review | splice (2010)

by lucy on July 29, 2010

What the..? Seriously, what happened? Adrien Brody, film dude extraordinaire, done a bad film, that’s what happened.

He fully deserves a chinese burn and a kick in the nuts for being involved in Splice. And maybe a Glasgow kiss, but to be fair that nose might do more damage to the kisser than the kissee.

Why is it a bad film? Because Sarah Polley, of Dawn of the Dead fame, plays possibly the most annoying character in any film to date. A character who eats tictacs and mixes splices her DNA with some animals’ DNA and makes a monster that starts off cute, then turns into a fox (i.e. a hot lady, albeit with wings, a tail, amphibian lungs and bizarre feet, not an actual fox although wouldn’t that be topical! She could go into middle-class families’ houses and attack their children – now that’s a monster for you!), gets rude with Big Nose, then turns into a dude and rapes Mrs Tictacs.

Crap? Worse. Particularly painful was that Steve’s phone ran out of battery just as he got to the ticket booth and so rather than Orange Wednesdaying it he had to pay for two full tickets. I’m so, so sorry : (

Rating: ☆☆☆☆☆

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review | clash of the titans (2010)

by lucy on July 28, 2010

Steve loves all those old greek mythology films with plasticine monsters in so he bought Clash of the Titans on Blu Ray. I always fall asleep whenever they’re on telly because a) they’re long and b) they’re on at prime naptime. I managed to stay awake for the new Clash of the Titans though and that’s because a) it wasn’t naptime and b) it’s really rather good.

Steve thinks I fancy Sam Worthington but I don’t, not even in a leather skirt and riding a Pegasus. He’s all right, but his Australian accent has a mind of its own and it winds me up a bit – not because there’s anything wrong with an Australian accent, but if you can’t do a different one properly, don’t even bother, eh cobber?

So it’s good, yes. The little clockwork owl from the original film makes a brief cameo appearance, which is quite nice, and all the beasties and monsters are suitably scary. Some of the CGI is appalling but most of it’s very good. And Liam Neeson is very Zeus-like. It’s slightly off-topic but I just wanted to throw a theory I have at you: Liam Neeson has ‘mega facial hair’ written into his contracts otherwise he won’t accept a part, with the exception to this being ‘Taken’ because he got to say ‘I will find you, and I will kill you’ which he pwns* as far as cool movie quotes go.

Back to Clash of the Titans – is it better than the original? I don’t know. I already told you – I was asleep. Would I watch it again? Yes, but if it’s on between 2pm and 6pm on a Saturday or Sunday I can’t guarantee I’ll catch it all.

Rating: ★★★½☆

*’Pwns’ is something I read on Xbox Live a lot. Apparently it means ‘owns’ but people can’t spell that properly (I didn’t realise it was that difficult) so they write ‘pwns’ instead.

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review | jack says (2008)

by lucy on July 18, 2010

Steve fell for the ‘lots of those leafy award symbols on the DVD cover’ trick, like I often do, with this one. To be fair, the sequel’s got Danny Dyer in, and everyone knows he’s awesome, so you’d assume that the Jack franchise is better-than-crap. But then, you know what assuming does – makes a d*ckhead out of you and me. That’s a quote from Jack Says, and it’s the best line it’s got.

Labelled as a film noir, as the back of the DVD says, it’s ‘poignantly Mike Reid’s last film’. Not sure why that’s poignant but all I know is that it’s poorly acted, scripted and shot throughout the whole thing, and there’s this awful, awful music that only fits the film because both are bobbins. The ‘Eric Cantona Gag Reel’ in the extras consists of Cantona showing why he should stick to football, except that he’s too old for that.

I hope Jack Said is better. Well, it can’t be any worse.

Rating: ★☆☆☆☆

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ten films | christina ricci

by lucy on July 17, 2010

1) Mermaids
2) The Addams Family
3) Black Snake Moan
4) Casper
5) Penelope
6) Buffalo ’66
7) Monster
8) Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
9) Sleepy Hollow
10) The Opposite of Sex

and

11) The Ice Storm

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review | tormented (2009)

by lucy on July 16, 2010

Here are five reasons why Tormented kicked the ass of all the other films I watched last week:

1) The lead character is played by someone whose name is Tuppence. No sh*t.
2) Its cast is made up of pretty sixth-formers of both sexes so everyone’s catered for. Nommy.
3) It’s scary and gory and fun.
4) It’s produced by BBC Films, which as far as I’m concerned means it’s got a hefty stamp of quality on it.
5) It’s got a moral. A proper one, not a rubbish one about world peace. And it’s delivered in a refreshingly un-schmaltzy way.

Watch this film.

Oh and 6) the soundtrack is banging. That’s the right word, right? Banging?

Rating: ★★★★½

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ten films | danny dyer

by lucy on July 15, 2010

I want to buy Danny Dyer a pint. He’s sound and he sent me a signed photo one time.

1) Severance
2) Doghouse
3) Outlaw
4) Adulthood
5) Human Traffic
6) The Business
7) Goodbye Charlie Bright
8) Malice in Wonderland
9) Jack Said
10) Football Factory

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review | the broken (2007)

Hmm. The Broken is tricksy. The back-of-the-DVD blurb made it sound totally awesome and eery and like what a pyschological thriller should be. And then when it started I waited for the awesome eeriness to kick in and it just, well, didn’t. We even had a proper ‘film debrief’ discussion in an attempt to work out whether we’d [...]

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review | the uninvited (2009)

Now this, I liked. Yes, it’s a very western remake of a South Korean horror film, but it’s apparently pretty different from the original, which is nice because I plan on watching the original – A Tale of Two Sisters/장화, 홍련 – at some point soon. It stars Emily Browning, off of Lemony Snicket, and [...]

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review | thr3e (2006)

This is one of those films, like many I’ve come across of late, where I’ve essentially watched it so you don’t have to. Really. Don’t watch it. From the unsettling use of Times New Roman-esque font in the opening credits to the appalling scripting, acting and ripping-off-of-all-the-Saw-films, and a shameless attempt – and subsequent fail [...]

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review | sugar (2008)

After writing rather gushingly about Avatar I felt I needed to give myself a Hollywood detox and so last night I went with my friend Maz to see Sugar at the arts centre where we live. The film focuses on a Dominican baseball player, Miguel ‘Sugar’ Santos (played by Perez Soto) and his journey to [...]

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