Honest Thief (2020) - Movie Review

A Neesonsploitation flick making it to cinemas, at a time when cinema turnout is lower than it’s been in years, might be the least surprising thing to happen in 2020. But quite frankly… well, I’ve been spending all day on festival detail for FilmInk, and I’m in the mood for something simple. Something to get me out of the house (with a mask and adhering to social distancing; I’m a workaholic, not an idiot) and away from my computer for a couple hours. Now, I'm going to try and be fair with this, and judge it on the same metric as all the other Neeson flicks I've reviewed, but as I'll get into, even that isn't going to do this film any favours.

100% Wolf (2020) - Movie Review

After the horrors of my last review, I figure there’s nowhere to go but up so why not check out more talking animal schtick? In fairness, though, I have at least a little faith that this film will turn out somewhat decent coming from Aussie studio Flying Bark. And indeed, ‘somewhat decent’ is certainly what I got.

Suicide Squad (2016) - Movie Review

Even before I developed anything resembling taste when it comes to cinema, I’ve always had a real soft spot for superhero and comic book-related movies. Films that have gotten a bad rap since their release like Constantine, the Tim Story Fantastic Four duology, even pre-Director’s Cut Daredevil; have to admit, I find quite a bit to like about them. That said, I still carry the comic book nerd gene for outrage: I still hate Man Of Steel with every fibre of my being, last year’s Fantastic Four movie is bad to the point of bafflement, and lord knows that I’m not looking forward to the latest iteration of Spider-Man on the big screen thanks to the imbeciles that are writing the bloody thing. And even with all that in mind, I still have to stop and say “Would you people get over yourselves already?”. I’ll admit, I was sceptical about this film myself due to factors I’ll get into in the review proper, but this kind of "Oh, they hate what we like, therefore we hate them" keyboard-smashing attitude is the kind of overreaction that I thought we had gotten past for this year after the whole Ghostbusters fiasco.

But no, we still feel the need to go on the uber-defensive for films that, even with my differing opinions on them, are mostly pretty divisive to begin with. Seriously, ignore what the aggregates are saying: Batman Vs. Superman’s reception has been about as consistent as Man Of Steel’s, and I’m willing to bet that the rest of the DC cinematic universe will follow a similar path. But, given my own reaction to Gods Of Egypt, there’s still a possibility that I could be a part of this backlash myself… except I hope I can show a tad more decorum than the average Youtube commenter. Anyway, enough waffling on; time to get into the film itself and see whether or not it’s worth its salt.

Felony (2014) - Movie Review

After looking through the last remnants of Sarah Snook’s filmography (that fall under my purview, at least), it seems that this uncharacteristically patriotic stint hasn’t left me just yet. So, with that in mind, let’s take a look at another Aussie talent who has a permanent fixing on my radar: Joel Edgerton. Since The Gift is still well and truly ingrained in my memory, and with the finale that film contained it’s unlikely to leave me at any point ever, I figure I’d go back and look into something else that had Edgerton attached behind the scenes. This also means that we’ll be checking in with another regular target in these parts, only for far less positive reasons: Jai Courtney. Between the two of them, this film could go either way, so let’s just hold off on the scepticism for once (stop laughing) and dive right in.

Terminator: Genisys (2015) - Movie Review

Back in the tail-end of May of this year, I looked at the latest instalment of the sand-encrusted cult series Mad Max with Fury Road, a surprisingly amazing offering. Then, a little while ago, we had Jurassic World, a mildly entertaining but ultimately pointless addition to the already flagging franchise. Today, we conclude this look into how Hollywood today deals with reviving older sci-fi series with a reboot of the Terminator series. Terminator undoubtedly has the strongest footing of the three series for a follow-up, regardless of how my opinion of Mad Max differs from the norm: The first film is a seminal classic of neo-noir and sci-fi in general, and Judgment Day is the epitome of the ‘perfect sequel’, along with being one of the greatest films in any genre without question. Then came Rise Of The Machines which, through a baffling mixture of self-parody, re-hashing of the second film and just plain disrespect for the series mythos as a whole, heavily contrasted what came before it by being one of the worst sequels ever, not to mention a pretty atrocious film in its own right. Salvation had its fair share of issues, but it was nevertheless a fun watch. Yeah, lots of baggage behind this one even without getting into its core theme of bending the space-time continuum over every table. So, how does this work as a means to reboot the series?

Insurgent (2015) - Movie Review

With the severe case of sequelitis Hollywood has been suffering from, getting to sequels/remakes of films I’ve already reviewed is inevitable. Of course, there’s two sides to that coin and I’ll end up seeing follow-ups to both the good and the bad. This time around, we are very much in the latter with the sequel to what I listed as the worst movie of 2014: Divergent. Now, this is a listing that I question from time to time, considering it beat out utter trash like the Annie remake and God’s Not Dead for that coveted placement, but out of sheer incompetence in creating a world for the story to exist in, I feel it more than deserves that spot. I usually go back to older films for a refresher in cases like this… but screw that noise, let’s just get into this thing already.

Unbroken (2015) - Movie Review

As Oscar season comes along in Australia, we of course have a period drama set in World War II. That's not to say that that automatically means it'll be bad; just that I have grown savvy enough in my short foray into film criticism to know that war stories make for great Oscar bait. With Angelina Jolie at the helm as director, a fact that blindsided me so much that I didn't even find out until recently that this isn't her directorial debut, and the Coen brothers as co-writers on the script, this film at least has some talent at its core. But how does it fare against its usually lofty competition?

The Water Diviner (2014) - Movie Review

Every so often, an actor will step forward and decide that they want to become a director and make their own movie. This can sometimes lead to great things: Clint Eastwood has had a very prolific and critically-praised track record of directorial efforts over the last decade or so and Ben Affleck made a major comeback in Hollywood with films like The Town and Argo. However, it can also lead to rather disastrous things: William Shatner made a dog’s breakfast out of Star Trek V, Eddie Murphy’s Harlem Nights is one of his many cinematic punchlines, and the less said about the brain-melting confusion that is Crispin Glover’s What Is It?, the better. Today’s film is the directorial debut of love-him-or-hate-him actor Russell Crowe.

I, Frankenstein (2014) - Movie Review

It’s a bit of a double-edged sword seeing Australian names in mainstream cinema: Sometimes you get James Wan, director of The Conjuring as well as the original Saw; and sometimes you get Baz Luhrman, director of Moulin Rouge and Australia, among other pieces of aggravating drivel. I love seeing this great (at times) country I live in being represented in Hollywood, but it doesn’t always yield the best results. With today’s film, we have Stuart Beattie as writer/director who’s had a very murky track record of late, having been a co-writer on G.I. Joe: The Rise Of Cobra, the aforementioned Australia as well as a re-writer on Punisher: War Zone. Let's see how well he does here.