Layer Cake
Friday 28 April 2006 | DVD - 4 Stars
See the full review over at Filmstalker.
Closer
Friday 28 April 2006 | DVD - 4 Stars | Comments (0)
See the full review over at Filmstalker.
Bin-jip (3 Iron)
Sunday 12 March 2006 | DVD - 4 Stars | Comments (0)
See the full review over at Filmstalker.
The Grudge
Monday 20 February 2006 | DVD - 4 Stars | Comments (0)
Having watched many original foreign films before they are turned into Hollywood films, particularly the recent spate of Asian movies, I was immediately sceptical about this one. It's another direct remake and this time with the unknown talents of Sarah Michelle Gellar, straight from Buffy and Scooby Doo. Yet things do stand out, the Raimi Studio Ghost House Pictures and the original Director in charge, Takashi Shimizu.
Continue reading "The Grudge"...
Hotel Rwanda
Thursday 9 February 2006 | DVD - 4 Stars | Comments (0)
See the full review over at Filmstalker.
Walking Tall - Collectors Edition
Saturday 28 January 2006 | DVD - 4 Stars | Comments (0)
First off, I'm a huge Arnie fan. I love the action flick and my hero of action is Arnie with Willis coming a close second. So when I heard that Welcome to the Jungle represented Arnie handing the mantle to some WWF wrestler I was extremely disappointed, how could anyone entertain me as Arnie had?
Well I never did see Jungle, but I have just watched Walking Tall and met this Rock fella, and you know what? I'm impressed. If this is the guy to carry on what Arnie did, I'm with him all the way.
Continue reading "Walking Tall - Collectors Edition"...
The Chronicles of Riddick
Friday 9 December 2005 | DVD - 4 Stars | Comments (0)
I loved Pitch Black, it took many of the great features of the Alien series and combined them with a hard, edgy character. much like Ripley in Alien:Resurrection. It also pulled open the confines of the corridors and space ships into an entire planet, populated with insurmountable odds stacked against the useless humans.
Those features endeared me to the movie and made me love the character of Riddick. So it's somewhat disappointing to see The Chronicles of Riddick and discover that the edge has gone.
Continue reading "The Chronicles of Riddick"...
House of the Flying Daggers
Thursday 8 December 2005 | DVD - 4 Stars | Comments (1)
Obviously if you are a fan of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon or particularly Hero then you would be very keen to see this movie, after all it was touted as the next in the line of these movies with great stunts, wire work, fantastic foreign actors and the gorgeous storytelling through these historical based Chinese epics.
So how did it fare against these two previously very strong movies, and was it as gorgeous onscreen as it should have been from all accounts?
Continue reading "House of the Flying Daggers"...
Freaked
Thursday 10 November 2005 | DVD - 4 Stars | Comments (0)
Firstly I have a big apology to make. I was given the DVD of Freaked some time ago to review, and unfortunately it's been relegated to the bottom of the pile time and time again, not because I didn't want to watch it, but because of the sheer amount of extras in the two disc DVD!
Now add to that the fact that I've lost the contact details of the person who sent me this when my PC crashed and I'm seriously into excuse mode now. So let me shut up and get on with the review...and what a lot to review, this DVD is huge.
Hide and Seek
Sunday 30 October 2005 | DVD - 4 Stars | Comments (0)
This is a movie that really tried to grab you from the moment the marketing hit. A film that was shipped to the cinemas for its opening without an ending, an ending which was shipped the day before the showing just to ensure no one knew how the film would really end. It was being sold on a big twist that you'd never guess.
Luckily, until I saw the movie the other night, I'd managed to stay away from the revelation. So I watched it with fresh eyes.
Continue reading "Hide and Seek"...
Profit
Saturday 15 October 2005 | DVD - 4 Stars | Comments (2)
Profit poses many interesting questions, even before you watch the series. It was applauded by critics and failed when broadcast, so who got it wrong? The critics, well they do it a lot; the network for dumping it, its scheduling or lack of advertising, or perhaps it was the audience?
After watching the entire series on DVD, including a few audio commentaries with the writers\creators and the star I'm convinced. This time the critics were spot on.
Wimbledon
Saturday 24 September 2005 | DVD - 4 Stars | Comments (0)
Straight off I have to make something clear, I wasn't really looking forward to watching this. A romantic comedy movie from some of the Working Title team based on Wimbledon didn't exactly set my pulse racing. I did not want another comedy from this stable, for me Love Actually had stretched the idea enough for me.
So after seeing it I'm very surprised I enjoyed it so much. Despite the rom-com badge and the almost unbelievable premise of Wimbledon it's actually very entertaining and the focus is very much on the com side of that genre label.
Continue reading "Wimbledon"...
Trauma
Tuesday 5 July 2005 | DVD - 4 Stars | Comments (1)
Within the first ten minutes something struck me about Trauma, it's not your average thriller\horror, well not in Hollywood anyway. There's something different about it, you can see it in the cinematography, the directing and the writing, it's more Asian than it is Hollywood and you'd be forgiven for thinking it came from the latest run of Asian Directors making Hollywood films, but that's not the case.
X2
Thursday 26 May 2005 | DVD - 4 Stars | Comments (0)
I really liked X-Men, it was one of the few comic adaptations that made it big, and also made it right, but it wasn't complete by any means. It felt loose, there were areas left unexplored and unexplained to the detriment of the story, and some characters were merely window dressing for the mains.
Although it was a good movie and a great superhero movie, it could have been better. So I was keen to see if X2 had managed to do it this time. Word of mouth had it that it was good, but I didn't realise just how good.
Empire Square
Saturday 7 May 2005 | DVD - 4 Stars | Comments (0)
This was the first DVD that a company had sent me to review for them on The Movie Blog, and having not been too taken with South Park I thought I was set for a laughless series of the British version. I was wrong.
Continue reading "Empire Square"...
Dog Soldiers
Thursday 17 March 2005 | DVD - 4 Stars | Comments (0)
I have never enjoyed an audio commentary as much as I have with Dog Soldiers. It's hilarious and the guys involved sound like they had such a laugh doing the movie, never mind the commentary.
When the trailer first came out for this movie I was dead excited, it was a British film with a different slant on a well visited horror genre. It had also received some interesting quotes at it's festival showing, all giving you the impression that it was a good movie.
Continue reading "Dog Soldiers"...
SWAT
Tuesday 1 March 2005 | DVD - 4 Stars | Comments (0)
The trailer did the normal job for me when the movie first came out, I thought great cast, cool movie, posturing and big explosions. What more could you want. Then I heard the reviews and a few friends saw it, bad news, bad film.
So since I'm catching up on loads of movies I haven't seen in the cinema, I thought this should be one. This is where reviewing a DVD and a Movie should be different, and perhaps I should have set my reviews up differently, but I haven't so DVD reviews are for both DVD and Movie.
What does that mean? That SWAT gets only four stars instead of five. What? I hear you say. The SWAT DVD is awesome. Before we hit that, let's talk about the movie.
Buffalo Soldiers
Sunday 6 February 2005 | DVD - 4 Stars | Comments (0)
This was an excellent movie, and it really made you feel something. There are so many movies out there that just fly by and don't even touch you or merely brush your emotions as they fly by your eyes and ears, but this one really did get hold of them and drag them along through the movie. What was even better was that this dragging of your emotions wasn't something that followed the action on screen, and let me explain that.
Continue reading "Buffalo Soldiers"...
Big Fish
Thursday 20 January 2005 | DVD - 4 Stars | Comments (1)
What a movie. I am not entirely sure what I was expecting considering this is a Tim Burton movie, but I was drawn to it since it stars Ewan MacGregor and Albert Finney.
What I found was a surprise. Although it packs the usual Burton bizarreness, it contained a lot of simple family drama, and in particular analysis of the ever present Father-Son relationship issues.