The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies is the final instalment in the ludicrously inflated Hobbit trilogy, a series that has vividly exposed many of director Peter Jackson’s filmmaking flaws particularly his long-winded story-telling and poor character development. The first Hobbit film, An Unexpected Journey was noisy, silly, featured too many embarrassing attempts at comedy and even had a
Read moreSt Vincent is a charming if flawed feel-good comedy drama that provides another showcase for Bill Murray’s amusing brand of misanthropy. Murray plays Vincent a familiar figure in American cinema, the rude, miserable, middle-aged grump neighbour who disdains anyone interfering with his self-contained, self-serving world. When his new neighbour, kindly single mum Maggie (Melissa McCarthy) is forced to work late,
Read moreThe Hunger Games: Mocking Jay Part 1 suffers the Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows curse where, in a final cash grab, the last instalment of a film franchise is split in two making the first half a mostly dull prelude to the actual finale. That’s not to say Mocking Jay Part 1 doesn’t have its attractions. Director Francis Lawrence
Read moreLast week ‘Built For Speed’ looked at the music of the 1970’s and this week we continue the Summer series with a selection of favourite tracks from the 1980’s. The mainstream music of the 80’s might have been horrible but there was a magnificent indie rock scene spawning thousands of amazing bands including The Replacements, REM, Sonic Youth and Died Pretty. We’ll
Read moreJason Reitman seems fascinated with the spiritual emptiness of contemporary America. With Up In The Air he captured the soullessness of corporate America through George Clooney’s Ryan Bingham a man who sacked people for a living and spent his life in the limbo of airports and hotels. With his latest film Men, Women and Children Reitman attempts to articulate the
Read moreExodus: Gods and Kings sounds disturbingly like the title of a violent video game and some people may feel this is what they have experienced after seeing Ridley Scott’s cgi-heavy take on the story of Moses. The obvious point of comparison for this film is Cecil De Mille’s 1956 biblical epic The Ten Commandments and like that film Exodus: Gods
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