Reviews

It's not terrible, but it's not particularly good either.

Some of the characters are decent, but the writing has little to be desired. As far as production values go, it feels a lot like a reasonably low budget TV series, as far as CGI and all that stuff is concerned, understandably of it's time, but also a little lifeless. There's very little charm across the board to make that particular issue tolerable.

Wolverine actually gets very little set up, the story telling very shoddy when it comes to building up key characters, and aside from Magnito and Xavier everyone else feels disposable.

Storm has quite possibly one of the worst lines ever in a movie, so bad that I had to look it up, to check I wasn't on my own in that thinking, and sure enough it's been subjected to a lot of entertaining commentary. It beggars belief when it pops up - "do you know what happens to a toad struck by lightning? The same thing that happens to everything else!" Not sure what that was all about - something of a bad "knock knock" joke, "why did the chicken cross the road?" etc.

There are some good bits in it, here and there, a nice moment with Magneto and the police, a few other bits too, but nothing really holds it all together.

4/10 for me at the min, but can appreciate why others might rate it highly. It was kind of good at times, but I just couldn't let go of The Last of Us, the leads here, including a guy called Joel, however wielding cameras in this case, the movie also minus the mushroom-infected zombie people; however, maybe I'm wrong about that. There are some great bits in it, but overall I'm just not sure how I feel about it.

I think I wanted to see a lot more destruction at the start, rather more than seemingly untouched cityscapes, for example. It's not like I expected New York to look like Godzilla just visited, but to see it still standing as it was here, and things like the internet still alive, and so on, kept taking me out of the movie a little bit more often than I would have liked.

The road movie aspects were better, much better at times, but then the end didn't feel all that well-earned. It does feel alarmingly plausible, I'll give it that, with consideration to the London Riots in 2011, and the riot at the US Capitol in 2021. It's clear in living memory, for me, that something like this could potentially flare up. Made me wonder if I was just watching it under a veil of denial at times.

As much as I didn't love it, I thought it was too short, and may have made for a better mini-series, then again it might have just been 10 minutes too short, with consideration to a very rushed ending. I'd definitely recommend it, even after giving it 4/10, as it's one of those ones that's difficult to be sure about in my case.

The movie most definitely isn't apolitical. It pretends to be, but very clearly isn't. I think they just said it was apolitical in order to get most people in to see it.

The movie was very careful to demonstrate that the Western Forces side was VERY diverse, whereas the opposite side was for the most part white. Key death moments concerned the death of black or Asian people, including a black guy set alight with arms tied up in a tire, and some particular shoot downs of either black or Asian people. There was a non WFs execution of soldiers we couldn't see, because they covered their heads up with bags for some reason. The suicide bomber at the beginning appeared to be a white woman. There were dead white bodies, civilians, here there and everywhere, diverse piles of bodies, but the featured deaths were mainly black and Asian.

It felt to me like the seemingly diverse Western Forces were for the most part fighting white men. It was clearly a DEI feature, and has certainly gone the way of mainstream media in that regard. Didn't feel very balanced to me!

In short it wasn't a great movie in my estimation, boring for the most part, aside from a couple of pit stops on route to Charlottesville.

Terrible

Some notably egregious casting choices in this. First of all Freddie Miles - what the hell were they thinking? Ripley too, blimey! I like Andrew Scott a lot, but he's not right for this role. Dickie and Marge, just meh - not particularly bad, but not good either.

Black and white, in a sort of saturation down, contrast up manner - doesn't work. It's also Italy - come on!!!! I'd have been fine if it was an old film, or it served a clear purpose, but I really can't connect with this particular decision.

Far too much creative freedom afforded to the director here, in a manner that in my mind disrespects the books, in addition to previous adaptations and character portrayals. The director appears to have all the adaptation, writing and director credits. Had way too much creative control.

I was excited about seeing this, however it became a painfully dull viewing experience. Tons of unnecessary padding.

In any case the casting choices appear to have been deliberately blind, in such a way I can't get on board with them I'm afraid, in addition to which they just didn't seem to understand the source material they were working with.

Most importantly of all - the series is utterly lifeless. I keep picking it up and dropping it. A key, initial death, involving a certain character has almost no emotional build up. You can appreciate how certain characters made themselves vulnerable to Ripley in the book, and other adaptations, but here no part of those relationships work at all, in the interests of giving any sense of emotional weight.

I re watched The Talented Mr Ripley soon after this, and thank goodness I did, as I didn't want to have my memories of this story overshadowed by this horrible production. I've never appreciated Phillip Seymour Hoffman so much!

Cut to pieces, and reshaped, making this their very own version of Hamlet, which isn't unusual, and delivers in spades.

I particularly loved the setting, using the theatre in a very interesting way, not on stage, not really, but quite literally all over the theatre, including the box office, wash rooms, the roof, and backstage. It does take a little getting used to, as does Ian playing Hamlet in this production, in addition to other reportedly "blind" casting choices, and there's no doubt the audience won't be blind to these choices for the most part, but thankfully, upon settling in it's less problematic than it could have been. It does however feel a bit strange, aspects of which have made it difficult for me to rate it higher than a 8/10, mainly because it does make it a little difficult to completely immerse yourself in the story, on account of noticing all these things.

This may not be quite so challenging on the stage, but everything is rather up close here, as such the "blind" casting approach doesn't lend itself so well to film in this case. It's helpful to remember that when this was first performed, a great many years ago, women were played by men, as such much of this stuff is par for the course in many respects, however some of these choices just don't lend themselves to the big screen as much as they might a stage production.

It is however great in all other respects!

Bad start, in some ways trying to play like a bad 80s high school movie, or something like that, to show the main characters at an earlier point in their lives, in 2008, something of a prologue.

In any case, from there it does pick up a little, and once it gets into it's stride is kind of okay, occasionally funny, I laughed out loud a few times, occasionally playing out like a documentary, some of the events closely resembling a lot of stuff we've been seeing in the media, but then it all just fell flat as it came towards it's end.

Quite an anti climax, the main issue being that it ran out of ideas and struggled to tie itself up in a neat little bow at the end.

It's not dreadful, the middle section is kind of okay, but it really really fails to stick the landing!

One of the best movies I've seen in a long time.

First and foremost, regards positives, I've got to say that the soundtrack for this movie is spectacular. I listened to it separately as soon as I got home, not just because of the movie, but because the soundtrack itself was so beautifully crafted.

Godzilla, full scale, isn't so big that the human characters here need to make use of Sci Fi tech to manage the issue, making it's impact on the human beings more believable. More recent Godzilla's have turned sky scrapers into Domino's and humans into ants, to such an extent it weirdly removes any meaningful sense of how people are really effected in the moment. We see the aftermath of war here, and the aftermath of Godzilla attacks, both similarly impactful, linking Godzilla to what originally inspired the monsters creation way back when.

The method used to dispatch Godzilla, without spoiling, was great, with respects the available means at the time, and in light of it being a somewhat more manageable size in that regard. I won't say what they did, but the final show down was very very well executed indeed!

Godzilla is very much like Jaws in this movie, which works very well, and there's a sea based scene that appears to directly make reference to Jaws, which is expertly done, however, the movie is also Jaws like in relation to many other aspects of story telling in this case. Godzilla's presence is very effectively handled, and although the limited budget is to some extent evident, with Godzilla animatronics, that doesn't take anything away from the monster, in fact it serves to make Godzilla's big gun moments far more impactful.

It has an old movie charm about it.

I'm hopeful about a few sequels that keep the budget similarly restrained, in such a way that enables them to maintain what was achieved here.

I would suggest watching only the trailer and, with memories of what you may have seen and read before, let that light up a little "Pure Imagination," and leave it there. Don't go and see this film.

The musical is built around the "Pure imagination" track from the original movie, however hasn't done much in it's attempts to spring board from there, creating rather a drab and uninspired musical around that!

They shouldn't have used that original song, not really, in that it appears to have revealed a considerable lack of musical talent, in so far as the new songs are concerned, within a musical production, in this case!

The musical whimpered on throughout a meaningless story, it all felt rather uninspired, with consideration to what came before it, featuring not a single character of interest, going on to fizzle out leaving nothing at all. I'm struggling to write about it in fact, it being almost entirely forgettable.

Timothy's Wonka, the character, is actually very good, as are some of the villains within this, however everything else simply fails to leave a mark. Some rather bad story telling in this one. I'm quite shocked about this to be honest!

A little better than the average it seems to have got on IMDB, and similar rating areas.

Well written, well acted, and all that. Seemed well directed. I didn't realise Ricky Gervais also directed and wrote the movie, until the end, and he's done a fairly decent job.

It's full of utterly absurd stuff, and requires a suspension of disbelief, to some extent, which helps, regards the situations, however the human character portrayals are decent, with respects the personalities that get caught up in situations like this. I loved Vera Farmiga's character in this - really well done! Ricky Gervais' character was also very likable among characters like Vera's and Erics!

It's a very easy watch, pretty much done and dusted in about 90 mins (excluding the credits).

Keeps you guessing, to some extent, though does through some seemingly obvious distractions out, but holds up pretty well right up until the last 10 mins, when it kind of flat lines.

The court room side of things was reasonably good, not gripping, but quite enjoyable, all aside from a developing romance that I won't go into, and upon that part of the movie coming to an end the movie seemed to run out of ideas.

Something new is suggested in the last 10 minutes or so, potentially sending the movie in another direction for a while, but really does nothing more than wrap it all up within about 10 mins, in a manner that felt very unsatisfying.

It's not a terrible ending, but seemed pretty lacklustre.

I thought episode 1 was reasonably interesting, to some extent anyway, and so hurtled into episode 2 and found my interest in the show snuffed out within the first 10 mins. I finished it, but really struggled.

It's basically a bunch of badly cobbled together timelines, with nothing meaningful to link them all together. This episode focussed at length on the 2053 time line, with snippets of the others, and it's in the 2053 part of the story where the production values take a rather sharp nose dive. It's so bad that I'm going to allow this episode to speak for the rest of the series, and drop it like a hot brick!

I didn't like this movie when it first appeared, for some reason or another, gave it 5/10 here anyway, but for some reason I put it on again, some 15 years later, and I really enjoyed it. It doesn't have the best start, got to say that, the first 15/20 mins, but upon settling into Gervais' character it grabbed me in a way that I didn't expect. I think my expectations were lowered by a younger self, and this time around I tuned into something I wasn't able to connect with the first time around.

As far as it taking me by surprise was concerned, I really didn't expect to find myself tearing up on occasion, almost weeping at a point I saw coming in advance, and yet still got taken down by it!

Could have been pretty decent if only the set up was better handled. Basically, what we get is a Vietnam war vet, Rambo, arrested for walking back into town, despite being encouraged to leave, the police soon after attempting to wash and shave him, while fully clothed, rather than let him stink in his cell, at which time Rambo slapped some of the police for mishandling him, triggering a full scale manhunt upon Rambo being able to flee Police custody.

Absurd!

It's very well made, however the story at the base of it, in particular what triggers events to unfold, significantly undermines what eventually transpires. It was very difficult to get behind anyone's motivations.

Sorry to say that this was far too long for the cinema. I found the Irishman far too long as well, however I was able to watch that at home from day one, which made it a much easier viewing experience, enabling me to take breaks as needed, because of which I was able to really enjoy the Irishman Would have felt the same about this under similar circumstances, but it really is a very tough watch in the cinema. I try to avoid looking at my watch during a movie, but couldn't seem to help myself during this one, on each occasion to see that only a few minutes had past since the last peek. I realise I wasn't helping myself much with that at all.

It's not boring, it's just NOT a cinema film. Something only for the comforts of home, where you've got the option to treat it like a mini series. If this was a mini series for TV it would have been fantastic, but as a movie for the cinema it makes for an extremely taxing viewing experience.

I must also admit that I started to go down with a nasty cold during the film, which might have affected my feelings towards it, however went in feeling perfectly well, as far as that goes, and came out quite sickly, and so the movie was evidently long enough for something like a cold to take hold!

... it's decent!

All the performances in this movie were very good, I especially enjoyed Glenda Jackson's character.

I found it to be very moving, and much to my surprise caught me off guard on a few occasions, forcing me to well up a little.

The movie does well to respect both the difficulties of war itself, and the fall out of that, with respect PTSD symptoms. It's not heavy with any of that, but it's very nicely balanced between a sense of here and now, and a time long since past, at least as far as most viewers are concerned.

Michael Caine did a great job, and really did a lot to embrace the man he was portraying here, doing so very convincingly.

It's more of a Sunday on the couch sort of movie, however I was still pleased to have seen it in the cinema.

I felt a lot more ready for Branagh's Poirot on this occasion, and found his portrayal much more pleasing than the last two films, then again I suppose I'm used to seeing him as Poirot now.

Unfortunately this particular tale didn't really do very much at all. I liked the set up quite a lot, but upon the death knell tolling it became little more than an over long TV episode.

It's fine, sort of, in all fairness to it, but the story didn't grab me at all for the second half, which was a shame. I must admit though, it's much better than the previous two movies. This one was a little more muted in many respects, in so far as the setting was concerned, and thankfully was at the very least a Poirot movie we haven't had before.

In some ways this movie prompts me to consider piecing together something of an essay, with consideration to my review, the narrative leaning quite heavily on that, in addition to the movie wanting itself to be one of those study pieces, in some way or another, while not giving us a great deal to think through either.

First and foremost the acting is really good, and drew me in to the characters far more than anything else did. A worthy Oscar was awarded here for best actor, however it's a shame the movie itself is otherwise quite lacking. I did love the 4:3 ratio, and the set design too, but realism went arry somewhat when we were exposed to the unclothed fatsuit, it reminding me somewhat of Jaws' effort to present an unconvincing shark. I just didn't find it convincing when it wad unclothed. Why that should matter, I don't know, but it distracted me more than it should have I suppose.

In any case, watch this for some great acting. I wondered if it was previously a stage play, on account of it being in a single environment. Might be good to see on stage if it was. Something a little lacking in the story though. Doesn't go especially deep. Maybe I missed something.

This is a fairly decent film, from which I really like the ideas, riffing off Chucky, care of AI this time, which also gave me a strong sense of 80s nostalgia, I think on account of the way it was filmed. The M3GAN doll itself has a perfect mix of sweetness and creepiness, which works really well, the more creepy elements often really affective.

Two things lacking, firstly, I wish they expanded further on things as far as the dolls primary objectives were concerned, to look after the physical and emotional wellbeing of it's principle user, secondly I wish they ramped up the horror a little more, with that in mind. I suppose they needed to secure an audience, which may have been harder to do if it was rated 18 or R, but there we go, is what it is!

It's not bad, not at all, but really could have been something quite special had they just pushed some things a little further.

This was recommended by a friend, one who appears to have lost his way a little when it comes to finding and recommending decent movies.

Something of a revenge movie, this one.

This movie has no soul, not a single likeable character, making it impossible to care about anyone in the movie, and has a story that throws such an enormous curveball, the idea of revenge kind of meant nothing at all, not really, at least in so far as what they appeared to be setting up.

It attempts to do something unexpected, but in doing so completely undermined any potential impact the movie could have otherwise had.

It get's 2 stars rather than 1 because I was at least able to sit through it, and I respect it for at least managing to get everything it wanted to into 90 mins, without dragging it out for 2 hrs.

A couple of significantly bad writing decisions. Aspects of brutality are rather weirdly softened by a series of rather unconvincing characters and situations within a rather banal tale (with exception to the curve ball I mentioned - which doesn't help the movie at all. I'm not suggesting there's a twist - it just does something weird).

The movie started out quite well, generally speaking, but lost it's way quite quickly unfortunately.

I quite liked Nicolas Cage's Dracula, seeming somewhat reminiscent of later Christopher Lee Draculas, however much more deliberately amusing, but had some degree of menace going for it.

Renfield himself was also quite a nice character, Nicholas Hoult balancing darkness and light quite nicely.

I also liked the cop, whoever that was, damn, the victim group facilitator, and most of the characters. I liked how a lot of it looked, some of the ideas, but it all comes crashing to a halt there for me.

There are some good moments in the writing, effectively using Dracula within something of a narcissistic personality disorder victim narrative, however that's kind of as far as it goes. Well, not quite, it does other things, but nothing particularly interesting anywhere else.

It does a lovely link into the universal movies at the beginning, which was a nice touch, and there were some very nice touches, but it seemed to very quickly run out of ideas. Some pacing issues too, making it feel quite long for a 90 min movie.

Urh... no! Just no! Really well made, looked great, in the most horrible way imaginable, and in all honesty I'm upset with myself for watching it so bloody late at night. I should have watched it this afternoon, and then spent the evening watching funny things. Anyway, the setup was really well done. I liked it, but I think I'll only really be at peace with it, as far as my tolerance threshold goes, on a second viewing. It really stressed me out. Got so restless at one stage during the movie I started making a paper boat with my cinema ticket. I took Diazepam before I went, not for the movie, just because my back is giving me gip, but it even managed to cut through that, taking me from one state of chill into an entirely different one altogether. It's not really a jump scare movie, there's the odd moment, and I consider it not doing this to be something of a testament to great filmmaking, and storytelling, in that it didn't need to do anything cheap. Jump scares are a bit cheap, though they always get me, but this didn't need much of that at all. A bit overkill on the gore, but I was saturated enough that I actually started to feel quite overwhelmed by it toward the end.

I think this is one of those movies that have become trendy to like, but that's it. I've tried it twice. Once at home, and then again in the presence of a live orchestra at the Royal Festival Hall, Southbank Centre.

Extremely dull. The first time I had had good amount of alcohol to drink, so blamed that to some extent, where as the second time I caught it, and paid a lot for the pleasure, I really got a chance to get the measure of what a serious test of endurance this movie is.

It has some interesting themes, but everything seems to just fall flat. It feels so empty. I was surprised I disliked it so much, given all the acclaim it has received, but then that eventually came to reinforce the point I opened with in my own review - people, it would appear, pretend to like it because they feel it some how means something to like this one. It really doesn't - waste of time and energy!

I consider this to be something of a public service announcement.

I liked about 2 sketches in this thing, within the first 20 mins, but then it completely went off the rails, and fell to pieces. Saw a glowing review in the Guardian for it, "laughing out loud!" all the way through apparently, but at what exactly I'm none the wiser. Quite shocked I allowed myself to fall foul of that recommendation. I don't follow them, but for some reason I fell upon the review and recommendation, but there we go!

If you try it don't go past the Kissing reality TV show scene, before which there are a couple of okay bits, but that's really it. Badly written, embarrassingly acted, no... just badly written, actors having to do their best to work with garbage, having little choice but to fall flat on their faces!

I watched this at home, on Prime, so could have turned if off, and yet I sat there and watched the whole thing!

This is an appallingly awful movie.

I don't know what I expected from this, given it's a Bill and Ted movie, though I guess I must have expected it might have been sort of okay. Evidently I haven't taken off my rose tinted specs, ahead of viewing this thing.

I half think I should maybe give it an extra star, given I somehow didn't turn it off for some reason.

Poorly executed, made for TV nafftastic garbage!

I feel angry with myself for sitting through it. I suppose in some ways I deserved what I got, from all 90 minutes of it, for putting it on in the first place!

Good start, but kind of looses it's way towards the end. Not particularly focussed. An annoying dollop of politics at the end, which got on my nerves - you can never truly escape the real world these days, it always creeps in to our entertainment these days.

Worst parts concerned any moments outside of the Matrix mainframe, or whatever it is, including a Zion mark 2, a problem I also had with the previous sequels.

Best parts, generally speaking the Matrix world itself, while plugged in, and a few really nice characterisations. I really liked the new Smith, in addition to Neil Patrick Harris' character.

Fairly average, a bit too long.

Best scene overall was a moment where bodies come tumbling down - I'll leave it there. That was a particularly good scene, and probably made me give it a star more than it would have otherwise deserved!

I kind of recommend it, I enjoyed it. It will gross some people out, it's kind of a horror, but in a weird and interesting way. It's a curve ball.

A reviewer said to "go in blind" and even stop watching their review, until it had been seen, and "don't watch the trailer!" so, I did as recommended, and I'm pleased I did.

It went somewhere I didn't foresee, and that will do.

I dare any of you, even if it might not be your cup of tea (the genre), to go and see something a little bit different and, if you do, try to steer clear of trailers and a synopsis.

I suppose the main thing to spoil is the journey, rather more than the destination.