Archive for the ‘Movie Reviews’ Category
Mostly reviews of the films I have seen, but sometimes I will post news and rumours that interest me.
Paul and The Big Lebowski
I recently got sent some more iTunes movies to review. I like getting free stuff and, as you can tell from the post titles, these were good'uns Paul Paul is the latest film from Simon Pegg and Nick Frost and the only one to feature a potty mouthed alien. Generally I watch the iTunes movies on my iPhone however since Jo, my better half, wanted to see Paul I decided to hook my laptop up to the tv - I [...]
The Green Zone
Let's get this out of the way quickly. Yes this is Matt Damon and Paul Greengrass, but it's not the Bourne Identity. Not close. One similarity the two films share is the shaky cam stylings. It's everywhere, even more so than the Bourne films. Thankfully this doesn't bother me at all but I know a couple of people who have issues with motion sickness and I'm pretty sure this would have triggered it rather quickly. From a factual point of [...]
The Wolfman
The Wolfman is a remake of a classic horror movie. Re-imagining the story and bringing the special effects bang up to date. On paper the cast sounds great. Anthony Hopkins rarely disappoints, Benicio Del Toro already looks wolf like, and Hugo Weaving is just plain awesome. However the decision to make Benicio the son of an Englishman, even one who has lived in America, is just strange. His accent never quite seems to go away and I can't help but [...]
Toy Story 1, 2 and 3
I'll be honest - I'm posting this because I was sent free copies of the recently re-released Toy Story 1 and 2 movies (Blu-Ray and DVD of both films). I was very close to turning it down - I don't like to advertise too much on here - but it's the Toy Story films... 2 of the best examples of animated story telling ever. The discs themselves have everything and more that you could want, not only do they have [...]
February Film Reviews
Recently I have been getting back into watching movies. I have a whole stack of them to catch up on and I am now finally reducing the stack. 3 of the films I watched in February were, Kung Fu Panda, The Invention of Lying, and The Soloist. Read the article for mini reviews of each.
Bruno
If I can tell you one thing about Bruno it's this. Don't watch Bruno on an iPod Touch on the train on the way to work. There's too much to describe in Bruno, it's a whirlwind of cringe inducing moments with a fair amount of male nudity. If you've seen Borat then you know what to expect... only you need to amp up the 'shock' moments. Sasha Baron-Cohen is clearly going out of his way to cause controversy. He knew [...]
Public Enemies
I always think of Michael Mann as making understated action movies. There's action and there's violence, but it never gets in the way of the story. Public Enemies is his latest offering with Johnny Depp playing the famous mobster John Dillinger. This role is quite unlike Depps normal quirky/ arty/ exaggerated characters. Like the action his performance is understated and realistic - and the change of character works really well for him. Christian Bale on the other hand plays the [...]
Coraline
Coraline is a stop motion animated movie directed by the same Director as The Nightmare Before Christmas, which meant I instantly assumed that the Director was Tim Burton, and after watching the movie my opinion hadn't changed. Coraline is a very atmospheric, dark film, and it wouldn't have surprised me at all if Tim Burton had directed it - but it turns out he hasn't. The Director of Coraline is a man called Henry Selick, and the story was written [...]
UP
Pixar have a habit of creating stories and worlds that transcend the age gap. Despite the fact they are animations the stories tap into your emotions, and in many ways are more real than anything filmed with live actors. Being digitally animated means that you can ignore who the (voice) actors in Pixars films are, and concentrate on the performance and story. It is often easier to project your emotions on to something that isn't real - your own imagination [...]
The Boat That Rocked – iTunes Movie Review
The Boat That Rocked is Richard Curtis (4 Weddings and a Funeral, Notting Hill) latest film - and it's so much better than I had imagined it would be. I'm not sure why I'm surprised, Richard Curtis films are always funny and feel good, but the trailer for the film left me feeling cold. It looked like the movie focused on Rhys Ifans character, who seemed rather dislikeable, it also seemed to have a much more serious tone - which [...]
Frost/ Nixon – NBC Universal iTunes movie
Being under 30, English, and disinterested in both politics and history I wasn't sure what to make of Frost/ Nixon. It's a movie about a US president, Richard Nixon, who disgraced because of something called the Watergate scandal (yes, I've heard of THAT) retired, and was later interviewed by a relatively unknown English man called David Frost. The only David Frost I know of is a nosey bloke who hosts a light weight lunch time game show involving rummaging through [...]
