Film Guide

First up, I just need to get something off my chest: JCVD is awesome! If you don’t read any further I want you to know that.

Ok, so why? You might think that I’m indulging some romanticism for action flicks watched in my teens? Yeah ok, I buy that. The allure of seeing the eponymous Jean-Claude Van Damme in a film, seemingly possessed of depth we wouldn’t expect from him, paid off with probably the most satisfying and interesting performance we might ever get from him. Who knows, maybe he’ll find his third act resurgence a la Bill Murray? Whatever the case this self reflective film from Belgian filmmaker Mabrouk El Mechri captures the long since faded glow of celebrity with keenly ironic eye whilst retaining considerable warmth for its beaten down protagonist.

Opening with a typical Van Damme action sequence El Mechri makes his intentions clear right off the mark, going meta with his film-within-a-film approach. We see Van Damme complaining to a young director about the difficulty of shooting long single takes at his age and is met with cold disdain. The director firmly places Van Damme’s cinematic clout in the past stating that just because “he brought John Woo to Hollywood” doesn’t mean that he holds any cinematic capital on this set. And although the above line of dialogue is purposefully repeated later in the film by other characters, in a positive way, it is apparent that Van Damme’s star has waned.  Read the rest of this entry »

Firstly let me say that in 1995 I stayed up till crazy hours in the morning to watch the All Blacks get beaten in overtime during the Rugby World Cup final. I felt empty and very unsatisfied at the outcome. Sitting there with a stack of friends all crowded into this smallish lounge in Epsom, all of us were dumbfounded. This was our year to win the world cup. We had longed to re-live the glory of the 1987 victory. Yes I know, this sounds a little too serious for just game, but back in 1995 we actually loved the All Blacks and their coach. We had faith in them and they seemed invincible. (Which ironically is “Invictus” in latin)

It didn’t take long for the stories of mass food poisoning within the All Black camp, which of course in turn gave life to rumours of deliberate poisoning by the opposition. So in general terms the majority of New Zealand felt hard done by and somewhat ripped off by the loss.  Read the rest of this entry »

Here it is another romantic comedy from Nancy Meyer, whose previous outings “Something’s Gotta Give” and “The Holiday” have helped cement Meyer as the “go-to girl” of the multi-layered romantic comedy that even guys could enjoy. As the writer/director of these three films, Meyer has been able to really build the cinematic experience to fit her own formulaic style. “It’s complicated” moves back to the topic material of “Something’s Gotta Give”, with the exploration of older people lovin’.

Meryl Streep stars as Jane, divorced mother of three grown up children, who has spent the past decade of her newly single life focusing on building her career. Pouring her heart and soul into her catering/bakery business, while her lawyer ex-husband Jake (Baldwin) cheats, leaves and then marries a much younger woman.  Read the rest of this entry »

Read the rest of this entry »

Read the rest of this entry »

I really wasn’t expecting much from this DVD, despite my kid’s over the top excited anticipation, I knew it was going to be cheesy, predictable, and somewhat on the boring side of lame.
Sure enough it was cheesy, predictable and had a groan factor of 10, but as soon as the Aliens arrived, they cranked the experience up a bajillion notches. Aliens in the Attic turned into a classic slap-stick affair, with raucous laughter filling our lounge, and not only from the mouths of my kids either.
Aliens wasn’t trying to be clever, the cheese and groan factor all playing into the laughable nature of the film, which turned out to be one of the funniest kids DVDs I’ve seen recently.  Read the rest of this entry »

Armed with very little knowledge of the background to The Soloist, I slid the DVD in the player and sat back with a completely blank canvas.

What I was awarded with was an incredibly stunning movie that left me not only thoroughly entertained, but also challenged.

The Soloist follows the journey of Los Angeles Times reporter Steve Lopez (Robert Downey Jr) as he discovers that there is more to life around him than just finding the next story to fill the front pages. Set to the background of huge economic and social turmoil in the United States, Steve stumbles across Nathaniel Ayers (Jamie Foxx) a vagrant living on the street with an incredible talent for music.

Once Steve discovers that Nathaniel is an alumni of Julliard he starts to realise that there is a potentially great story to be told, and the chance that through his work he may be able to bring positive change to Nathaniel’s life.  Read the rest of this entry »

Boy A is a coming-of-age story starring Andrew Garfield as Jack. We first meet jack in a small non-descript room where he seems to be having a get to know you conversation with a father he has never met. It soon becomes clear that this isn’t quite the case; it feels more like someone being instructed on how to live under witness protection. Jack isn’t his real name; it’s the name he’s chosen to live under.

Witness protection isn’t quite right either, but it is a form of protection and a new chance at life. But trying to forget your past and fit into a society that you can’t relate to isn’t easy for Jack. You see jack hasn’t lived in society for most of his life, and now at age 24, he’s having to come to terms to a world where he feels like an alien, an impostor.

Jack does an amazing job of fitting in and soon becomes a hero after rescuing a little girl. Becoming a hero comes at a cost however.  Read the rest of this entry »

Read the rest of this entry »

Many films have told us that vampires live among us, but this is the first that I’ve seen where a shadowy secret society of humans use a half human, half vampire to hunt down and kill vampires. Originality doesn’t stop there however as this vampire sub genre sees the mixing of demonic bloodsuckers with Japanese Samurai, creating a hero who uses sword play and martial arts to dispatch of her foe.

The only non-original component of the whole film is the film it’s self, being a re make of an anime horror film of the same name produced in 2000. The visually stylistic approach seems to reference the style of the original – though having not seen the anime I can’t say for sure, just that it looks like it has had strong animation influences.

The story itself is an interesting one, with a great bunch of characters and plenty of plot twists to keep you on your toes. The action scenes do get confusing from time to time, but this mainly comes down to the sheer amount of foes that our hero Saya takes on in some scenes.  Read the rest of this entry »