Review: A Perfect Getaway

I'm not sure what to make of David Twohy. The man is responsible for Critters 2: The Main Course, Waterworld, G.I. Jane and The Chronicles of Riddick (and unleashing Vin Diesel onto an unsuspecting world, damn it). One might despise him for these vile offences, nay, not just despise, but secretly wish to haul him into the Hague for crimes against humanity.

Review: Moon

Considering that Neil Armstrong's giant leap for mankind ranks as one of the most recent triumphs in the grand scheme of human exploration, it's a little odd that science-fiction has never really landed on the Moon. A case of 'been there, done that', perhaps? Maybe Apollo 11 robbed the Moon of its mystery. But given that every h...

Review: Public Enemies

On paper, this movie has it all. A credit crunch-defying story about renegades sticking it to the money men. A mouth-watering A-list face-off between two of the coolest bastards on the planet. A director who couldn't direct a shitty shoot-out if Michael Bay had him at gun-point. Why, then, does it feel so lacking? Despite all th...

Review: Angels & Demons

Tom Hanks adopts his serious face: "I need to get to a library... fast!" Never has one line damned a film so completely. The book might have sold 83 billion copies, but The Da Vinci Code movie was turgid, self-important and – oddly, for a movie about the lineage of Jesus Christ – terminally dull. I'm happy to report, t...

Review: The Uninvited

Yawn. That's how excited I was about The Uninvited. Not even bothered enough to think up a witty intro. Fact is, even for a man who's often frightened by his own toes, modern horror movies fill me with roughly as much terror as receiving a free pizza. I am happy to report, then, that this is barely a horror movie at all, and wha...

Review: Let The Right One In

The world hasn’t come down yet from the whole Twilight extravaganza: not only is the sequel in production, it seems that they are getting ready to prepare parts three and four of the franchise. But before Twilight fever sinks its fangs in us again, along comes a vampire movie cut from a different cloth entirely. Let the Right...

Review: State Of Play

Let’s say for argument's sake that Paul Abbott’s 2003 mini-series State Of Play wasn’t watched by everyone, and that many people will be coming to Kevin Macdonald’s complex thriller completely cold, with no prior knowledge. Sitting comfortably? Let’s begin. Cal McAfferey (Crowe), an old school investigative journalist for the...

Review: Fast And Furious

Fast And Furious is, confusingly, the fourth movie in the Fast And The Furious saga; a franchise ripe for sequels, bursting at the seams as it is with plotlines, enduring characters and witty, beautifully-written screenplays. Ahem. Vin Diesel and Paul Walker both return to their original roles, having popped in and out of the...

Review: Friday The 13th

“Remakes? Pah!” Before you spit with indignation, remember it's kind of hard to besmirch the legacy of a slasher series that boasts ten awful sequels thus far. In fact, a Friday The 13th remake is one of the safest bets imaginable, and paired with a release date nobody's likely to forget – the day before Valentine's, no less – t...

Review: Taken

Ah, the French. They know how to do so many things well – runny cheese, red wine, yacht-based film festivals and so on. Now they can add kidnap capers to that list. Taken, co-written by Luc Besson and directed by District B13’s Pierre Morel, is a fast, taut and remarkably enjoyable thriller which is refreshingly free of twisty r...