Elle

News, Reviews & Features

Discussion: Impossible - Mission: Impossible III (2006)

Movie Feature | Ali Gray, Matt Looker, Becky Suter, Ed Williamson | 22nd July 2018

Another installment of the most original feature series in online history: the one where four people get together over email to force themselves to talk about the Mission: Impossible movies, instead of just enjoying them like everyone else on the planet. Today: Mission: Impossible III, directed by Jonathan Jonathan Abrams.

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Mission: Impossible - Fallout

Movie Review | Ali Gray | 17th July 2018

Forget the rubber masks and the death-defying stunts: the Mission: Impossible movies' true gimmick is its insistence on hiring a different director for each outing, building a franchise that feels fresh and flavourful with every new installment. Fallout, however, is unique in that it marks the return of Rogue Nation director Chris McQuarrie, the first man to have a second go on Ethan Hunt. The results speak for themselves: what the series' first true sequel trades off in originality, it more than makes up for in dramatic tension and sky high stakes. Rooted deep within the franchise and connecting back to every other M:I movie, Fallout still feels uncomplicated and unbothered by baggage collected over 22 years. It's the most effective execution of the Mission: Impossible formula so far - a heady mix of humour, action and adventure, distilled to its purest form.

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mother!

Movie Review | Ali Gray | 11th September 2017

I've had nightmares like mother!, proper sweat-drenched, bolt-upright air-gaspers that have left me shaken for hours. The ones where ordinary, mundane events turn hellish in an instant. The ones where your loved ones are there too but they're in on the bad juju, their blank faces betraying the feverish insanity you feel. Mother!, the new movie from Darren Aronofsky, is the closest a film has ever come to replicating one of those bad dreams; how quickly the drip-drip-drip of reason gushes into madness, how helpless we are in the face of our own demons and how it's always the ones we love that hurt us most. That exclamation mark in the title does not signify a comedy - it's the kind you see shortly before you plummet off a cliff.

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Maudie

Movie Review | Ed Williamson | 1st August 2017

Since Maudie is a film whose hat hangs largely on its two main performances, and since the critics on the posters are starting to talk about Oscars for them, let's have a word about performances and whether there's any value in qualifying them.

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Fast And Furious cast still unable to tell women from cars

Movie Feature | Matt Looker | 29th June 2017

Fresh concerns have arisen regarding the ability of the Fast And Furious cast to tell the difference between women and cars after franchise regular Michelle Rodriguez called out the need for "female characters with better parts".

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Elle

Movie Review | Ali Gray | 10th March 2017

As part of a sustained effort on my part to watch more films featuring female leads and more films in a foreign language (an effort which so far has resulted in me seeing zero of either), I found myself at Elle, the new movie from Paul Verhoeven. Given that it fit those two criteria (Isabelle Huppert? Check! French? Check!) I gamely plopped myself into the screening room chair, not knowing what it was about. Some two and a half hours later, I still wasn't sure. I was told this was an exciting and edgy new thriller from the director of RoboCop.

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La La Land

Movie Review | Matt Looker | 12th January 2017

Please let's not ruin this. We have a great thing here: La La Land is the rare kind of spellbinding, wonderful film that has reviewers like me tripping over themselves to find new superlatives for describing it. It's simply flawless. But that means that there'll be an unholy inclination by some #hot-takers to put it down; to chip away at the film's perfect sheen just to say something "interesting". But can we just not, this time? Can't we just have this one? Don't we deserve to enjoy something this sweet and pure and lovely just for once? It certainly feels like it's been a while.

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Bleed For This

Movie Review | Ed Williamson | 4th December 2016

Trouble with all boxing films: they aren't Rocky. Rocky not only set the benchmark, but the template, out of which no one's really managed to break: guy has to overcome adversity, the other boxer is a metaphor for his life, and his real opponent is himself. True-lifer Bleed For This is a bit different. But not that different.

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War Dogs

Movie Review | Matt Looker | 26th August 2016

As I was leaving my work office to come to the screening of this film, I happened to tell a colleague where I was going. His response was: "Oh cool! I saw a trailer for War Dogs. It looks like The Hangover meets Lord Of War". He's not wrong, but it's the kind of reference point used far too much these days and is so simplistic as to become meaningless. He might as well have said "Oh cool! War Dogs looks like Todd Phillips meets gun-running". Or "It looks like funny stuff meets serious dangerous stuff". "Oh cool! I saw a trailer for War Dogs. It looks like Jonah Hill meets Miles Teller". Yes. Yes, he does.

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Finding Dory

Movie Review | Ali Gray | 31st July 2016

I was supposed to write a review for Finding Dory about a month ago, but I, er... forgot. Now, in the spirit of the movie's hopelessly forgetful protagonist, allow me to piece together what I can remember in an attempt to create some coherent thoughts. Please also forgive me if I use the same bullshit excuse when filing my Jason Bourne review in six weeks.

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