#7 COLLATERAL BEAUTY

Starring Will Smith, Edward Norton, Keira Knightley, Michael Pena, Naomie Harris, Jacob Latimore, Kate Winset and Helen Mirren. Written by Allan Loeb and directed David Frankel. Running time 97 minutes. Budget $36 million. Certificate 12a.

Will Smith is Howard Inlet, a fantastically amazing advertising executive of a fantastically amazing and successful Manhattan advertising agency and Edward Norton, Michael Pena and Kate Winset are his dear, dear friends and co-partners. However, three years later and poor old Howard is crippled by the tragic death of his six year old daughter and utterly unable to function in the real world and instead spends his time building elaborate domino runs and writing letters to Death, Love and Time. His trio of good, good buddies terrified that their cash cow is going to leave them penniless when they lose their biggest client thanks to Howard's misery decide that what they need to do is prove Howard is insane with grief and thereby they can take control of the company in a boardroom coup. To do this the trio hire three actors to pretend to be Death, Love and Time to confront Howard, while it's secretly filmed, then, later they'll be cgi-ing out of the footage, so it looks like Howard's talking to himself and thus proving he's mad. In the meantime, Howard struggles to come to terms with his bereavement on his own terms and starts to attend a support group run by the kindly Naomie Harris, who's also lost a daughter at the same age. Hmmm....

This is an odd, odd film. It starts off like a light-hearted comedy and is filmed liked one but as it drags on it becomes more and more morkish and overly sentimental, which is a shame. If this film had just been Will Smith struggling with his loss and coming to terms with it I think it would have been a fantastic film, particularly if the trio of actors, as promised by the trailer, were actually Death, Love and Time then it would have been a far better film.

However, when we discover that each of the three friends have their own problems that could be helped by Death, Love and Time the film begins to lose it's credibility. Added to that there a growing suspicion that this film is desperate to be considered something magical. Then there's the problem that Will takes a back seat to Norton, Knightley and Pena and their problems for large portions of this film and when that happens we sort of lose interest, because they're just three greedy bastards.

This film has one rather moving twist in the third act, which goes someway to redeeming the movie, but by then it's a little bit too little too late. Overall, I don't think it's as bad as the critics claim, but it's still mawkish, over-sentimental and overwrought. All that said, Will Smith's portrayal of grief is poignant and painful to watch and emotional.

The ending offers us the possibility of a happy ending and also one last revelation about our three actors, although by this point I don't think we really care anymore.

5/10

#6 UNDERWORLD 5: BLOOD BORES

Starring Kate Beckinsale, Theo James, Lara Pulver, James Faulkner, Charles Dance and Tobias Menzies. Written by Cory Goodman and directed by Anna Foerster. 91 minutes too long. $35 million budget. 15 certificate.

The plot to this movie is so labyrinth and convoluted that I simply don't have the wherefore all to do it justice so instead I give you this link to the film's Wikipedia page which does a bang up job of describing it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underworld:_Blood_Wars

Thus freeing me to launch into a gentle and none angry review.

Oh. My. Sweet. Mother-fucking. God. Please kill me now. Seriously what a total bag of utter bollocks. In fact this is a staggeringly useless and anemic sac of shit that it's left me debating which breed of cinematic vampire I hate more, these useless bunch of double fanged twats or the sparkly Twatlight ones? Honestly I can't decide. I mean by rights I should hate the Robert Paterson/Kirsten Stewart ones the most, but after this I really don't know any more.

Now, I have to admit to not having watched all the Underworld movies. I know I've seen the first one, and from what I dimly remember it was quite silly but fun, and I've seen one where this big hybrid vampire/werewolf thing was in it and Bill Knighy got sliced in half, and I seem to remember one really terrible one about a little girl, and there was one set in the past about a war between werewovles and vampires and had Michael Sheen in it, but I really don't know or care. Anyway, this fifth entry in the seemingly undead franchise brings back Kate Beckinsale as the Death Dealer Selene to wear a pretty impressive leather jump suit and kill werewolves. Shot entirely in infuriating grey and steel blue and featuring some genuinely unimpressive CGI effects this is a poe-faced, dull as ditch water stinker which is about as scary as a Scooby Do and Scrappy Do cartoon. The high points are Charles Dance who seriously deserves better and um, the death of one of the baddies which is wonderfully funny. Apart  from that, I'd rather have my teeth pulled than watch this again. Actually I'll never watch this piece of shit ever again, not if you paid me. Although I probably would if you paid me, but it would have to be atleast £10, cos' I'm not cheap.

There's a group of vampires in this stupid film that are clearly inspired by those Lord of the Rings Elves, being all white haired and crap. They seem utterly balls and die easier than ants.

God this was dull. Dull, dull dull. There's a big fight at the end which is okay, someone gets their spine ripped out and one of the vampires looks like my mate James so that was funny. But apart from that. Just don't bother.

Imagine all the cut-scenes of a rather inept first-person video game cut together into one film, and you'll get the idea.

I saw it so you didn't have to. Big balls 2/10.

#5 LIVE BY NIGHT

Starring Ben Affleck, Zoe Saldana, Sienna Miller, Elle Fanning, Brendan Glesson, Chris Messina, Robert Glenister and Chris Cooper. Written and directed by Ben Affleck. 129 minutes long. Budget $65 million. Certificate 15.

Ben Affleck is Joe, the Boston son of an Irish police chief (Brendan Glesson) and a First World War veteran who comes back from the war a changed man, a man who refuses to obey the laws of anyone ever again, thus becoming an outlaw. To achieve this he robs banks and shags the moll, Emma (Sienna Miller) of Albert White (Robert Glenister). That is until White finds out and kills Emma and Joe is jailed for 2 years for the deaths of 3 police men.

Two years later, Joe is released two weeks after his dad dies and he heads out on the revenge trail, by teaming up with White's rival Italian mob boss, Maso (Remo Girone) and taking over the lucrative rum business in Tampa Bay and running White out of town. Then he has to battle the KKK, an evangelical preacher in the shape of Loretta (Elle Fanning) and Maso's stupid son known as the Digger. All the while Joe falls in love with the sister of a Cuban gangster Graciella Corrales (Zoe Saldana). There's lots of other stuff that happens but I wouldn't want to spoil the whole film for you.

This is a well mounted but utterly dreary plod through a boring man's exciting life. Told without a modicum of wit, excitement or drama this film is totally ruined by the blandness of its leading man, author and director, Ben Affleck. He sleeps through the entire film and offers only one small flash of emotion and that's in the films dying minutes. The rest of the time he plods along in one ill-fitting suit after another delivering lines in a monotonous drone and occasionally shooting a gun.

In a film overburdened by a stupidly dense plot, this film never stops for a moment to flesh out the story, it just keeps on putting down more and more plot as we trudge through one gangster's rather bland rise to the top. It builds to a big shot out glimpsed in the trailer and then very quickly ties up a couple of lose ends, chucks in one last cheap emotional kick to the teeth before slowly grinding to a halt.

This looks good, great art direction, a couple of dramatic shot-outs and car chases and some good performances. The rest of the cast try hard but are all hamstrung by a writer/director/star who just seems to be phoning in his performance. Perhaps he was more interested in what was going on behind the camera instead of what was going on in front of it. There's a sense that Affleck was trying to make a 21st Century Godfather, instead it's just another Godfather 3.

5/10

#4 MANCHESTER BY THE SEA

Starring Casey Affleck, Michelle Williams, Kyle Chandler, Gretchen Mol and Lucas Hedges. Written and directed by Kenneth Lonergan. Budget $8.5 million. Running time 137 minutes. Certificate 15.

Just superb. A true masterpiece. One of the most satisfying movies I've seen in an absolute age!

Casey Affleck is Lee Chandler a man living in self imposed exile as a quiet reserved janitor. From his single basement room in the bottom of a Boston tenement, that resembles a cell, Lee spends his days  clearing the paths of snow, unblocking toilets or fixing the numerous problems of his tenants. Then in the evenings he gets roaring drunk in a dingy bars and gets into fights for no good reason.

That is until one day when he gets a phone call and learns his beloved brother, Joe (Kyle Chandler) has died and so he heads back to his hometown of Manchester to arrange the funeral only to discover that Joe has not only left him the family home, a trust fund, the family business - a working boat - but he's also made Lee the legal guardian of his 16 year-old nephew, Patrick (Lucas Hedges). Trapped in Manchester until the frozen ground has thawed enough to allow Joe to be buried, Lee is forced to relive some painful memories and try to bond with his emotionally stunned nephew.

Over the course of the next two hours, through flash backs, we discover Lee's truly tragic past and watch as he struggles to find himself and bond with his nephew, while his old friends and ex-wife try to reconnect with him.

This is a genuinely stunning movie. Beautiful to look at, staggering well written and acted and truly heart-breaking. I utterly loved this film and would have happily sat through another four hours of it. That said, it won't be for everyone, it's painfully slow, like molasses. It's filled with ennui and at it's core is a heartbreaking revelation. Like life, there is no plot and conversations ramble and often end without a full stop.

For some unknown reason, I adore these sorts of slow, slow burn movies about seemingly nothing, I find them almost intoxicating. Casey Affleck is brilliant in the role, as is new comer Lucas Hedges and Michelle Williams as Lee's ex-wife, Randi brings an agonising poignancy to the role and the glimpses of their past life together as a loving married couple are beautiful to behold.

But this isn't all tears and heartbreak, it's also painfully funny and filled with naturalistic humour that brings some all-too-brief warmth to the proceedings. Likewise, the scenery is beautiful and the direction by Kenneth Lonergan is subtle and un-showy.

I don't often say this, but I urge you to see this, it deserves to be seen.

A modern masterpiece. 10/10

#3 A MONSTER CALLS

Starrring Sigourney Weaver, Felicity Jones, Toby Kebbell, Lewis MacDougall and Liam Neeson. Written by Patrick Ness and based on his book. Directed by J. Bayona. Budget $43 million. Running time 108 minutes. Certificate 12a.

It's January, which can only mean one thing. Tis award season. That time of year where we're spared the usual special effects spectaculars, action flicks and super hero movies and in return given, whether we want them or not, movies with proper stories to tell and souls to reveal, and to that list we can offer up this, A Monster Calls starring two female SF heroines, one old and one new in the guise of Sigourney Weaver and Felicity Jones, as well as a hard-boiled action hero Liam Neeson and a stunning new young actor Lewis MacDougall.

The film, heart-crushingly poignant, sees young Connor O'Malley (Lewis MacDougall) struggling to come to terms with a world that is crumbling around him. His parents are divorced and his father (Toby Kebbell) is visiting from the States, his mother (Felicity Jones) is slowly dying of cancer and he is forced to go and live with his grandmother (Sigourney Weaver) with whom he doesn't get on with. Plus he's being horrifically bullied at school and seems powerless to act or tell anyone. Oh and the ancient Yew tree that lives on top of a nearby hill has transformed into a gigantic terrifying wooden monster (Liam Neeson) who visits Connor over four nights, promising three fairy tales on the first three nights, which are lies, and on the fourth night he tells Connor that the boy will tell a story in return that is true.

Despite being very well acted, well directed and visually stunning I wasn't wholly won over by this and I don't really know why. At its core the relationship between Connor and his mother is wonderful and I found myself wanting to stay longer with them rather than with the other family members who, in my mind, just became frustrating particularly in their inability to see how much pain Connor is suffering and that began to annoy me. Plus, no matter how impressive the monster is, and it is, believe me, it's superb, I found it strangely jarring. You find yourself waiting for its next appearance, but each visit pulls you out of the story and ultimately frustrates because each of the Monster's fairy tales are so annoying (although visually stunning) that they somewhat kill the mood and it takes a while to get back into it once the Monster has gone and Connor's life continues.

Overall I found this a moving and powerful movie and well worth seeing but frustratingly I wasn't won over by it. That said, it sure beats the usual action packed candyfloss spectaculars we're normally given in our wonderful multiplexes so I'm gonna enjoy them for as long as I can.

8/10

#2 YOUR NAME

Starring vocal talents of Ryo Narita, Aoi Yūki, Nobunaga Shimazaki, Kaito Ishikawa and Kanon Tani. Written and directed by Makoto Shinkai and based on his manga. 107 minutes long. Certificate 12a.

A stunning, beautifully animated and staggering engrossing story of star crossed young lovers. The story is rather complicated but very worth while sticking with. Set in present day Japan, the story unfolds during the visit of a comet which last passed Earth over 12 hundred years ago. One day a young Tokyo boy wakes up in the body of a Japanese coastal girl with no idea what is going on. It transpires that without warning these two students will swap bodies for a day and the film follows the consequences of what has happened as each grapples with the bizarreness of the situation while trying to make a go of it. This flits between funny, touching and dramatic.  Then the third act arrives and literally changes everything and the film becomes a very touching and dramatic adventure of two young lovers literally out of time.

What elevates this above the norm is that despite it being an anime it's shot as if it's a live action film. The shots and cinematography are just sublime and I loved every minute of this touching and heart rending movie. If you get a chance to see it on the big screen do, it's just wonderful.

Not a thing to fault this wonderful, beautiful and compelling film. 10/10

#1 ASSASSIN'S CREED

Starring Micheal Fassbender, Marion Cotillard, Jeremy Irons, Brendan Gleeson, Charlotte Rampling and Michael K. Williams. Written by Michael Lesslie, Adam Cooper and Bill Collage. Based on the video game franchise published by Ubisoft. Directed by Justin Kurzel. Budget $125 million. Running time 116 minutes. Certificate 12a.

Hooray, it's a new year! I can't wait to see what exciting new films there are to wash away the mainly foul taste of 2016 from my cinematic palette! I bet the Michael Fassbender produced affair that is Assassin's Creed will restore my faith in cinema! I mean the games were great fun, all that running around killing people and climbing up tall building to jump off them while performing stunts, great fun! Just don't ask me what the plots were about cos I always fast forward through the cut scenes so I have no idea, and besides we all know that games don't have plots!

But enough of all that, what about the film!

Well, congratulations 2017 you've clearly started as you mean to go on with another huge dollop of cinematic meh. Welcome to Assassin's Creed the movie, a murky dirge of brownish, greyish sludge with a group of moping, gloomy grumps who never learned to smile let alone laugh. It's directed methodically and shot almost entirely in slow-motion, all the action is anyway, as is all that jumping off stuff, or at least it felt that way. Likewise, everyone talks quietly and no one ever bloody smiles, like not even once! No, these guys are really serious, there's just no time for fun when you're doing parkour in olden days Spain and stabbing dudes in faces and shit. But every week on You've Been Framed we get to watch wanky parkour runners fall face first into stuff, and that's bloody funny! But not for the Bottom Creed, they never fall over, not once, not ever.

The plot, well I'm not sure I can summarise it well enough to do it justice but I'll give it a go. There's this bloke played by Micky Faceblender whose name is Ass Creed and he's recruited by this big super powerful organization, which has a 2 billion dollar a year budget to help them locate the apple that Adam and Eve ate, to do this they have to use the descendant of a dead assassin from the time of the Spanish Inquisition who stole or hide the apple. And that's where Mike Bassblamer comes in, you see not only is he a direct descendent but so were his parents, grandparents, uncles, cousins, nephews and nieces, or so it seems. Anyway, Jeremy Irons and his daughter Marion Cotillard (I'm sure they have proper character names, but I can't remember) run this super secret base from the middle of Madrid and they attach Mike Bassfender to this very large trash picker and shine 30 watt bulbs in his eyes. This allows Mick Massmender to relieve all the murdering he did back in the good old days while he was a member of the Arse Creed. Meanwhile Jezer and Marrion have also recruited all the other descendents of the A-hole Creed and they don't want Mikel Fastsender to help for some reason, don't care, can't remember. After that lots of waffle about stuff and free will and then Charlotte Rampling turns up and spouts bollock about Apples and pears and it all ends with people leaping off buildings while the Eagles play Hotel California.

ANYWAY, there's lots of eagles soaring over dusty Spain and lots of hoodies doing parkour while stabbing people, it's all very serious and very, very earnest and I'm sure it's the first part of a much need new franchise, because if there's one thing this new cinematic year is crying out for it's a new movie franchise!

In a nutshell, this is a dusty, dull, dreary dirge which ends up with lots of stabby stab-stab. If you've played the games then don't worry this hasn't ruined those for you, and if you haven't, then I don't know if not playing them will damage your enjoyment. Either way, it's probably far more fun playing the games then watching this poe-faced, stupidly serious, shit.

3/10