Movie: Jack Reacher: Never Go Back The opening scene of Jack Reacher 2 – which is in the trailer – pans across the aftermath of a hand-to-hand fight, while the eponymous aggressor Tom Cruise sits in a nearby diner, waiting for law enforcement to arrive. Rather than starting with an action scene, we start after it. …
Category Archives: movie
Movie – Swiss Army Man
Swiss Army Man tells the story of Hank (Paul Dano) – a man stranded on a desert island, who has given up hope of living, and Manny (Daniel Radcliffe) – a dead body. But it’s not a horror film. It’s oddly dramatic and funny; goes to some strange and dark places, but manages to keep …
Movie – Star Trek Beyond
Movie – Star Trek Beyond (pronounced as per the Madness song) I really wanted to like this one, but there wasn’t too much there. Plenty of visual spectacle, and some laughs, some character interaction, but there were too many scenes where my response was to think “I know who is going to win this conflict: what’s …
movie – Batman vs Superman: Dawn of Justice
Movie: Batman vs Superman Not as bad as I thought it would be. Loud, PG-13 in its relationship sensibilities, literate in its vocabulary (but shows a gala event in a library that has no books). Crammed and over-crammed with plot, visually spectacular; but hard to connect with emotionally.
Movie: Spotlight
Spotlight is a Tom McCarthy (director of The Station Agent) film with an ensemble cast of seasoned Hollywood actors. Though not passing the Bechdel test, the presence of Rachel McAdams in the reporting team helped balance out what would otherwise be a throughly male-dominated environment. This movie seems like the logical, fictional successor to the 2006 …
movie: The Big Short
Movie: The Big Short A star-studded take on the Global Financial Crisis that’s part drama, part TED talk, and regularly breaks the fourth wall to help explain advanced financial concepts to the audience. Some needless adult content that seems to be included to push up the rating rather than help serve the plot. Perhaps its …
Movie: The Hateful Eight
Movie: The Hateful Eight Tarantino’s latest movie is part mystery, part character study of awful people, part scenes of violence that are in keeping with his usual tradition. The cinematography is strong – especially for a film that’s so often set in enclosed spaces. There’s so much objectionable content, it’s hard to know where to …
Movie: The Good Dinosaur
Movie: The Good Dinosaur Widely reported as the first bad Pixar movie, this is a beautiful looking film that lacks the spectacular quality of character and story we’ve come to expect from Pixar. There’s a set-up, an unhappy event, and then a lot of travelling, and a resolution, but not much else. A little too …
movie: The Lobster
Movie: The Lobster Colin Farrell again shows his commitment to his craft knows no bounds. In a dystopian future, single people have 45 days to find a match or they are turned into the animal of their choice. If you find that premise interesting, and you can push through some uncomfortable scenes, there’s much to …
movie: Bridge of Spies
Movie: Bridge of Spies I went into this fairly spoiler-free, having not heard of the historical person the movie was based on, and only watching the trailer briefly, and seeing this Tom Hanks / Jimmy Fallon piece. Spielberg is in good form here, even if the absence of a John Williams score (and indeed the …