The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 1 - review

It seems that playtime is over with The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 1 as it abandons the well-worked three act structure of the first two films as the events of the second part of the trilogy have put an end to the Games but the wheels of revolution have been set in motion.

It might pick up right where Catching Fire left off but I for one could have done with a quick catching up and a "Previously on The Hunger Games" in order to remember certain characters, relationships and events.

The gang's all here and it still has Hunger Games in the title but this is as different a movie to the others as District 12 is to the Capitol.

This is dark, bleak stuff as Lawrence's Katniss, in a twist on the established formula, is moulded, schooled and trained to become, not a fighter, but the face of the revolution and a propaganda weapon.

She is needed in order to galvanise the support of the surrounding districts to take down the villainous President Snow and the Capitol. Funny though, if this was the follow up to The Running Man Arnie would just take down the city single-handed.

As President Snow, Donald Sutherland chews through all the scenery available to him, hence why all the Districts are so barren and destroyed, but in order for the fight to really mean something he needs more screen time, perhaps something that will be rectified in the final part.

Hopefully it will also provide moments for all the non-Katniss characters like Peeta, Haymitch, Plutarch, Effie, Finnick, etc who all feature but don't have a huge amount to do although Liam Hemsworth must be thankful of finally getting a big speech instead of just sitting around and brooding.

Once again, another Hunger Games movie, another one that feels like just another part of an incomplete story. Looking forward to seeing how it all ends as the franchise is starved of a satisfying conclusion at the moment.

3 stars

Serena - review

Question Of The Day:

If an Oscar winner and an Oscar nominee who starred together in two Oscar-nominated films teamed up for a film set in a forest and nobody went to see it, would it still exist?

That is the question certainly facing the distributors of Serena starring the incredibly bankable stars Jennifer Lawrence and Bradley Cooper that has

After all this is the pair that were lit up the screen together in Silver Linings Playbook and American Hustle.

Unfortunately they are unable to light a match let alone catch fire in this damp squib of a tale that tries to be so many things (a love story, a noir, Thirties crime drama) that it can't see the forest for the trees.

2 stars

Sex Tape - review

Yesterday this was just a feature length Apple product placement advertisement disguised as a bawdy comedy.

Today Sex Tape is a cautionary tale and horror movie.

Following the news that a hacker stole and "leaked" naked pictures of celebrities including Jennifer Lawrence, this has become the most unintentionally socially relevant film release of all-time.

No one comes out this film smelling of roses, whether it be Cameron Diaz or Jason Segel and their awkwardly airbrushed youthful faces in the opening segment but especially Apple with many people watching it as an instructional video of how to understand the "f*cking mystery" that is "The Cloud" rather than entertainment.

While it misses its intended mark as a comedy, it does have some valid points to make about the current trend for sex tapes and "leaked" footage and the damage it can cause. At one point Diaz's character correctly states "they won't even be looking at you (referring to Segel) they'll all be looking at me" in that despite it taking two to tango, it is sadly the woman who will predominately be "slut-shamed" over her involvement and receive the brunt of the abuse.

However, and this just proves what a pedantic film geek I actually am, the most frustrating thing about the film was when you finally get to see the sex tape in question, that was filmed on ONE iPad, it features and cuts between several different angles that is impossible to do!

Diaz, Segel and everyone else involved will probably end up viewing this film like an actual sex tape. Seemed like a fun idea at the time but turned out to be a horrible mistake that should be erased from existence.

1 star

X-Men: Days Of Future Past - review

If I were to try and sum up the plot for X-Men: Days Of Future Past in one paragraph, I might say that Wolverine is sent back in time to persuade Charles Xavier and Magneto to come together to stop Mystique killing Bolivar Trask which prompts the creation of the Sentinel program which ultimately wipes out mutant kind in the future.

Follow that? No? Doesn't matter. You could try watching all the X-Men films, including the Wolverine ones, and all the end credits stings to re-familiarise yourself with the storyline and characters but it might just end up creating more questions than answers.

An action-packed opening sequence in the future which introduces us to some new and familiar faces under attack from sentinels poses such nerdy questions like "How has Wolverine got his adamantium claws back?", "How the hell is Professor X alive and looking like himself?", "Kitty Pryde has always been able to walk through walls but how can she now send people back through time?".

But before we are given time to think too hard about these questions, Bryan Singer quickly sends Wolverine back through time and presents the audience with a shot of Hugh Jackman's naked arse in order to distract us.

As much as this is the X-Men version of The Terminator storyline where someone is sent back in them to prevent the creation of robotic creatures that will wipe out an entire race, it is also paralleled with Singer's return.

Having left the franchise after X2 in order to make Superman Returns, he returns to a storyline where he uses the characters developed in First Class to retcon the universe to alter events that he wasn't happy with in X3: The Last Stand which mishandled The Dark Phoenix saga among other things, effectively giving him a clean slate to work with in the future in The Age Of Apocalypse (which I can't help but sing to the tune of Age of Aquarius).

But you can't make people excited for the future unless they enjoy the current film (take note makers of Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justice).

Luckily this instalment is the most enjoyable since X2 from the opening attack which highlights the future sentinels and new mutants including Blink whose power of creating temporary portals is used to terrific visual effect or the sequence where Quicksilver infiltrates the Pentagon to break out Magneto with the best use of bullet-time since The Matrix.

Despite switching between the two time frames and featuring as many characters as you would find in a tweet, the main focus of the plot is the younger versions of Charles and Eric, who are further at odds than when we last saw them in First Class.

James McAvoy really gets to stretch his acting legs (pun intended) with the biggest character arc, starting as a drunk, disillusioned man who has given up his powers in exchange for the use of his legs (again not fully explained), completely uninterested in Wolverine's "future-shite" but must grow into the man who eventually becomes Patrick Stewart's calm, noble Professor X (with whom he shares a geek-tastic time-bending head-to-head).

The all-action climax helps to start reassembling the jigsaw pieces together to head towards the world already established in X-Men and X2 and it will be interesting to see if the next instalments feature the younger or older X-Men as this almost feels like a passing of the torch between casts.

An X-Cellent ensemble that successfully mutates between post-apocalyptic Sci-Fi and funky seventies blockbuster with the overall result being a bright future for the franchise.

If it was sitting an X-am, this would get a Days Of Future Pass.

4 stars

American Hustle - review

David O. Russell reunites with Oscar-winner Bale and nominee Adams from The Fighter and Oscar-winner Lawrence and nominee Cooper from Silver Linings Playbook for this outrageous tale of comments, corruption, cleavage and combovers in the Seventies.

With the addition of Jeremy Renner, O. Russell has assembled himself an ensemble cast of superhero proportions with the movie becoming an unofficial Marvel/D.C. crossover featuring Batman, Lois Lane, Hawkeye, Mystique and Rocket Raccoon.

Partly based on the real-life ABSCAM scandals, Bale & Adams play a couple of small time hustlers who are forced into running an entrapment con on Renner's sympathetic mark, the Mayor of New Jersey Carmine Polito.

Starting out as a relatively simple con, Cooper's over-ambitious and quick-tempered FBI agent keeps expanding the reach of the investigation and things soon spiral out of control thanks to the involvement of Bale's wife played by Jennifer Lawrence and a mobster connection with a rather familiar face.

From Bale's committed turn as Irving, with a combover as complicated and elaborate as the cons he's running and Adams's fake English accent and dresses that are so low-cut her cleavage probably deserved its own screen credit, down to Alessandro Nivola's crazy Christopher Walken impression as an FBI boss, there is not a weak link in the whole cast.

However if it was possible to single one standout performance from an entire movie of standouts, it would have to be Jennifer Lawrence.

Lawrence doesn't even bother to pull any type of con, rather she straight up, brazingly steals every scene she is in.
Whether it is cleaning the house while singing Live And Let Die or making sure audiences will be referring to their microwave as "Science Oven" from now on, as younger, unstable New Jersey housewife, it's a role that is likely to bag her another Oscar nomination if not another gold statue.

Despite the fantastic recreation of the period, with particular mention going to Michael Wilkinson's costume design and the hair and makeup team, the film does tend to lose its way as the con becomes increasingly more complicated.

Rumour has it that a lot of the dialogue was improvised from the cast which had an influence on the plot, which has led to a lack of overall cohesiveness.

What it resulted in however is an unexpectedly hilarious movie with much of the comedy coming from Cooper's character and the one of the best running gags in years where he tries to find out the end of his boss's story about ice fishing and its relation to the case.

Like any good con, the performances are top notch and while you'll initially leave satisfied you might be left with the feeling that you've been had.

3 stars

REVIEW: X-Men: First Class - Vaughn gives this franchise a reboot up the arse.

Ah, what a difference a couple of months can make.  It was only back in March that people (The Incredible Suit included) were despairing over the terrible marketing campaign Fox were putting out for X-Men: First Class.  Could it be that an insanely tight production schedule had resulted in a turkey of mutant proportions?
Fast forward to the end of May and First Class debuts to a 98% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, and critics hailing it as the best comic book movie since The Dark Knight.
So what's the truth?  While it is certainly not as good as The Dark Knight, it is closer to Batman Begins than Batman & Robin.
A lot of the reviews so far have made comparisons to Christopher Nolan's reboot of the Batman franchise and a lot of them are justified.  Both Tim Burton's Batman and Bryan Singer's X-Men started with the heroes already existing in society.  Nolan went back to the beginning to look at what makes a man dress up as a bat to fight crime, and Vaughn looks at the formation of the X-Men (the recruitment montage features one of the best ever cameos and uses of the F-bomb) and the pivotal moment that turned friends Charles Xavier and Erik Lehnser into the enemies they were are the start of the first film.

"I loved you in Band Of Brothers", "I was going to say the same thing!"

Matthew Vaughn is really coming into his own as a director and delivers a summer blockbuster that nearly manages to break out of the comic book genre and become just a really great movie.  The period setting allows for Vaughn to fulfill his Bond fantasies (to the extent that the villain has a secret submarine in his yacht).  Kick-Ass proved he could do action but he manages to create a fun, action-packed summer blockbuster that never has to sacrifice story or character development. 
He has an impressive ensemble cast that help provide a lot more threads in the Six Degrees Of Kevin Bacon game but top marks however must go to the James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender and Jennifer Lawrence.  Despite the iconic performances of Stewart and McKellen, their younger counterparts quickly make the parts their own.  McAvoy has an impish charm to him, using his power to get girls until fate shows him that he is destined to use this power for a greater purpose, and Fassbender has the steely eyed look of a man who could be the next James Bond, and in this film he becomes a bona fide star.
There is a moment in the film where Xavier helps Magneto achieve the full extent of his powers and the look on Fassbender's face played out with Henry Jackman's music underneath is a truly touching moment which cements their friendship which makes the tragic turn events take all the more sad.
Jennifer Lawrence also makes the most of a terrific story arc that focuses on what has always been at the heart and soul of the X-Men stories: the struggle and fight for acceptance in a world that fears what is different.
First Class is not a perfect film.  Due to the rushed production schedule (it was rewritten, filmed, edited and post production all within a year), unfortunately there are some niggling issues like dodgy CGI, Beast's make-up, missing love story lot between Charles and Moira, a couple of underwritten minor characters, and Fassbender's accent going rather Oirish at times.  But I think that if Vaughn had had a little more time to polish rounds the edges then this could have been a five star film... but unless he gets the chance to tinker with it before the DVD release then he'll have to make do with a rating of 4.5 stars.

4.5 stars