FILTH                                                Ds Bruce Robertson a manically depressed ,bigoted policeman drinks,snorts,and generally debases his way through the festive season in a bid to secure promotion and win back his estranged wife and child,this was entertaining ,nauseating ,touching, and blackly funny James McAvoy give a career best as the contemptuous Bruce,with a fine mostly Scottish supporting cast John Session stands out as his beleaguered boss and fellow masonic brother everyone sparkles and deliver there lines with gusto,i have to say i was fairly skeptical going in as i had read the book and while enjoyed it never thought it would make a great film,but the director John S Baird does a great job of the screenplay,but ultimately McAvoy brings humility and humanity to a character who is quite frankly not worthy of empathy in other words its filthy and its gorgeous.   

ONLY GOD FORGIVES

Nicholas winding refn latest offering is a more ponderous affair than drive or bronson , a very violent but very beautiful film more art house than grind house ,i mean i really like gosling but hes definitely cornering the market in stoical silent tough guys,the directors love of neon and light is to the fore i really love the photography a joy to behold, and the sonic sound track scintillating as usual if your looking for a complex crime thriller look else where ,this is a simple story of justice,injustices and punishment gosling is pretty perfect in his role but it was the thai police chief who caught my imagination like a cross between an asian devil and or god,but its kristin scott thomas  whom i dearly love that gives a standout performance as the brassy blonde matriarch. 

STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS 

And so it begins kirk and bones on an alien world being chased by wild alien tribesman,while Spock trys to plant a cold fusion device in a nearby volcano to avert there planets ,and there destruction,kirk and bones make it back to the ship however Spock is left in peril and is ready to sacrifice himself ,but is saved by kirk by a violation of the sacred starfleet prime directive,back on earth kirk is demoted and Spock reassigned,but theses events take a back seat when a terrorist attack and a mysterious starfleet agent poses a huge threat to the federation,well i didn't really know what to expect here ,however i was rewarded with the usual jj  Abraham  kinetic pacing ,stunning visuals,and a story that really got my star trek blood pumping plus a couple of good reveals and twists that keep you guessing,good performances all round from principle cast , Benedict cumberpatch was maybe not fleshed out enough ,but still superb also enjoyed peter Weller a personal favourite of mine,this is in every respect what i wanted from this movie and maybe a little bit more!

SKYFALL

Bond begins in Istanbul trying to recover a hard disk with the names and  covert identity's of MI6 agents across the world .the mission goes awry and bond is injured presumed dead,bond take advantage of this and lives the life of a beach bum for a while,but is startled to discover MI6 headquarter has been coprimised in a terrorist attack ,bond reports back to m and is told he ll have to be tested before he can go back into the field,he struggles to pass once back on active service bond follows the lead to an assassin that then lead to silva a highly intelligent ex  employee of m from her days in charge on MI6 in hong kong .and so much cat and mousery begins between silva and bond ,this i felt was possibly the most serious of the bonds there r still touches of over the top stunt work a la Istanbul opening scene involving a train and an earth mover,the action feels a little more restrained but it makes it a better movie more about the characters and dialogue ,also being a bond fanatic i loved the nods to the old ,q branch etc all in a very satisfying entry it actually feels as if Sam mendes has givin the franchise his own reboot ,shaken not stirred,perfect.     

some where in the future...2044 to be precise Joe is a looper a hired assassin who waits for his victim to materialise from the future then blasts them with a crude scatter gun, Joe is living the high life hes rich and hes a drug addict until one day his future self appears in front of him,this is called closing the loop.needless to say things don't go smoothly from this point what follows is a paradoxical nightmare for Joe ,ironic you know how some people say if i could go back in time i would tell myself all the pitfall and mistakes etc ,well older Joe does just so and has it thrown back in his face ,which is actually the way it would happen! anyway both versions of Joe are driven towards a situation of emotionally fraught scenario's both with there separate agendas literally fighting his self's, this makes for great entertainment all of the actors are superb its a rare beast a sc-fi action movie with heart and brain it pulls off the wizard of oz hat trick,courage,heart,and intelligence.

DREDD

                                                                                               

set in the future in a dystopian America the capitol selects a boy and a girl from each of the 12 districts to fight to the death until only one stands on live television,OK went to this with an open mind as it is the new "young adult "franchise Ala twilight etc,clocking at roughly 2 and half hours it goes swiftly always a good sign not to much time spent on premise and the training montage ,all the performances r pretty good ,the 2 young leads hold there own,i liked woody harrelsons lush mentor,Stanley tucci puts in a good turn as the games mc a huge prancing tit and Elizabeth banks as an air headed socialite,the movie looks great we start of in district 12 a coal mining community wear the female protagonist lost her father and now takes care of her young sister and estranged mother,and then on to the capitol a vast rolling city of monuments and decadent society where the inhabitants look like some sort of cross between Victorians and Willie wonka ,although there is technology the whole game arena is controlled in a sort of virtual reality command centre,mag Lev train that does 200mph and yet everything looks old fashioned very art deco this movie says a lot about our society ,the ever widening poverty gap,the love of the celebrity ,reality television,decadent consumerism etc ,all in an engaging an entertaining movie ,however i felt that when the games segment of the film started you never really felt the danger or threat enough and a couple of gory deaths would've help you realise that more,but that's not the demographic its aimed at which is unfortunate because if this movie had that edge it would've risen from a good movie to a great one.

Drive

well so much for my commitment to reviewing in 2012!its march and this is only my second movie and its from last year! anyway drive is Nicholas winding refns 8th picture i have only seen drive and Bronson ,the rest are all danish language films i believe anyway i thoroughly enjoyed Bronson so i thought yeah il give drive a go,Ryan gosling seems to be in everything at the moment hes kind of perfect in the sense that hes good looking and fairly capable and adaptable actor ,so he play the unnamed driver the character loosely based on the driver of the 70,s movie of the same name,although refn said he was influenced by Halloween and the transporter and i can see those in his film the relentless pursuit of the antagonists much like myres pursuing his victims,and the methodical precision of the driver in his work,a mechanic and stunt driver by day and a getaway driver by night its very film noir and not hard to understand why its become such a cult hit ,that coupled with a soundtrack that matchs the mood of every scene perfectly ,the driver befriends a single mother from his apartment block and falls for her,soon the womans husband returns from jail with debt that needs to be repaid the driver agrees to help him ,soon things go awry the driver has to deal with the fallout,a great little movie that only gets better with repeated viewing good support from the rest of the cast Albert brooks as the not unlikable mobster Carey mulligan as the damaged mother and Ron perlman who is just Ron perlman .

well its been a while since iv done one of these ,to be honest 2011 wasn't the best year for film although i couldv made more of an effort,anyway i intend to approach 2012 with a more positive attitude,and so to the business at hand,Sherlock Holmes a game of shadows reunites Robert Downy Jr and Jude law as the titular tecs the plot is not really that important as it only serves as a backdrop for some spectacular set pieces and witty verbal jousting ,the ad campaign suggested bigger, better,funnier which i have to say in this case is true ,the pair have a great chemistry good support in general by the rest of the cast,although noomi rapace doesn't set the screen alight but this is more due to scripting and not performance.

x-men first class

in 1963 Charles Xavier starts up a school for and later forms a team,for humans with extraordinary abilities among them is Erik lensherr   his best friend and future nemesis,the film starts with lensherr pursing Sebastian Shaw a Nazi slave master who once held him captive and brought out his dark side,he then runs into charles and his step sister raven ,a loose collaboration with the CIA is formed lensherr and Xavier purse more mutants  train and assemble there team to fight for the greater good,the films 60,s setting is wonderfully conveyed through wardrobe, sets and make up there are quite a number of locations giving it that international spy thriller(bond)) feel also several languages spoken that are subtitled ,i loved the retro feel especially when you finally see the x-men in their blue and yellow uniforms very reminiscent of the original comic, and a wonderful climax that neatly dovetails the x-men into history ,the two leading men are fantastic real chemistry between the two of them although i think fassbender wins it due to more screen time ,the rest of the cast is equally good loved Kevin bacon s villain, Nicholas hoult,s beast and January jones Emma frost stand out.

Source Code

Chopper pilot capt colter Stevens wakes up in the body of an unknown man on a Chicago commuter train on a mission to find a bomber on the train ,the catch he only has 8 minutes then the bomb explodes and the time loop resets later he learns he is part of an advanced military mission to stop an much larger device killing millions in down town Chicago,the film opens giving you a good sense of space and geography with some good helicopter tracking shots showing you the path of the train going into Chicago, then were on the train for the time loop explosion sequences i think he travels through the same moment about 8 times roughly kind of reminiscent of ground hog day with each time he has a better knowledge of the events, iv said time loop but actually its more of a mind loop because its the last 8 minutes of this teachers consciousness  who capt  Stevens has jumped into, there's also times when he  jumps back to a pod with a flight seat and monitor where he is in instructed by beautiful air-force officer and a scientist, i found this movie fantastic . OK maybe the science was a bit dodgy but it had it all tension, suspense, laughter and enlightenment  a smart , exciting ,touching little and at the same time huge movie,great cast but its Jake gyllenhall  who holds the movie together id say his best yet, ground-hog day for super geeks!

Battle:Los Angeles

A  marine platoon faces off against an alien invasion of Los Angeles,first of all i did read a few reviews of this movie and i kinda of got the impression that it was one of those movies that critics were going to hate to be specific a lot of the reviews had the phrases : lack of plot, no character development first of all its an alien invasion film theres the plot Wright there, character development they are a platoon of marines they r not going to be that deep,i really enjoyed this film i will acknowledge the acting wasn't great but it was sufficient i mean its an action movie and aside a bit to much shaky cam work i felt the action scenes were amazing ,and your really felt as if the marines fought for every inch of road,also liked the aliens they were vaguely humanoid but completely alien i would say the best certainly most realistic alien invasion i have seen and a top action film to boot.

True Grit

A tough U.S. marshal helps a stubborn young woman track down her fathers killer well where do i start firstly iam a fan of the coens although i thought there last couple of films while being good films lack that certain sparkle of there earlier works this made me think maybe we had already seen there best work well iam  glad to say i was wrong this film blew me away OK the acting the three main players  Jeff bridges Matt Damon and new comer halle stienfield  all perform majestically the script is fantastic the dialogue is just mesmerising  the photography beautiful and atmospheric  i mean i felt that u could taste roosters whiskey smell the camp fire and at times stark showing how tough life was back then the music you know music is important to me in a film and i usually pay a great deal of attention to it but i have to say while i acknowledge there was music i was so wrapped up in the story i dint really notice but hell I'm sure it was fantastic just like the rest of the movie.

The Mechanic

Arthur bishop is a mechanic an elite assassin who is compromised when he is asked to eliminate his friend and mentor harry (Donald Sutherland) things become further complicated when harrys troubled son Steve(Ben foster) turns to him to become his apprentice Arthur grudgingly agrees then the mission seems clear find the real reason behind harry s death well another Jason Statham  action movie and yes i,am a fan this is a very slick violent action pic with a lot of gun play fighting which kinda reminded me of the Bourne series a few plot holes aside i throughly enjoyed this good performances from Statham and foster.

The Green Hornet

Brett Reid a playboy in l.a. life takes a turn when his father,s media empire falls into his lap after his mysterious death when he decides to take up the mantle of fighting crime with his fathers ex chauffeur kato well to be honest kinda had low expectations for this one but turned out to be not bad Seth rogen is really quite funny in the first half of the movie but becomes a bit tired in the second half  I'm a rogen fan but the slacker stoner thing maybe beginning to wear a bit thin on the other hand jay chou as kato has a more subtle humour which seems to suit the tone of this film more throw in some nice set pieces and a pantomime villain played with gusto by Christopher waltz you've got a pretty good superhero b movie oh Cameron diaz is also there strictly eye candy.

127 HOURS

Aron Ralston a mountain climber becomes trapped under a boulder while canyoneering in Utah going into this movie i was obviously looking forward to see how Danny Boyle was going to handle the one man and a rock scenario well he did it just fine Franco turns in a good performance the photography is stunning and a good soundtrack to boot you would think with the tile 127hours you'd be in for a bit of a drag but Boyle delivers in 94 minutes a brisk punchy inspirational movie.

Chico & Rita

A aspiring young pianist and his lover chanteuse hit the jazz -bebop scene from Cuba to new york Paris and Vegas the films starts showing Chico an old man now shinning shoes for a living in Havana once home he turns the radio on and hears an old song of his then we are transported back to 1948 the beginning of his on of love affair partnership with Rita what follows as the hit the highs and lows in their life and music is a beautifully animated well scripted film with a great jazz soundtrack very evocative of the golden era of jazz a very pleasant way to spend a couple of hours.

UNSTOPPABLE

A runaway train carrying toxic chemicals pits an engineer and his conductor in a race against time as they chase the runaway in a separate locomotive and need to bring it under control before it  hits a curve in the track and destroys a town. there,s not many surprises in tony Scott,s Juggernaut of a film almost the definition of predictability and cheesy dialogue certainly sells the idea that these machine r heavy clunking leviathans with plenty of noise and colorful imagery but its strictly by the numbers good performances from Denzel Washington a tony Scott regular and also Chris pine as engineer and conductor respectively .

The Social Network

On an autumn evening in the dorm rooms of Harvard university young undergrad and computer genius mark zuckerberg heatedly begins work on what will become a global social network and computing revolution six years and one million friends later he is the youngest billionaire on the planet this comes at he cost  of lawsuits and friends that feel deeply betrayed.David fincher is back with a vengeance this is text book film making an then some form the beginnings at Harvard everything is beautifully shot the Harvard dorms are moodily lit dark browns and amber light in contrast to the bright pastels of California and silicone valley the three male leads Andrew Garfield,(Eduardo saverin) Sean Parker(Justin timberlake) and Jesse eisenberg(mark zuckerberg) are pitch perfect casting i particularly liked timberlakes lounge lizard Sean Parker add to that a great sound track by Trent reznor and you have in my opinion one of the best if not the best film of the year so far.

DEVIL

five people trapped in a lift one is the devil went to see this with fairly low expectations i don't trust 15 rated horror movies although i have been pleasantly surprised in the past but as it turned out this is more thriller than horror its competently acted by a bunch of b list stars and well directed some of the plot devices were a bit hokey eg the superstitious mexican security guard but never the less the devil was a character in this so technically still a horror but when reveled the devil is frankly not that interesting and the inevitable third act twist is also pretty low rent not the worst movie a mediocre thriller at best at worst a luke warm horror.