The sweeping, captioned opening of Darren Aronofsky’s Noah is reminiscent of its cinematic heritage, the Biblical epics of years past, all elegantly flowing cursive script and delicately composed shots, until it promptly swoops down to the dark brutality of humanity.
The original Rio (I’ve noticed the fact I seem to be using ‘the original’ or variations on that theme a lot of late – probably says something about just how many sequels have been coming out this year) was an entertaining-enough blast of colour and samba, propped up by decent vocal performances and
The obvious point to be made here is that not only is this yet another sequel, it’s also a sequel to a reboot to a film series that was barely a decade old the first time around. And so it is again, with this reboot sequel coming ten years after the best film in the original trilogy.
Muppets Most Wanted’s opening song, “We’re Doing a Sequel” successfully nails almost every criticism that could be thrown at it from a “ugh, the sequel’s not as good as the original” point of view which makes reviewing it slightly difficult.
The Grand Budapest Hotel is a tricky film to review. Put quite simply: it’s a Wes Anderson film. In every conceivable way, as with all of his films before it, it is the essence of its predecessors mixed up, distilled, and delivered to the silver screen in a blast of pure, surreal, bittersweet joy.
Grating noise over a blackout. A pinprick of light. The noise intensifies, the light grows. More. More. The light spills out, begin to refract. Colours seep through.
Michael S. Martin & Jack Steadman take turns to review Dallas Buyers Club
The original Robocop was – is – an undisputed classic, a masterpiece, quite possibly the best film to come out of the ‘80s, and other such insanely excessive superlatives (but trust me, it really is that good), and if you dispute any of that… well… you’re wrong.
The latest entry in the Jack Ryan franchise (a character who shares with James Bond and The Doctor the habit of being played by multiple different actors with varying degrees of respect for previous iterations) punches the big red ‘reboot’ button –
Following on from the Oscar-nominated The Descendants (featuring George Clooney’s best performance in years, and introducing the amazing Shailene Woodley – soon to be seen in The Fault in Our Stars), Nebraska is Alexander Payne’s latest film as director, and (unsurprisingly) it’s almost everything.. Nebraska Director: Alexander Payne
On paper, The Counsellor should be perfect. Cormac McCarthy’s first original screenplay (a few of his other books have been adapted into screenplays – notably No Country for Old Men and The Road), directed by Ridley Scott, the genius behind Alien and the man with such a passion for McCarthy’s...
Jack Steadman reviews the newly released Don Jon, directed by Joseph Gordon-Levitt