Wednesday, 20 November 2013

Don Jon (2013)

Very enjoyable, gentle film. The story is slight (in fact, I was a bit annoyed that I happened to see the trailer as it showed so much of the enjoyable tone and style of the film that there wasn't much left to surprise me), but touching. Every character is lovable - even the bro friends are open-minded and positive influences - except for Johannsen's, who briefly provides some tension before disappearing. On the other hand, it is refreshing to have no contrived jeopardy or true-love ending.
Rating: Very Good

Monday, 11 November 2013

Gravity (2013)

Brilliant film. Good lead performances, masterfully paced, great 3D and effects, and even very touching in places.
Rating: Great

Tuesday, 29 October 2013

Escape Plan (2013)

Very poor. Terrible dialogue (in a bad way - the banter either falls flat or just doesn't make sense), wooden acting (and I do think better performances could have been teased from the two leads by a better director), nonsensical plot, a mass of cliches. It both wastes a load of great character actors (which makes me wonder whether the script was good at one point then got gutted after they signed up) - Neill, Caviezel, D'Onofrio, Amy Ryan - and also has fucking Vinnie Jones and fucking 50 Cent in it (both giving adequate performances as thugs, one a baddy thug and one a goody thug).

Basically, the 20 minute prison escape segment from Face/Off, but done badly and looped a few times.
Rating: Awful

Jackass Presents: Bad Grandpa (2013)

One third very funny, one third surprisingly sweet, and one third uncomfortable to watch in a bad way.
Rating: Good

Captain Phillips (2013)

Very tense, well-made, well-acted. Only suffers from not being able to have much structure due to being based on true events, but still recommended.
Rating: Good

Sunday, 27 October 2013

Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2 (2013)

Disappointing sequel to a brilliant film. There's scope for a fun take on lost world movies, but it gets bogged down with pointless returning characters and bland new ones, plus some tacked-on character reset/progression that makes Flint pretty passive and annoying. The 3D was also pretty much non-existent.

The two original director-writers only did story on this so perhaps that explains it...
Rating: Bad

Tuesday, 8 October 2013

Filth (2013)

A great lead performance, but no drive or depth. Essentially just a series of scenes of a nasty, fucked-up guy being nasty and fucked-up. A sledgehammer of a film.
Rating: Fine