Søren Hough

Science Communicator

London, UK

Science Communicator. Freelance journalist/editor. Founder/Editor-in-Chief at Movie Fail. Contributor at RogerEbert.com. Cancer Biologist (PhD).

Søren Hough

Science Communicator

London, UK

Science Communicator. Freelance journalist/editor. Founder/Editor-in-Chief at Movie Fail. Contributor at RogerEbert.com. Cancer Biologist (PhD).

Featured
Neighbours are the Best Barricades: Interview with Cambridge Community Kitchen
Cambridge Community Kitchen (CCK) emerged out of the same anarchic current that created The Lockon (see this interview), a squat based in Cambridge, UK. Throughout COVID, CCK has bypassed local government to prepare and deliver vegan food to rough sleeper
The Commoner
Politics Interview
Featured
Fight the Power: Cyril Schäublin on Unrest
Everything seems to tick in "Unrest," the latest effort from Zurich-born writer/director Cyril Schäublin. “Unrest” depicts the working lives of 19th century anarchist watchmakers in the Swiss mountains, laying bare the absurdities of the wage system. Schäublin follows workers as they navigate their working hours across four different time zones in one town—factory time, train station time, municipality time, and church time. It is a fitting theme after his 2017 debut, “Those Who Are Fine,” skewered the transactional and atomized nature of capitalist society. His new film blends the persistent whirring of factory machines with the heavy breathing of manual labor, an intentional confusion of internal and imposed rhythm.
RogerEbert.com
Film Interview Politics
Featured
Light in a Dark Space: Interview with The Lockon Cambridge Squat
The Lockon is a vegan squat based in the building of the former Hopbine bar in the centre of Cambridge. The squat formed in the beginning of 2020 and, following intense legal battles with the landlord, won the right to continue using the premises as a living and organising space. Today, The Lockon serves as a home for its residents and a mutual aid resource for locals who need food, clothing, or other materials — no questions asked. The Commoner sat down with Glade, a long-time resident at The Lockon, to get their perspective on how the project started, how it builds community in a non-hierarchical manner, and how it fits into the broader Cambridge landscape.
The Commoner
Politics Interview
Featured
Pastries, Freedom, and Love: An Interview with The Artist Airidescence
The Artist Airidescence is a multimedia anarchist creator whose work has picked up significant attention on social media. Their ongoing anarchist raccoon art series has been popular enough to warrant sold out print runs on Etsy. Recently, in collaboration with scholar Zoe Baker, they have produced an animated short film entitled Pastries, Freedom, Love: A Malatesta Story based on text by the Italian anarchist Luigi Fabbri. The full short can be viewed in full for free on Youtube. The Commoner sat down with Airidescence to discuss the inspirations for their art, how Pastries, Freedom, Love came to be, and what projects are on the horizon for 2022.
The Commoner
Film Politics Animation Interview
Featured
Peasants with Pitchforks: An Interview with Noam Chomsky
Noam Chomsky is an award-winning linguist, political theorist, dissident, and activist. He is currently Professor Emeritus at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Laureate Professor of Linguistics at the University of Arizona. Chomsky is a prolific author, having published over one hundred books since 1967 on topics ranging from anarchism to media skepticism.
Science for the People
Interviews Science Politics
Featured
Planet of the Humans and Climate Change: Muddled, Misinformed or Malevolent?
Planet of the Humans is a 2020 documentary directed by Jeff Gibbs, executive produced by Michael Moore and distributed by Films for Action. The movie purports to reveal the failures of environmentalists for investing time and activism in green technologies which, according to Gibbs, have not fulfilled their promise for a more sustainable future.
Science for the People
Film Politics Interviews Science
Featured
Interview with Nora Twomey, Director of The Breadwinner
Cartoon Saloon has knocked it out of the park ever since they hit the scene in 2009 with The Secret of Kells. Their feature-length movies have consistently garnered praise from critics. Nora Twomey, who co-directed Kells, is back as a solo director on the studio’s third film: The Breadwinner. The Breadwinner is an adaptation of Deborah Ellis’s book of the same name.
Movie Fail
Interviews
Featured
Interview with Astrid Goldsmith, Writer/Director of Squirrel Island
n a garage somewhere in Folkestone in Kent, a grey squirrel named Dot begins to move, blinking and stumbling forward as she comes to life. Dot looks around an impenetrable, foreboding forest, rife with do-it-yourself artistry. A human hand reaches over to adjust her fabric-covered arms just so. The hand belongs to Astrid Goldsmith, an animator whose short film, Squirrel Island, caught my attention at the London Short Film Festival earlier this year. It’s a remarkable dialogue-less effort with an incredible sense of handmade aesthetic, dark humor and perilous narrative thrust. I sat down with Ms. Goldsmith to discuss her movie, from her first screening with Laika Studios to where she plans to take her career next.
Movie Fail
Interviews Animation Film
Featured
Charles Agbaje, Co-Creator of Spider Stories
There is limitless potential in fantasy. It exists in the realm of the imagination where constraints mean nothing. Sometimes it offers commentary on real world phenomena, while other times it simply explores ideas too outlandish for the confines of grounded drama. Yet despite this freedom, modern fantasy storytelling has barely scratched the surface of what’s possible.
Movie Fail
Interviews
Featured
Tomm Moore, Writer/Director of Song of the Sea and The Secret of Kells
There is a certain magic to animation that allows filmmakers to bring our imagination to life. Even live action films depend on these techniques through CGI and other means to help us visualize fantastical versions of our own reality. This outlook drives Tomm Moore, one of the filmmakers behind The Secret of Kells (2009) and Song of the Sea (2014).
Movie Fail
Interviews
Featured
The Magic of MAGI: Douglas Trumbull’s Quest to Explore a “New Planet of Cinematic Potential”
It began with something Stanley Kubrick once said. With "2001: A Space Odyssey," he felt he owed the audience an experience. He wanted to use Cinerama to show people what it was like to fly through space. This was ambitious for 1968, but it worked. The film has certainly stood the test of time, due in no small part to special effects provided by Douglas Trumbull, Wally Veevers, Con Pederson and Tom Howard.
RogerEbert.com
Interviews
Interview with Stephen Stanton
Stephen Stanton has lent his talents to numerous animated television shows, games, and movies, including Life Itself.
Movie Fail
Interviews Podcasts
Video game stars to release Punisher passion project
“He is constant like the Northern Star. He is like the Grim Reaper. He is the angel of death.”
The Daily Collegian
Interviews
Tom Ciaburri, Director of Ironing Board Sam’s Tenth
It’s probably safe to assume that you haven’t heard of Ironing Board Sam.
Movie Fail
Interviews
5 College Professor Co-Creates Award-Winning Animated Short “Caldera”
The flowing figure of an enigmatic young woman floats down through sapphire blue water pierced by rays of faint sunlight. The young woman’s black hair streams behind her as she leans forward to touch the looming form of a giant, peaceful turtle. A quietly haunting tune compliments the scene as it accentuates the flood of emotional imagery.
The Massachusetts Daily Collegian
Interviews

About

Søren Hough

Film Journalism

Blogging

Editing

Epigenetics Research

CRISPR

DNA Repair

Podcasting

Film Criticism

Science Journalism

I am a freelance film and science journalist. My work has been featured on key entertainment industry websites including RogerEbert.com (www.rogerebert.com/interviews/the-magic-of-magi-douglas-trumbulls-quest-to-explore-a-new-planet-of-cinematic-potential) and ScottFeinberg.com (http://moviefail.com/tag/scottfeinberg.com). I additionally serve as an Editor at Science for the People magazine (https://magazine.scienceforthepeople.org/web-extras/noam-chomsky-interview-covid-19-climate-crisis-class-warfare/).

I started Movie Fail (http://moviefail.com) in January 2012, a site dedicated to multimedia reviews, op-eds, academic essays, and news articles about movies and the film industry. My work there includes interviews with multiple Oscar-nominated filmmakers (https://moviefail.com/nora-twomey-director-the-breadwinner/) and up-and-coming directors (https://moviefail.com/astrid-goldsmith-writer-director-squirrel-island/).

I brought my experience as an Editor and Staff Writer to The Massachusetts Daily Collegian (http://dailycollegian.com/author/soren-hough) one year later as I began working for the paper as a film and science correspondent. In the spring of 2013, I was hired as Editor of the film section of the paper for the fall of 2013.

In December 2013, I graduated from the Film Studies and Microbiology programs at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. In 2023, I graduated from the University of Cambridge with a PhD in Biochemistry.

The cover photo is a screen shot from Tete's wonderful short film, raintown.