Triple 9

Director: John Hillcoat (2016)

This confused crime drama is a loose tissue of tattoos, muscles and machismo.

Despite the violence, very strong language, drug use and nudity, the lack of focus and ambivalent moral stance makes for an un-involving experience.

Too many minor characters slow the pace and the moody lighting fails to illuminate the blunt action scenes.

Kate Winslet gives tremendous vamp as a glossy Russian-Israeli mafia mol who blackmails a crew of corrupt cops into one last heist.

The gang leader is Michael who’s played  by Chiwetel Ejiofor, an actor rarely given to compromising his character’s intensity in return for popularity.

Breaking Bad’s Aaron Paul appears as a loose cannon with a drug problem. Again.

Full of epic ambition and clearly influenced by Michael Mann’s far superior Heat (1995), director Hillcoat had a much firmer grip of his material with the taut Australian western The Proposition (2005).

 

★★☆☆☆

The Finest Hours

Director: Craig Gillespie (2016)

Batten down the hatches and prepare for heroism on the high seas in this historical drama.

It’s a sturdy old fashioned tale of duty, courage and comradeship in extreme circumstances.

But it offers only a squall of excitement, not a storm of danger.

During the ferocious winter storm of 1952, a Massachusetts coast guard crew combats ferocious conditions to rescue the crew of a stricken oil tanker.

But when a second tanker is ripped in two, it is left to a lowly Boatswains mate to launch a second mission with an inexperienced crew and unsuitable craft.

The action is a well staged mix of real action and special effects but the soggy performances threaten to capsize the story.

Bernie Webber is a shy, cautious soul. As the quiet hero Chris Pine carries none of the arrogant swagger of his Captain Kirk from the recent Star Trek reboot.

Instead he acts his little serious socks off, trying to out furrow the knotted brow of a typically downbeat Casey Affleck.

He plays Ray, the engineer and acting skipper of what remains of the tanker.

His authority is challenged by Seaman Brown, an enjoyably dissident Michael Raymond-James. Being a Disney movie, these are the most profanity free sailors ever to set sail.

The story flounders as when Bernie begins to abandon his cherished regulations to follow his instinct. It’s almost as if he’s using the Force from Star wars.

As Bernie’s pretty telephonist fiancee Miriam, Brit actress Holliday Grainger has little to do by drive about the dock and look worried. It’s a thankless role but the script at least attempts to give her a mind of her own.

A thunderous score seeks to drown out the scolding winds and though there’s some fine moments, you won’t be blown away at any minute or hour.

★★★☆☆

 

 

Bone Tomahawk

Director S. Craig Zahler (2016)

Four cowboys ride out to the rescue in this brutal western horror.

Kurt Russell is a crafty and charming Sheriff, leading his misfit posse against cannibal troglodytes.

The savages have captured his deputy, a young bride and an outlaw and we’re never sure if anyone is coming back alive.

There’s a welcome element of the supernatural and the sparse music and dry humour echo the barren landscape.

With well staged gory action scenes, it’s an effective visceral thrill ride which succeeds in upsetting the stomach.

But it’s never interested in engaging the brain.

★★★☆☆

 

Chronic

Director Michel Franco (2016)

In this deeply humane yet bleak drama, Tim Roth plays a home care nurse for the terminally ill.

David is trying to rebuild his life and tentatively reaching out to his adult daughter after some time away.

He becomes too close to his patients but isn’t guilty of the crime of which he’s accused.

The film suggests possessing too much empathy is a trait which is not only undervalued by society, but one destined to be punished.

Filmed with an unflinchingly clear eye, a sober sensitivity and a largely static camera, it’s an intelligent and sensitive call for compassion and support for the lonely and infirm.

★★★☆☆

 

Oddball and the Penguins

Director: Stuart McDonald (2016)

Furry friends fight financial felons in this feel good family flick.

Oddball is a chaos causing canine pressed into service to protect a colony of penguins threatened by wild foxes.

If the population falls into single figures, developers are poised to turn the island sanctuary into a tourist attraction.

With its honest eccentrics, broad humour and a strongly pro conservation, anti-authority agenda, it’s a reflection of what Australians see as the best of themselves.

Cheery, cute and charming through out, not liking this film would be like kicking a puppy. Or a penguin.

★★★☆☆

 

 

 

A Bigger Splash

Director: Luca Guadagnino (2016)

Dive into the shallow end of the celebrity gene pool in this sun kissed erotic thriller.

Intelligently written and beautifully photographed, it features the normally ultra serious Ralph Fiennes on liberated form as a hyper active hedonist music producer called Harry.

He arrives unexpectedly at the Italian villa of his ex love Marianne, a recuperating rock star.

Tilda Swinton gives a rasping performance as the singer protecting her voice, a symbol of the film’s grand themes of the inability to communicate with honesty and freedom.

Matthias Schoenaerts is in typically morose mode as her new partner Paul, their shared idyll threatened by Harry and his lithe daughter Penelope, played by Fifty Shades star Dakota Johnson.

It’s almost an anthropological examination of human behaviour, a shame the subjects aren’t more deserving of our study.

At first entertaining, the preening narcissism of the characters is wearying during the slow build up to an act of violence. It couldn’t have happened to a more deserving person.

★★★☆☆

 

 

 

Zoolander No. 2

Director: Ben Stiller (2016)

Fifteen years is an eternity in fashion and the threadbare joke has worn desperately thin in this comedy sequel.

From self imposed exile, Ben Stiller’s idiotic catwalk model Derek Zoolander is called to Rome to investigate the murder of pop stars such as Justin Bieber.

Penelope Cruz parades in her skimpies as the fashion police and Will Ferrell offers manic energy as an incarcerated super villain.

Aping the glossy action thriller style of Mission Impossible, the plot develops into a Da Vinci Code type hunt for the fabled fountain of youth.

With a long line of cameos by models and designers, it’s as incestuous and self adoring as the industry it pretends to be mocking.

★★☆☆☆

 

 

 

 

Deadpool

This unpleasant spandex spin-off is a desperate lunge to sex-up superheroes.

It energetically thrusts a minor member of the X-Men franchise centre stage, but can only muster some limp entertainment.

A weak and formulaic origin movie, the non-linear narrative and meta-commentary on the genre can’t disguise myriad failings, not least the unappealing lead.

Ryan Reynolds is perfectly cast as Wade Wilson, a proudly irritating special forces agent turned mercenary.

The script has to fall back on inflicting terminal cancer to create sympathy for him.

A sadistic scientist called Ajax deliberately disfigured Wade while attempting to turn him into a super-powered slave.

Last seen replacing Jason Statham in dull reboot The Transporter Refuelled (2015) reboot, rapper turned actor Ed Skrein over acts as the dull villain.

Believed to be dead, Wade adopts the identity of the gun toting masked man called Deadpool.

Despite two members of the X-men team attempting to recruit him, Deadpool insists he is not a hero.

His signature move is to pirouette into action, a deliberately camp affectation in keeping with the supposedly transgressive character.

Convinced of it’s own outrageous hilarity, Deadpool replaces the intense boredom of the recent Superman film with a juvenile tone, flippant sexism and some light bondage.

Then it adds child abuse jokes and frequent threats of rape.

Slow motion action scenes are mostly powered by mediocre CGI, blood splatting violence and explosions.

Deadpool is hunting Ajax for revenge, and to discover the secret to having his leading man looks restored.

Without them he feels unworthy of his fiancee, the beautiful hooker Vanessa, played by Morena Baccarin.

This presupposes Wade recognises he possesses no other feature such as charm, wit or intelligence to which Vanessa might be attracted. Perhaps the character is written with more self awareness than Reynolds allows him.

Baccarin and Reynolds make an attractive pair and the few moments of quality are in their initial sparky banter.

Described as the first pansexual superhero, Deadpool is actually monogamously heterosexual.

Sadly all that’s required of the talented Baccarin in the role is to look fabulous in fishnets, talk dirty and be kidnapped.

This is in keeping with the pervasive sexism. All female characters are either ugly and therefore suitable subjects for mockery, or they’re gorgeous strippers and prostitutes.

Deadpool rooms with a blind old black woman whose sexual unattractiveness is a butt of much humour, none of which is funny.

Grossly pandering to the worst impulses of it’s target audience demographic of twelve year boys, the BBFC should be congratulated for putting Deadpool out of their reach.

Kingsman: The Secret Service (2015) which off a £56 million budget globally grossed £282 million. The lesson learned is there is a lot of money to be made in arse jokes.

Among the slight attempts at deconstructing the gene, there is a weak joke regarding The Matrix (1999) and at one point Reynolds’ riffs on Ferris Bueller’s Day Off (1986).

Marvel comics supremo Stan Lee cameos as a DJ in a strip club.

Most of the film consists of two fights, one on a freeway flyover and the other on a crashed Helicarrier from an Avengers movie.

There are some laughs along the way to the lacklustre climax, a word guaranteed to have Deadpool sniggering.

★★☆☆☆

Oscars 2016

Best supporting actor nominees
Sylvester Stallone, Creed
Christian Bale, The Big Short
Tom Hardy, The Revenant
Mark Ruffalo, Spotlight
Mark Rylance, Bridge of Spies

Best supporting actress nominees
Jennifer Jason Leigh, The Hateful Eight
Rooney Mara, Carol
Rachel McAdams, Spotlight
Alicia Vikander, The Danish Girl
Kate Winslet, Steve Jobs

Best actor nominees
Bryan Cranston, Trumbo
Matt Damon, The Martian
Leonardo DiCaprio, The Revenant
Michael Fassbender, Steve Jobs
Eddie Redmayne, The Danish Girl

Best actress nominees
Cate Blanchett, Carol
Brie Larson, Room
Jennifer Lawrence, Joy
Charlotte Rampling, 45 Years
Saoirse Ronan, Brooklyn

Best director nominees
Adam McKay, The Big Short
George Miller, Mad Max: Fury Road
Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu, The Revenant
Lenny Abrahamson, Room
Tom McCarthy, Spotlight

Best film nominees
Spotlight
The Big Short
Bridge of Spies
Brooklyn
Mad Max: Fury Road
The Martian
The Revenant
Room

Goosebumps

Director: Rob Letterman (2016)

Magical mayhem materialises when book bound monsters come to life in this entertaining horror comedy.

It runs away at a decent pace, has fine performances from an attractive cast, isn’t short of laughs and tries hard to make you jump out of your seat.

The spooky fun is based on the massively popular Goosebumps books by R.L. Stine.

And as Stine says, it’s full of twists, turns, insights and some personal growth for the hero.

He appears as a character in the film and is played by Jack Black in one of his stronger performances.

Black abandons his frequently smug demeanour for a more acerbic and angry persona, and he’s all the more entertaining for it.

In a quiet suburb the reclusive Stine home-schools his teenage daughter Hannah, claiming it’s for her own protection.

A tentative romance begins when handsome high school student Zach Cooper moves in next door. Dylan Minnette and Odeya Rush share a sweet chemistry as they sneak out at night to an abandoned fair ground.

But Zach inadvertently unlocks one of Stine’s books, releasing an evil ventriloquist’s dummy, called Slappy, also voiced by Black.

The marvellously malevolent Slappy frees a multitude of fantastical fiends from Stine’s shelf of manuscripts and burns the volumes, preventing the creatures from being caged again.

The leaves the town at the mercy of aliens, zombies, killer clowns and in a spirited homage to the sci-fi monster movies of the 1950’s, a giant praying mantis.

Steven McQueen’s drive-in classic The Blob (1958) is also a key reference.

The film’s best scene is the emergence of the garden gnomes. It combines the comic violence of the job interview from The Full Monty (1997) and the creeping horror of the doll attack from Barbarella (1968).

Amanda Lund briefly steals the film as an overly enthusiastic police trainee and I wish we’d seen more of her.

The suitably scary score by Danny Elfman works hard to gloss over the less than groundbreaking special effects, which themselves are used to pad out at least a couple of scenes.

It’s probably too scary for very young kids. But everyone else, even big kids like me, are guaranteed the goosebumps of a good time.

★★★☆☆