quote:

ORIGINAL: Qwerty Norris

quote:

ORIGINAL: Dr Lenera

THE DARKEST HOUR
Yet another bad alien invasion movie [why is it so hard to get those right these days?], which, for the most part, isn't fun enough to be a 'good bad' movie; it's mostly just bad. A reasonably good first fifteen minutes and a hilarious dumb final fifteen minutes don't really compensate for the tedium of the rest.
3.5/10

Dr Lenera, it must be said you've been FAR too kind!


THE DARKEST HOUR (...and a half....boom boom!!)

Where to start with this colossal turd? In the opening moments, as soon as the hapless Emile Hirsch opens his mouth with an attempt at wise-cracking over the "no mobile phones switched on when on a plane" situation, I hated him instantly. As he & his arsehole of a friend then arrive at Moscow airport & start musing over their fantastic enterprising internet idea that will surely make them millions & millions - I hated the pair of them equally. And as soon as we're introduced to that lassie from Juno & that Aussie one from Transformers prancing around Red Square displaying their obnoxious touristy behaviour, I hated EVERYONE I was supposed to empathise with for the films duration - bugger.

Yet even a set of loathsome characters may end up being a good thing if the film opts to put them through utter misery (casing point the Final Destination series), unfortunately though the only ones likely to suffer immensely through the Darkest Hour is the audience themselves. After 15 minutes of vile, imperialistic exposition; the aliens thankfully arrive & start killing everybody in sight - forcing our "heroes" to forget about any character arcs they've attempted to build up in the opening stages, switch into bland / personality-free "survivalist mode" and lock themselves in a kitchen cupboard alongside the routine cowardly, jerk-like figure who is obviously neither American or Russian & will inevitability perish in the later stages.

And then the boredom, OH THE BOREDOM! The following hour attempts to evoke the apocalyptic empty atmosphere defined by the likes of 28 Days Later, The Omega Man & Day Of The Triffids, yet instead creates the feeling you've been locked in a darkened room against your will for 4 weeks. We lurch from one tedious "lets go here" storyline to, "actually no wait, let's go here instead" plot thread - meeting a collection of scarcely-drawn Russian's along the way who occasionally need a little dose of westernised wisdom in order to combat their cowardly, sexist Eastern bloc tendencies and behave appropriately in a crisis-ridden situation.

We'll even face the scenario of plot logic breathtakingly leaping out of the window over & over again. With electricity being the catalyst for the ridiculous outer space creations to impose their aggressive will against humanity; a character will freak out over a pocket radio switched on yet she'll be quite content with around a dozen lights illuminating the room they find themselves in at the time. A singular bus amongst many will manage to take on a life of its own in a sort of Maximum Overdrive kind of way, despite the absence of a foot on the accelerator. We'll have a bunch of mobile phones that'll ring as warning signs despite nobody actually attempting to call them in the first place. Our heroes will invent a special gun that can kill the badly-rendered baddies yet will still resort to classic "Russian bullets" that previously failed. The characters will face a capsizing boat, propelling one of them to make it to shore & run a good 2 miles in the opposite direction of where they actually need to go (about the length of the average swimming pool), hide within a bus & launch a flare they previously had no knowledge of acquiring...And then the jewel on the crown of shite; despite the cataclysmic devastation wiping out much of the earth's power supply, a character will still manage to receive a text message on board a nuclear submarine - presumably their network provider wasn't O2?

All of this nonsense would be somewhat forgivable if it were hilariously fun, it isn't. It's a hateful exercise in boredom & Western consumerism disguised by the premise of an alien invasion flick. It's insistence on going "look there's a McDonalds, a Starbucks, a shopping centre full of your favourite shops you'll find back in the good ol' US of freaking A – so you see, us Russian's are just like you...but in Russian like, ya know?” is reminiscent of the worst possible tourist – the kind that goes to a foreign country yet only invests money in everything they already have access to back home. The Darkest Hour? If only it felt that short....

1/10

quote:

ORIGINAL: Qwerty Norris

Pretty much summed up my views as well over Chronicle doc, although you probably liked it a bit more than I did.

JACK & JILL

After watching a rough cut of his dunkin' donuts-appearing commercial; a caricature of Al Pacino (played by...err...Al Pacino) turns round to its producer played by one Adam Sandler to offer his opinion. "Burn this....this must never be seen.... by anyone....all copies....destroy them." The deep irony of course being that this point of view is comfortably appropriate for the review ofJack & Jill itself.

The nicest possible thing that can possibly be said about Sandler's new vehicle is that it never reaches the levels of technical incompetence set by such monumental disasters like Tommy Wiseau's The Room... but that is absolutely it. In recent memory; It's hard to think of a film as headache-inducing, head in the hands, fingers over the eyes, jaw-dropping, seat-sinking, brain-battering, "OH FOR HEAVENS SAKE" declaring, world-shatteringly awful as Jack & Jill. There are no redemptive qualities. There are no "so bad it's good" characteristics. There is literally nothing within it to consider it as anything other than cinematic torture. If you're a fan of Al Pacino, Johnny Depp, John Mcenroe or even Justin Bieber - it's more dreadful than you can possibly imagine.

Too often; there are people out there who will come out of a perfectly decent and well-intended (if perhaps flawed) piece and come out going "that was rubbish" or type furiously onto their keyboards and post "worst film ever" on the IMDB forums. At worst, these types of people are complete morons. At best, they're extremely naive. To understand just how bad a mainstream film can aspire to; one has to experience a film like Jack & Jill. A film that metaphorically speaking; is the equivalent of Adam Sandler gathering all his films, all his awards, all his earnings, all his credibility (of what's left of it anyway) - absolutely everything relatable to his career, soaking it in petrol & setting it ablaze with not a match, but a flame-thrower...or maybe even the firery depths of eternal hell.

Astonishingly shite.
0.5/10MARTHA MARCY MAY MARLENE


An atmospheric & impressively ambiguous drama about a lost girl (both literally & metaphorically) who escapes a dangerous cult, yet struggles to re-adapt to the form of normality she abandoned in the first place. It does a very good job of intertwining the two separate timelines, contains a brilliant breakthrough performance from Elizabeth Olsen and is one of those films that gets under the skin and stays with you long after the credits. Certainly worthy of the same praise as the previous Sundance hit that gathered a lot of awards buzz (Winters Bone) & a very fine debut feature from Sean Durkin.
8/10

YOUNG ADULT


After the utter rubbish that was Jennifer's Body, it's good to see Diablo Cody (with the help of Jason Reitman once again) returning to form with this enjoyably nihilistic comedy drama showcasing a great performance from Charlize Theron. Not only is it her best role since Monster , she does a fantastic job of playing an immensely unlikeable character through her choice of words, yet frequently displays both a huge sense of vulnerability & a fractured individual constantly acting in denial through her pitch-perfect body language - a performance that certainly wouldn't have been undeserving of awards recognition.
7/10


CARNAGE

You do at times wonder how much of the successes of Carnage is down to the source material of the play, whilst it does lack a heart in order to make any of the quartet sympathetic (or even to an extent, believable) and the confines of its obvious stage roots does result in a piece that's not particularly cinematic. That said; it's a very funny, very lean satire on the absurdities of middle class etiquette and one of the better Polanski efforts of recent times.
6.5/10

Over the next week; will be checking out The Grey after hearing some positive reviews that differ from what the "Liam Neeson Vs Wolves" trailer suggested. Daniel Radcliffe breaking away from Harry Potter typecasting in James Watkins' follow-up to Eden Lake, The Woman In Black. And of course, there's the small matter of The Muppets.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Qwerty Norris

Pretty much summed up my views as well over Chronicle doc, although you probably liked it a bit more than I did.

JACK & JILL

After watching a rough cut of his dunkin' donuts-appearing commercial; a caricature of Al Pacino (played by...err...Al Pacino) turns round to its producer played by one Adam Sandler to offer his opinion. "Burn this....this must never be seen.... by anyone....all copies....destroy them." The deep irony of course being that this point of view is comfortably appropriate for the review ofJack & Jill itself.

The nicest possible thing that can possibly be said about Sandler's new vehicle is that it never reaches the levels of technical incompetence set by such monumental disasters like Tommy Wiseau's The Room... but that is absolutely it. In recent memory; It's hard to think of a film as headache-inducing, head in the hands, fingers over the eyes, jaw-dropping, seat-sinking, brain-battering, "OH FOR HEAVENS SAKE" declaring, world-shatteringly awful as Jack & Jill. There are no redemptive qualities. There are no "so bad it's good" characteristics. There is literally nothing within it to consider it as anything other than cinematic torture. If you're a fan of Al Pacino, Johnny Depp, John Mcenroe or even Justin Bieber - it's more dreadful than you can possibly imagine.

Too often; there are people out there who will come out of a perfectly decent and well-intended (if perhaps flawed) piece and come out going "that was rubbish" or type furiously onto their keyboards and post "worst film ever" on the IMDB forums. At worst, these types of people are complete morons. At best, they're extremely naive. To understand just how bad a mainstream film can aspire to; one has to experience a film like Jack & Jill. A film that metaphorically speaking; is the equivalent of Adam Sandler gathering all his films, all his awards, all his earnings, all his credibility (of what's left of it anyway) - absolutely everything relatable to his career, soaking it in petrol & setting it ablaze with not a match, but a flame-thrower...or maybe even the firery depths of eternal hell.

Astonishingly shite.
0.5/10

MARTHA MARCY MAY MARLENE


An atmospheric & impressively ambiguous drama about a lost girl (both literally & metaphorically) who escapes a dangerous cult, yet struggles to re-adapt to the form of normality she abandoned in the first place. It does a very good job of intertwining the two separate timelines, contains a brilliant breakthrough performance from Elizabeth Olsen and is one of those films that gets under the skin and stays with you long after the credits. Certainly worthy of the same praise as the previous Sundance hit that gathered a lot of awards buzz (Winters Bone) & a very fine debut feature from Sean Durkin.
8/10

YOUNG ADULT


After the utter rubbish that was Jennifer's Body, it's good to see Diablo Cody (with the help of Jason Reitman once again) returning to form with this enjoyably nihilistic comedy drama showcasing a great performance from Charlize Theron. Not only is it her best role since Monster , she does a fantastic job of playing an immensely unlikeable character through her choice of words, yet frequently displays both a huge sense of vulnerability & a fractured individual constantly acting in denial through her pitch-perfect body language - a performance that certainly wouldn't have been undeserving of awards recognition.
7/10


CARNAGE

You do at times wonder how much of the successes of Carnage is down to the source material of the play, whilst it does lack a heart in order to make any of the quartet sympathetic (or even to an extent, believable) and the confines of its obvious stage roots does result in a piece that's not particularly cinematic. That said; it's a very funny, very lean satire on the absurdities of middle class etiquette and one of the better Polanski efforts of recent times.
6.5/10

Over the next week; will be checking out The Grey after hearing some positive reviews that differ from what the "Liam Neeson Vs Wolves" trailer suggested. Daniel Radcliffe breaking away from Harry Potter typecasting in James Watkins' follow-up to Eden Lake, The Woman In Black. And of course, there's the small matter of The Muppets.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Dr Lenera

THE WOMAN IN BLACK
Now I was surprised [but pleased] when I heard this has very traditional, slow-paced ghost story has become a huge hit and indeed I could barely get a seat at my cinema, but then of course it does have a certain Harry Potter in the lead role! Actually Daniel Radcliffe is okay, considering at least a third of the film consists of him on his own, in a haunted house. These lengthy sequences are superb examples of creepy atmosphere building and contains some solid jolts, though I could have done without the obvious CGI. Overall, the film drags its heels a little too much and a few bits fall flat but it's great to look at and solidly plotted, though the ending, which I hear has been changed from the book, seemed a bit of place for me. As someone who has yet to see the ITV version, I thoroughly enjoyed this often scary, but also rather quaint, old fashioned spook tale, though I disagree with it being cut to get a '12' certificate,which I still don't think it deserves; there may be little blood and violence, but God it screws with your mind!

7.5/10


THE MUPPETS
Longer review elsewhere in Reviews, but for the most part this is a thorougly enjoyable piece of fun, the kind to put a goofy smile on your face and keep it there as you leave the cinema. I laughed alot and was pleasently surprised how wierd certain bits were too ['Man Or Muppet'?]. It's slightly let down by its plot, which has been done to death, and a poorly written romantic subplot with a seriously uncharismatic Jason Segel [Amy Adams is divine though!], but these don't really ruin the joy of the movie, which manages cleverly to mock and celebrate at the same time. I didn't have much interest in the TV show as a kid, and have never even seen a Muppet movie up to now, so I'm not too familiar with the Muppets, but think I might go check some more out....

8/10


THE GREY
Again, longer review elswhere, but overall a solid survival yarn, suspenseful and so convincing that you pretty much forget the silliness [these wolves are hardly anything like real wolves!] until after you've left the cinema. Sadly the wolf attack scenes are ruined by the usual mess of closeups and shakycam that seems to be par for the course these days, and the creatures are most effective when either unseen or far away, such as a scary night time of shot of loads of eyes staring at the humans out of the dark. A strong performance from Liam Neeson and an underlying subtext about dealing with death gives the action some weight.

7/10

quote:

ORIGINAL: Dr Lenera
This Means War looks horrid but the wife wants to see it, and have already seen John Carter, will post thoughts soon.

That deep-browed Homer ruled as his demesne.


TREK WARS

quote:

ORIGINAL: ElephantBoy


Kind of a companion piece to TIL as once again the make up department does go into over drive in the way it ages the central characters,

quote:

ORIGINAL: homersimpson_esq

quote:

ORIGINAL: Dr Lenera
This Means War looks horrid but the wife wants to see it, and have already seen John Carter, will post thoughts soon.

...always assumed was female forumite...unless is lesbian...