Category: Reviews

REVIEW: Black Widow [Disney+]

For a while, it seemed like the Marvel Cinematic Universe was one of the great constants, alongside death and taxes. Then Covid hit and even Disney had to duck for cover.

Now, more than two years after Spider-Man: Far From Home, the MCU makes its return to the big screen – as well as home entertainment, after a slight delay – but has the magic returned with it?…

REVIEW: The Tomorrow War [Prime Video]

The Tomorrow War is a big, dumb sci-fi actioner with an actual semi-functioning emotional component.

Dan Forester (Chris Pratt) is an ex Green Beret now working as a high-school chemistry teacher. His life with wife Emmy (Betty Gilpin, underutilised) and young daughter Muri (Ryan Kiera Armstrong) is idyllic, though Dan is struggling to break into the field of research science.…

REVIEW: No Sudden Move

For all his many and varied cinematic experiments, Steven Soderbergh always returns to making lighthearted crime capers.

Based on a original script by Ed Solomon, No Sudden Move is reminiscent of the works of Elmore Leonard; insofar as it portrays overconfident criminals out of their depths.…

REVIEW: The Ice Road

A loose remake of The Wages of Fear, The Ice Road reconceptualizes George Clouzot’s seminal 1953 thriller as a Liam Neeson vehicle and transports the action to the icy wastes way, way north of the equator.

When a methane explosion at a diamond mine leaves miners, including the dependable Holt McCallany, trapped and rapidly running out of air.…

REVIEW: F9

The Fast & Furious franchise returns in its ongoing quest for peak automotive ridiculousness.

In the twenty years since we first heard Dom Toretto (Vin Diesel) evoke “fam-lee” in his rumbling baritone, it may have occurred to you that we know nothing about his own.…

REVIEW: The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard

Four years and an extra possessive noun later, an unexpected hit of 2017, The Hitman’s Bodyguard, returns for an even more unexpected sequel, The Hitman’s Wife’s Bodyguard’s.

Eponymous bodyguard Michael Bryce (Ryan Reynolds; still snarky, just more tired) is still on the outs following the events of the first film.…

REVIEW: The Killing of Two Lovers

The Killing of Two Lovers is a family melodrama shot as horror that feels like much like the work of David Lowery.

It was, in fact, written and directed by Robert Machoian, but many of the same elements.

Set in the rural midwest, the film follows David (Clayne Crawford), struggling to hold it together due to the breakdown of his marriage.…

RETROSPECTIVE: Johnny Mnemonic

Before there was The Matrix, there was Johnny Mnemonic.

Keanu Reeves’ first foray into the cyberpunk genre came in 1995, four years before the Wachowskis’ genre-redefining classic, but not in a way likely to make his career highlights reel.

Johnny Mnemonic slots neatly into a trend of blockbusters fascinated by the possibilities of the still-emerging internet.…

REVIEW: He Dreams of Giants

Writing about He Dreams of Giants feels a bit like Kirk Lazarus talking about his acting process.

2002’s Lost in La Mancha was a making-of in search of a finished product. Terry Gilliam’s The Man Who Killed Don Quixote, whose troubled production it documents, was one of the great unfinished movies – until it wasn’t.…