Saturday 31 July 2010

Race To Witch Mountain


An hour long serenade to the invincibility of Vegas taxis.
Unfortunately followed by a tacked on 30 minutes of The Rock in a top secret bunker blatantly grinning maniacly at nothing whilst the rest of the film desperately tries to convince you otherwise.

Friday 30 July 2010

The White Ribbon [Das weisse Band - Eine deutsche Kindergeschichte]


Gorgeous cinema, where the word gorgeous can easily be interchanged with incredible, thoughtful or compelling.
Also if you squint a bit you can start to see parallels with The Children Of The Corn.
No? Just me then.

Thursday 29 July 2010

The Killer Inside Me


American Psycho Vs Columbo embedded in sweaty southern noir.
Not sure why the fuss over the violence, there's been far worse.

Monday 26 July 2010

Wizards


Crudely animated oddity about a feuding pair of wizards and their armies.
Bad wizard uses a secret weapon that consists of showing good guys ancient newsreel footage of Hitler causing them to pass out.
Good wizard is a bumbling buffoon who wanders about with an extremely chesty sidekick.
It all comes off as being a bit like Dangermouse only on industrial strength acid.

Saturday 24 July 2010

Treasure Planet


A poor muddle of Treasure Island and Men In Black style sci-fi gimmickry.
Jim Hawkins is played as a sulky teenager ripped from an eighties movie, Bloody Martin Short is a robot and there's a scene where Jim Hawkins is trying to swat miniature versions of his own head all of whom are shouting at him. The film mostly just demonstrates why Disney's recent Princess And The Frog was hailed as the triumphant return that it wasn't.

The Girlfriend Experience


The most boring film about a prostitute I've ever seen.

Wednesday 21 July 2010

The Invisible Maniac


A goofy combination of plucky effort and complete shit all marinaded in a preposterously unnecessary amount of naked breasts.

Monday 19 July 2010

Inception


Nolan channels Michael Marshall Smith and creates mind shattering genius.

Sunday 18 July 2010

The Machine Girl [Kataude mashin gâru]


Absurdly gory soap opera that details the circumstances in which a pacifist school girl comes to have her arm replaced with a machine gun in order to wage war on the local yakuza by shooting their faces off.
King.

Saturday 17 July 2010

Survival Of The Dead


I was going to write some sarky guff about this cack-handed mess, but it is neither big nor clever to laugh at an old man shitting voluminously on his own legacy.
Somebody needs to tell Romero that it's time to stop now.

Friday 16 July 2010

Following


A nice idea segues seamlessly into a cleverly structured puzzle piece that satisfies immensely and demonstrates that from the get go Christopher Nolan hasn't really played anywhere other than at the top of his game.

Sunday 11 July 2010

The Informers


Brave but not entirely successful attempt to document Bret Easton Ellis' incredible visions of the dispassionate bleakness that occurs when people's moral compasses are erased by absurd quantities of sex and drugs.

Saturday 10 July 2010

Bridge To Terabithia


Due to some confused marketing idiot desperate to piggyback onto Narnia, I was caught unawares by a touching, intelligent meditation on childhood friendship, imagination and the tragedy of loss in place of the half baked fantasy toss I was expecting.
Charlotte on the other hand got a nice film about 'being friends' that stubbornly refused to develop into the dragons and princesses she wanted, and instead took an unexpected turn so harrowing it may as well have been a 7 year old's version of Requiem For A Dream.

Sorority Row


Similar to watching the slow contraction of skin on a scrotum exposed to cold air because you can't help but look on with mild fascination even though you're essentially watching bollocks.

Thursday 8 July 2010

Predators


Lines up all the buttons you'd want pushed by a Predator sequel, and then smashes the shit out of them.
Genius.

Sunday 4 July 2010

Blood: The Last Vampire [2009 Remake]


It is my thinking that to remake an anime into live action your special effects need to be seriously top notch. If at any point you sink to the level of using a man in a stupid demon costume then you have probably failed.
This fails.

Saturday 3 July 2010

District 13: Ultimatum [Banlieue 13 - Ultimatum]


A series of extended action sequences spoiled by a silly story, awkwardly levered into place halfway through.
I did find that watching the little man running around fast and doing lots of meticulous jumping over gaps and bad guys was a lot of fun, although I can't quite put my finger on why.

Friday 2 July 2010

Ponyo [Gake no ue no Ponyo]


Hugely enjoyable and visually flawless.
I must add though, the vast majority of my enjoyment did stem from watching the adult characters react sociopathically calm in the face of incredible catastrophe. The mother character in particular must surely suffer the most explosive mental breakdown roughly five minutes after the end credits roll. Surely.