#95: RESIDENT EVIL

 

STARRING: Austin Abrams, Zach Cherry, Kali Reis, Paul Walter Hauser. Written by Zach Cregger and Shay Hatten. Directed by Zach Creger. Based on Resident Evil by Capcom. Budget $75 million. Running time 95 minutes. 

Bryan (Austin Abrams) is a medical courier looking to finish for the night and go home to his newly pregnant girlfriend, Michelle (Sara Paxton) and discuss their future, that is until he's given a double fee job to transport a medical freezer bag to Racoon General Hospital and heads off into a snow blizzard where he accidentally runs down an old woman and everything goes wrong in ways so bizarre, so outrageous, so gory and so goddam insane that you'll start questioning your own sanity. 

Austin Abrams is perfect for this film, a nerd, a wimp forced to fight for his life using only skills he's learned from playing video games and at points in the film he finds those skills sorely wanting. 

Directed by Zach Cherry, the genius behind Weapons and Barbarian, who also co-wrote the script for this fantastically gory and exhilarating romp. He manages to honour the mechanics of the game itself with knowing little nods, like Bryan arriving at the hospital at the beginning of the film, filmed from behind, and having to decide whether to turn left or right, or the search of the abandoned farm house for ammo, or the absolutely delightful meta gag of Bryan drinking milk from a bottle and eating cereal straight from a box called 'Life'. Similarly Bryan keeps levelling up his weapons and even finds himself counting his rapidly diminishing meagre ammo, or his constant failure to shot padlocks, then there's the clever use of first person shoot 'em ups, as Bryan searches deserted corridors and sewers. Likewise there's a gorgous 'iris out' scene break where the actual forest slowly engulfs the hero's car as he drives off into the distance. 

This is a film packed with excellent jump scares, which don't telegraph themselves, plus revelations that are sure to cause gasps of horror, they made me gasp. The soundtrack is perfectly suited to the absolute gory bloodbath you're about to experience and never intrudes. And through it all runs a superb, thick vein of comedy that helps to break the spell, and boy do you need it. 

The audience seemed to unite as one, seeking comradeship in shared laughter at the horror unleashed upon them. It was a much need release, as the horror just kept building until the astonishing final boss level showdown at the top of a 28 storey hospital. 

Referencing a slew of famous horror films, like The Thing, Evil Dead, Day of the Dead, and channelling Train to Busan, this powers through the running time furiously and leaves you dazed but never bored, you find yourself rooting for Bryan and hoping he'll somehow managed to survive it all, only time will tell...

Goddam it I loved this, it was a fantastically fun and furious gross-out romp, brilliantly and hilarious gory, with The Thing inspired split-headed creatures and multi-limbed monstrosities, and more tentacles than a Shokushu Goukan. This was a horrific and deranged horror romp that totally nailed the landing and for once didn't bottle it, right down to the insane final shot. 

9/10 

#94: BAD APPLES

 

STARRING: Saoirse Ronan, Eddie Waller, Nina Brown, Jacob Anderson, Rakie Ayola, Robert Emms, Sean Gilder and Kerry Howard. Written by Jess O'Kane, story by Jonatan Etzler and Jess O'Kane. Based on De Oonskade by Rasmus Lindgren. Directed by Jonatan Etzler. Running time 101 minutes.

Primary school treacher, Maria Spencer (Saoirse Ronan) is having a bad old time of it, she's disliked by the parents of her students, the school's Head and staff think she's incompetent, her boyfriend's dumped her, her Scandinavian home is a building site and her life is been made a living hell by one of her 10 year-old students, Danny (Eddie Waller). He's a rage ball and utterly uncontrollable, violently disrupting classes and school outings, defying her and bullying all and sundry. On the verge of an Ofsted visit, Danny pushes fellow student, Pauline (Nia Brown) down a staircase and breaks her arm and he's suspended. When Maria tries to tell Danny's father Josh (Robert Emms) she ends up 'accidentally' kidnapping Danny and locking him in her basement. Over the next six weeks her life is transformed with his disappearance, her class thrives, the parents love her, and even her ex-boyfriend - the schools' deputy Head Sam (Jacob Anderson) sees her in a different light. However, Maria has a second problem student, Pauline (Nina Brown) who's fixated on Maria and blackmails her when she discovers Danny is locked in the basement. The town every man jack of them, save for Josh, thrives now that Danny's missing and things come to a head during a PTA meeting. 

This is Saoirse Ronan's film, she is superb bringing a desperate weariness to her portrayal of Maria, she's a victim of fate, and even the kidnapping isn't what it seems, and yet with Danny now her prisoner a bond develops between the pair of them and we get a glimpse of his life and reasons why he might be so horrible. This is when the film is at its strongest, the connection between her and him is great and offers an intriguing plot point, but this is squandered with the progressively more unhinged Pauline whose antics just cause you to groan in frustration. The film is soon to be revealed to be a black comedy and although laughs are in short supply it does have its moments. 

There are several plot points that seem to offer different routes which are ignored and a major plot hole late in the third act derail the whole thing.

There was a similar film out this year called The Good Boy starring Stephen Graham and Andrea Risenborough which covered a similar set up but with more skill. This can't decide what it is and ultimately leaves you feeling a little flat.

7/10  

#93: THE TRUMAN SHOW

 

STARRING:  Jim Carrey, Laura Linney, Noah Emmerich, Natascha McElhone, Holland Taylor and Ed Harris. Written by Andrew Niccol. Directed by Peter Weir. Music by Burkhard Dallwitz, Philip Glass and Wojciech Kilar. Budget $60 million. Box office $264 million. Running time 103 minutes. Originally released in 1998.

Written by Andrew Niccol and directed by Peter Weir this 28 year-old film seems more prescient with each passing year, predicting with apparent witchcraftian ease the prolific growth of reality TV. Jim Carey is Truman Burbank, the unknowing star of a world-famous live TV show called The Truman Show. His whole fabricated life, from birth has been broadcast live to the world to see. He spends his days in a fictitious costal town of Seahaven Island working as an insurance broker, and even his mother (Holland Taylor), his wife, Nurse Meryle Truman (Laura Linney) and child-hood best friend, Louis Coltrane (Noah Emmerich) are just actors playing out lines read to them through their ear-pieces. And from his office in the moon, Christof (Ed Harris) the god-like figure who produces and directs the Truman Show watches over Truman dictating every minute of his life. But Truman has an urge to explore, to travel the world and when, one day, he narrowly avoids death from a falling spotlight Truman begins to see the cracks in his reality and realise his world might be something else, something sinister and he sets out to escape, while the whole world watches with baited breath.

What a profoundly moving film this is, a brilliantly brisk 103 minutes of cinematic gold, funny, tragic and emotionally moving. Nowadays it would be an eight-part Netflix series, with one filler episode and dragged out across eight hours, although it wouldn't surprise me if there wasn't one in the works already.

But this glorious little film is a modern marvel, emotionally moving, powerful and superbly acted, Jim Carey is a revelation and showed in this one film that he could act and well, keeping his little comedic gimmicks in check apart from his crazy dance in the car and the rain storm on the beach and playing it straight. He's gone on to prove he was more than a clown in both Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Man in the Moon. In this you'll find yourself drawn to his plight and rooting for him, yearning him on and when at last he triumphs you feel as if you've escaped too. Similarly the music is exceptional and the use of the main Truman hero music twice, first as he defies the system, and then when he finally sailing free. There's also a strange feeling of anti-climax at the end when you realise just how different and difficult his life is about to become and it's bittersweet despite the fact he's broken free, you want to know he's going to be safe and you wonder whether he'll be able to find true love with Sylvia, or if she'll turn out to be just an obsessive fan. And what of poor Christof, the other prisoner of the show, what now for him now that Truman has escaped, for him his life is effectively over there'll never be another event like The Truman Show for him while Truman himself is going to become a global megastar forever in the spotlight and glare of publicity. I'm sure there'll come a time for him when he realises he was never freer than when he was a prisoner of Seaheaven. 

If I had one criticism it would be the length (which is what my wife said to me on our wedding night) I wish it was longer (also what she said to me). Normally I winge about films being too long, but every now and then I watch a film and wish it was longer, this, Blade Runner, The Paper, Master and Commander and Spatacus. Actually, I'm lying about that last one, it's perfect just the length it is (which is what I said back to my wife on our wedding night).

One day, I'll find my own way out of the David Leach Show*, but until then I'll have to make do with Truman's adventure. Perfection is rare, so is this. 10/10

*FOOTNOTE:
Actually, if you're interested in reading David's own adventures in the real world then check out his autobiographical graphic novel David Leach Conquers the Universe available direct from the author and Dead Universe Comics in Aylesbury. It's all true!

#92: TRANSFORMERS THE MOVIE (ANIMATED) 40TH ANNIVERSARY

 

STARRING: Eric Idle, Judd Nelson, Lenoard Nimoy, Robert Stack, Lionel Stander and Orson Welles. Screenplay by Ron Friedman and Flint Dille. Directed by Nelson Shin. Music by Vince DiCola. Animation companies Sunbow Productions, Marvel Productions and Toei Animation. Budget $6 million. Box office $5.9million. Running time 85 minutes. Originally released in 1986.

Sorry to swear right off the bat, but FUCK those godawful live action Transformers movies, every goddam one of them from the first five truly hateful Michael Bay abominations: 2007's Transformers, 2009's Revenge of the Fallen, 2011's Dark of the Moon, Age of Extinction in 2014 and the fucking, unbelievably atrocious The Last Knight in 2017 which brought to an end a decade-long cultural attack that Michael Bay vomitted over the world. Then, just one year later Travis Knight spat out Bubblebee, and finally to add insult to injury Steven Caple Jr ejaculated Rise of the Beasts all over us in 2023. 

Those eight live-action movies went to gross over $5.42 billion dollars worldwide, proving that age-old adage of 50 million files eating shit can't be wrong. And so to this, the hand-animated animated feature film that's celebrating its 40th anniversary. Unlike other 40th Anniversary films that have been released this year, this is the only one I've not seen on the big screen and I went as eager as a proverbial beaver to see it. I've seen it a dozen or more so times on video and DVD, but up there on the big screen, never! 

Enough rambling, old man, tell us of the film, tell us of its plot, then describe the experience and final wrap it up in a pithy final paragraph before scoring it out of 10 like you normally bloody do!

The plot to this 40 year old film is just about as bonkers as you can get, indeed as I sit here and write I realise there wasn't a plot, there was just a series of explosions linked by a limitless number of transforming robots. There was the giant planet sized one, Unicron voiced by Orson Welles he wanted the gem thingie from Optimus Prime's chest and then there was Megatron leader of the Deceptorcons who also wanted it. He launched an all-out attack on Earth which finally killed Optimus, forcing him to hand the power gem thingie to Ultra Magnus, and Megatron was mortally wounded and revived by Unicorn and told to destroy the power gem crystal thingie. So he chases the Autobots around a bit, until they crash on a junk planet, get captured by some sort of fish-like Trannies, then Unicorn attacked the Transformers home world, and the lead Ultra Magnus gets killed and Megatron tries to double cross Unicorn, but gets eaten, so then the other Autobots unite the Trannies on the junk planet and they attack Unicorn, put out his eyes and blow him up killing him, but not before bringing Ultra Magnus back to life with the Matrix, that's what the glowing gem stone crystal thing was, the power Matrix. And then the film ends.  

Jesus that wasn't good, sure my nostalgia for it was strong but even that couldn't help. I know I'm blind to the short-comings of Godzilla films, but not so this. At the end of the day this was a badly animated 85 odd minute toy advert with some truly awful heavy metal songs thrown in. It's repetitive, confusing, and utterly baffling. Then Eric Idle turns up spouting not one line of dialogue, just an endless stream of random TV jingles and ads, at times this film seems to almost Dada-esque in its approach. And spare a thought for Orson Welles in his last ever movie, his voice hidden behind filters to make it almost unrecognisable, save for his last weary death groan as Unicrom get his head chopped off.

But damn it if it wasn't oddly entertaining at the same time. The hand-drawn animation of gigantic planet transforming was spectacular, Unicrom when he finally transforms is amazing but sadly it's not enough. The robots change size quicker than a Conservative heading to Reform, I mean at one point Megatron is huge, then next he's sitting in the fist of another having transformed into a gun. And the ones that go from robot to Boom box and then eject tiny cassettes which transform into little robots. And Grimlock, the sodding transforming dinosaur, who is so stupid he has to be pushed up the ramp of a spaceship to escape death. The dialogue is just sound bits and catchphrases and the voice acting is painful. This is  looks like a 85 minute long Saturday morning cartoon. It's cheap looking and scrappy and repetitive and packed full of stupid plot points and holes.

But, and I say this in all honesty, it was still somehow stupidly enjoyable! The cinema was packed, the audience of students and dads taking their kids were up for it and enjoyed it, laughing and revelling in the chaos, and it was 1000% better than all of the other animated films trailers before it. Seriously each and every one were just the same generic sassy, wacky kids flicks, all CGI animated and all looked exactly like each other. At least this looked different, infinitely different and I'd watch it over all those in a heartbeat. 

Despite all its many failings this is still better than each and every one of those motherfucking, godawful live-action Transformers film put together.

7/10

P.S.

For all you film nerds out there. Name the other film Orson Welles and Robert Culp starred in? 

#91: RUNNER

 

STARRING: Alan Ritchson, Owen Wilson, Rodrigo Santoro and Leila George. Written by Miles Hubley and Tommy White. Directed by Scott Waugh. Budget $35 million. 

This one caught me unawares, I only became aware of it last week as part of a comparison with the new Gal Gadot film, The Runner, with which this shares half the same title. 

The plot to this one sees 'runner' divorced ex-Seal, ex-alcoholic Hank Malone (Alan Ritchson) living on a house boat in Melbourne Harbour. He's a Deliveroo driver, although when we first meet him he's busy doing the following, engraving a girl's name into a tiny padlock, eating French sandwiches and learning French. He's stoic, tacit, somber, sober and solemn. You see he's atoning for his past. He makes a living driving 'hi-end' stuff around town, like endangered golden parrots, Subway orders, or forcefully picking up belligerent politicians for a government vote (don't ask). Meanwhile, Ben Bishop (Owen Wilson) makes his living as a different sort of runner, flying round the world in first class and delivering organs for transplant, in this case a liver (in a codeword protected hi-tech freezer box) for a little girl who's lying in a hospital and slowly dying. Hank arrives at the airport to pick up the organ and parks beside a huge black SUV, with blacked out windows. I wonder it that'll play a part later? Hank agrees to take Ben to the hospital and we learn that if the freezer box's temperature goes above 8 degrees or if it takes longer than five hours to deliver will expire. So off they go, along with the mysterious black suv with the blacked out windows. 

WITHIN seconds the baddies, who were in the all-black SUV with the blacked out windows, ambushes them leading to the first of many full-out gun battles, in the streets of Melbourne, which will leave scores of nameless tattooed henchmen dead, but oddly enough not from gun shots. No, because of Alan Ritchson's massive size, the man is simply humongous, all of the henchmen are literally broken into pieces, arms, legs snapped, backs broken, necks bent into pretzels,  faces are crushed with single punches, and many people are killed, including random bystanders, who are shot, but not by Hank. Luckily the Australian police aren't on hand to investigate any of this and the chase between Hankben (Ritchson and Owen, to save time) and the baddies led by psychotic Rodrigo Santoro (Damian Zaldivar), he's one of those baddies who executes his heavily tatooed henchmen as a lesson to the others. It's clearly a lesson that the others don't learn as they continue to get stuff wrong. Actually, the reason he, Rodrigo, doesn't kill those who fail him is because the Hank half of Hankben does, in horribly brutal ways. Add to that the following: an old woman dying of the exact same thing as the little girl, a kidnapped surgeon, a mole in the hospital where the little girl is staying, an ex-wife with a spare car, when Hankben's car is destroyed. A vengeful second tier henchman. Oh and to make things more time sensitive, the cooler box and one half of Hankben gets ventilated with a hole meaning time is running out. And that's the plot from then on, Hankben get chased, steal a car, crash the car, bicker, banter and get into one incredibly violent fist/gun fight after another. Then just repeat till the insane final showdown in the hospital where everything just goes batshit crazy and one half of Hankben gets shot, stabbed multiple times with a stiletto and an actual bone saw, and here's a clue, it's not Owen Wilson. Then, finally the police show up and the film ends with a coda of one half of Hankben in Paris honouring their dead daughter from the character backstory. 

Fast, violent, and moderately fun. Apparently it's a lot more fun than The Runner. The Australian setting makes it look fresh and the weather and sun look lovely. The effects and car stunts augmented by CGI are in the Fast and Furious school of car physics, but it does suffer from ridiculous plot contrivances and holes and it's painfully clear that logic is clearly asked to step away from the plot at points during the film to make the whole thing somehow work. 

It would have been made for a tenth of the budget back in the 80s by Canon and probably starred Charles Brosnson, or Chuck Norris, but while this is on it's fine. Nothing big, it's amusing, very violent and utterly over the top and Alan Ritchson is clearly being groomed as the next big action hero. I'm still hoping for the day he becomes Doc Savage. 

Anyway this, well it's okay. But you'll do just as well with it at home than at the cinema. 

6/10

#90: INDEPENDENCE DAY

STARRING: Will Smith, Bill Pullman, Jeff Goldblum, Ary McDonnell, Judd Hirsch, Margaret Colin, Randy Quaid, Robert Loggia, James Rebhorn, Vivica A. Fox, Adam Baldwin, Brent Spiner, Harry Connick Jr. and Harvey Fierstein. Written by Dean Devlin and Roland Emmerich. Produced by Dean Devlin. Directed by Roland Emmerich. Music by David Arnold. Budget $75 million. Box office: $817 million. Running time 145 minutes. Originally released in 1996

Featuring over 3000 special effect shots, the majority of which were practical, to 'save money', including the glorious iconic shot of the White House getting utterly destroyed, as well as some truly spectacular scenes of utter devastation of skyscrappers exploding, streets on fire and a world obliterated. The legend goes that it was written over a month-long holiday in Mexico, green lit by 20th Century Fox chairman Peter Chernin just one day after it was pitched, and put into pre-production just three days later! This film exploded onto our screens and psyches 30 years ago to humungous applause and insane cheering and just devoured the box office. It took over $50.2 million on its opening three-day weekend and spent the next 10 weeks at number #1, ultimately finishing its cinematic run with over $817 million. It slammed Will Smith on the map cementing his legend as a leading man for years to come, and also blasted Jeff Goldblum onto the A List, and it's without doubt one of the most exhilarating, exciting, and entertaining science fiction blockbusters ever made and it just never gets old or boring. 

The plot sees 15 mile wide flying saucers take up position above key points across the globe and then launch a planetary-wide wave of utter destruction. From then on we follow a rag-tag team of heroes as they at first fight to survive, then unite together, before fighting back in pure Hollywood style, but only after the President of the United States of mother-fucking America (Bill Pullman) has given the greatest mother-fucking speech in the history of the world (and cinema) to rally the troops for one glorious mother-fucking counter-attack, while eco scientist David (Jeff Goldblum) and ace pilot Stephen Hiller (Will Smith) fly a stolen alien fighter craft right in the heart of the mother-fucking alien mother ship to deliver Earth's mother-fucking payback in the most ludicrous way possible and all you can do is cheer! 

What a thrill ride, what a treat! What a mother-fucking fantastic film! Back on the big screen to celebrate it's 40th anniversary. I loved this the first time I saw this at a multi-media preview in London in 1996, where the entire crowd of hardened, cynical critics cheered as one and applauded at the president's speech. By no means could this be called high-brow, or clever, or intellectual, but what you can call it is an utter delight, and sod the need to call it a 'guilty pleasure'. The fact that 40 years after its release it's coming back and people want to see it proves what a total classic it is. This is utterly unapologetically the purest popcorn movie ever made, it revels in its own trashiness, it honours the history of the science fiction B-Movie and it stands tall and proud and shouts, I'm loud, I'm proud, I'm goddam bloody epic, me!

I for one refuse to find fault with it, or scoff at it, or sneer, I don't care if the dialogue is lame or cliched, I don't mind a jote if it's just a B-Movie, I bloody love B-movies and I bloody love this. It's a throwback to a simpler time, it's almost a Hollywood WWII movie in style, the gungho attitude the rugged heroes fighting back against a much bigger enemy, and its not ashamed to be downright and outrageously fun!

I was lucky enough to see this several years ago at the Royal Albert hall with a full live orchestra and it was sublime! This time round it's just as nature intended but on the biggest screen High Wycombe has to offer! if you get yourself a chance, do yourself a favour and go and see this on the big screen, sit as close as you can to the screen and just get ready to be utterly entertained. It's defo not clever, but boy, is it big, epically BIG!

10 out of mother-fucking 10, bitch!

#89: STAR TREK IV: THE VOYAGE HOME

 

ORIGINAL 1986 MOVIE POSTER

40TH ANNIVERSARY MOVIE POSTER 2026 

STARRING: William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, DeForest Kelley, James Doohan, George Takei, Walter Koenig, Nichelle Nichols, Catherine Hicks, Michael Berryman, Mark Lenard, Jane Wyatt and Robin Curtis. Story by Harve Bennett and Leonard Nimoy, screenplay by Steve Meerson, Peter Krikes, Nicholas Meyer and Harve Bennett. Directed by Leonard Nimoy. Music by Leonard Rosenman. Budget $25 million. Boxoffice $133 million. Running time 122 minutes. Originally released in 1986.

All together now. 

"Computer. Computer. Ah! Hello computer."

It's 2286 and a dirty great big cylindrical dustbin has arrived in our solar system, taken up a parking orbit above Earth, and started broadcasting a signal that takes out the global power grid, causing untold environmental disaster with huge planet-wide storms blocking out the sun, triggering a possible ice-age and generally acted like a massive dick because somebody on Earth couldn't be bothering to answer their intergalactic phone call. Luckily, pointy-eared, child psychologist and science officer Spook has discovered the signal was meant for the now (then) extinct Hump-Back whales and so him, Kirk and the others set off through a time warp back to 1986 in search of some whales they could bring back to communicate with the alien interlopers and save the world. Urgh, Mondays, am I right?

And so we arrive at the fourth Star Trek film made back in a time when Star Trek existed only at the cinema and re-runs on TV and hadn't spawned five progressively bad spin-offs filled with valuable life-lessons and gender politics, when the world wasn't over saturated with an excess of science fiction, super-heroes and fantasy, a time when this sort of good-natured and dare I say, old fashioned entertainment seemed rather exciting and, fun! Hedy, happy days before the internet and streaming ruined everything.

A novel idea for the franchise, take the crew and throw them in the real world and see how they react. And what a fun ride that turned out to be. Because this is by far the most light-hearted Star Trek film they ever made, with a game crew eager to have a bit of laugh with their roles while still sticking to the world of Star Fleet and a quite serious scenario.  

What you take away from this is just how enjoyable and exciting it is, how they managed to mix amusement and action, drama and fun. It's not a comedy but it's funny, but that is never at the expense of the characters or story. The story split across three different objectives keeps you hooked, it also gives Scotty his moment to shine with perhaps one of my favourite Star Trek scenes of all time, when he has to interact with a computer, watching his fingers dart across the keyboard, it's clear that actor James Doohan who played Scotty so well, hasn't the foggiest notion what the hell a 'computer' is, leading to the sublime moment he picks up the mouse to talk into the infernal machine. Then there's Spock's re-emerging humanity and the re-awkening of his friendship with Kirk and a profanity spouting Spook is worth the admission fee alone, then there's, Uhura and Chekov's mini-adventure aboard the Enterprise aircraft carrier leading to the hospital escape and finally Captain Kirk's deeply creepy flirtation with Marine Biologist Gillian Taylor (Catherine Hicks). He might have been a hit with all the aliens hotties in outer space, but back on terra firma he's just a middle-aged man standing way too close and flirting so badly he might as well just dropped his pants. Way back in Star Trek II: Wrath of Khan I marvelled at William Shatner's acting, particularly when his voice breaks during his eulogy for Spook, but here, when the camera is often right up there in his face it seems to be mugging and gurning are his preferred methods of acting. And that kiss from Gillian on Kirk's cheek at the end when she tells him they'll always be friends makes my toes curl.

That minor quibble probably explains why this doesn't get a solid 10/10, but regardless, I bloody love this, great fun and a joy again, as always, to see on the big screen. Finally it's as old as my relationship with Petra, so happy 40th to us both.

9/10

P.S.
You might wonder why I posted the two posters at the top of this review, well the first is the Bob Peak painted artwork for the original cinematic release and the second is the bag of shit some stupid intern spewed up for the 40th Anniversary release, it's a never-ending source of great sadness for me to see how utterly piss poor modern film posters have become and that photoshopped abomination above just shows the decline, what the fuck is going on with Gillian Taylor's pick up truck on one side and the taxi on the other, as far as I can remember there isn't a single taxi in the film, unless it's driving past in the background. This poster is lazy, badly constructed and enticing as a mouldy loaf of bread. Explain to me Paramount how that poster is going to encourage anyone new to this film?

Poster artwork 2/10 (actually I might even do a top ten of film posters this year). This one be on it.

#88: DE GAULLE: RESISTANCE

STARRING: Simon Abkarian, Niels Schneider, Thierry Lhermitte, Karim Leklou and Simon Russell Beale. Written by Antonin Baudry and Berenice Vila. Directed by Antonin Baudry. Budget $74 million. Running time 158 minutes.

The plot sees Charles de Gaulle (Simon Abkarian) escape Paris following the surrender of France to Germany in World War II. Winston Churchill (Simon Russell Beale) grants him exile in London and he sets about setting up the Free State of France in London and leading the French Resistance. It charts his highly confrontational relationship with Churchill and the deeply harrowing Battle of Bir Hakeim. 

Serious, ponderous, dramatic and deeply engrossing. This was a satisfying cinematic experience with a good cast and some powerful acting. Some of the CGI work is a little poor, but it's not a film about that, it's about the powerful political battles that are seldom discussed in WWII films. I racked my brains for ages trying to remember where I'd last seen Simon Abkarian only to be reminded he was a villain in the Daniel Craig Bond film, Casino Royale. Simon Russell Beale feels and looks like he was born to play Churchill. The British come out of this looking like a slimy bunch of back-stabbing toads, but perhaps that was the sort of attitude that was needed to beat Hitler. 

This was a sombre and powerful film that despite its long running time never dragged. Well worth a punt. 

8/10

#87: GODZILLA, MOTHRA AND KING GHIDORAH: GIANT MONSTERS ALL-OUT ATTACK a.k.a GMK

 

STARRING: GODZILLA! MOTHRA! BARAGON! KING GHIDORAH!!! Also Chiharu Niiyama, Ryudo Uzaki, Masahiro Kobayashi, Shiro Sano and Hideyo Amamoto.  Written by Keiichi Hasegawa, Masahiro Yokotani and Shusuke Kaneko. Directed by Shusuke Kaneko. Budget $9 million, running time 105 minutes. Box office $20 million. Originally released in 2001.

If your only experience of Godzilla is the handful of Legendary movies so far released and the terrible 1998 film directed by Roland Emmerich then you ain't seen nothing yet!

This astounding film released in 2001 by the Toho studio was the 26th film in the Godzilla franchise and was written as a direct sequel to the original 1954 Godzilla film and shares the same universe as the aforementioned 1998 outing and is the third instalment of the Millennium era.

The story sees a very angry, white-eyed Godzilla, this time possessed by the spirits of the people killed during the Pacific War, rising from the depths to wreck bloody havoc against the Japanese populous, but help is on hand in the guise of Baragon, Mothra and King Ghidorah, the legendary Guardian Monsters who are destined to rise and defend the land when Godzilla threatens. Meanwhile, b-movie maker and daughter of a commander in the Defence League finds herself caught up in the mayhem and destruction that shatters the land. Bravely the monsters face off against the Big G but with little effect, Baragon is brutally destroyed, and Mothra (never my favourite) can't do much except batter herself senseless on lightbulbs, so it's up to Ghidorah to try and save the day but will even he be able to stop the relentless onslaught, or is he going to have to level up? The final boss battle in the bay of Tokyo is truly and utterly extraordinary and leaves you absolutely dazed. 

Nothing can truly prepare you for the joys of a Japanese Godzilla movie, they have a charm, an energy and a feel all of their own, the characters, the strange humour, the wonderful man-in-a-rubber-suit special effects, the amazing models and that never date and the sheer forward momentum the films possess. As with any giant monster movie, the story that lives between the action beats matters not one jote and yet these Toho films seem to create characters you oddly care for. Japanese films make big jumps in logic and plotting and expect the audience to catch up, they don't spoon feed their audienced, so you have to be on your toes at all times, plus you can never guarantee who's going to live or die and death is only ever a blink away. The one thing that strikes you about this superb film is just how truly collateral the damage is, Shusuke Kaneko doesn't shy away from depicting how terrirfying it would witness first-hand a Kaiju attack.

It's worth noting that despite using over 350 CGI shots, the majority of the effects in the film were achieved practically, and CGI was used to enhance the action. and boy do those effects stand up, seriously impressive and the use of actual actors inside the monster suits doing the stomping and fighting just enhances the whole movie. The Godzilla suit itself featured in this film was the largest and heaviest one ever made and stood over 2 meters tall and weighed 70kgs!

I was lucky to see this as a 35mm print at the Barbican, a pre-recorded video introduction accompanied the film with the director giving us a brief history of the film and his work before both Mizuho Yoshida (Godzilla) and Akira Ohashi (King Ghidorah) too gave video intros explaining briefly their methods, Mizuho was told to be furious all the time, and Akira demonstrated his technique for being King Ghidorah by squatting down, with both arms raised and roaring. Then both men turned to face off against each other and began roaring together. It was wonderful, those three clips were worth the admission alone. 

If you ever get a chance to see a proper Japanese monster movie at the cinema then do it, it's a true thing of wonder. 

Ladies and gentlemen, Godzilla, King of all the monsters has left the building, standing!

The gods of cinema dictate that I can only score this a 10/10. They are indeed cruel and unusual deities. 

#86: KIKI'S DELIVERY SERVICE

 

WRITTEN AND DIRECTED BY Hayao Miyazaki. Based on Kiki's Delivery Service by Eiko Kadono. Japanese vocal talents: Miniami Takayama, Rei Sakuma, Kappei Yamaguchi and Keiko Toda. Music by Joe Hisaishi. Running time 102 minutes. Budget $6.9 million. Box office takings so far: $41.8 million. Originally released in 1989.

In a world where witches are just accepted, 13-year old witch, Kiki follows the time-honoured tradition of being a witch by flying off on her broomstick to find a town she can practice being a witch in. She sets off with her talking black cat Jiji and lands in an un-named French coastal town where she ends up living in a granny flat of a bakery run by a friendly couple. While she's there Kiki becomes friends with a boy her own age, Tombo, an artist who lives in the woods, and an elderly woman whom Kiki does deliveries for. She also briefly loses her magical powers and still helps to avert a terrible catastrophe when a huge Zeppelin-like airship crashes in the town square and then it ends. And you realise you're close to tears.

What an utter, utter treat. A hand-drawn animated classic of sublime charm, with a warmth and emotional core completely missing from most, if not all, CGI animated  films of the past 36 years. Produced by the legendary Studio Ghibli and directed to perfection by the animation genius, Hayao Miyazaki. This is an exercise in artistic brilliance. The endless street scenes, the crowds, the lighting, the skies, the clouds, the small, tiny bits of artistry that if you blink you'd miss. It's all so wonderful. It fills your soul with joy and I found myself smiling all the way through. There's something about this film that actually enhances your soul, that makes you feel good about your fellow man. It's a film where there's no life lesson to be learned, no sassy, wise-cracking, girl boss beating up stupid male characters, there's just the story of a young girl trying to make her way in the world and encountering a group of people who try to help her. At times she is peevish, and even down right rude, on a couple of occasions she is sad and lonely, but each time there's reasons why and they feel organic and real.  

Finally, just before the film there were the obligatory trailers and because Kiki's Delivery Service animated, nearly all the other trailers were for upcoming animated films all of which, with the exception of a new Shaun the Sheep movie, were generic, bland CGI sludge including a film called Forgotten Island, about two sassy, wacky teenage girls who get sucked into a magical realm and befriend a stupid werewolf boy who's there to provide the obligatory hilarious stupid male character. You just know that there'll be wacky adventures and valuable lessons to be learned before the two girls are returned to their real world. It's just another forgettable animated life-lesson featuring an off-the-rack plot and yet another cast of forgettable female characters, because god forbid a Hollywood animated film should ever have a male character like Tombo. 

Give me Kiki's Delivery Service every time. This is an absolute animated classic and I loved every minute. There is not one thing wrong with this beautiful, joyful, life-affirming film and to see it, once again on the big screen, with Japanese subtitles and in all it's full 4k glory, was a dream come true. 

10/10 

      

#85: THE DOG STARS

 

STARRING: Jacob Elordi, Josh Brolin, Margaret Qualley and Guy Pearce. Screenplay by Mark L. Smith. Based on the book The Dog Stars by Peter Heller. Directed by Ridley Scott. Budget $110 million. Running time 118 minutes. 

For many years Ridley Scott worked on developing a movie based on the classic science fiction novel, I am Legend by Richard Matheson. It would have been the third adaptation of the book and would have starred Arnold Schwarzenegger in the role of Robert Neville, played previously by Vincent Price in Last Man on Earth (1964), and Charlton Heston in The Omega Man (1971). Alas it was not to be. 

That was back in 1998, now in 2026, 28 years later Scott bounces back with this! The Dog Stars, a film with that original sf classic embedded in its DNA, featuring as it does a flu-ravaged, post apocalyptic wasteland of ruined, overgrown cities, hordes of nomadic Reapers ravaging the countryside and a stoic, grief-stricken hero and his dog, although this time he's joined by not one, but two stoic, grief-stricken old men with serious anger management issues and one beautiful young woman. That's also the plot, bar the introduction of a mysterious community of survivors operating out of a small town airport.

The book upon what this film is based on, is a staggering slow read, filled with chapters of seemingly endless descriptions of the leaves moving in the wind and stoic PDSD men droning on about nature, and survivalism. It depicts a world much reduced from the one in the film. In the book, chapters fly by with nary a glimpse of another human being. And when they stumble, starved and desperate they number in the ones, or twos. Or in the 'big action beat' scene nine, while in the film it's like bloody Piccadilly Circus, I mean like every five minutes another roaming group of survivors stumble into view only to be executed without a word or difficulty. 

Hig (Jacob Elordi) and Bangley (Josh Brolin) spend their days bickering and shooting anyone who dares to wander onto their patch – a rundown airfield, from where Hig goes flying almost everyday to nearby Denver on supply runs. It's been nine years since the world ended in a flu pandemic and the world is gone. Everyone, except Hig, his much loved dawg, and Bangley, an ex-combat marine, are desperate and starving, but old Hig has it down good, every week he goes off on the weekly shop, just unlike you or I, he goes off in his still functioning light aircraft, fuelled by petrol that's not gone off. He shoots off to Denver with his dog, lands takes out an electric buggy, visits his old home, mourns his dead wife, then goes shopping, picking up sodas and drugs he keeps hidden in a functioning walk-in refrigerator, then on the way back he stops off a nearby Mennonite community  near the airfield and benevolently hands out the drugs and Cokes. But good ole Hig is an ickle sad, his wife died in the pandemic and he sort of blames himself. Then one day he picks up a radio transmission and decides to go off to investigate. Along the way, his engine fails and he's forced to crash-land, but luckily it's only a minor inconvenience as he comes across Cima (Margaret Qualley) and her dad, Jack (Guy Pearce) who are also surviving quite nicely thank you in a secret hidden valley. Anyway, there's a army of reapers who stumble across our gang of friendly survivalists so Hig, Cima and Jack fly away looking for the home of the transmission. Meanwhile, back at home, Bangley is swamped by an sodding army of tattooed skinheads who want what he has. 

This looks beautiful, the post apocalyptic city scapes are eerie and impressive, the cast are fine, although they seem a little bored by it all, and it's competently  directed by Scott, but this is most certainly third tier Scott, down there with the likes of A Good Year, G.I. Jane and Robin Hood. Beyond the expertly finessed art direction, there's nothing here that screams Ripley, sorry Ridley. It's just a generic plod. It's also not helped by the introduction of a truly ridiculous third-act action set-piece which feels like an entirely different film shoehorned in because of the lack of some action, unless your idea of action is watching people clearing a field of rocks and stones.

Trouble is I'm a sucker for post-apocalyptic movies and books, I eat them up, call me a prepper, but I just love the idea of wandering the wasteland looking for gazoleen, the last Twinkie or bottle of diet Coke, especially if Margaret Qualley is along for the ride. 

And finally, what's up with Hollywood and this genre of rugged men in light aircraft and their dogs, what with this and the up coming Brad Pitt flick, Heart of the Beast?

This? Slow, sombre, sad but not altogether terrible. That said I bet you a stack of 10,000 dollar bills it's going to polarise people. As for me, I can see myself happily rewatching this as a double bill with The Omega Man on a cold Sunday afternoon. 

7/10

#84: CASINO

 

STARRING: Robert DeNiro, Sharon Stone, Joe Pesci, Don Rickles, Kein Pollak, James Wood. Screenplay by Nicholas Pileggi and Martin Scorsese. Based on the book Casino: Love and Honor in Las Vegas by Nicholas Pileggi. Cinematography by Robert Richardson. Edited by Thelma Schoonmaker. Directed by Martin Scorsese. Budget $50 million. Running time 178 minutes long. Originally released in 1995.

If Goodfellas is the blue collar world of organised film, then this, is the sequin encrusted jumpsuit of crime. Set in 1973 and exclusively in Las Vegas, it follows the rise of Sam 'Ace' Rothstein (Robert DeNiro) who's sent by the Chicago Mafia to run the Tangiers Casino, trouble is he's bringing a shit ton of emotional and psychotic luggage with him that's going to make his job a lot harder. 

I originally hated this when it first came out, it felt like an unnecessary sequel to Goodfellas, I couldn't see what was different about it, but over time and repeated viewings it's warmed on me, sure it's far more brutal than GF, it's longer, it's more intense and it feels far more real, there's a sense of excitement about GF, you kinda want the three leads to maybe get away with it. But here, it feels far more real and close. Watching Sam and Ginger's marriage collapse is difficult to watch, the rage and anger unleashed makes you feel like an accidental witness. Similarly, Joe Pesci's Nicky is so unhinged so dangerous you feel no warmth for him, no connection and his final demise is so vicious, so violent and yet you're glad he's dead, there's a sense of relief that washes over you. 

The three main actors are at the top of their game in this, Joe Pesci is truly unhinged and scary, you really feel he is capable of anything. DeNiro seems to inhabit the role of Sam and gives him a sheen vulnerability that feels real, despite the fact you feel he's only a fraction away from lashing out, but is too scared too.  And then there's Sharon Stone  as Sam's wife, Ginger McKenna who has never been better, her raw power, or dependency on her boyfriend/pimp, James Wood feels horribly real. All three bring such a sense of realism to their roles that film feels at times more like a fly-on-the wall documentary.

It's still got all that wonderful Scorsese DNA, the use of popular music as a soundtrack, the extraordinary editing skills of Thelma Schoonmaker and the cinematography is gorgeous. But it's not as good as Goodfellas, it's perhaps a little too long and it's just too raw.

For a film that runs two minutes shy of three hours, it flies by in a blurr. I was engrossed from the moment it started 'till it's explosive ending. This short run of Scorsese films at my local Cineworld has been an utter delight and I thank them for sharing some true stone-cold classics like this. 

An absolute cinematic treat. But it doesn't quite reach the greatness of Goodfellas.

9/10

#83: ONE NIGHT ONLY

 

STARRING: Monica Barbaro and Callum Turner. Also featuring Maya Hawke, Molly Ringwald and LeVar Burton. Written by Travis Braun. Directed by Will Gluck. Budget $25 million. Running time 102 minutes. 

It's the near future and in America the ultra right have won the election and control the country. Their first move is to instigate a total 'no sex before marriage' mandate banning premarital sex. The entire population has been tattooed with a tattoo that changes colour meaning if it's red you can't have sex, and if it's green you can. If you're married you can have sex whenever you want, but if you're single you have to wait for that one day of the year when for 12 hours you can have sex with anyone you like as long as it's consensual. And on that very special day we meet Allie (Monica Barbaro) an aspiring jingle singer with performance issues and jug-eared Owen (Callum Turner) who owns and runs his own pizzeria called Claremont. He's a hopeless romantic waiting to propose to his girlfriend of three years on the night the whole country goes fuck-crazy, while Allie wants to find something more than just a meaningless shag. He finds out his girlfriend wants a hall-pass for meaningless sex with someone else and Allie just wants the D.  Throughout the evening these two cross paths more often than is normal, I mean be it the waiting room of a police station, in the queue to buy the last remaining condom in the city, at a private invite only party for the hottest pop singer in the business, or literally on the street corner, it's almost like fate had commanded these two be together. What follows is the classic Boy meets girl, loses girl, meets another girl, while girl meets another boy, both lose respective boys and girls before meeting other boys and girls before losing those before reuniting with original girl, in his case, before realising they want the other but then losing each other before the happy ending. And oddly enough it's that happy ending that's missing. For a film obsessed with meaningless sex with random strangers this is a film that's ridiculously chaste when it comes to the two leads making the beast with two backs, because when push almost become thrust (or shove) and with literally minutes left on the clock before the no sex rule kicks back in again, these two lug heads decide to wait another year before playing 'let's hide the salami.' because if something is good it's worth waiting for. And the strange thing is that this last minute cock block just reinforces the whole celibacy until married conceit. And while the chant from all the insanely horny sex-upped singletons throughout the film is "FUCK THE MANDATE!" except for our two leads who when we join them a year later, living together the message seems to be, "It's better to wait." Mixed. Fucking. Messaging.

What a weird little film this is. The two leads who are as horny as fuck and twice as sexy are so chaste they could have stepped out of a Hallmark flick. Callum Turner as jug-eared as he is, is nevertheless easy on the eye, as is Moncia Barbaro whose plunging halter-top silver mini dress is silver revelation excude sex appeal by the bucket load and have lovely chemistry and charm to boot but it's all above the waist and the nearest we get to any sex is no-tongue kissing and not a single nork grope, or bum squeeze.  

Also, the logic and complex set-up makes this whole world seem utterly implausible. It's like a reverse Handmaids Tale of sexual politics. Both Allie and Owen have sexless encounters throughout the evening but neither has sex, saving themselves for the other at the climax of the film and it all feels so virginal. Mildly amusing, some of the situations and characters they encounter raise a smile, perhaps none more so than when LeVar Burton and Owen's mum, Molly Ringwald who hook up for some bubblewrap kinky sex. But that's about it for fun, or sex. With neither a bare bum, or boob, save for one chaste sidebob, to see, there's no sex, or nudity, which is weird in a film about meaningless sex. 

It's all so toothless and sweet. 5/10

   

#82: COYOTE VS. ACME

 

STARRING: Will Forte, Lana Condor, Tone bell, Luis Guzman, Martha Kelly, P.J. Byrne, Eric Bauza, Kenneth Choi and John Cena. Screenplay by Samy Burch. Story by James Gunn, Jeremy Slater and Samy Burch. Directed by Dave Green. Budget #72 million. Running time 103 minutes. 

Think of this as the 21st Century response to the utterly superb 1988 Who Framed Roger Rabbit. Set in the present and featuring a world where cartoon characters and humans co-exist side-by-side in harmony.

The plot sees Wile E. Coyote decide to hire the services of a small law firm, Avery, Jones & Maltese to sue ACME – the ubiquitous industrial complex that creates devices for cartoon charactors. After decades of failing to capture the Road Runner, the Coyote decides the defective ACME products he's been using, are responsible and sets out to sue ACME for damages, setting in motion the court case of the century. But as Kevin Avery (Will Forte) and his niece, Paige Avery (Lana Condor) start to investigate they uncover a conspiracy decades in the making, leading ACME's head lawyer, Buddy Crane (John Cena) to go on the attack. Leading to a dramatic race to a congressional investigation, where the Road Runner will testify, assuming he lives long enough...

Funny, meta, packed with gags, visual and verbal and enough Easter Eggs to keep even the most hardened fans of the Warner Bros. cartoons happy, this was an absolute hoot! The animation is top notch and the the cast list of legendary WB characters includes Bugs, Daffy, Tweety, Sylvester, Porky, Foghorn and even includes a legendary 1930s character actor by the name of Lorre. 

I've not laughed this much at a film in ages, it's such a playful, joyful and funny film that doesn't pander, doesn't preach and still packs a rather sweet little ending. 

Sadly, this is going to tank and tank hard. Its story to the big screen is worthy of a film in its own right. Originally scheduled for deletion back in 2023 as part of a tax write off, that included Batgirl, the film was rescued and sold off, but released at the tail end of August with an almost non-existent press campaign, which is a great shame because this was a terrifically funny flick, it's got heart, silliness and some brilliant gags. 

If you love the films of Tex Avery and Chuck Jones Go and see it, you'll love it. The characterisation of Wile E. Coyote is spot on, and he stays utterly true to his cartoon origins. The animation is a treat and really looks hand-drawn, John Cena continues to show his comedic chops but gets a little sidetracked. And finally fantastic to see Leghorn Foghorn back in action. 

8/10   

#81: TRAINSPOTTING

STARRING: Ewan McGregor, Ewen Bremner, Jonny Lee Miller, Kevin McKidd, Robert Carlyle, Kelly MacDonald, Peter Mullan, Eileen Nicholas, Shirley Henderson, James Cosmo, Kevin and Keith Allen. Screenplay by John Hodge. Based on the book by Irvine Welsh. Cinematography by Brian Tufano and edited by Masahiro Hirakubo. Directed by Danny Boyle. Budget £1.5 million. Box office takings £48 million. Running time 93 minutes. Originally released in 1996.

It's 30 years since this film first debuted and I can still remember it vividly, it's one that has stayed with me all these years, so the chance to revisit it on the big screen was too much to resist. But, has it stood the test of time, or has it become jaded and old? It's funny, but the same week I watched this again and I've seen both Ewan Mcgregor and Kelly MacDonald in new stuff, The End of Oak St. for him and the new Lanterns show for her.

The Trainspotting plot is told from the point of view of Renton (McGregor) and starts off as an apparent love letter to the joys of heroin and drug taking and a rejection of normality, a carrion call to reject 'life' and embrace the joys of smack, but it soon becomes clear that Renton is lying to himself and he desperately tries to crack his addiction. The trouble is, his whole life and all of his friends are involved in one way or another and every time he seems to get clear he falls back into his old ways, leading to one final attempt to escape his chaotic life. 

By god this is a great film, directed with true passion and energy by Danny Boyle. Brilliantly edited, and photographed. The soundtrack – a compilation album of bangers perfectly captures the mood and spirit of the times. The writing is sharp, funny and crisp, capturing Renton's inner monologue perfectly. But it's the acting that truly elevates this to something special. The six young leads are just note perfect, McGregor has a lot of carrying to do and he does it with effortless skill. Robert Carlyle's Begbie is one of cinema's greatest villains and the menace and violence he brings to the role is outstanding. Jonny Lee Miller's James Bond obsessed Sick Note brings both pathos and humour. while Ewen Bremner's Spud, perhaps the film's funniest character is also its saddest, although Kevin McKid's Tommy is by far the most tragic. 

This is a film that starts off by telling us the reason kids do drugs, and in particular heroin, is because it feels so good, but which never glamourises or sensationalises drug use, it just shows the reality, of five friends lying on the floor of a drug den littered in fag butts and discarded needles in slums lost in a bliss-filled haze of a drug rush. 

This is a funniest, intense and sobbering film that's lost none of its power and feels as fresh today as it did back in 1986. This new 4K restored version of the film presents an Edinburgh that is hideous in tooth and claw, which only helps to make the whole experience feel even more real. If you get a chance go and see the sort of film 'they' just don't make any more. 

10/10

 

#80: MUTINY

 

STARRING: Jason Statham, Annabelle Wallis, Roland Møller and Adrian Lester. Written by Lindsay Michel and J.P. Davis. Directed by Jean-Francois Richet. Budget $50 million. Running time 95 minutes.

Jason's job in this new outing is bodyguard and chauffeur to shipping magnate, Tibor (Ramon Tikaram). Jason or Cole Reed as he's known in this outing has naturally a hidden past, he used to be not only a commando, a special forces operative but also a policeman, highly decorated, stoic, deadly serious, driven, committed, lethal, dangerous, fighter, loner, chess-champion, and most importantly one-man-killing machine. So when his surrogate father figure Tibor gets killed on his watch during a botched kidnapping attempt, that sees Cole framed for the murder of Tibor and death of four policemen and the small army of thugs out to kill Tibor he does the only thing he can. He goes undercover as a sailor on a shipping container ship Tibor owned to find out why Tibor was killed.

That's the plot, sort of, there's other stuff too, a container holds trafficked people who a bunch of pirates want, but mostly it's just Cole on a ship killing off the 20+ sailors under the stewardship of villainous Captain Marko Madsen (Roland Møller), who it turns out had something to do with the killing of Cole's dad some years earlier. Added to the mix is 3rd Mate Angie Ellis (Annabelle Wallis) shoe-horned into the script because the focus group that shaped and moulded this felt it was a little sausage heavy. So in comes Angie who's more than capable of fighting and killing with impunity.

And so with the scenario set up and the plot running it's just a case of watching JS butcher 20 odd men using his fists, feet, and whatever guns, knives, hay hooks and harpoon guns that come his way. 

But unlike his previous cinematic outing's character, Shelter's Michael Mason, Cole Reed isn't invulnerable and actually gets stabbed in the chest, top left, which after a minimal bleed does no more than to make him even more peevish. 

Then it's Die Hard on a boat, or Underseige: The Remake, as Cole just does his thing in confined spaces before finally confronting Marko Madsen for one last fight. then it's back to Far East to get revenge on the man who set the whole film in motion. 

If you've read enough of my posts you know I like Jason Statham films and this is no exception. It's vicious, nasty, and surprisingly violent. The action isn't edited to death and the gore and injury details are surprisingly not skimped on. This isn't big or clever, it's not creating something new, and it most certainly isn't reinventing the wheel. There's no humour to undercut the violence and the only one liner we get is Cole thanking Tibor for gifting him a Rolex watch that enables Cole to unscrew some screws. 

Like all Statham films it's not big, or clever, it just gets the job done. Bish Bosh. And unlike the American based adventures, he gets to keep his British accent. 

6/10 

 

#79: TONY

 

STARRING: Dominic Sessa, Emilia Jones, Dagmara Dominczyk, Rich Sommer, Stavros Halkias, Leo Woodall and Antonio Banderas. Written by Matt Johnson, Matthew Mller, Todd Bartels and Lou Howe. Directed by Matt Johnson. Running time 106 minutes. 

It's 1975 and Jaws is playing in a double bill with the classic Charles Bronson movie, Violent City, while staggeringly creepy 19-year old Vassar College student, Anthony 'Tony' Bourdain (Dominic Sessa)lies to everyone he meets, knows or has even the merest of interactions with that he's a budding writer and winner of a writing scholarship, even his family. Latching on with all the focus of a laser guided missile, Tony fixates on fellow student Nancy Putkoski (Emilia Jones) and follows her to Provincetown in Massachusetts, for the summer, after stealing a couple of hundred dollars from his doting father. Once in Provincetown, Tone gets pissed, runs up a debt in a lobster restaurant called the Flagship, loses all his money, gets beaten up and knocked unconscious. In the morning he wakes up in a hammock on the back porch of the kindly owner of the Flagship (Antonio Banderas) and blags himself a job as a dishwasher where he slowly befriends the gang of psychopaths and maniacs who work in the kitchen. Every morning the unnamed Flagship owner throws a bucket of water over Tony, who then spends the day, smoking, taking drugs and flirting with Nancy. All the while Tone pretends to be a writer while not writing anything while secretly observing the practices of the kitchen. Finally he convinces the owner to open a special Friday night dinner service and serve lobster thermidor to impress Nancy, so he can shag her, and ends up burning down the restaurant. Which naturally upsets Antonio who tells Tone he was going to offer him a full time job. To repay the kindly old man, Tone and his junkie friend break into Antonio's house, steal a cooking book and stage a clam bake BBQ on the beach pretending to raise money to rebuild the Flagship. Happily the two young men collect a huge amount of money for 'charity' when Antonio arrives and Tone decides to make amends for being an absolute shitberg for the previous 100 minutes and sods off to culinary school in New York, but only after reuniting with his family so they can forgive him for stealing and running away. Before a series of captions tell us that the real life Anthony Bourdain went on to write a book about kitchens and travel the world. 

And that's it plot wise.

This is a tonally weird film about a miserable, self-obsessed teenage arsehole who thinks the fucking world owes him a living. Convinced of his own greatness and happy to roll over anyone he chooses and to lie, steal and cheat to get what he wants, the young Bourdain is a thoroughly unlikable little shit played horribly by Dominic Sessa who makes Bourdain appear to be a serial killer in training. He spends the whole film looking dirty, unkempt and disgusting, he's a boy who never bathes or brushes his teeth. All he does is stalk Nancy and try and groom her into having sex with him. He spends every second he is with her staring at her as if she's a piece of meat he's about to fillet. Every moment Sessa takes the stage you find yourself subconsciously scratching and fantasying about having a wash once the film is over. 

At no point does Bourdain become even remotely likeable and his grubby, greedy, self-obsessed narcissism becomes quite exhausting. The film presents him as a loner, a rebel destined for greatness but Sessa who spends the film slumped over like a hunchback and peering through greasy curly bangs is so unlikeable there's never any chance you'll buy into his self-obsessed bullshit. 

As an award-winning TV chef, I love a film about cooking but it seems the only nation capable of creating fantastic films about cooking are the French. For comparison, the French gave us the exquisite fare like The Taste of Things, about a banquet of fine wine and food while the yanks gave us Chef, about a food van selling cheese toasties. In fact the best movie America has ever given us about food was The Menu.

Because Sessa's Bourdain is so sleazy and unlikeable you spend the film wanting the foppish haired twat to fail, you're practically egging him on to so so in spectacular fashion, however, when the fail finally arrives late in the third act, it's handled with all the finese of a dine and dash. It's clumsy and implausible, he apparently doesn't realise that throwing buckets of water over an oil fire isn't a good idea and only succeeds in setting fire to the restaurant. Thank fuck then for Antonio who at least offers a subtle masterclass in less is more acting, but that's really about all I've got to praise it. 

It looks okay, some of the scenery is nice but that's all it really has going for it. I think a film following Bourdain after he leaves culinary school for his journey round the world would have been more interesting. Not so this, which arrives with all the pomp and ceremony of a disappointing desert.

6/10

#77 & 78: THE END OF OAK STREET. Revisited

 REVISITED

STARRING: Anne Hathaway, Ewan McGregor, Maisy Stella and Christian Convery. Produced by J.J. Abrams, Hannah Minghella, Jon Cohen, David Robert Mitchell, Matt Jackson and Tommy Harper. Written and directed by David Robert Mitchell. Budget $92 million. Running time 99 minutes. 

Can't help thinking the people who churn out the utterly turgid Jurassic Park films must be slapping their foreheads in disbelief and shouting, "So, that's how you do a dinosaur movie!", their last film – the 2025 woeful Jurassic World Rebirth cost a genuinely staggering $254 million dollars to make, while this one a 'mere' $92 million, which in comparison is low budge and ten times better!

It's 1982 and life, or so it seems is good in the Oak Street neighbourhood, there's a massive street party underway and everything seems wonderful and everyone seems happy, although scratch the surface of Platt family, Denise and Gret Platt (Anne Hathaway and Ewan McGregor) and you can easily see their marriage is on the rocks and their two children, Audrey and Brian (Maisy Stella and Christian Convery) know it. Greg's hiding a secret – that he's lost his job and trying to make ends meet by working as a pizza delivery boy and she's an aspiring novelist who's written something wonderful using her own family as her inspiration. Then one night during a particularly violent lighting and thunder storm, the entire neighbourhood is transported via a worm hole, or ball, back 65 millions years ago to the Cretaceous Period and the family find themselves fighting for their lives as the neighbourhood goes to the dinasours. As their neighbours get whittled down and the family dog goes missing, the family naturally, because it's a film, split up and go off looking for him leading to a genuinely scary sequence that just keeps building. Finally our nuclear family piece together what's happening and how to get home and then late into the third act, something truly shocking and unexpected happens and the stakes rise meteorically leading to a superb third act that does not disappoint. 

Who would have thought dinosaurs could be scary, taking place mostly in the day light, these beasties are feathered, ugly and unbelievably lethal. The action builds nicely and as the town is reduced to a burning ruin, our family keep running looking for a way out. This feels like a Spielberg film, hardly surprising since this is a Bad Robot Production and one of the producers is J.J. Abrams, who for a long time was hailed as the next Spielberg, much in the same way Christopher Nolan is called the next Kubrick.  

This looks, feels and sounds like a Spielberg film, it's packed full 1980s elements, like kids riding their BMX bikes around the neighbourhood, 8-tracks, Battlestar Galactica movie posters, typewriters, and not a mobile phone in sight! Kids take centre stage for much of this and are deeply annoying at times, asking stupid questions, taking ridiculous risks and running off whenever the plot needs them to. 

Overall this was a thoroughly enjoyable, action-packed, dramatic and emotional romp, a true rollercoaster of excitement and one that utterly nails the landing. What an utter treat. Sure without Jurassic Park, we wouldn't have this, but boy what we do have is a dinosaur film that's actually scary.

Do yourself a favour and pay Oak Street a visit, you won't regret it!

8/10

REVISITED
Back from seeing this for the second time, I dragged Petra. So, what was it like second time round? 

Don't get me wrong the dinosaur bits are still great, the whole third act is a hoot and it sure is exhilarating, it's just that there are elements that really drag this down and those elements are the family at the centre of it all. Them and more importantly all the male characters in this film – from Ewan McGregor's Greg, to Brian, his idiot son (Christian Convery), their next door neighbour, Mel (P.J. Byrne) and any other random male we see are all stupid, pathetic and ineffective. While every single woman is dynamic, go-getting, pro-active and the utter opposite of pathetic. Denise (Anne Hathaway) is an uber girl-boss in the mould of Alien's Ripley, who shots and fights her way to victory, while their daughter, Audrey (Maisy Stella) is the brain box able to offer her expert opinion on wormholes and quantum physics. Greg is a milk-sop, weak, wimpy, pathetic, he acts like an anchor slowing them all down, offering empty hope and platitudes, while Brian, the boy child, is just there to put himself and his family in constant jeopardy, and whine incessantly and it grates, boy does it grate. Actually, I really wanted Brian to die horribly. He spends the whole film running round the town armed with a child's bow and arrow set and feebly fires arrows at everything missing every single time. That said, he does happen to hit the side of a barn with an arrow, but that's from inside the barn and the wall is behind the dinosaur that's trying to eat him. Oh, how I screamed for that dinosaur to tear his stupid face off, but sadly Brian survived, only to fall off a roof at the most  in-opportune moment, putting his whole family in danger - AGAIN! Although I don't suppose there's a right time to fall off a roof. 

There's also a bizarre lack of other people in this world, when the Pratt [sic] family first realise what the fuck is going on, they go exploring and beside one single neighbour going to work, there is simply no other living person in this neighbourhood. Finally as the film progresses we see bodies and the occasional group of dinosaur fast food (slow-running packs of humans), and corpses but that's it, I think this would have been better if the neighbours had banded together to survive and then been whittled down. 

As we walked home, Pet and I talked about the film and both agreed that the one thing both the children needed was a bloody good thrashing, Greg and Denise are dreadful parents and I for one wish the bastard dinosaurs had eaten them all.

FINALLY, one really important thing for anyone with young children to know. THIS isn't the film for your under 12s, stop bringing them. yet again a performance marred by frightened children who had to be 'rescued' by their parents because this is too violent. It's a 12A for a goddam reason you stupid shits. 

That said, despite the pathetic males, and the annoying family, this was still loads of fun. And more importantly, Pet loved it and gave it an 8/10 so who am I to disagree, 8/10 it remains.