comedy

ANNA AND THE APOCALYPSE

Cert 15 Stars 4

Catchy tunes make the blood-splatting violence sing in this inventive and entertaining teenage zom-rom-com musical set in a Scottish school.

Ella Hunt, Malcolm Cumming and Marli Siu lead the bright, attractive young cast as they sing, dance and fight through a zombie apocalypse, which interrupts Anna’s plot to escape her humdrum small town life.

There’s evident glee at the volume of guts, gore, music and mayhem the filmmakers can squeeze out of the low budget, and it feels like a big screen version of the Buffy The Vampire Slayers’ musical episode, Once More With Feeling. And I mean that in a good way.

 

GOON: LAST OF THE ENFORCERS

Cert 15 97mins Stars 2

A poor year for cinematic comedy continues with this violent ice hockey gross out comedy which left me cold.

Set in Canada’s minor league, this sequel to 2011’s sees many of the original cast reprise their roles. But the script leaves any decent jokes on the bench and whenever it strays from the playing arena, finds itself on thin ice.

Hard man team captain Doug has retired due to age and injury. Having taken a dull office job, he’s drawn back to the ice when his old team struggle without him.

Likeable actor Seann William Scott is strangely subdued in a film seemingly geared to his limited strengths. Thrust to fame as Stifler in the American Pie franchise and now 40 years old, he’s also struggled to adjust to a more adult career. 

The out takes over the closing credits are no more funny than anything include but you can console yourself the cast at least entertained themselves during filming.

 

 

BABY DRIVER

Cert 15 113mins Stars 4

This exhilarating crime caper is so achingly cool and confident, I should be in it.

Sadly for me Hollywood has yet to knock on my door. So you’ll have to make do with Ansel Elgort as Baby, driver on bank jobs for Kevin Spacey’s sharp suited mob boss.

The young getaway driver looks like a young Han Solo with shades and earphones permanently attached. This allows for a stream of great tunes of every type, including Egyptian reggae.

Baby plans to do one last job before hitting the road with Lily James’s pretty waitress.

The thin tread of the plot is pimped to the max by the trademark zippy editing and knowing humour by Brit director Edgar Wright. He puts a fast spin for the heist movie the way he did with zombies movies in Shaun of the Dead. 

The dialogue pops, tires squeal and bullets fly as this non stop thrill ride delivers your new favourite soundtrack to the summer.

 

 

ROCK DOG

Cert PG 86mins Stars 1

Tone deaf humour and off-key animation characterise this incoherent and tuneless hymn to the unifying magic of music.

It’s a discordant mix of eastern mysticism, western music, Tibetan mountains, Texas accents, analogue technology and giant robot mice. The original songs are uninspired auto tuned pop rock.

Luke Wilson voices Bodi, a naive pup who leaves his village of sheep at the mercy of wolves to pursue dreams of stardom in the big city.

Narrator Sam Elliot riffs on his cowboy persona from The Big Lebowski, while Eddie Izzard channels his inner Osbourne as a thin white rock legend with a robot servant called Ozzie.

Bodi’s father is an incompetent disciplinarian who frowns on his son’s ambition and wants him to remain at home, working at the family firm.

Personally, the sooner my son leaves home on a tour bus to find fame, fortune and a mansion full of adoring groupies, the more proud I’ll be.

 

BAYWATCH

Cert 15 116mins Stars 2

Flaunting its saucy seafront of solidly buttressed flesh, the only thing modest about this pumped up update of the 1990’s TV show is its ambition.

Based on the adventures of crime-solving lifeguards, the show was a worldwide smash. This success was due to the frequency with which improbably beautiful women ran in slow-mo through the surf, en route to saving the day.

This big screen reboot is an exercise in body shaming on a global scale, its bikini-sized comedy brains existing only to flex its action biceps.

It revives the formula with a lascivious wink. But a light hearted tone, gross out gags and stream of bantz are a poor substitute for a decent joke or a smart script.

Buff bromantic lifeguards Dwayne Johnson and Zac Efron are joined on the team by Jon Bass. He’s the token shy, fat, ugly techie guy. Johnson is given to making motivational speeches about duty, family and team work, just as he does in his The Fast Furious films.

They attempt to solve a case of drugs and corruption which threatens the future of the beach. The bad guy is the ambitious entrepreneur, played by a fully clothed Priyanka Chopra.

The female lifeguards are essentially cheerleaders, they’re a handy reward for the guys when they bust the case. This is a waste, as all three actresses suggest they are more than capable of holding their own against the boys.

Pamela Anderson became a star when she squeezed into the famous red bikini, and she and original star David Hasselhoff make predictable and painful cameos.

By frequently pointing out how absurd the TV show was while going through the same old motions, the film wants to have its cake and eat it.  Though I imagine cake is an alien concept to the ridiculously ripped bodies promenading across the beach.

DIARY OF A WIMPY KID: THE LONG HAUL

Cert U 91mins Stars 1

I thought the recent reboot of National Lampoon’s Vacation set the all time low in family road trip comedies, but this car crash goes the extra mile.

Stockport-born director David Bowers has entirely recast his own franchise from 2012’s last instalment, and it’s poor Alicia Silverstone who suffers the most.

Her career may never to have recaptured the heights of 1996’s teen comedy Clueless, but it’s extremely upsetting to see it sink this far.

She plays the mother to wimpy boy Greg, who decides to take her husband and three sons on a road trip for their grandmother’s 90th birthday.

However the social media-addicted boys conspire to attend a video game convention instead.

Along the way they suffer cockroaches, a farting pig and projectile vomit. There’s an-in car karaoke scene featuring Wannabe by the Spice Girls, which is gnaw-your-own-leg-off painful.

It’s all as desperate as needing the toilet and knowing the next motorway services are 37 miles away.

 

 

 

SNATCHED

Cert 15 90mins Stars 3

Goldie Hawn is so confident and likeable in this brisk and amiable action comedy, it’s remarkable to realise she hasn’t appeared in a film since 2002’s The Banger Sisters.

The one time Oscar winner shares a breezy chemistry with co-star, Amy Schumer. They play a mother and daughter who are kidnapped while on holiday in Ecuador.

Their well established screen personas allow for an interesting generational comparison of comic actresses in Hollywood.

Superficially sweet and ditzy on the surface, Hawn’s character is far more shrewd and strong than she first suggests. Schumer offers a brash yet insecure social media-addicted slattern who seeks affirmation.

The better jokes are mostly in the first half, while the second half uses the more action orientated stuff for some predictable family bonding.

Schumer’s determinedly shambolic presence infects everything from the random music choices to the occasional under-written scene.

But her energy and willingness to play the clown can’t be taken away from her.

 

 

 

HOW TO TALK TO GIRLS AT PARTIES

Cert 15 103mins Stars 3

Three sex hungry teenagers have a very close encounter in this raucous and oddball 1970’s-set British sci-fi comedy.

Looking for an late night party in Croydon, the lads mistakenly blag their way into an avant garde latex fetish swingers club. Which almost always never happened to me when I lived in the South London borough.

Based on a short story from the weird and wonderful mind of  writer, Neil Gaiman, the central joke is no one can tell the difference between punks, aliens and Americans.

Dazzlingly put together by Brit multi-Oscar winning costume designer, Sandy Powell, the costumes are a riot of electric colours.

Nicole Kidman unleashes her inner anarchist as a punk matriarch called Boudicca, and Elle Fanning is demented as an alien with only 48 hours to experience life, or at least Croydon.

For all its punk posturing the film is more fun than ferocious, and its alarming appearance disguises a surprisingly sweet nature.

 

MINDHORN

Cert 15 89mins Stars 3

Tune into this telly detective spoof, where the Bionic Man meets Bergerac.

Back in the 1980’s, Richard Thorncroft was the star of the TV crime series, Mindhorn. The ‘best plain clothes detective on Isle on Mann’ was equipped with a truth-reading cybernetic eye.

Thorncroft sees an opportunity to reignite his career when he’s roped in by the real police to help solve a murder.

Relying heavily on nostalgia for TV shows which are probably best forgotten, too many scenes drift, and jokes about acting auditions are funnier for the cast than the audience.

However, Julian Barratt is a paragon of deluded middle age as Thorncroft. It’s a consummate performance in the vein of Steve Coogan’s failed sportcaster, Alan Partridge.

Coogan is part of an impressive cast which sees cameos from Kenneth Branagh and Simon Callow.

The design looks suitably cheap and the films one joke is milked relentlessly, albeit with energy, conviction, and occasionally laughter.

 

FINDING FATIMAH

Cert 12A 99mins Stars 1

There’s little fun to be found as Mancunian muslims go looking for love in this laugh free romcom.

A sincere debut film by writer and director Oz Arshad, it’s keen to highlight the broad diversity among British muslims.

And there’s an honesty in demonstrating they’re as pompous, stupid, class conscious, and obsessed with talent shows, as anyone else in the UK.

Plus there’s no faulting the energy of the cast who gamely attempt to breathe life into the inert script. But their best efforts are undermined by a lack of visual flair and weak production values.

Shahid is a 30 year old divorcee whose printing business is going bust. But his life seems to turn for the better when he meets Fatimah via a Muslims-only dating app.

Danny Ashok and Asmara Gabrielle are endearing and attractive actors. But their characters have far more chemistry and affection with their respective families than they ever do with each other.