Allen) and Artie (Kassius Carey Johnson) to an alien theme park far from Earth – only to find it almost entirely abandoned and ruined. They soon discover a plot by the Cybermen to return to menace the galaxy, and to turn the Doctor into their Cyber-Planner.
REVIEW: Obsession (2025)
Bear (Michael Johnston) is a music store employee with a crush on co-worker Nikki (Inde Navarrette). When he impulsively buys her a ‘one wish willow’ novelty from a new age store – crack the stick in half and make a wish – and then fails to give her gift, he uses it himself and wishes she will love him ‘more than anybody else in the world’. Love him she does, with a supernatural intensity that turns his hoped-for romance into a nightmare. Much has been written of Obsession‘s trajectory to success.
REVIEW: The Warped Forest (2011)
Miki Shunichiro’s The Warped Forest is a strange, somewhat wonderful beast, rich in ideas and gently transgressive concepts. That it might only be partially successful is, in this case, excusable: while there is not a particularly strong story or well-defined characters, its off-kilter and sexualised weirdness will be a real treat for those attracted to their weirder end of Japanese cinema. You know who you are.
REVIEW: Moana (2026)
It must be difficult for the creatives hired to remake Disney’s animated features to find opportunities to be inventive. By and large they simply duplicate the popular original films with a combination of live-action and CGI, in many cases on a shot-for-shot basis. Certainly they are becoming difficult for critics to continue reviewing them: how many times must we write the same piece, condemning the company’s imagination-free, mercenary approach?