Highlander

Let's face it, Highlander is awesome! Have a list of stuff that will go some way to proving that.

1. Christopher Lambert - An American brought up in Switzerland, thus giving him a crazy accent anyway...playing a Scotsman.
2. Sean Connery - A Scotsman with one of the most distinctive voices in the world, making no attempt at an accent as he plays an Egyptian from Spain called Ramirez
3. Clancy Brown - A solid middle American with deep American voice playing an ancient Russian (no accent needed)
4. Sword fighting Immortals
5. Queen soundtrack that dicks on Flash Gordon

Any arguments? No. Thought not.

It's ropey and pretty poorly directed in places, but for sheer nostalgia value, it's solid!

Highlander - 8/10

Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street

Unlike many people it seems, I went into watching this knowing it was a musical, not that, that reassured me! I'd seen the trailers!! :/

And the film totally lived up to my expectations! Slow, dull, boring, not very interesting, mediocre visuals (yes I did say that about a gothic Tim Burton film), I just don't think it's that good.

I don't have a problem with musicals, I just don't rate this one, the songs in fact are (IMO) rubbish, and annoying as generally each song could've been replaced with a single line of dialogue saying and emoting the same thing!

Had this been done as a straight (non-musical) film, I probably would've enjoyed it a lot more... well I probably would've enjoyed it. There were odd chuckle-worthy moments, and despite the fact that both my girlfriend and I forced our way to the end, just to find out how it ended, we were both glad when it was over!

All that said, it's got a solid 7.9 on IMDb and 86% on Rotten Tomatoes, so you'll probably like it!!

Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street - 4/10

Rambo

GOOD-FUCKING-GOD!

I mean really?!?!?

The film starts with some, actually pretty harrowing, news footage and images telling you how fucked up Burma is at the moment, then we see some (dramatised) footage of some Burmese people exploding, then we're straight into good ol' John catching snakes, although he's not exactly employee of the month on that as you find out.

Along come some do-gooders wanting to get up-river and into Burma to..well.. do good. John however thinks that may not be so wise.

Funnily enough he's on the money with that and the rest of the film is a rescue mission.

Back to "GOOD-FUCKING-GOD!!", to bring in a Spinal Tap analogy here, on the gore and blowing bits off people scale if Saving Private Ryan and Starship Troopers et al are a 10 on the dial, then Rambo is the special amp that goes up to 11, because Jesus! it was fucking horrible! I mean really nasty, I'd love to know what Eli Roth thinks of it, cos this pisses on his efforts.

And it's so full on, you hit a point in the film and it's relentless, I'm guessing if you saw this in the cinema you must've been washing blood out of your hair for days afterwards!! I was literally blown away (no pun intended) by the scale of the violence, to the point that it's more "car-crash" violence, you know you shouldn't look, but you can't help it.

IMDb reckons it's 91mins, it feels about 20, it doesn't hang around, little bit of Rambo not doing much and setting up the "story" then people start dying. It's ridiculous, or at least it feels it, but it's a bloody good watch and, IMO, far better than the boring mess that was Rocky Balboa. (which I've just discovered I watched but didn't blog! damn! I keep doing that)

Rambo - 7/10

Semi-Pro

Will Ferrell can act, however Semi-Pro sees him back to his usual shouty self. In fact, it's not really his movie, which is a bit odd.

The movie is more the story of Woody Harrelson's and Andre Benjamin's characters, with Ferrell's Jackie Moon, more of the film's Mcguffin.

So.. All these fellows are members of the Flint Tropics, an ABA basketball team, the worst one in fact, so when it's announced that the ABA will merge with the NBA and only four teams will go through, they decide to make a concerted effort to make it into the top four.

And thus follows your pretty much bog-standard Will Ferrell/Underdog movie. It's as funny as his others, but again, nothing special, nothing that will make it stand out from the rest. The best thing about Semi-Pro is the commentators, characters lifted from pretty much every other sports comedy of this type, but pretty damn funny.

Worth a watch but not necessarily for Ferrell.

Semi-Pro - 6/10

Sympathy for Lady Vengeance (Chinjeolhan geumjassi)

The third and final film in Park Chan-wook's Vengeance Trilogy is undoubtedly the weakest.

While it takes things down a different road from the others, although still some familiar themes are there, and introduces a woman as the main character, for some reason it didn't feel like it had the same edge as it's precursors.

It retains the oh so dark humour of Oldboy, whilst still pushing the emotions of the characters and the justifications for their actions (not that Oldboy didn't of course).

Again, it's beautifully shot, beautifully directed and although it's, in my view, the weakest of the three films, it's a must see.

Sympathy for Lady Vengeance (Chinjeolhan geumjassi) - 9/10

Oldboy

Understand this: OLDBOY IS AWESOME!

That's pretty much all you need to know, it's an incredible film from Park Chan-wook, the follow up to Sympathy for Mr. Vengance and the middle film from his Vengeance Trilogy.

Basically after being imprisoned for 15 years Oh Dae-su is released. Shortly after he meets a man who tells him he has 5 days to find his captor and discover why he was imprisoned in the first place. What follows is an amazing, mind-numbing and disturbing mystery tale that left me both horrified and amazed.

Needless to say a re-watch of this doesn't have quite the same effect, but it's still an amazing piece of art, yet again demonstrating Park's amazing skills and talent as a director.

I really don't want to explain too much of this away, not specifically giving spoilers but even hints at the different parts.

No-one can be told what Oldboy is, you have to see it for yourself. SO GO!! WATCH IT!!

Oldboy - 10/10

Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance (Boksuneun naui geot)

I cannot begin to express how simply fucking awesome this film is. Part of Park Chan-wook's vengeance trilogy (including Oldboy and Sympathy for Lady Vengeance), it follows a series of events leading through a bungled kidnapping and the outcome.

Oldboy was the first one I watched a while back (although I re-watched recently and didn't post so I'll do that after this one, also a re-watch), after hearing a lot of good things about it. Mr. Vengeance is the precursor to Oldboy, but the stylistic similarities are most definitely there, not so much with Lady Vengeance.

The film is beautiful. The lighting, framing, performances, everything about it. The way that Park is not afraid to hold a shot, using single shots for entire scenes, something a lot of Western directors aren't so confident with.

The performances are amazing, the lead character is a deaf-mute, which immediately changes the game in how the story is told and again, there's no trying to 'PC' the guy for the sake of it. One of the other stunning performance comes from Song Kang-ho (pictured), playing a TOTALLY different role from his one in The Host! He's in a fair few Korean films so check him out.

The film is hard to deal with at times, it's slow paced, but you want to stick with it, not quite a full on and gruesome as Oldboy, but still potent enough. AWESOME!

Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance - 10/10

Alvin and the Chipmunks

JAAAAAAASSSSOOOOONNN! WTF?!

Didn't Jason Lee used to be cool? Wasn't he a pro skater? When did he sink into saccharin family fodder? 2007 actually, with this.

To be fair, it's not terrible, it's bad yes, but it's not terrible, I managed to watch all of it, possibly smiling a bit throughout and it moves along swiftly enough, there's no real dead spots.

The 'munks are drawn and animated pretty well, not as funny as I was expecting to be honest, but then I wasn't expecting a lot from this. It probably would've added something to the film to put the 'munks in a little more jeopardy than they actually are, but then again this is an Alvin & the Chipmunks movie!

The most annoying thing about this (apart from being irritated by David Cross) is the bloody AAAAALLLLVVIIIIINN which pops up in various forms throughout, although my girlfriend kept chuckling, in an almost Butthead fashion, at the fact that Justin Long voices Alvin.

Well apparently a sequel's in development, let's hope they give Eli Roth a shot at it.

Alvin and the Chipmunks - 5/10

The Invincible Iron Man

If the Iron Man film was a cartoon, set in China and not as good, then it would be pretty close to this.

For a part it follows a very similar plot line, indeed even some scenes are pretty close to the movie, I'm going to hazard a guess that they're common across the origin story variations in the comics too. But then there's this whole other super natural thing with a Chinese Mandarin and his elemental warriors, wait, that's it!...

If the Iron Man film, was a cartoon, set in China, not as good and basically Iron Man meets Big Trouble in Little China, then it would be pretty close to this. (Although Big Trouble.. is better ;)

I'm guessing seeing the movie before this didn't help, but then I've only watched this because of seeing the movie and I probably won't go out of my way to watch any more Iron Man stuff until Iron Man 2.

If you're into Iron Man, then it's probably worth a watch, casual viewers, maybe not so much.

The Invincible Iron Man - 5/10

Balls of Fury

Bad, bad, bad, bad, bad. Why does Dan Fogler exist and is Christopher Walken really this hard up??

I thought the trailer was reasonably funny, that is all the funniest bits and their cut together better in the trailer.

Many a punchline is dragged out, just to make sure you get it, or maybe to try something different to make it funny. It's trying to jump on the Will Ferrel sports comedy bandwagon (which to be fair isn't that great) and misses, landing face first in it's own festering excretia.

Harsh? No. I laughed a few times and each one felt forced and I now feel slightly guilty for them as I know, it's just not that funny.

Balls of Fury - 1/10 (for the trailer)

Iron Man

I'm reasonably into comics, but not all and Iron Man hasn't been one to grab my attention, nor the Saturday morning cartoon, it just didn't appeal, the movie however...

It was announced that Robert Downey Jr. was t play Tony Stark. Hold on a sec Robert Downey Jr. in a superhero movie, ok you've got my attention.

Then it was the promo shots of the MkIII suit, nice, looks pretty sweet, still interested.

Then the trailers and good lord it looked good!

So this one I made sure I got in on opening weekend, saw it yesterday and, let's be honest here, it's fucking awesome!

As I say, I've not read the comics (I may look at a couple now), so I don't know how close Downey's Tony Stark is to the comic iteration, but in this he's perfect, he fits and he makes it work. He brings a certain quirkiness to the role, which starts out as arrogance and turns into remorse and determination as the film progresses, all of which with a cheeky smile and a witty quip thrown in for good measure.

Tonally, this Billionaire-crime-fighter flick is a world away from Batman, and rightly so, it's closer to Spider-Man, although I'd say even that's darker than this one. There's comedy and action, with a dashing of drama, although not too much (possibly not enough??)

My only complaint with the film is that pace wise it does seem to falter every now and again, but I think that's the main issue with all 'origin' movies, in that you have to cover certain ground before getting into the action, but then in Iron Man there is a couple of slow spots in the middle of all the action and while it doesn't drag, I certainly shifted in my seat a couple of times.

Also some of the latter action sequences reminded me a little of what I've seen in The Incredible Hulk trailer (2 btw), but better ;) Small fact, RDJ pops up as Tony Stark in The Incredible Hulk, not sure where, but it's on the IMDb page.

They're already talking Iron Man 2, and I'll be there to watch it, if rumours fill out, then it'll probably be slightly darker, going more into Stark's alcoholism and the stress and pressure of being Iron Man, but it'll still rock and I'll still go see it.

So far it's being raved about, best superhero movie of the year so far, one of the best superhero movies, one of the best movies this year so far, so it seems a lot of people like it.

Three words tho...

The Dark Knight

Iron Man - 9.5/10

Juno

Y'know when I saw this advertised I was like "Meh", when I saw that it had won the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay is was like "Ok, Meh", having now watched it I can say "Cheers!"

A surprisingly awesome film, maybe a little over the top on some of the "teen slang" scripting and performances in places, but still a heartwarming, interesting and highly entertaining movie.

Michael Cera's stunningly understated performance clearly steals the movie, and I'd hazard a guess that it pisses on Superbad (yet to endure that one) and despite the caricatured characters that the film requires, they all had depth and actually, believability.

I can't take it with all these movies that as far as I know I shouldn't like, but then do, what's with that? A new found open-mindedness? Being in touch with my feminine side? Dunno, maybe it's just there's some good films about in the indie sector now and I should pay more attention, and so should you.

Juno - 9/10

The Bank Job

I like Jason Statham, to the extent that my girlfriend thinks there's some sort of "man-crush" in there somewhere, well possibly. I think that, in a similar way to Dwayne Johnson, he can actually act, but unfortunately he hasn't been given a good enough script or director yet, yet a film I'm quite looking forward to is Transporter 3, not so much Death Race, cos that's a Paul WS Anderson, so chances are it won't be that good. Anyway I digress...The Bank Job...

It's not bad, the reviews I heard were pretty mediocre, and to be fair, it's not the best film in the world and is not without fault (there's a fair few), but as far as britflicks go, I thought it was pretty entertaining.

Statham gives hints of a deeper than usual performance, but ultimately does the job with the usual JS thang. Saffron Burrows is just plain annoying, but you can kinda let that go. Plot wise, it's a little messy, with bits all over the place and maybe tried to be a bit too complicated for it's own good and how close it sticks to the "based on a true story" side of things is anyone's guess.

Anyway, another one that's worth a watch.

The Bank Job - 7/10

30 Days of Night

I have to be honest, this was a bit of a let down. I love the comic and the film just didn't seem to have the impact it should've done.

My main issue was how they represented the main characters differently from the comic, it changes the dynamic and, in my view, not in a good way.

Apart from that it's a slow slow film, ok, it's set over 30 days, but it just doesn't have the tension it should do, and as such the interest levels drop lower and lower over the course of the film.

And yeah I agree with the comments on IMDb, too much velociraptor style screeching.

30 Days of Night - 5/10

The Condemned

When you see the WWE logo pop up at the start of the picture it can't be a good sign, and to be fair this ain't the best film in the world, however, it's okay.

Someone on IMDb for their user comment, put "A Great Movie, Average Remake", WRONG!!, what it should be is "An average movie, NOT a remake", this isn't a remake of Battle Royale, it's a similar concept yes, a load of people on an island who have to kill each other, however the political subtext of Battle Royale isn't there, in it's place a rather ham fisted attempt at a message, one which somewhat contradicts most of WWE's output.

So, the film's so so, Steve Austin's no Dwayne Johnson, but he's not terrible either. Vinnie Jones is pretty much awesome in this as a deranged ex-SAS soldier on the rampage, playing it proper brit suits him, and to be fair more should've been made of him. (whoever thought that would be said?!)

The Condemned - 6/10

Rawhead Rex

Good God this is bad, and to think Clive Barker wrote it, you'd think he'd be able to come up with something a tad better than a man in a toothy monkey suit!!

And the title!?! Really?! Rawhead Rex?! As if ANYONE will take you seriously now!

Rawhead Rex - 2/10

Walking Tall (2004)

I've got a lot of time for Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson, I think he's extremely charismatic and can actually act!

I'm not sure how far he could be stretched on the acting front, but with the stuff he's done so far (I *still* need to see Be Cool and Southland Tales), he's been pretty good. He's a solid action hero, that has absolutely no problem with a helping of self deprecation, all of which makes for an entertaining watch. Give him a good script and a good director and see what happens.

As for Walking Tall, based on a 1973 film and real events, we have Chris Vaughn returning home after 8 year's army service, to find his home town ain't what it used to be. He gets pissed off, beat up and sets out to put things straight.

This is another film that I've been waiting ages to see, and well, it wasn't as good as I was hoping for. It's a tad slow and choppy, Johnny Knoxville was pretty lame, and the script wasn't the best, thank the lord The Rock was in it tho, that made it watchable.

Walking Tall (2004) - 7/10

The Covenant

Apart from a few nice lines and tricks, it's basically rubbish, Lost Boys meets The Craft, meets a steaming pile of witchypoo.

It's directed by Renny Harlin, I'd recommend Deep Blue Sea over this one.


The Covenant - 3/10

The Mist

Another one that was better than expected, not brilliant, kinda predictable and unfortunately it seems about half of the Dean Koontz books I've been reading recently have followed a similar theme, so I'm slightly bored with it, maybe Dean and Stephen hung out for a bit??

This is also the first film I've seen Thomas Jane in since The Punisher, there's probably a reason for that.

I don't know how this compares to King's story, but it's pretty well contained, despite having a number of people, it stays pretty small and close, playing on paranoia and hysteria to reasonable effect, overall it's slow though, plodding and the ultimate pay off wasn't as emotional as I think it should've been.


The Mist - 6/10

Resident Evil: Extinction

The third in the series of films, adapted from the Capcom game. The first was entertaining enough, the second was a bit shit, and this one is probably up to the standard of the first one again (not exactly a high bar).

3's basically Resident Evil + Mad Max 2 + Day of the Dead and not much else. So what has it got going for it?...

1. Milla Jovovich!!!!
2. Directed by Russell Mulcahy (not great true, but he did direct Highlander!!)
3. Milla Jovovich kicking ass!!!!
4. A fair bit of gore

What I'd really like to see is Milla leading in a GOOD film!

Resident Evil: Extinction - 5/10

Hitman

As far as game adaps go, this isn't actually that bad. Of course they could've made more of it, but there's some signs of promise there.

Timothy Olyphant is pretty good as Agent 47, everybody else is pretty much inconsequential and as far as plot goes, well.. it's as to be expected.

At the end of the day it's better than both Doom and Silent Hill put together!


Hitman - 6/10

The Messengers

Another film to demonstrate how originality in the horror genre is in short supply.

Family forced to move - check
Dysfuntional? - check
creepy new house - check
etc.

Didn't I watch this film the other day??

Basically The Messengers was pretty dull, there's a couple of goosebump inducing moments, but no real scares and the whole thing doesn't really make a huge amount of sense.

The Messengers - 5/10

Fantastic Four

I previously posted about the sequel to this, so now, a tad back to front, a short piece on the 2005, Tim Story directed re-boot (is it?) of Marvel's Fantastic Four!!!!!

Now Batman Begins this ain't!! But then it's a shitload better than Man-Thing and overall reasonably entertaining. I'm not a huge fan of F4, I'm more of a Batman, Spiderman and Hellboy person myself, but as films go, it's ok.

It's a bog standard origin story, they all go to space, soak up some rads and come back a bit peaky.

The best thing about this film is Michael Chiklis as Ben "The Thing" Grimm, the worst thing is Jessica "Why in God's name do I keep topping FHM lists" Alba.

Also welcome Chris Evans, then go watch him in Sunshine.


Fantastic Four - 7/10

The Spiderwik Chronicles

Y'know Harry Potter's got a lot to answer for, namely the spate of fantasy filled family films. No not so much LOTR, cos that was that wasn't really for kids.

Spiderwick takes some pretty standard set-ups, broken family, new start in a new place in a new house, etc etc.

Then one of the boys finds a book, then all fantastical hell breaks loose, with goblins, trolls, ogres and stuff.

There's some pretty funny stuff in here and for once Seth Rogan didn't annoy the shit out of me.

It's a little slow in places, and cliche world, but it's entertaining enough.


The Spiderwick Chronicles - 7/10

Amelie (Le Fabuleux destin d'Amélie Poulain)

It doesn't matter how many time I see this film, it will never be anything less than awesome.

One of several examples of why Jean-Pierre Jeunet is one of my favourite directors, Amelie is a heartwarming take of imagination and romance. It helps that the adorable Audry Tatou is in the lead role too!

I love pretty much everything about this film, the story, the characters, direction, cinematography, it's simply brilliant. You need spirits lifting, watch Amelie.


Amelie (Le Fabuleux destin d'Amélie Poulain) - 10/10

Flight of the Navigator

They don't make 'em like this anymore. No really they don't!

The sort of kids adventure film that typified the 80's and my childhood, young kid, bit dissallusioned, spaceship (etc) adventure, all's good in the world.

The film's all about family, possibly not the best example, but at the same time, a great classic 80's movie, with possibly Alan Silvestri's worst ever score!

You are... the navigator!

Flight of the Navigator - 7/10

Black Sheep

New Zealand does chuck out some crackers. Black Sheep is very much in the same vein as early Peter Jackson, silly, gory comedy horror and it's brilliant fun.

It's a tad slow in the middle and to be honest a little anti-climactic, but overall it's an entertaining romp, silly humour and a good way to spend an evening in front of the telly.

Well worth watching and I'll certainly be purchasing of a copy.


Black Sheep - 7/10

AVPR: Aliens vs Predator - Requiem

Has it really come to this?? Why do studio's STILL not understand or simply not care about making a good franchise film? Something as high profile as the Alien & Predator films and they give it to a couple of FX guys.


Ridely Scott
James Cameron
David Fincher
Jean-Pierre Jeunet
John McTiernen

then

Stephen Hopkins (I like P2 btw)
Paul W.S. Anderson (lame attempt but better than this)
The Brothers Strauss (fucknuts)

There are a couple of good ideas in AVPR, tracking stuff and beacons of sorts, but overall the film is shite, just plain shite, it's soooo dark in places, there's clearly cock all budget for actors or everyone else who looked at the script said "You've gotta be kidding right?"

It seem like they've tried to 'homage' all the other films, they fail in this but succeed in ripping them off.

The main character is called "Dallas" for fuck's sake, there's lines from the other films, there's an armoured car escape sequence, there's other bits, but my head hurts.

It's over the top, badly choreographed and the predailien is rubbish.


AVPR: Aliens vs Predator - Requiem - 3/10

Bug

"From the director of The Exorcist" blah blah. Bug is kinda marketed as a horror, it's not. It says "Thriller" on the back, not really.

"Comedy" that would be more apt. It's quite an interesting concept, all about paranoia and stuff and the acting gets pretty full on crazy, but in the end it's laughable. The 'quotes' on the case exclaim how "gripping", "tense" and "claustrophobic" it is, rather than how "stupid", "laugh out loud funny" and "best comedy of the hear so far" it actually is.

Well maybe not "best" as at the end of the day, it's a shit film. And not Shit Good either.


Bug - 3/10

Black Christmas (2006)

Another remake, another slasher film, another pile of shite.

This one does have a few funny moments tho and they're clearly aiming to be funny, but overall the film is just shite, to be fair we even got a tad distracted during the middle, so watched the beginning and the end and pretty much knew all we needed to know about what was going on.

I don't feel I need to go back and watch the rest.

Black Christmas (2006) - 3/10

Pulse

Pulse is rubbish. I don't know what the Japanese original's like, but the remake, as to be expected, is rubbish.

Evil wi-fi, um.. ok..

There's a few creepy bits and it does have Kristen Bell in it (although her performance in Heroes was much better), but in general it boring as hell, like really really boring.


Pulse - 2/10

Cloverfield

FUCKING AWESOME!!! And to be honest I'm surprised it's only got a 7.9 on imdb.

It's a monster movie, set in Manhatten, everything's shown from the persepctive of the "Average Joe" who's caught up in the middle of it all.

Utilising the 'camcorder generation' stylings, where the whole film is supposed to be POV from whichever character's filming at the time, it works brilliantly, draws you right into the action (distrurbingly so at one point) and keeps you there.

I'm not gonna go into details but needless to say by the time the credits rolled, and the lights went up, it seemed like everyone in the cinema had been left numb from the assault.

Sure there's a couple of cliches in there, but Cloverfield is an original, interesting and fucking intense take on the monster movie. This and The Host reign supreme at the mo.

FUCKING AWSEOME!!!


Cloverfield - 10/10

Arachnia

BAAAAAADDDDD! ZoneHorror does it again, with another brilliant piece of "horror cinema"

It's good to watch a low budget poorly made horror film once in a while, but this really is shite, couple of funny bits (there's supposed to be more), some nudity and some really really bad stop motion.

Arachnia - 2/10

Night at the Museum

Quite surprisingly, this was pretty good. Even Ricky Gervais was reasonably funny.

Premise is that because of a certain artifact, everything in the Museum of Natural History comes to life at night.

Cue Ben Stiller as the cliched divorced dad who needs some stability in his life (yes it's Liar Liar in a museum), cue three old duffers (Mickey Rooney, Dick Van Dyke and Bill Cobb) as the old guards. Cue various cameo related shenanigans.

It's bog standard family movie stuff, but it's pretty entertaining.


Night at the Museum - 7/10

An Inconvenient Truth

I can see why people have been seduced by this. Mr Gore certainly puts across a compelling argument and is as good at keynotes as the great Mr Jobs.

A lot of people think it's all stuff and nonsense, fair enough, I'm no scientist, but I admire Al Gore for trying to get this message across, how much good it'll do is a different matter though.

As far as this being a good film, well it's not a film really, it's a Keynote Presentation, a reasonably engaging and entertaining one, but a presentation nonetheless.


An Inconvenient Truth - 6/10

Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby

Will Ferrell back to his old tricks as a simple shouty man. What happened to the Will Ferrell of Stranger Than Fiction eh?? Where is he?? Please Will come back!

Saying that, this ain't that bad, it's funny enough in places, Gary Cole is brilliant, and there were enough moments throughout to keep me watching until the end. Plus there's some pretty cool NASCAR stuff in there.

Sacha Baron Cohen, is fucking terrible, one of the most annoying performances I've seen, and as with other films from this camp, it's the supporting cast that keep the thing going.

Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby - 6/10

Dead Silence

"From the makers of Saw...."

Well Saw's (and sequels) pretty mediocre, interesting concept but there's better films.

This is more standard horror fare, although sticking with the now near fetishistic (on the part of Wan and Whannell) subject of ventriloquist's dummies. There's a nursery rhyme (thank you Elm Street), and a creepy old lady. I can't remember who the lead guy is and I can't be arsed to check, he's not that great, Donnie Wahlberg is pretty good as usual, and the supporting cast, support.

The plot's pretty sketchy, as I say, it's standard horror fare. There's a couple of reasonably clever bits, the whole "You scream, You die" thing is a great idea, but again, executed in a half-hearted fashion, Including the 'explanation bit', which it doesn't need and clearly would've been better without. NB: Not all members of the audience are idiots.

I pretty much figured the twist (although itself is a bit weak), although was thrown off for a bit, it was confirmed at a certain point and then the rest of the film is pretty much rendered useless.

Dead Silence - 6/10

Enemy Of The State

Everyone and his mum is in this film, Will Smith, Jason Lee, Jake Busey, Lisa Bonet, Barry Pepper, Seth Green, Jack Black... it's like they gathered together all the 'new talent' at the time and threw them at Tony Scott.

EOTS is a pretty good, conspiracy thriller, all NSA and spy shit, with Mr. Smith caught up in the middle.

It's a bit far fetched in places (NB: rotating a 2d cctv video image.. uhuh), but it's an entertaining run about, and surprisingly relevant!!

Enemy Of The State - 7/10

Waxwork II: Lost in Time

It gets worse!! Waxwork II is terrible, really really bad, but yet again, in a knowing, self mocking, cheesy way... It's basically a 1980's (well 1992) Scary Movie... not sure which is better to be fair.

Actually, I do know. Waxwork II has Bruce Campbell in it. He pretty much saves the film.

WII:LiT, carries directly on from where the first one left off, although there's been some bizarre accident and now the girl is played by a different actress, who looks much like Daryl Hannah, but clearly isn't.

Billy, sorry Mike must clear Sarah's name and ends up battling the various forces of evil. That's pretty much all you need to know, plus whereas the first film went for the classic horror monsters (frankenstein, wolfman etc), numero duo goes after Alien for instance, and then a load of other random stuff.

Oh and then there's the rap song over the end credits. Priceless!

Waxwork II: Lost in Time - 5/10

Waxwork

This was AFTER Gremlins!?!? WTF?!

It's terrible, really bad, but it's also really bad in a good way, it's cheesy, camp, fun, ridiculous and tomorrow night I'll watch Waxwork II - Lost In Time.

Basically there's this house, it's got a waxwork exhibition in it of various notorious killers and monsters, each one needs a victim which is where the kids come in.

It's a TV movie through and through, but watchable enough.

Waxwork - 5/10

Disturbia

I like Shia LaBeouf, he's a entertaining actor, although he pretty much does play himself in everything, I'm sure he'll go the way of Hanks and reach a point where he plays someone dying of Aids and all of a sudden turns his back on comedy and becomes a "proper" actor, until that day comes I'll enjoy his films in the same fashion as early Tom Hanks films.

Disturbia... The 'burbs

Ok, not quite but that's about as made as my point's gonna be.

Anyway, Disturbia, basically Rear Window for the Internet generation, it's an okay film, entertaining enough, David Morse is pretty creepy, although could've gone further, Aaron Yoo is very funny and it ticks along reasonably well.

My main issue with it is that it's cliche after cliche after cliche, relentless, people at windows or behind doors, thunderclaps, I mean c'mon!!

It was entertaining enough, but at no point could I take it at all seriously.

Disturbia - 6/10

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix

Harry Potter, practically inescapable, much like Big Brother, well until they moved it E4 and as such I've heard bugger all about this series... bad thing?? ;)

Anyway, with the inclusion of this one I'm up to date on all the HP films, and this one's pretty good. A little bit more grown up now, the gang are dealing with a little more grown up things, basically stuff's getting very angsty and HP's getting a filled with anger and frustration and teenage stuff.

Thankfully Ron's there to keep it real and show Mr Radcliffe how to actually progress as an actor and the whole chemistry thing between Ron and Hermione is ticking along just nicely since the last one making for some nice moments.

Saying Rupert Grint appears to have progressed far more than Daniel Radcliffe as the years have gone on, I think is fair comment, but some of the darker stuff DR does is still pretty good, despite the rest of his performance feeling more than a little forced.

The wizardy stuff in this (I mean the fighty bits) is also pretty good, one particular scene is pretty much what Gandalf vs Saruman should have been like, rather than the lame spin me right round bollocks that it was.

I haven't read any of the HP books, I don't really want to, so as regards the HP purists out there...whatever, the films haven't been half bad, bring on the other 2. And considering they're pretty much this generation's BTTF/Indy/Star Wars etc, don't knock em too much ;)

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix - 8/10

3:10 to Yuma (2007)

Westerns are back, gritty, "real" and all that. 3:10's a remake and throws a little bit of the adventure back in to the mix.

Bale plays a downtrodden, disabled rancher to Crowe's charming outlaw. Bale has kid issues, well he has all sorts of issues and he aims to sort them out by helping escort Crowe to the train of the title.

It's not bad, but a few times i drifted from the screen, and I wasn't left feeling much by the end except the need to go and get a drink.

The highlight (apart from Alan Tudyk) is Ben Foster as Charlie Prince, awesome performance.

Bring on The Dark Knight ;)

3:10 to Yuma (2007) - 7/10

The Bourne Ultimatum

Practically non-stop fucking action, running, smashing, fighting, chasing... the kinetic energy of this film is ridiculous.

However sometimes, you do want the camera to stay a little more stable for a couple of mintes so you can at least get your bearings!

Although even with the release of Casino Royale, Bourne still kicks Bond's arse, obviously we'll have to wait and see what they do with the new (more introspective) Bond that's recently gone into principal photogrpahy, but at the end of the day, i could actually feel the adrenaline pumping through me while watching this, and a number of times I loudly exclaimed on certain stunts and set pieces.

An awesome film, bit of a rushed ending, could do with a little more plot glue, but at the end of the day, kicks ass.


The Bourne Ultimatum - 8/10

Dead Man's Shoes

I've heard many people rave about this one, "best film evar!" and all that, well I picked it up in CEX and had a watch.

Paddy Considine is creepy as fuck as the film's resident mental, it has a reasonable but not overly original twist, the characters are pretty funny as long as you can deal with the Midlands accents and the "natural" dialogue.

The revenge thriller's been done before and will be done again, this is one of the better ones, low budget, simply yet well shot, pretty much a ronseal film.

The closest thing it brings to mind is Switchblade Romance, don't know why, probably the rural ness and the whole low budget film, 'Shoes is a far better films tho.


Dead Man's Shoes - 8/10

I Am Legend

I've said it before, put Will Smith in a Sci-Fi movie and it's a winner, although I Am Legend is more horror than sci-fi, basically combining vampires and zombies, or at least the visual stylings of them, the formula still works though.

Adapted from the book by Richard Matheson and taking some cues from 28 Days Later, which itself takes some cues from The Omega Man, which in turn is adapted from the story by Richard Matheson. Apart from the stuff showing the evacuation (which is the bridge stuff in the trailer), it's a pretty low key affair, most of the film focuses solely on Dr Robert Neville (Smith) and his dog Sam, showing his deteriorating mind set and near OCD focus. It gets a little more pacy towards the climax, but again, not really with any huge set pieces, there's explosions and shit, but we're no where near Michael Bay territory, which is a good thing in this case.

It's 101 mins, a good length, in fact it felt like it ended slightly early, which is a rare thing for films nowadays, it's mostly a meandering pace, but doesn't feel slow, basically there was room for a bit more.

Any niggles, yeah a couple, one I argued with (well, discussed) my girlfriend, as she hadn't picked up on it, maybe I'm just reading it differently, I won't go into details here, but it seemed Neville was missing quite a major thing about the Night Stalkers, which I guess was maybe touched on but..

Although this is Will Smith, it's a serious Will Smith, there's a couple of his trademark cheeky chappy moments that try to squeeze through, but don't be expecting Fresh Prince vs The Vampires (note to Warner...)

In the meantime I need to find The Omega Man and The Last Man on Earth.


I Am Legend - 8/10