The Raid (Film Review)
The notion of a foreign director coming into the martial arts industry and changing it is not a new one. One of the most important Chinese martial arts films that established countless conventions (King Boxer) was directed by a Korean, which in the early 70s was unheard of. Over 40 years later we have someone from Wales – Gareth Evans – shooting his second Indonesian film. That film is the Raid. (more…)
Dark Shadows (Film Review)
Dark Shadows is Tim Burton and Johnny Depp’s 8th collaboration and their interpretation of the cult 1960s Supernatural drama of the same name. In both versions the Collins family is the order of the day, of which we are introduced to through Barnabas Collins (Johnny Depp), an early patriarch of the family who helped establish them after moving from England. Who was at the centre of an unfortunate love triangle between his true love Josette DuPres and the jealous servant Angelique Bouchard – a spiteful witch. Angelique concludes that if she cannot have her love no one can by murdering Josette, cursing Barnabus to spend eternity as a vampire and then setting the townspeople on him, sealing him in a coffin, burying him ‘alive’. Then, thanks to all the curses on his family and lover lining up he is freed from his captivity. No longer is it 1790s frontier America, it is 1972. (more…)
Safe (Film Review)
You rarely get a surprise when you visit the cinema intending to watch the latest Jason Statham movie. You know he’ll be bald and stubbly, his dialogue will be delivered in a very gruff accent, he’ll make a few sarcastic comments, and he’ll kick seven shades of shit out of nameless bad guys for 90 minutes. (more…)
Battleship (Film Review)
Battleship is a movie that starts dumb, and gets progressively dumber as it progress. It’s high on unintentional comedy, and low on excitement, originality and particularly, a decent plot. It’s a cliché-fest in which you’ll have no sympathy for any of the characters, or be able to decide if you’re supposed to be on the side of the good old US Navy, or the (apparently) really terribly nasty aliens. (more…)
Avenger’s Assemble (Film Review)
The Incredible Hulk, Iron man 1 & 2, Thor and Captain America, all of these Marvel produced superhero films were made with their own aspirations and goals most of which were achieved to varying levels. Alongside each pictures own aims, Marvel created its own self-sustaining hype machine. An added allure that fanned the flames of anticipation at the prospect of all these superheroes coming together to fight with each other. The fact is finally here, the massively anticipated avengers written and directed by Joss Whedon is here. Typically such a weight of expectation would suffocate most films, which makes it all the more satisfying to confirm that this ensemble blockbuster is everything fans wanted. (more…)
Lockout (Film Review)
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Based on an original story by Luc Besson, there’s an embellishment. Lockout is from Besson’s production studio and the best way to describe it without going into the specifics is to say that it is a blend of Escape from New York, Alien 3, Con Air and Die Hard. Maggie Grace is Emilie Warnock, the president’s daughter and she’s on a humanitarian visit to the space station/prison MS One (Maximum Security) to investigate the effects of hyper sleep. As she is there something inevitably goes wrong, the prisoners break free and the president’s daughter is held hostage. On Earth, Guy Pearce is Snow, a rogue agent involved in a conspiracy. Getting caught by the government, he is eventually offered a bargaining chip to go solo into MS one, along with 500 violent convicts to rescue the president’s daughter. His promise to a dying friend and his freedom neatly coincide and an understanding is reached. (more…)
The Cabin in the Woods (Film Review)
How to discuss the Cabin in the Woods? Now there is a million dollar question. A group of college students made up of Chris Hemsworth (pre-Thor), Anna Hutchinson, Fran Kranz, Kristen Connolly and Jesse Williams all decide to disappear off the grid and go to Hemsworth’s cousin’s Cabin in the Woods for the weekend. The horror archetype is right there, only instead of the characters being stupid stereotypes, they are all intellectual in their own way. Keeping true to the genre stereotypes, they have a run in with a creepy local before arriving at the cabin. That is a sequence of often travelled horror clichés and it takes very little time to shake those shackles free. (more…)
Headhunters (Film Review)
Aksel Hennie is Roger Brown, the lead in Headhunters, based on the book of the same name by Jo Nesbø. Roger is a diminutive man, standing 5ft6 tall and married to Diana (Synnøve Macody Lund, in her acting début). A statuesque, beautiful woman who has given him Napoleon complex, therefore he believes it necessary to impress his wife with lavish gifts to prevent her from leaving him, none of which he can afford. He has driven himself into a corner where his income as a high-flying head-hunter in the recruitment industry isn’t enough, so on the side he is an accomplished art thief. (more…)
The Cold Light of Day (Film Review)
Abduction was an awful film that saw Taylor Lautner fight against those that murdered his fake parents and throws him head first into the world of spies and international subterfuge. The cold light of day, directed by JCVD director Mabrouk El Mechri, is essentially the same film, only this time the father is Bruce Willis instead of Jason Isaacs and Sigourney Weaver is the antagonist this time, since the first trailer emerged the cold light of day has mockingly been called Abduction 2 in this dojo. (more…)
The Pirates! In an Adventure with Scientists (Review)
Arthur Christmas, Chicken Run, Curse of the Were-rabbit & The Wrong Trousers, if any of these clay animated films sound familiar, then Britain’s greatest cinematic exponent, Aardman Studios, will be no mystery. If those titles hold no meaning, please greet with open arms their latest film, an adaptation of the first Gideon Coe Pirate novels – the pirates! In an adventure with scientists! Or as it is titled in North America, The Pirates! Band of Misfits! (more…)
The Hunger Games (Film Review)
Right from the go, there is the issue of the elephant in the room to be addressed and that elephant goes by the name of Battle Royale. The set up for The Hunger Games is of a gladiatorial battle to the death by people aged between 12-18, shown on TV throughout the world and hosted in a dome open to manipulation al a the Truman show. The comparison between the Hunger Games and Battle Royale is there, it would be erroneous to suggest otherwise and it is impossible to ignore, however there is more to this film than a comparison. (more…)
21 Jump Street (Film Review)
21 Jump Street was one of the many iconic American TV shows of the 1980s, which launched Johnny Depp’s career. A series that wasn’t embraced in the UK, hence this re-adaptation doesn’t have the weight of fandom weighing it down in these waters. Here, 21 Jump Street is just another buddy cop comedy and that fact alone, isolated from its status as a remake, made this film a tiresome prospect prior to seeing it, especially when the advertising campaign makes it look like insufferable dross. (more…)
The Raven (Film Review)
Edgar Allen Poe is one of the most famous names in literary history, on top of that proud lineage he is also has a huge role in the formation of horror as it is now known. Naturally his role and influence in horror cinema is huge, whether it is in a direct sense and the endless adaptations of his work from the likes of Roger Corman and other less well-known directors or in a more idealistic and stylistic sense. Edgar Allen Poe, the person, is somewhat or a mystery, an enigma. He has rarely, if ever, featured as a character in cinema. In 2012, some 169 years after his death he is making his character début in cinema in John Cusack’s passion project from director James McTeigue, which is named after the legendary wordsmiths most famous work, The Raven. (more…)
The Cycle (Short Film/Review)
The Cycle is a short film directed by Chris Suffield of the Vulture Hound parish and Mike Jelves. Opening with the ambiguous and puzzling words of, “I slept last night”, the director duo’s short film follows the exploits of an insomniac. John Bocelli plays a twenty something who is suffering from crippling Insomnia and at the suggestion of his therapist he records himself talking to camera as a vehicle to come to terms with his condition. The Cycle adopts a stylised approach to telling its story which is not quite found footage; this is more of a documentary direction. As far as set-ups for using the camera as a tool to exist in the films world rather than a tool of voyeurism, this is well conceived. (more…)
The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel (Film Review)
The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel comes with an impressive pedigree. Director John Madden, and stars Judi Dench, Maggie Smith and Tom Wilkinson have all won or been nominated for an Oscar, and between them, the entire cast has won a host of BAFTAs. Alongside Dench, Smith and Wilkinson, the cast also includes Dev Patel, Ronald Pickup, Celia Imrie, Bill Nighy and Penelope Wilton. But despite such celebrated stars, The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel is not an easy sell as a movie. Although there are funny lines in the trailer, on paper the plot is not an exciting one. 7 retirees read about a hotel in India that promises a home for the ‘elderly and beautiful’, and all of them make the decision to go there for different reasons. (more…)
Project X (Film Review)
The found footage horror movie has been around for a long time, so it’s not surprising that film-makers have started to move on, and found footage movies based in other genres have begun making it to cinemas. (more…)
Rampart (Film Review)
Oren Moverman’s debut as a director, The Messenger, was critically acclaimed after its release in 2009. Woody Harrelson Captain Tony Stone, an army man whose job is to inform the next of kin after a soldier has been killed in combat. His performance in particular drew praise, and lead to Golden Globe and Oscar nominations for best supporting actor. In anticipation of watching Rampart, I watched The Messenger, but felt that co-star Ben Foster (Six Feet Under, 3:10 To Yuma) was better than Harrelson, and that the movie itself was reasonably good, but not great. (more…)
Urbanized (Film Review)
Gary Hustwit started his career in the late 1980s with legendary LA based punk rock label SST Records; now in 2012 he is an accomplished documentarian releasing the third entry into his design trilogy of documentaries. Urbanized the latest entry into this series, and was preceded by Helvetica and Objectified. Returning for his third collaboration is accomplished cinematographer Luke Geissbühler. (more…)
Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance (Film Review)
In 2012, the directorial partnership of Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor, who are best known for Crank (and its 2009 sequel, High Voltage), returned to their brand of high energy cinema with a re-adaptation of the Ghost Rider mythology in Spirit of Vengeance. Somewhere in an unnamed Balkan state, Johnny Blaze (once again played by Cage) is hiding away from the murderous spirit that resides inside him. Soon after being introduced in a kinetic opening scene, French drifter, Moreau (Idris Elba) finds Johnny and requests his help to save Danny who is being hunted down by Carrigan (Johnny Whitworth) at the employ of the man who gave him with the Ghost Rider curse, Roarke (Cairan Hinds). There really is little else to say about the plot as it employs a cat and mouse chase with a generous sprinkling of action scenes leading up towards the inevitable end-game clash, nothing beyond the conventional here. (more…)
Man On A Ledge (Film Review)
Basically, the movie Man On A Ledge is exactly what it says it is. Sam Worthington is the man in question, and he spends the majority of the movie on a ledge, outside the Roosevelt Hotel in Manhattan. Worthington plays ex-cop Nick Cassidy, who claims he has been wrongly imprisoned after being accused of stealing a diamond worth $40million from businessman David Englander (Ed Harris). (more…)
The Muppets (Film Review)
In 2012, the Muppets have returned to much anticipation from adults the world over. Kids who haven’t been brought up on the franchise won’t care one way or the other, unfamiliar with the characters or the history. That is the huge issue confronting the potential for success for this repackaging of an old icon for a new generation. The writers Jason Segel & Nicholas Stoller have evaded this perfectly, by introducing the Muppets to a new audience through the two lead characters and brothers, Walter (a new Muppet) and Gary (also played by Segel), who grow up with the TV series and fall in love with it. Building up the series from the ground up gets around the issue nimbly. (more…)
The Woman in Black (Film Review)
Event cinema is a term characteristically earmarked for hugely anticipated blockbusters, for horror fans each new film released by Hammer is an event of great anticipation, that this one will finally be the one to announce Hammer’s return to the cinema landscape. The latest flag bearer for these expectations is another adaptation of the novel by Susan Hill turned stage play and TV film – The Woman in Black. There is plenty worthy of anticipation too, with direction from James Watkins (Eden Lake) and a script by Jane Goldman (Kick Ass, The Debt and X-Men First Class). (more…)
This Means War (Review)
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This Means War was directed by McG. I’ll give you a moment to let that sink in. Yes McG, a man so desperate to become iconic he made his name look like an Irish carbonite compound, is still working in movies. He may have driven the Terminator franchise into the ground, reduced one of the biggest feminine icons of the 1970’s into a wet T-Shirt competition and introduced the world to “Chuck”, but someone somewhere was so impressed by this chain of imploding catastrophes they were still willing to give him a sum of money so large it could wipe out the debt of a dozen third world countries.
Martha Marcy May Marlene (Film Review)
Borderline films is made up of three directors who take turns producing each other’s projects, they opened for business in 2008 with Antonio Campos’ Afterschool (who returns later this year with Simon Killer). As a collective they have a lot of acclaim from the indie capital of film festivals – Sundance – seen as much of a derogatory endorsement as a positive one, in certain cynical points of view. The latest project from the Borderline collective to see the daylight of the UK release schedule is Sean Durkin’s shrewdly titled tongue twister of a gothic western Martha Marcy May Marlene. (more…)
