Film Reviews

Happy Death Day 2 UDir: Christopher LandonIt would take only two words to sum up the concept of the first Happy Death Day: “Groundhog Slay”. Taking the time looping concept of the classic Bill Murray comedy and applying it to a homage to post Scream comedy inflected 90s slashers, the initial entry in this now newly minted franchise was warmly received and a sleeper hit. For me, while it had going for it a versatile and highly entertaining final girl...

Liam Neeson may have blighted his career with the admittance of his “rape revenge” anecdote and in truth, it does sour the viewing of Cold Pursuit, a film with a plot built near solely on revenge… The Norwegian Hans Peter Moland directs ‘Cold Pursuit’, remaking his own 2014 film In Order of Disappearance. Cold Pursuit follows Neeson’s, Nels Coxman, a snowplow driver and upstanding member of the remote community living in Kehoe, Colorado. Tragedy strikes the Coxman family when Nels’...

Steven Soderbergh’s Netflix movie High Flying Bird is a sharp and layered drama set in Manhattan during a six-month lockout between the NBA and the players. The season’s come to a standstill and no one’s getting paid. Hotshot sports agent Ray Burke (Andre Holland) and his number one client, Erick (Melvin Gregg) are stuck in limbo as the lockout has completely neutralised their income. These are people who are used to seeing huge money rolling in, so now their daily...

The best thing that can be said about Happy Death Day 2U is that it does what it says on the tin: a few jump scares, some unconvincing romantic subplots and enough cliches to make it palatable for a 'what not to' class at any film school. Still, no-one in the audience around me seemed to expect anything different, except for the one or two walk-outs. A sequel to 2017's Happy Death Day, Happy Death Day 2U follows a number...

Bird Box, Netflix’s new apocalyptic thriller, jumps between two timelines in an uncompromisingly dark narrative. Based on the 2014 novel by Josh Malerman, this adaption is stacked with talent and the premise seemed like a sure winner: it’s set around a mysterious force that compels people to commit suicide once they see it. The film works for a while, but unfortunately becomes undone by genre clichés and lapses in logic. Sandra Bullock stars as Malorie, an expectant mother who only...

Growing up, my understanding of Robert Rodriguez films consisted solely of Spy Kids. I did not watch Desperado, From Dusk Till Dawn or subsequently Sin City or Machete. I suppose his work is a cultural blind spot for me but in truth I felt let down by Spy Kids, the less than impressed 10-year-old I was. So upon viewing Alita: Battle Angel, I did so with some trepidation. Was Rodriguez going to let me down again as he has 18 years ago...

Dean DeBlois has done it again! One of the most noticeable and remarkable things about the How to train your Dragon franchise is its ability to make adults realise their inner child and come into touch with those feelings once again. Furthermore, the animation captivatingly brings to life a world where dragons actually exist, and leaves us dreaming we were Berkians living in the village of Berk. Let’s face it, with dragons as adorable as Toothless, who wouldn’t want to be a...

The Copacabana nightclub, 1962. The rugged chief bouncer Tony 'The Lip' Vallelonga finds himself out of work while the club is refurbished, and agrees to drive concert pianist Dr. Don Shirley (Mahershala Ali) across country for his upcoming tour. Snags to this arrangement are that not only is Don a genteel, particular man, he is also an African-American who will be travelling through the American Deep South. Tony must rely on the Green Book for Negro Travellers to get Don...

Vice opens not in an office of government but with the sight of a young Dick Cheney being called over by the police for drink driving. Having already dropped out of Yale, he spent most of his early twenties drinking and working as an electricity maintenance worker. Fearful that his life was going nowhere, his wife Lynne (Amy Adams) demands that he cleans up his act and by 1969 he was interning in the White House. Initially under the tutelage...