Beast (2022) - Movie Review

I really like carrots. I admit that I don’t eat as healthy as I probably should, but carrots would likely be a foundation for my diet if I were to make any major overhauls. That slight sweetness combined with the crunch when it’s raw and fresh; it’s definitely one of my favourite healthier foods.

But that’s not to say that I could happily live off just carrots. Eating one or two on their own as a snack, sure, but when I sit down for dinner, I’m not likely to just have a plate piled high with raw carrots to eat. They’re good, but there needs to be something more to it. Seasoning, a particular cooking method, some other vegetables and proteins; anything to make it into more of a complete meal.

No, this has not suddenly become Mahan’s Munchies or anything like that. I’m bringing this up because I have a similar attitude to survival movies. Survival as a character drive in a film can be great, and is usually built into the more visceral genres like action and horror. But I’m starting to realise that a film that is just centred on characters surviving a perilous scenario, with all the scripting and production focus being put towards that one aspect, doesn’t do much for me as a viewer or a critic. So you can imagine how not-glowing my review for this survival thriller will be.

The Last Days Of American Crime (2020) - Movie Review

It’s been a while since I engaged in some cinemasochism, so let’s take another dip into that hallowed hall of hogwash that is the Rotten Tomatoes 0% club. And I’ll be honest, I wasn’t even expecting to hate this all that much. I’ve been more than charitable with Olivier Megaton’s movies in the past, walking away from stuff like the Taken sequels with far less disdain than a lot of other critics out there. Yeah, they weren’t all that great, or even decent, but maybe there’s something in me that’s got a soft spot for his frenzied overload style of action. I even hunted down the original comic book this is based on, and again, it didn’t blow me away or anything, but it’s a pretty solid crime yarn. Maybe these two worlds will collide into something that I’ll see some merit in that most others didn’t.

Or maybe I’ll walk away thinking that even the film’s biggest detractors were far too lenient with what is undoubtedly one of the worst films of the year. Like, everything about this, from the Impact font-ass opening credits, to Depeche Mode getting dragged into the cesspit over the end credits, is wrong.

Gringo (2018) - Movie Review

The plot: Harold (David Oyelowo), a worker at pharmaceutical company Promethium, is tasked by his higher-ups Richard (Joel Edgerton) and Elaine (Charlize Theron) to go to their factory in Mexico to deliver an experimental form of medical marijuana. However, unbeknownst to Harold, it seems that Promethium's business dealings aren't all on the up and up, as the Mexican cartels are also involved in this deal. With few options and a growing number of people after him, Harold will have to think fast if he wants to get out of Mexico alive.

Hardcore Henry (2016) - Movie Review

Video game movies are hardly anything new in today’s day and age. We’ve had video game adaptations like Need For Speed and Warcraft, films centred on video games like Pixels and The Wizard, even films that take place within a video game like Wreck-It Ralph and Tron. However, even with that precedent, this film expects to be of a different breed than all of those. This is a film that incorporates video game tropes as a form of cinematic storytelling. Now, the success of any video game-related film is rather sporadic; adaptations are rarely if ever good and films set in and about video games often just translate into watching others do what we would rather be doing ourselves. So, with this step into a new direction, how does it fare?

Chappie (2015) - Movie Review