Two new movie stills have landed – the first showing Ben Affleck in David Fincher’s GONE GIRL “A woman mysteriously disappears on the day of her wedding anniversary” the film is a big screen adaption of Gillian Flynn’s novel of the same name and also stars Rosamund Pike & Kim Dickens – the second picture on the right is from the new biopic The Imitation Game about British wartime cryptographer Alan Turing played by Sherlock’s Benedict Cumberbatch and is directed by Norwegian filmmaker Morten Tyldum
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ALAN PARTRIDGE (2013) – Movie Review ★★★¾
Cast – Steve Coogan, Anna Maxwell Martin, Sean Pertwee & Colm Meaney – When DJ Alan Partridge’s radio station is taken over and it’s name is changed, it’s everyman for himself as the threat of job loss looms and one of the DJ’s decides to take matters into his own hands by taking the station hostage VERDICT Alan Partridge is a character portrayed & created by British comedian Steve Coogan and although I have not seen much of the TV show I found myself enjoying Partridge’s big screen outing – yes the script is wafer thin and at times some of the jokes fell flat but more often than not I found myself giggling and squirming at the antics of the staff at Partridge’s Radio Station – some of the best scenes in the movie include moments when our DJ finds himself naked and locked out of the hostage taken Radio Station, the board meeting when Partridge meets the new owners and tries to impress upon them his worth to the company by sacking another staff member and the delightfully funny finale with Coogan and Meaney on the tour bus – overall Alan Partridge is one of the better comedies of 2013 – it’s a character I may consider watching more of in the future and a movie that I would highly recommend….
“After a stint in prison a street racer who was framed gets the chance to act revenge on the guy who sent him down” – Breaking Bad’s Aaron Paul headlines Scott Waugh’s NEED FOR SPEED – from the writer and producer of Underworld comes the Stuart Beattie (Tomorrow, When the War Began) directed fantasy horror film I, FRANKENSTEIN that stars Aaron Eckhart, Bill Nighy and Yvonne Strahovski – here’s two new movie posters…. Enjoy!
With the brilliant Hatfields & McCoys, Man of Steel and next years Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit it seems Kevin Costner is back headlining the movie world once more and that makes me a happy man – in 3 Days to Kill he plays Ethan Runner a secret agent trying to reconnect with his estranged daughter whilst eliminating the bud guys – the film is directed by McG who’s credits include Charlie’s Angels, Terminator Salvation and We Are Marshall and starring alongside Costner is the gorgeous Amber Heard, the ultra talented Hailee Steinfeld and the Danish beauty Connie Nielsen – the film has a dark comic feel to it with Costner rocking the action scenes & Amber Heard looking deliciously sexy as always – check out the trailer…. Enjoy!
Peter O’Toole the BAFTA winning actor of 1962’s Lawrence of Arabia has died aged 81 – in his long career O’Toole received 8 Academy Award nominations and starred in countless movies such as The Night of the Generals, Murphy’s War, Under Milk Wood, Man of La Mancha, Becket, Goodbye Mr Chips and The Lion in Winter – he also starred in 1984’s Supergirl and voiced the character Anton Ego in Pixar’s Ratatouille – I’m sure alongside his friends Richard Harris & Richard Burton the pearly gates of Heaven will be entertained this evening and the first drink will be raised in honor of a stage & movie legend….
ENEMIES CLOSER – (2013/4) – Movie Review ★★★½
“Looks like you brought a knife to a gunfight”
Cast – Jean-Claude Van Damme, Orlando Jones and Tom Everett Scott – from Peter Hyams the director of Timecop, End of Days and Running Scared comes the latest action movie that stars the muscles from bruscles Enemies Closer – somewhere between the US/Canadian border a plane carrying a drug shipment crashes leaving a park ranger and a brother hell bent on revenge to work together and stop a ruthless drugs cartel from retrieving their prize shipment VERDICT I must confess to having a soft spot for Van Damme and his usually poorly written action movies that contain dreadful dialogue & cheesier than cheese one liners – one thing you can always say about the Belgian is that the majority of his action flicks seem to contain awesome fight scenes that even at the age of 53 he still manages to make look so easy – in Enemies Closer Van Damme plays Xander a vegan, gun tooting drug boss who’s wild hair doo and psychotic ramblings only add to his watchability and make him quite the villain – the film also includes good performances from Sleepy Hollow’s Orlando Jones playing the brother seeking revenge and Southland’s Tom Everett Scott mixing it up with Van Damme and not looking out of place doing so either – overall if your a fan of JCVD and this resurgence of yesteryear’s action stars then Enemies Closer will prove lot’s of cheer, with 80mins of low budget action fun, that’s not only solidly acted by it’s three main stars but is well directed by Peter Hyams a veteran of this arena….
Muppets Most Wanted is the movie sequel to 2011’s The Muppets that stars Ricky Gervais, Ty Burrell and Tina Fey – “on a global sell out tour The Muppets run across a Kermit lookalike and his dastardly sidekick and get unwittingly entangled in an international heist” – James Bobin returns to the directors chair whilst Danny Trejo, Tom Hiddleston, Christoph Waltz, Zach Galifianakis and Salma Hayek are amongst the stars making cameos in the movie – here’s the latest movie trailer and some new stills…. Enjoy!
Muppets Most Wanted – US (21st march) – UK (28th March) – Australia (3rd April)
RED 2 – (2013) – Movie Review ★★★¾
Cast – Bruce Willis, John Malkovich, Mary-Louise Parker, Helen Mirren, Byung Hun Lee, Anthony Hopkins & Catherine Zeta Jones – Inspired by the comic book series of the same name by Warren Ellis and Cully Hamner and is the movie sequel to 2010’s Red – Ex C.I.A. agent Frank Moses (Willis) and his band of misfits reunite in an attempt to find a missing nuclear device and stop those who plan to use it – VERDICT the first 15mins of RED 2 is better than the entire last outing of John McClane, Willis is at his action best and it sets the scene for the film’s sequel directed by Galaxy Quest helmer Dean Parisot – the introduction of new characters to the sequel including Zeta Jones, Hun Lee and Anthony Hopkins all add to the movie, especially Hopkins hamming it up playing the villainous and slightly deranged Bailey – one of my favorite scenes in the movie is when the team led by Helen Mirren infiltrate a maximum security insane asylum and Mirren’s character Victoria goes in disguised as a mad, eccentric Queen of England, she truly is brilliant in these action movies – overall RED 2 is an excellent movie sequel, it’s full of over the top action scenes, delicious humor and gives Bruce Willis a reprieve from that awful A Good Day to Die Hard – Dean Parisot’s RED 2 is better than it’s original and one of the better action comedies released this year….
When Rodney (Affleck) disappears and the local law enforcement fail to find him, his older brother, Russell (Bale) looks to find his own kind justice by taking matters into his own hands.
Scott Cooper who directed Jeff Bridges to Oscar glory in 2009’s Crazy Heart had said that he would not direct Out of the Furnace his second feature without Christian Bale as his lead.
Below is a selection of the cast – just another 5 reasons why I’m pretty excited for this movie….
Movie Release Dates: USA (December 6) – UK (January 31) – Australia (N/A)
Take a peek at the Out of the Furnace movie trailer
2 GUNS – (2013) – Movie Review ★★★
Cast – Denzel Washington, Mark Wahlberg, Paula Patton, Bill Paxton & Edward James Olmos – Based on the comic series of the same name by Steven Grant, the film’s story follows a DEA agent and a Naval Intelligence agent who find themselves having to work together to take down some corruption in the CIA and a Mexican Drug Lord who is after their heads VERDICT Just like Baltasar Kormákur’s 2012 movie Contraband that also stars Mark Wahlberg 2 GUNS starts with real promise, but ends up being a pretty messy action movie – for me the chemistry between the two W’s doesn’t quite work, Paula Patton’s talent is wasted, sadly only used as some onscreen eye candy, so it’s all left to the movie’s villains to save the film from mediocrity – Bill Paxton’s kneecapping, russian roulette playing Earl and Edward James Olmos’s Drug Lord Pepi both appear to have fun with their respective roles – during it’s original development 2 GUNS was to star Vince Vaughan and Owen Wilson and in my opinion that would have made for one hell of a better movie – overall 2 GUNS is an average Saturday night popcorn flick, with a mundane script and too many predictable set pieces – yet again… along with two of Hollywood’s biggest stars comes a big budget comic-book adaption that has sadly failed to deliver….
Monsters University (2013) – Movie Review ★★★★
Vocals by Billy Crystal, John Goodman, Steve Buscemi, Joel Murray, Charlie Day, Helen Mirren & Alfred Molina – after a school trip to Monsters Inc. a young monster by the name of Michael “Mike” Wazowski dreams of becoming a Scarer – 11 years later at Monsters University Mike comes across James P. “Sulley” Sullivan – at first the two loathe each other, trying to outdo the other by any means necessary BUT if they are to make their monster dreams a reality and become Scarer’s then they must put aside their dislikes and team up to win the annual “University Scare Games” VERDICT I love the Disney Pixar Universe and Monsters University is one of their best in recent years – it also happens to be their first movie prequel and contains another delicious soundbite by Randy Newman – you will have so much fun watching Mike and Sulley first meet, joining the Oozma Kappa team at the Scare Games and their hilarious encounter with new characters such as Dean Hardscrabble’s evil looking dragon centipede that runs the University – she truly is scary – some of the movies best moments include the scene when Mike & Sulley are chasing down Archie the Pig and of course the Scare Trials towards the end of the movie are so much fun – overall Monsters University is a rare breed, a movie prequel that’s better than it’s original – if you like your animation to be cute, full of smart dialogue and so funny your sides will split then Monsters University is for you!
MAN OF TAI CHI (2013) – Movie Review ★★★¾
Stars Tiger Hu Chen, Keanu Reeves, Karen Mok and Simon Yam – making his directorial debut “Matrix” star Keanu Reeves takes us to China – Tiger Chen is an exciting young Martial Artist who get’s noticed by Donaka Mark (Reeves) and is lured into being his champion in the lucrative underground world of the “Fight Club” – Sun Jingshi (Mok) is a police officer trying to bring Donaka to justice after one of her undercover operatives suddenly disappeared VERDICT I had lots of fun with this movie, very reminisent of the old Bruce Lee movies back in the 70’s, visually superb, performed with a stylish flair and delivered in breathtaking fashion by it’s stars – Tiger worked as a stunt man on “Crouching Tiger” and the last two “Matrix” movies and judging by this performance in this movie we could be seeing more of him as the actor rather than the man behind the scenes, he’s the complete package – as for Reeves his first movie behind the camera was impressive and as an actor he plays the villain with a delicious swagger – overall I really enjoyed Man of Tai Chi the cinematopgraphy and action scenes were flawless and Reeves love letter to the East was a terrific one!
CBGB (2013) – Movie Review ★★★¾
“50,000 Bands and 1 Disgusting Bathroom”
Stars Alan Rickman, Donal Logue, Freddy Rodriguez, Ashley Greene, Stana Katic and Malin Åkerman – a historical movie looking at the Punk Scene in the 70s – Talking Heads, Blondie, Patti Smith and The Ramones all started off in this dank & dirty club called CBGB that was owned and run by Hilly Kristal (Rickman) VERDICT Director Randall Miller has the knack of surprising me with small movies that fly under the radar and deliver a fun night in front of the screen – in 2008 it was the brilliant Bottle Shock that also starred Rickman, Rodriguez & Chris Pine and now in 2013 comes a real fun musical trip down memory lane, where a club in New York City known as CBGB gives us our first taste of the Punk Scene back in the 70s – it’s cast along with the music is the movies main draw – Alan Rickman looks to be having a ball with his role as club owner Hilly Kristal even capturing a little resemblence – Malin Åkerman is delicious as Blondie and Ashley Greene gives a fabulous performance as Lisa Hilly’s daughter – overall CBGB is a really enjoyable movie with a fine script by Jody Savin & Randall Miller that captures the mood of the time perfectly – the film also delivers a neat comicbook storyboard effect and along with the the movies subtle comedy and it’s knockout soundtrack it’s one I would highly recommend….
Insidious : Chapter 2 (2013) – Movie Review ★★★★
Stars Patrick Wilson, Rose Byrne, Barbara Hershey, Danielle Bisutti & Ty Simpkins – continuing the woes of the Lambert family as they try to uncover the past in order to tackle the spirits that haunt them VERDICT James Wan’s sequel is pretty impressive, it’s shot on a lowish budget by Hollywood’s standards and it’s very scary – the movie also pays homage to some of the screens finest horror films including the likes of Poltergeist, The Shining and Psycho – Wan has once again demonstrated his eye for horror – taking the ghost story to a new level and showing that the modern horror film doesn’t need to have lots of blood and gore but can be delivered with a good story and genuine jumpy moments that come at you from all angles, Wan’s camera work is as good as any of his Horror Predecessors and his eye for a good cast that lends itself to the picture is spot on – in my humble opinion Insidious : Chapter 2 is slightly better than the first – I found the hairs on the back of my neck rising as Patrick Wilson character slowly transformed into the evil that was haunting him and Danielle Bisutti’s terrifying turn as the mother of Parker Crane was deliciously evil and her scenes are still giving me night terrors – overall this is a superior movie sequel that I would highly recommend but if your in any way squeamish or have a heart condition then stay away….
Sweet Vengeance (Sweet Water) (2013) – Movie Review ★★★¾
Stars Ed Harris, January Jones, Jason Isaacs and Eduardo Noriega – sometime in the late 1800’s a lawman who is in search of two brothers gets tangled up with a sadistic, murdering preacher (Isaacs) and a woman looking for her husband (Jones) VERDICT I really love a good western and although Sweet Vengeance has it’s failings (mainly it’s poor script) the film is lot’s of fun and has some fabulous photography and is surprisingly funny at times – January Jones gives a career best performance – Jason Isaacs looks delicious as the murdering god fearing preacher and Ed Harris looks like he’s having a ball playing the bumbling stumbling Lawman who’s obviously slightly mad – overall this is no Unforgiven but it’s a solidly made western with some fun characters, plenty of sheep and a great shootout in the films last quarter…

















































































































































