HorrorAlso known as “Two Pigeons”, you may think “Freehold” doesn’t really qualify as a horror film. It’s certainly creepy and undeniably horrible things happen in it but there’s nothing supernatural or murderous at work here, just a blackly humorous act of karmic retribution that puts a chillingly plausible spin on being ‘home alone’. Hussein is ..
MoviesThere’s something deeply disturbing about the fact it’s so easy to laugh at “The Death Of Stalin”. Were it not for the fact these events all actually took place, this absurdist comedy from Armando Iannucci could be dismissed for simply being too far-fetched for its own good. When Joseph Stalin (Adrian McLoughlin) suffers a devastating ..
MoviesMy Little Pony trots back to the big screen with a cinematic outing based on the wildly successful (and surprisingly cross-generational) ‘Friendship Is Magic’ incarnation of the toy franchise. As she is busy preparing for the Friendship festival, Princess Twilight Sparkle’s efforts are interrupted by the arrival of Tempest Shadow (Emily Blunt), a broken-horned unicorn ..
With serendipitous timing and real world resonance that borders on opportunistic, “Detroit” arrives in cinemas to emphasise the perilous nature of present day America and it’s far too recent shameful past. Detroit, 1967. The city is in the grip of growing discontent which is spilling over into racially-charged rioting driven by large scale disaffection and ..
MoviesAnother summer, another big screen adaptation of a cult favourite TV show. This time, it’s nineties T&A-fest “Baywatch” being dragged in to cinemas with the hope the megawatt star charisma of Dwayne Johnson and Zac Efron will be enough to fill up the big screen. When disgraced Olympic champion swimmer Matt Brody (Zac Efron) is ..
MoviesIf you thought off-the-books, quasi-legal internecine government shenanigans were a practice brought to the White House by a tangerine reality TV buffoon, wait until you get a load of AMERICAN MADE and find out what was going on the last time a former celebrity became commander in chief. Telling the mostly true story of Barry ..
MoviesLuc Besson’s Space Oddity opens with a suitably inspirational opening as the story of Alpha (the eponymous City Of A Thousand Planets) is told through an evolutionary montage which nods to both Kubrick and Zemeckis. En route to Alpha to begin his next mission, Agent Valerian (Dane DeHaan) experiences a vision of the destruction of ..
HorrorI remember when I first saw “Harry Potter And The Philosopher’s Stone” in the cinema, it was one of the strangest cinema experiences of my life. I didn’t feel like I’d just watched a film of the boy wizard’s adventures, I just felt like I’d re-read the first book in two and half hours, so ..
MoviesThere are few animation studios that can cut a trailer together like Illumination Entertainment can. Unfortunately, outside of the “Despicable Me” movies, the finished products are increasingly failing to live up to the hype, and “Sing” feels decidedly flat, when it needs to be sharp. When Buster Moon (Matthew McConaughey) realises his theatre is in ..
MoviesThere’s a refreshing swagger to Edgar Wright’s latest creation, drifting on to the screen with irresistibly brash confidence, popping the clutch, downshifting the gears and roaring past the sluggish, lumbering summer blockbuster behemoths. Sure, “Baby Driver” could have a smug-off with Ben Wheatley’s “Free Fire”, but “Baby Driver” ultimately earns its sense of self-satisfaction. Baby ..
MoviesDead men may tell no tales but dead horses are still ripe for flogging it seems as Disney cranks out yet another sequel to the surprise 2003 smash hit based on a veteran theme park attraction with fifth instalment “Pirates Of The Caribbean: Salazar’s Revenge”. When a down-on-his-luck Jack Sparrow (Johnny Depp) trades his precious ..
MoviesWe may be marking the return of Xander Cage, but did anyone really notice he was away? 2002’s “xXx” was a dumb but fun extreme action-adventure, a 90’s ‘attitude’ hangover given a last millennial hurrah. Cage never felt as iconic as the film believed him to be, hence his easy replacement by Ice T’s Darius ..
HorrorI have a near-pathological dislike of people coming into my home uninvited or unannounced and I remember when we first moved into the house we live in, it had a front door which, if it was unlocked, you could just open and walk in, as friends, relatives and in-laws were wont to do. Now, don’t ..
MoviesWith apologies to Robert Lopez, Kristen Anderson-Lopez, and Kristen Bell… Do you want to see “The Snowman”?It’s not really all that good,It’s got FassbenderAnd FergusonBut neither’s in the nude…They adapted Nesbø’s novelAnd now we’ve gotThis dreary murder myst’ryDo you want to see “The Snowman”?You might not want to see “The Snowman”Are you sure?Well let’s see… ..
Movies😒 It’s absolutely fitting that the breakout character from this is the poop emoji. Oh, sorry – did you want more than that? Okay. This is a lazy, cynical exercise in filmmaking driven by executive hubris and utter contempt for the audience. Ill-conceived, muddled and creatively bankrupt, Sony have shattered the rock bottom for animated ..
MoviesJohn Wick: Chapter 2 burns the candle at both ends The second chapter in the saga of “John Wick” is a curious beast. In many ways, it feels like the third part of a trilogy rather than the sequel to a surprise break-out hit and it’s in trying to make the leap from one hit ..
MoviesIt may be that you’d need the Lasso of Hestia itself to separate truth from speculative fiction when it comes to “Professor Marston And The Wonder Women”. Presented as a true story, although much of it is disputed by the Marston family, the origin of Wonder Woman turns out to be as captivating and enchanting ..
MoviesSeventeen films in, you’d forgive Marvel for resting on their laurels but there’s no sign of fatigue as Marvel closes out its Thor trilogy with “Thor: Ragnarok”. Driven by recurring dreams of the destruction of Asgard, Thor (Chris Hemsworth) allows himself to be captured by the fire demon Surtur in order to pre-empt and prevent ..
MoviesImagine if you took the MacGuffin from “Highlander 2: The Quickening” and gave it to the Kansas State Board of Education to reframe it using their expertise in science before summarising it in crayon on a children’s menu placemat and you’ll be pretty close to how I imagine the pitch meeting for “Geostorm” went. That ..
Movies“Kingsman: The Secret Service”, a gleefully disrespectful, violent and funny action reworking of “My Fair Lady” was an unexpected delight, right up until it ended on a decidedly bum note. Regrettably, in tuning up for the sequel, write Jane Goldman and director Matthew Vaughan have taken that same note as the opening for “Kingsman: The ..
MoviesHave you checked your kitchen recently? Chances are the sink might be missing, stolen by Michael Bay to throw into his latest robots-in-disguise extravaganza “Transformers: The Last Knight”. It’s no secret that Paramount Pictures have assembled a writer’s room to spin their Hasbro franchise into an expansive shared universe but “The Last Knight” suggests they ..
MoviesWar! What is it good for? Concluding the Planet Of The Apes trilogy, that’s what! As a rule, I’m not a fan of prequels. But rules were made to be broken, and “War For The Planet Of The Apes” manages to thwart two of mine: not only is it a superb prequel, it’s also the ..
Movies*POTENTIAL SPOILERS* It’s been a long time since a movie surprised me as much as “Colossal” did. Won over by the quirky trailer and a crazy but fascinating premise, I was expecting a quirky exploration of the characters exploring their ‘inner demons’ in a very external manner. Instead, Nacho Vigalondo’s dark sci-fi fantasy delivered something ..
MoviesWith the original having been an unexpected delight, anticipation for “Paddington 2” was sky-high. Could the little bear from Peru pull off the ‘difficult’ second movie? The answer is an unqualified ‘yes’. Determined to get his Aunt Lucy a special present for her 100th birthday, Paddington (Ben Wishaw) sets his heart on a unique pop-up ..
MoviesSecret and lies haunt the cobbled London streets of The Limehouse Golem On the surface, “The Limehouse Golem” seems like just another Victorian murder mystery, a Sherlockian tribute act riffing off the legend of Jack The Ripper but it’s what beneath the surface, behind the façade that drives the narrative and gives it a thematic ..
MoviesOnce in a while, down in the depths of Netflix or Amazon Prime, you come across something so odd looking, it would be a dereliction of duty not to watch it. Or maybe that’s just me? In any event, it happened to me today while browsing for something to watch on Amazon Prime, I came ..
MoviesWith something as pure and innocent as the adventures of Winnie The Pooh, you’d be forgiven for thinking the story of their creation would be equally as heart-warming and uplifting. But, as Simon Curtis’ absorbing biopic reveals, the truth is anything but. “Goodbye Christopher Robin” tells the true-life story of how one of the world’s ..
MoviesI’m a pretty big Stephen King fan, although admittedly I’ve been a bit lax in keeping up with the prolific author’s output since around “Cell”. The first time I read “The Stand”, I did it in one sitting, forgoing sleep to finish it sometime in the early hours of Sunday morning (having started it on ..
Shark WeakThe latest entry in the polycephalic Carcharodon carry-on opens with a decidedly mono-mouthed shark swimming through the ocean. *rings trade descriptions* Oh wait, it’s a fake-out. It’s actually just a regular great white; a snack for the real monster… *starts to put phone down* …which has four heads??? *snatches up phone again* Once again, the ..
MoviesAdapted from Munro Leaf’s beloved 1936 children’s book, Blue Sky Studio’s “Ferdinand” is also a remake of Disney’s 1938 Silly Symphony short of the same story. In light of the proposed acquisition of Fox by Disney, this movie offers an interesting example of the differences between the two studios. Ferdinand (John Cena) is different from ..