In Maid, we are enveloped in the protagonist’s scramble for all of the following: income, social security benefits, custody rights and a place to live. For the most part, the ticket to each of these is a low-paid, labour intensive house cleaning job with a lousy employer called Value Maids.

Rarely does the Australian Television industry produce something that feels so real. However, Fires is also a fascinating case study of how easy it is for good television to become bad.

Fans of Normal People, Fleabag and Marriage Story: rejoice. Your next fix of authentic romantic suffering has arrived.

It’s hard to justify watching The D’Amelio Show as mind-numbing reality television in the same way that Keeping up the Kardashians could be at its finest.

Disclosure is a confronting tale about two close couples whose friendships implode through the allegation that one of their children was sexually abused by the other.

Set in the icy tundra of Manitoba Canada, The Ice Road is a race-against-time action thriller that pits Liam Neeson not only against thin ice roads that could crack at any minute, but also corporate greed.

Fanny Lye Deliver’d is a quasi-Western set just after the English Civil War, circa 1657, in period of moral and sexual liberation, as well as barbaric violence.

The Orchard Murders does well as a standalone crime read, although I imagine loyal readers of Gott’s series would better appreciate the character development across novels.

Dating Amber centres on Eddie and Amber, both teenage homosexuals who fake a romantic relationship together at school to convince their tormenting classmates they are straight and otherwise ‘normal’.

No film in recent memory has made the experience of sitting with a knot in your stomach so enthralling and intriguing.

With this new release, Australian readers especially would do well to take a look at Seven Fallen Feathers and consider the similar atrocities perpetuated against Indigenous people in our own backyard.

A wonderfully enthusiastic and enjoyable tribute to the esoteric stylings, and wide-ranging influence, of the band Sparks.

Minamata’s painterly composition paired with its desperate, clawing story of inequality and the exposing of truths creates a multilayered masterpiece that is equal in its depiction of beauty and pain.

Black and white has never looked so vibrant.

Amidst the turbulence and wildness, First Love is fundamentally a story of the quiet good and maniacal evil that inheres in the world.

Ema unveils itself as a political statement through the microcosm of its titular character. However, it’s crowning achievement is the immersive kinetic energy created from the phenomenal dance choreography, pumping soundtrack and beautiful cinematography.

If you want a film that takes an honest look at familial relationships, which breaks your heart and proceeds to mend it in 100 minutes, then June Again is your best bet.

JESUS lived, Jesus Died, and Jesus has been resurrected again at Theatreworks. Not in a typical patriarchal way but a completely reimagined production with Jesus represented and played by a transgender woman.

Don’t immediately write Twist off as just another modern re-telling of a classic, only further proof that the film industry is well and truly out of new and fresh ideas. New and fresh is exactly what director Martin Owen achieves with this re-vamped return to everyone’s favourite orphan (sorry Annie).

Reichardt’s concern throughout First Cow, it seems, is with people, and the consequences of the structures to which they are subject. That much is clear from the film’s framing device, which I won’t ruin here – this story, astonishingly tender and beautiful as it is, isn’t content to just give the audience likable characters developing an endearing friendship that you like to watch.