Sausage Party: a surefire way to get rid of the munchies

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Has there ever been a film as patently conceived of while stoned as Sausage Party?

While most of us would have had a bit of a giggle at the thought of sentient food reacting with horror at the prospect of being eaten – and then probably gone and ordered some pizza – Seth Rogen went and made a movie out of it.…

Morgan is a generic sci-fi thriller straight off the assembly line

A man stands in front of a glass cell, ready to question its occupant; a woman who is not truly a woman. If she fails the test, she will likely be terminated.

Where that scenario provided the focal point of last year’s Ex Machina – a restrained study of trans-humanism and toxic masculinity – in Morgan it is part of a much more generic effort.…

Café Society: a cinematic pousse-café – guaranteed no hangover

The latest cinematic frivolity from Woody Allen, Café Society is like a well-layered champagne cocktail; smooth and light, but with a deceptively subtle finish.

Set at the height of Hollywood’s Golden Age, the film follows the bright-eyed, slightly smarmy Bobby (Jesse Eisenberg), the latest in a long succession of Allen surrogates, who arrives in L.A.…

London Film Festival 2016: 10 films to get excited about

Well, it’s that time of the year again.

It’s a well-known but little commented upon phenomenon that each year Christmas comes to London roughly three months early – at least for capital-based cinema buffs – as, each October, the BFI hosts the London Film Festival.…

The Purge: Election Year has some great visuals but a rickety social platform

The Purge: Election Year is a film that’s more intriguing as a product of its time than as a work of cinema.

Setting its usual flurry of vigilantism against the backdrop of a Presidential election is an inspired choice – especially one as incendiary as this – but, other than which, it’s just business as usual for the franchise.…

War Dogs does a good job of keep it on the leash

How many more biographical crime comedy-dramas do we need to see about sun-tanned bros and their embodiment of the worst excesses of free-market capitalism?

Based on Rolling Stone reporter Guy Lawson’s “Arms and the Dudes”, War Dogs relates the “based on a true story” account of how two twenty-something small-time arms dealers ended up the recipient of a $300 million military contract to essentially outfit the Afghan army to fend for themselves; the shortcuts they took and the laws they broke to try fulfill the order, including more than 100 million rounds of AK ammo.…

Lights Out: too self-illuminating to be truly terrifying

Is there any fear more primal than that of the dark?

After all, what you can’t see can kill you, especially if the what is Diana, a twitchy, pinhole-eyed wraith with an attraction to the mentally ill.

Based on a genuinely creepy short that went viral back in 2013, Lights Out, the feature début of David F.…

Mike And Dave Need Wedding Dates: lazy title, some good gags

 

Mike And Dave Need Wedding Dates is the type of film that needs no introduction — well, maybe a brief one.

Two lovably amped-up bros, Mike (Adam DeVine) and Dave Stangle (Zac Efron), roped into bringing dates to their sister’s wedding to keep them out of trouble, are tricked into bringing along supposed “nice girls” Tatiana (Aubrey Plaza) and Alice (Anna Kendrick) on an all-expenses-paid trip to Hawaii.…

REVIEW: The Shallows is a lean, mean tale of survival

Just when you thought you were safe from shark movies being genuinely scary…

Forty years after since Steven Spielberg first chummed the waters, those feeding grounds are now mostly patrolled by bottom-feeders, like the made-to-be-so-bad-it’s-good Sharknado franchise. What Jaume Collet-Serra’s The Shallows does is provide a good argument against that next beach holiday.…

Batman V Superman is a flaming bag of shit left on the doorstep of cinema

SPOILERS!

Say what you want about Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justiceand I have — it’s a film that demands critical analysis.1

A reported passion project of so-called visionary director Zack Snyder,2 the film he helped birth from development hell is in dire need of an exorcism.…