martin-807-452270 Reviews

Killers of the Flower Moon (2023)

wasted opportunity.

[2/10 · 20 November 2023]

I watched this movie hoping I would learn a little bit more about the Native American people - who were there first. But after three and a half hours I know almost nothing more than when I went in. It's a totally wasted opportunity.

I also don't care; everyone in the film is awful or passive. No one is doing the right thing and there is no hero, just a weasel.

Not a single really cool shot, nothing we haven't seen before. Where is the cinematic edge? It's just lots of big sets with lots of costumes. No cinema.

What is new in this film? What is there that hasn't been done before, and the answer is nothing.

Yawn.

Sharper (2023)

Desperately Dull

[1/10 · 19 November 2023]

So, so dull. I was looking at my watch after 10 minutes, and the main star, Julianna Moore, doesn't turn up till an hour in. The film is set in 4 or 5 sections, (so dull can't remember) which means there is no real story progression, as we keep starting again and characters disappear for an hour or more. Absolutely no chemistry between anyone. It felt like a first-time director's movie, but apparently, the director has done loads.

So Dull. Dreadful. Did I say Dull? I know we all make jokes about -"I'll never get those two hours back", but really, I won't. At some point, the cast or crew or producers must have known it was a dud, but still, they inflicted it upon us.

Such a waste.

Sisu (2022)

I just saw Sisu in the cinema - it's brilliant.

[10/10 · 31 May 2023]

SISU I just saw Sisu in the cinema - it's brilliant.

Without a doubt, the best film I have seen in the cinema this year, and that includes all the boring BAFTA-winning rubbish I had to endure.

It's a brilliantly entertaining action war film with minimal but essential dialogue. Brilliant performances, fantastic direction, awesome Cinematography and some of the best blocking I have seen in years.

There are 4 shots that will stay with me until my brain is destroyed for medical research.

This is a proper cinematic film that begs to be seen in the cinema and just goes to remind you that directing is an ART, and very few people are actually any good at it.

You do not need famous actors to tell a great story and you do not need a famous Cinematographer to make things look good.

This should win all the awards everywhere for everything. I don't care what anyone else thinks - this was a brilliant afternoon's viewing.

Finch (2021)

pointless

[2/10 · 27 April 2022]

I love post apocalyptic, but there is just nothing in this film that we haven't seen before. I just wonder what the point of this film is? What was the director trying to say?

The Batman (2022)

The car is the star

[7/10 · 10 March 2022]

So The Batman, saw it in the IMAX in the afternoon so maximum screen-size and no one else in the cinema!!

SPOILERS***SPOILERS***SPOILERS***SPOILERS*****SPOILERS***SPOILERS***SPOILERS***SPOILERS

Yeah I thought it was alright.

It's basically Batmen meets Seven.

It's a proper cinematic film, you need to see it on a big screen, not because it's really well shot, but because it's so dark it's like that Game of Throne Episode where no one could see what was going on. Watch it on your TV at your peril.

I do feel that we have kinda done gritty serious Batman to death now, I mean Alan Moore's Killing Joke and Frank Miller's Dark Knight Returns must be almost 40 years old!? So maybe it's time for interesting and imaginative Batman?

Batman still has his silly 'no guns' rule, but is perfectly happy to incinerate fellow drivers in a cataclysmic moment of road rage chasing the Penguin... But wait. Why is he chasing the Penguin, when he knows where he lives and works, and also has his phone number. He could just pop round later? And avoid buring all those people to death. Various other serious plot holes rear their ugly heads but I can't be bothered to list them.

I feel it's also lacking in imagination and seriously lacking in cool Batman stuff. It's just not very Batman-y. Where are all his gadgets? Just like James Bond didn't feel very Bond-y. Maybe we need to get in more people who like movies to make movies? I dunno.

I want to see The Long Halloween as a film not just 'inspired by'.

BUT! It is a great movie and I enjoyed it much more than Joker which was just not my cup of tea.

Oh there's my cup of tea. Lovely. Thanks.

Action is excellent, stunts are 1st class, and Paul Dano as the Riddler is very good, but if the stories about him taking 200 takes to get it right are true then maybe someone should have a little word, or you know, do some directing?

Bit confusing that Colin Farrel was The Penguin and they called him Oz (yeah I know his name is Oswald), just call him the Penguin, or Oswald?? But he was very, very good.

Jeffrey Wright is v. Dissappinting at James Gordon, he just doesn't seem to have any gravity and is given some toe curlingly poor dialogue, so maybe it's not all his fault. But I don't believe he's a hard nose detective for one second when he doesn't even seem to know police procedure. Hasn't he watched CSI?

Zoe Kravitz as Cat Woman is good but any back story would have been nice, rather than the terribly unimaginative 'she works in a night club'. All a tad feeble. Remember Cat Woman in Tim Burton's Batman 2? Yeah some of that back story please!

It could have done with a bit more to it visually, we have the same rain drenched shot time after time, and the brown colour pallet again, I was longing for some colour, couldn't someone have just worn a blue scarf or a yellow hat?

But it's good. Not brilliant, but very good.

Pattinson is OK as Batman, he just is, doesn't really work at it, but heaps better than Bale.

Still think Keaton is the best Batman.

4/5 for the car - which is the real star of the film.

And it'll prolly make a billion dollars.

Oh and it's about 17 hours long, so don't bring a drink and eat dry foods.

#Nice.

The Matrix Resurrections (I) (2021)

This is quite simply a really bad film

[2/10 · 22 December 2021]

This is quite simply a really bad film. All the elements of a good script that we have learnt over a hundred years of cinema have been ignored or forgotten. Simple questions like What does the lead character want? Are unclear. There is ENDLESS exposition where characters tell us what they are doing as they are doing it. I thought it was only Doctor Who that was this bad at doing expo, but no. I was wrong. There is no clear goal. And I have no idea what is 'real' or not real. Which means there is no sense of jeopardy. I'm not sure what Neo wants and I don't know what the bad guys want or are doing and I don't know who the bad guys are. I don't know why the original agent Smith is not in the movie (must be an actor contract thing) and I don't know what is going on. I loved the original Matrix and I love sci-fi, this is just poorly written nonsense. And I am bored of this sort of movie. The original Matrix was brilliant partly because of it's original special effects that had never been seen before, there is none of that in this movie - everything has been seen before. And I lost count of the amount of times Neo used his magic shield to stop bullets hitting him, Yawn. He holds Trinities hand four times each with a big music swell. Once would have been super dramatic, four is lame. It's clear that Lana Wachowski, is not only absolutely terrible at attempting to direct comedy, but has nothing more to say and that The Matrix was really just a really brilliant movie that never needed a sequel.

Father Christmas Is Back (2021)

Not really worth the effort.

[1/10 · 4 December 2021]

So badly directed and such a bad script. All these talented actors can't save a a film when the director doesn't know where to put a camera, how to shoot comedy or what comedic timing is. Half way through they start adding sound effects to the foley and then forget to do it for the rest of the film. So bad. Camera work also awful. I just don't understand why Netflix who clearly know how to make incredibly good productions let things scripts like this that are so bad get through the net. Come on Netflix. You can do better.

Dune (2021)

Brown very brown.

[5/10 · 4 November 2021]

"So Denis, what are your colour themes for the mo--" "BROWN." "So a bit like Your Blade Runner Thin--" "BROWN." "I see, and what can we expect from Dune Episode 2--" "BROWN."

It's not a bad film, and everyone is banging on about the directors vision, but where is the imagination? Critics seem to get them confused.

Le daim (2019)

Not as good as it should be

[2/10 · 19 July 2021]

I saw it today and was very disappointed. It has such promise and the trailer and the poster is so good, but clearly the director/writer don't know what to do with their Frankenstein creation once they made it and it's all over the place. It's also boring, and really badly shot. Like the camera operator had never shot anything before and keeps on reframing because the original frame is rubbish. Performances are good - Adèle Haenel is great, but given so little to do. It's missing a whole chunk of its third act and I think they were scraping around the edit bins to find that 77 minutes. It's a 30 minute one off stretched to breaking point. For a comedy I got one laugh out of it. And the snow keeps coming and going, comic and going. Yawn. Great idea - terrible execution. 1/10 plus 1 because the camera they use in it is the exact same camera as my first digital camera 20+ years ago. 2/10.

The Predator (2018)

Awful, awful, awful

[1/10 · 1 October 2018]

Boring, unimaginative and crap.

*****SPOILERS****

This is a terrible movie and has absolutely NOTHING new in it at all, every single scene comes form another movie and the dialogue and acting is just bad.

I can't even, I just, It's so bad I can't. Just. My god this is crud.

Just don't bother watching this. The original Predator has everything this movie could wish for and does it better. this is just painful. PTSD soldiers being charactered as Loonies. Attempted Suicide victims being laughed at, children with Aspergers being the new evolutionary humans, DNA being looked at under a school microscope in an RV????

Everything is bad and hollywood should know better.

No imagination, No story, no fun, bad language for no reason and no decent predator fight scenes, just rubbish.

How It Ends (2018)

Boring Unimaginative Crap

[1/10 · 14 July 2018]

SPOILERS**** SPOILERS

Honestly this is just crap. I don't know what it wring with Netflix, they have got a load of money and have the time in development to get good scripts developed. There are books out there on screenwriting and loads of people who can write scripts, but they keep just making crap. The acting is OK, the VFX are really good. The stunts are cool, the cinematography is nice, the casting pretty good, but the scripts just suck. And I am sick to death of lazy writing where they can't even bebothered to work out WHAT the things is that went wrong. Just a load of crap. Avoid. Watch The Road instead.

Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle (2017)

So... Jumanji - Welcome to the jungle.

[9/10 · 3 January 2018]

So...

Jumanji - Welcome to the jungle.

***SPOILERS***SPOILERS***SPOILERS***SPOILERS***

I totally loved the original Jumanji, can't believe it's over 20 years old! I remember watching the herd of rhino crashing through the town centre and being incredibly impressed with the CGI and all that nonsense, and it was actually touching how Robin Williams' family had suffered after his disappearance. Was a great film and I re-watched it recently in preparation for this sequel and it is still an excellent film.

I really liked this new movie - it's very well made, quite funny and superbly paced. Loved it. If (like me) you've ever played D&D then this is about as close as you'll ever get I suppose. Anyone who has played a Computer game or RPG should love it and let's face it that's quite a big market.

Karen Gillen is particularly good, after such small roles in Guardians of the Galaxy she deserved a more prominent role. Jack Black is excellent and the Dwayne The Rock is, um just the Rock with more asides than usual.

Some awesome CGI and imaginative camera work really made this film for me.

It did deserve a slightly better polish on the script and some of the plot points could have done with a nudge, but on the whole I thought it was great. I'd watch it again.

But now I need a third part when we discover who made the game and why... Or maybe I don't need a prequel at all and sometimes things can just be because that's how things are.

4.5/5 Excellent fun.

Murder on the Orient Express (2017)

So... Murder on the Orient Express

[6/10 · 3 January 2018]

So...

Murder on the Orient Express

***SPOILERS***SPOILERS***SPOILERS***SPOILERS***

I was in two minds about going to see this as I do like Kenneth Branagh as a director, (though I still haven't really forgiven him for Frankenstein), but it is an all-star cast and it looks very beautiful and made me want to drink champagne out of dead posh cut crystal glasses (rather than just swigging it from the bottle as per usual).

But see it I did. It looks fabulous though a strange lack of frosty breaths during lengthy conversations in the freezing cold and a lot of hugeous long exposition that just felt like a TV movie.

Then I realised it was just a very very expensive TV movie.

I got a bit bored at one point.

Some of the VFX and CGI or whatever it was was a bit rubbish, I don't understand why when there is so much money they can't just fix an incongruous shot or even just cut it.

And I got a bit bored again.

And I wondered why in 1934 they used a neon sign for the titles - felt out of place and if I was feeling that then I was missing something somewhere.

Some of the acting was alright and then some of the actors were doing 'The Acting' which was rather annoying.

I didn't really 'feel' anything for anyone, Ken is supposed to be able to get performances out of a wooden chair but clearly he was just working on characters here rather than performance.

And then it was over.

We know Ken can do better so he really should.

3 out of 5 - could do better.

The Greatest Showman (2017)

A world of weirdos, freaks and fantastic costumes!

[9/10 · 29 December 2017]

Today I watched The Greatest Showman. ***SPOILERS****SPOILERS****SPOILERS****SPOILERS** A world of weirdos, freaks and fantastic costumes is an easy sale for me so I've been looking forward to this for some time and I was not disappointed - from the very single opening shot - which is superb! I was hooked. Properly hooked. I loved it all the way through. Yes it's a very basic plot and a very basic script, very light in substance and quite predictable but if you want sumptuous visuals, incredible dance sequences and some really great cinematic moment it delivers the goods big time. Performances are excellent across the cast particularly good are Jackman and Rebecca Ferguson (Playing singer Jenny Lind). Proper on screen chemistry. For my money I enjoyed it far more than LA LA Land, but for some reason it's had a lot of bad press. Too much willing suspension of disbelief perhaps? They have gone to a lot of effort on costume and wardrobe for that time period, but then one of the dancers is wearing DMs so, erm... Anyhoo. There are three stand out scenes that should win this film Cinematography and Choreography awards left right and centre. Jackman and Effrom in the Bar with the barman is just the best choreographed scene I think I have ever seen and the 'Rope dance' with Effron and Zendaya defies gravity, and the premiere of Jenny Lind on stage is captivating. I loved this film and if you need a bit of unashamed entertainment in this time of cold and darkness you could do a lot worse. 5/5. One of my favourite films of 2017.

Blade Runner 2049 (2017)

it's good but it ain't no classic.

[1/10 · 6 November 2017]

Blade Runner, Blade Runner, Blade Runner.

Now then: Blade Runner 2049.

SPOILERS****SPOILERS****SPOILERS****SPOILERS****

I've been waiting to see this for years. Blade Runner is in my top ten films of all time and to prepare myself for this I re-watched Blade Runner again the other day.

This new film has so many good points and SO MANY bad points that it sadly left me cold. As I sat in the theatre at the end as the final credits ran did I feel elated? Did I feel excited? Did I feel emotional? No I did not.

Ultimately it just did not have that much effect on me, except possibly on my bladder which was not impressed at all.

It does have some really beautiful moments, but that is all set design and cinematography. I can't think of a single scene where the action was amazing or the dialogue was stellar. And all the visuals were directly inspired by the original film, and I couldn't see anything that the new director had bought to the film. Where was his original vision?

I'm so bored of films that are supposed to be a bit more cerebral and then the main blokes just punch each other in the face, again and again, and oh Yawn, what's happening now? Oh some bloke is punching another bloke in the face. Yawn.

The original Blade Runner had great action scenes, Dekkard chasing the Skin Job through the shopping centre or the final conflict with Rutger!

All I could see on this film was the arrogance of the Director's Ego all over the place (I also felt this in Arrival, which I hated, and, yes, I know everyone else thought it was the wonderful, I was so disappointed it wasn't a film about ABBA) and any holes in the script, and there were many, were just ignored. I mean if skin-jobs were not meant to reproduce then surely not putting a womb and eggs in the female and no sperm in the male might have been a sensible place to start?

And what about Mr Blindo? what about him? He's still a nut job. And really they have been looking for this Baby Blade Runner for 30 years and the entire LAPD and Mr Nutjob and all his little nut jobs can't find a single clue and agent Joe just finds a date on a tree and... oh rubbish, this is rubbish.

I felt having cameos from the previous film and then killing them off so blatantly (Rachel) were just cheap shots (pun intended) and destroying Dekkard's original Flyer was a total Yawn moment.

So many completely cut-table scenes and so much exposition. And waiting 60 odd minutes for Harrison Ford to turn up and then give him nothing to do..? I felt like I was watching Star Wars 7 and just waiting for Han Solo to turn up. I mean If I was making a movie and I'd managed to get Harrison Ford in it I'd get him in earlier and give him something cool to do!!

There are several books out there set in the Blade Runner world and I suggest Reading Blade Runner 2 by KW Jeter which is a HUGELY better than this.

Blade Runner 2049: 4 out of 5 - it's good but it ain't no classic. Pretty disappointing.

The Mummy (2017)

Blander than a bland thing that's been blanched.

[4/10 · 3 July 2017]

****Spoilers****Spoilers****Spoilers

I love all that ancient Egyptian stuff, pyramids, deserts, mummies, curses, ancient evil. Can't get enough of it.

But I can get enough of this.

This is an odd film as there isn't a single thing in it that hasn't been already done in another film. It's just one borrow after another.

It's so bland it's like a Korma Curry with extra milk, and some gaviscon thrown in for good measure.

I can't even, I just can't be bothered, to..... Zzzzzzzzz

2 out of 5. Blander than a bland thing that's been blanched.

Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales (2017)

it's got pirates in it, and big ships and stuff.

[7/10 · 3 July 2017]

Pirates of the Caribbean part 5 ****Spoilers****Spoilers****Spoilers Pirates! A-ha! Swashbuckling and gold and ships and stuff! Brilliant! I unashamedly thought Pirates of the Caribbean 1 and 2 were brilliant and I liked them a lot. Since then they have suffered a lot from sequel-itus but fairly enjoyable. For me this was a guilty pleasure, like having an extra donut, when you know that four should be enough, but well, donuts!! (or in this case Pirates!). Yes, we've been here before, but it looks so beautiful, it's so well made and it's production values are so high and I can just imagine how much fun it was to make and, and, and I really want to go to the caribbean and oh, just let me like this for the fact I like it. Damn you! A-ha! Pirates!

Slack Bay (2016)

a comedy without humour

[1/10 · 3 July 2017]

So having had a feast of high budget US feature films recently I thought I should try a cinematic sorbet and went to see French film Slack Bay at the Curzon cinema the other day in London.

******Spoilers****Spoilers****Spoilers****Spoilers****

Now I love comedy, several of my top ten films of all time are comedy, and I've spent quite a lot of time in France over the last 44 years, and I think, I have a very wide understanding and appreciation and knowledge of comedy.

I have also written comedy, performed comedy and directed actors doing comedy.

I would describe Slack Bay as 'Without humour'.

Slack Bay is just a terribly unfunny film. After a mere 15 minutes (it's an excruciating 2 hours and 2 mins) I was anxiously glancing at my watch and wondering if it can really be this bad throughout - but it was!

There are no 'jokes', no clever dialogue, just a little bit of visual humour. One of the main characters has a strange shambling walk, which he does in every scene. He sits in a deckchair and it collapses. But not overtime he sits in a deckchair and the one time he sits in a deckchair and it SHOULD collapse. predictably it doesn't.

It is a film of grotesque but that gives a name and a 'style' to what anyone else would call rubbish. It features unjustified and unpunished cannibalism which is just horrid and not funny or even in keeping with the rest of the film. There's a lot of spitting up close to the camera which is clearly hilarious in the eyes of the 'director' but didn't elicit a titter from me or the audience. There's a lot of homophobia and one of the main characters gets a huge beating for being a boy dressed as a girl dressed as a boy (?) which just felt terribly out of place in a 'comedy'.

So many scenes don't go anywhere and every joke is repeated: When the fat detective walks there is a dubbed on sound of someone rubbing balloons. again and again and again and again and again. The secret of comedy is timing, as we all know and the editor and director just never knew when to cut and when too much was too much.

I was so hoping that this would be the antidote to Hollywood Block Busters that I wanted but it ain't.

Apart from the pretty good wardrobe, and OK cinematography (which in these days of Digital cameras is achievable by children with an iPhone) and the star turn of actress known only as Raph, it is unwatchable pants.

As I considered the varied merits of the film as I left the cinema one of the other cinema goers said to me: "What did you make of that?" I said: "It didn't really work for me, where's the story?" and he said: "It was just a terrible mess" quite.

This film was nominated for an award at the Cannes Film Festival which just goes to show that I really don't know anything.

1 out of 5 without humour.

Colossal (2016)

3/5 Not bad. Nachos and beer in a pub.

[6/10 · 31 May 2017]

****SPOILERS********SPOILERS********SPOILERS******* So today I went to see Colossal the the Odeon Covent garden which is a really great cinema as there is never anyone there and they always show the slightly more off the wall movies, the seats are however extraordinarily uncomfortable, and It kinda made me want to leave! To carry on with the food theme of my last few reviews this film was like meeting up with a long lost school friend for beer and nachos in a pub. You know the sort of thing: you are walking down the road minding your own business when someone catches your eye - you know you know them, but you can't place it so you stop and look proper and that's when they look at you, and it's too late to look away when you realise it's that bloke from school who was quite nice but a bit dull, and before you know it you're having a chat and he's saying we should have a beer, and before you can say "yeah in another 20 years dick face" you find yourself inexplicably saying, "well I've got nothing going on tonight - fancy a beer? We can catch up on old times!?" and the bastard says "Hey that's great!" and you suddenly find yourself in a pub you used to go to 20 years ago, but it's all been done up and it's not how it was, and the music is just a little too loud so you keep saying "what?" all the time. You chat for a bit and at first it's really exciting because he has got some information about a few people you wanted to know about, like the bloke you sat next to in Maths, and apparently he married a Canadian and now lives in Calgary, which you are never going to go to and you ask if the person you liked in the 5th form is still around and dick face says "Oh yes they are doing really well - they are store manager of the Ladbrokes by the station," and that's great for them, but you know you are not going to pop in, and they were going to be a rock star and be on Top of The Pops and everything, but now you are struggling and you ask how Colin is and his Mum died and it's all a bit awkward so you order some nachos, as they are loads of fun and not too expensive and you can both pick at them until there is only the huge lump of re-formed cheese like some sort of hideous tumour cut out of a Chernobyl technician's gut. That's how this film was. Really exciting at the beginning, I thought - this film maker has a voice and Ann Hathaway has the most amazing hair, but then quite quickly the magic began to trickle away. Plot points were rammed home a few more times than were necessary and a whole subplot with a useless English boyfriend (who also had wonky teeth - is this too much of a Cliché' these days?) which was completely cuttable the film hits a bump in the road. And stays on this bumpy road for a good half hour before deciding that they should probably get on with it and finish the movie, which they do in an extraordinarily predictable manner. No surprises here. I can totally see how this film was written, the director and his long lost mate in the pub saying, "wouldn't it be brilliant if this girl was like a huge Colossal monster in Korea!" and they both fall about laughing and that's it. Lovely hair Ann has no real character arc to fulfil and at the end of the movie she is just back at square 1. It just seemed very odd. It was full of really great moments, and some lovely ideas, some of the dialogue was coo, but the total lack of chemistry between any of the four main characters led me to look at my watch several times and I was really hoping for some super clever reveal at the end or a sting in the tail, but there was none. Even the motivation for the nasty man to be nasty was a bit feeble and in the end I was ready for the end. It's not bad - but it's not brilliant, just like that evening in the pub with the slightly boring bloke from school. Ann is excellent and deserved to be given a slightly more encompassing role, yes she's an alcoholic we get that but she needs to be more than that IMHO. 3/5 Not bad. Nachos and beer in a pub.

Alien: Covenant (2017)

Chicken Korma of a film

[4/10 · 22 May 2017]

****Spoilers**** This film is a bit like going for dinner at a curry house you've been to before. The first time you went it was brilliant, the food was amazing, the waiters were brilliant - you tried a new dish and it was excellent! So you went back, had one of those meals that sizzle and everyone looks when the waiter brings it in! Awesome! But then the next couple of times you went it's just not been very good, maybe they changed the chef or the menu and to be honest it was pretty awful, OK the Naan bread was nice, but the meat dish, well, was rank. But it's just down the street so you keep going back for more. You've had the tikka which was excellent and the vindaloo which was good but a bit too spicy and made your ring sting for a week and you regretted having it (Aliens Vs Predator 2). So after that you tried something totally new, that everyone told you was amazing and it gave you the S**** for a week. (Prometheus). For some reason you just can't stay away from this curry house - maybe it's the decor, or just that those first two meals were SO good even though it's almost 40 years since you had the first one, and all the chefs are dead or retired. So now you are back and you're going to play it safe: you'll have the Chicken korma. But it's bland and there's not enough of it, and they forgot the naan bread, which is the bit you really liked! You try to find a waiter. But there is no one there. You're all alone in the restaurant and you can't even get that beer! You peek into the kitchen and there is no chef! Just the waiter trying to cook everyone's dinner from a recipe book. And it's a shitty recipe book written by a child who has no idea how to cook or even has any understanding of flavour or subtlety or has ever been in a flipping kitchen! That's what Alien: Covenant is: a chicken korma of a film. The opening scene was like something written by a film school student. It felt like it went on for three hours of pure exposition and they all like Wagner, gimme a break. Then we are into space - lovely cold scary space - and all this stuff was great - loved it - was really thinking this film was on track, then they get to the planet and everyone behaves like a moron just like they did in the last film! It's a new planet and they don't even have respirators! I get sick if I go beyond France - so I take medicine with me! But No. Not an alien planet with spores and microbes everywhere. No just walk around and look at stuff. Split up and take your clothes off if you are a woman and wash in some dark corner with lots of dark tunnels. (How many times do we have to see the close up of her severed head? at least four and I say 'her' because apart from 'T' (For Tennessee - maybe a reference to Dallas in Alien?) I didn't really pick up on anyone's name apart from Walter and Daniels. Then David appears (yawn) and tells them to follow him, which they do without even saying "Excuse me, but who are you?" as you might especially just after loads of your friends have just been eviscerated and he leads them into some sort of medieval castle. All this technology but they couldn't sort out the guttering or the drainage let alone find a sewing machine (maybe they could have asked King Arthur?). In the scene where the big engineers were all standing round like people from Life of Brian waiting for a stoning I swear one of them was wearing Birkenstock sandals. Halfway across the universe and they haven't even got fashion sense. And then (checks watch) it's about an hour into the film and there are no aliens yet and some aliens start turning up and etc etc as you'd expect. They gestate in about 3 minutes and grow to full size without consuming any matter, so they just spontaneously generate matter, which is silly. But this isn't Guardians of the Galaxy and it's trying to be serious and not a little bit silly, so you start thinking about the logic and there is no logic it's just stupid and unimaginative. The foil of the unimaginative is often to hide behind perceived complexity which does not stand up to scrutiny and that's exactly what happened in Prometheus and again in this bland movie. And then there's an alien and he's a big one and he's climbing on a space ship thing that looks like it was designed from Lego and haven't we seen this before? OK the alien(s) can smash glass so let's do this scene yeah? And let's do it again. And one more time OK? Hell it worked the first time so and I've completely run out of ideas so sod it one more time! Yeah! Smash smash. Lovely. Now then. Um. Er. Actually. Do you know what? Lets try one more time what with 5 being the magic number an all. It's quite clear that the film makers don't know what to do with the aliens and they are just cannon fodder in this film which is now all about David and his god-complex and eventually he's going to get to Earth and try to kill everyone, and yawn, is that the time?

Tis a silly film and Ridley Scott should know better. I really enjoyed the bits in the space ship(s), but from the second they were on the planet to the second they left the planet it was utter balderdash. And the bit on the poster - isn't in the film. 2/5 Chicken Korma of a film.

King Arthur: Legend of the Sword (2017)

woeful withered rat's cock of a film

[2/10 · 22 May 2017]

King Arthur: legend of the sword *****There be spoilers in these words, mate***** So to keep with the food theme of the previous review Blokey Arthur legend of the sword is like popping down a good old East End Chippy for a guilty portion of greasy chips. You know the sort of place: no where to sit, they have pickled eggs in a jar on the counter, the man serving you picks his nose with a fat tattooed finger and someone has been sick outside on the pavement. Yeah, pukka. Salt of the earth. And then you walk off with your cone of hot chips, only they are not hot, they are cold. More like small brown paper bags filled with pus. But you carry on because, well, you are hungry and they did cost £15. But then you find a pubic hair. But you carry on, because it could have just blown in or could even be one of your own! But you carry on and a few 'chips' later you find a set of false teeth, and you know these aren't yours because, well, you don't have false teeth and you don't know anyone who does, what with the advent of the NHS and all that. So you press on determined to get to the bottom of your cone of pus-chips and just as you are about to get to the last chip you discover that it isn't actually a chip but a withered rat's cock. That's what King Arthur: legend of the sword is: a withered rat's cock of a film. Kind Arthur the legend has been around for over 1000 years there are many stories and yarns about which to weave your narrative. But this film does not do that, it moves everyone to Londium (FFS!) and make young Arthur an Arthur Dodger clone and lives in a brothel and is handy with his fists and does thieving and stuff, yawn, Oh I'm so sorry, are you still here? Guy Ritchie made Lock Stock and Two Smoking barrels which is about a bunch of east end gangsters stealing stuff. It is an excellent films. He then made Snatch which is about a bunch of east end gangsters stealing stuff. and he also made Sherlock Holmes 1 and 2 (I can't be arsed to talk about Rocknroller and Swept Away) which are about a bunch of east end gangsters stealing stuff. They worked because in Victorian London there WAS an East End and people DID speak like that and steal stuff. But not in 1000AD (FFS part2) where people would be speaking some sort of bastard Latin - anglo saxon norse heathen mix and there wasn't any East End, what with London only having about 50,000 people in it following 300 years known as the dark ages, where not much happened, except for death and disease and stuff. This film is all about a bunch of east end gangsters stealing stuff but it just doesn't work, as the language is incongruous the wardrobe ridiculous (I kept on looking for a singer sewing machine in the wide shots) and the acting often tragic (but not in a good way!). Ritchie's thrilling directorial style which was so good in 1997 does not translate to mystical worlds where the genre expectation makes you feel uncomfortable when the characters use 21st century speak. The camera work just felt 'wrong' and the sets all looked theatrical and not for one second did I not think I was watching a movie. Plot is poor and difficult to follow, so many scenes are throwaway and could be cut, and where is Merlin? or Sir Lancelot or any of the other Arthurian heroes and as for the poor females in the film, I'm not sure why they bother to turn up. Arthur of Legend is full of love stories and betrayals for lust and love and there is none of that in this film. It was so dull I've even lost interest in writing this. 2/5 woeful withered rat's cock.

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (2017)

A large dominoes pizza with everything on of a movie

[9/10 · 22 May 2017]

*******SPOILERS***** Now I don't know about you but every now and then I like to go and have a pizza. I don't actually care for fancy la-di-dah pizza's I just want a Dominoes thick crust with everything on it and a cold beer. Hopefully I can put my feet up and watch a good movie at the same time and once we've finished the pizza who knows we might even have some ice cream! Crazy right? It's madness! We're bonkers here. That is exactly what Guardians of the Galaxy Vol 2 is, Dominoes Pizza, cold beer and maybe ice cream. IMHO it's not quite as ice creamy as Vol 1, but it was thoroughly enjoyable from start to finish. I was never bored there were some genuine laugh out loud moment and it's all rather silly, but in a good way, like Star Trek can be silly but IN A GOOD WAY. If at any point I had stopped to think about the logic of the story or even went, "hang on - wait a minute...?", the illusion would have been ruined and I would have found a shard of glass in my thick crust. It doesn't stand up to story scrutiny but it isn't 'that sort' of film. All the visuals are totally awesome and the space ship designs and tech are (pun intended) out of this world. I'm not sure why Sci-Fi always feels the need to get Godly and have gods in them (Star Trek, 2001, Promethius (shudder) and so on and so forth and what have you) but they do, and I know that they are guardians of the galaxy and they have to protect the galaxy but can you really kill an all- knowing immortal god by punching him in the head? Apparently so! It also makes Quin guilty of patricide, he kills his father because he killed his mother, but does that make it right? I suppose so, But wait hang-on! Doh! see - I'm not supposed to think about this stuff! Quick gimme some beer! Phew! Thanks! Some really awesome casting - Stallone is ace, Kurt Russel is fabulous and I was genuinely moved at the death of blue bloke, but mostly cause he's the best actor in the film, bit of a shame his 2nd in command wasn't Alieny-at all and just looked like a skinny human, but small potatoes. But I genuinely looking forward to Vol 3. Another slice? Why yes - that'd be lovely. And one more beer n'all. Thank you. 4/5 Great movie.

Mindhorn (2016)

Enjoyable - but we've see it all before.

[6/10 · 10 May 2017]

Mindhorn

******Spoiler alert*****

As you know - I'm a British film maker and I like to watch anything by my fellow British film makers, and I'm a big fan of Julian Barrat, as Flowers (C4) was just the best thing on TV last year.

Mindhorn is very standard fare it follows the career of a washed up TV actor now involved in a real murder case, and that's it. I was really hoping for something different or really funny but it just never quite gets there. It's so similar to the Alan Partridge movie and the Bad Education movie that they could have all been edited together to make one big multi-strand film, with Steve Coogan playing a sort of Alan Partridge character in Mindhorn it just doesn't have any individuality.

Sean Young the Director has no other Directing credits at all and it shows in many scenes it's quite clear he's not sure where to put the camera and eyelines are all over the place, which is odd as it's all about a man with only one see who can 'see the truth' (this ability is never used).

The story is simple but it is populated with far too many unmotivated bad guys, the bad cop, the killer cop, the foreign stuntman, the nasty agent, the man fan, and the actual murderer whose motive isn't really clear or funny enough.

It's absolutely full of cliché' but not in a good way: very simple unimaginative plot points and coincidences: e.g.: Julian discovers he might be a father and whilst walking along bumps into potential-daughter at a bus stop. Later on he knocks over one obvious box in the garage and it contains 20 years of lost love letters that the Mrs has never noticed.

Julian is, however, very good and some of the cast like Russell Tovery are fabulous, but on the whole it just isn't funny enough. The love interest Essie Davies isn't given a single funny line and plays it all 100% straight, when in the world of Mindhorn even Kenneth Branagh is not playing it straight.

The structure is exactly the same as the Dad's Army movie, which although brilliant cast was strangely without humour. There seems to be a strange sort of small to mid budget formulaic feature film making, that involves coastal towns, predictable plots and a lack of any sort of cinematography at all: everything is coverage. The DoP is David Luther who has shot some absolutely incredible stuff such as Black Sails, so I can't imagine he decided to shoot it in a 'boring' style. It's also got 16 producers and that may well be why it is so anodyne.

I left the cinema trying to remember a single funny memorable line but I couldn't recall a single one.

The Beastie Boys video for sabotage is funnier and more cop-centric.

3/5 quite funny but nothing special. Enjoyable - but we've see it all before.

Ghost in the Shell (2017)

If you like sci-fi go and see it. If you don't like sci-fi then don't.

[9/10 · 12 April 2017]

Now Ghost in the Shell

******SPOILER ALERT*****

I thought this was ace 4.5 out of 5. I don't understand why it's getting such bad reviews. Yes they cast Scarlett Johansson as The Major rather than an 'asian' actress, but she is very good in the role, and obviously brings a lot of potential box office, but ignoring that, I thought it was really good.

I have also only seen the animation once and that was the year it came out so there was no comparison for me.

It's the closest thing to BladeRunner we have ever had since BladeRunner, and some of the scenes I felt could just be cut into a future SuperMega cut of Ghosts in the Bladerunner Shell. (I'm pretty sure I could cut them together and make a single story - maybe one wet weekend I will).

It looks fantastic and the world they have created is believable and not too far in the future I imagine (except for the killer robot bits).

But as with all CGI heavy movies, as I left the cinema I felt like I had been overwhelmed with images and that I would have difficulty singling our individual scenes that looked amazing.

All the city scapes are brilliant, the fights are brilliant the chase through the city on foot looks great the big helicopter thing is awesome (and will probably appear in the next James Cameron film) but the scenes that were the best in the film for me were, The Major and her Mum. The Major on the boat with the blonde bloke, Old dude and the baddies with the old fashioned gun. Once again the best bits are all the character developing stuff where I actually get emotionally attached to the film.

If you like sci-fi go and see it. If you don't like sci-fi then don't.

I liked it. It's cool. 4.5 out of 5.

I look forward to the directors cut!

Kong: Skull Island (2017)

'Tis a silly film. But worth watching if you like that sort of thing.

[5/10 · 5 April 2017]

So Kong: Skull Island. *****Spoiler Alert***** I quite enjoyed it, it is beautifully shot and the setting is excellent, the lost island comes alive on screen even down to the like insects buzzing about. I'll give it 2.5/5 as it's lot of nice shots with some reasonable acting in bits. The story on the whole is just the usual rubbish, lost island, recently re-discovered, go and have a look blah blah blah. This time it's the 1970's end of the Vietnam war and there are four groups of people: group A) Stupid scientists led by John Goodman Group B) Gung-Ho Vietnam helicopter Vets led by Samuel Jackson Group C) Pretty photographer lady and the bloke off Thor who isn't Thor. Maybe called Loki. (Don't worry about him though as he plays no useful part in the film) Group D) people already on the island. Natives and Pilot-Bloke out of WW2. I can't really be bothered to write up a proper review, just to say it's very silly, and the script is disappointing in it's lack of originality. Structurally the film seems to have a very long first act, and then relatively short second act and a microscopic third act. So it's all front heavy, and once they get there they don;t really know what to do. The best thing in it is The Lost WW2 Pilot, who gets all the best line and plays the moral compass which is interesting I suppose. The Bloke from Thor could be completely cut and does and achieves absolutely nothing, just a really odd role to bother with. The Vietnam Vets have just spent God knows how long in the jungle, so the silly scientists go and hire a bloke who knows about jungles. But they just hired the Vets? But, wait, hang on... Oh yes! They are silly scientists. Kong turns up in the opening shot and smashes stuff, and generally that's all he does. After so many films with giant creatures in: Kong, Godzilla, Cloverfield etc, could we possibly come up with a scenario where huge creatures do something other than just smash stuff? We know that monkeys and Apes are intelligent so why not have them do something intelligent? And after a while the endless fights Kong Vs Squid-thing, Kong Vs Helicopters and Kong Vs Biped-monster thing become a bit repetitive to be honest. All the scenes with the indigenous people in look wonderful but have absolutely no purpose at all, I just felt that they should have been involved in the story in somewhat rather than just being background colour. I enjoyed the film, looks like they had fun making it, but i just wish that Hollywood screenwriters would justify the huge sums they got paid by actually doing something original. 'Tis a silly film. But worth watching if you like that sort of thing.