Film Reviews by Timmy B

Conceived as an off-the-wall comedy and transformed from the script by the genius of Jim Carrey's improvisation, this was one of the films that defined the 90's. Completely crazy & and in no way taking itself seriously, it remains to me one of the definitive comedies ever made.

Carrey plays the titular detective, searching for a stolen dolphin and uncovering a schlocky scheme to extort a ransom. And that's basically the plot.

Without Carrey, this film would be nothing. Ace's tics and traits are all Carrey's creation and being allowed to let loose is what makes this film great.

It is also divisive in many ways, whether because of the humour and just how surreal it can be, or being retrospectively criticised & condemned/compared to today's standards by some people.

To me, if you are genuinely offended, upset or take in any way seriously a film character whose signature move is to pretend to talk out of his backside, then nothing that is written here will change your mind otherwise.

For everyone else, this is a comedy to laugh your head off to and gets better with each viewing. Highly recommended

This is a stunning film, made on a tiny budget, with not an ounce of excess/uneeded exposition or bloat.

Lesley Manville is perfect in the role and Liam Neeson, who is known for his leading man status and powerful prescence, eschews all of this to become in many ways the lost and worried husband, powerless to stop the pain and upset his wife is going through.

There are many tender moments, but the two that really stick in my mind is the meeting of an old school teacher in hospital and reminising about the daughter that has passed (no reason is given as to why, which to me is a very good thing, as there is already so much going on within the narrative;) and a beautifully shot, unbelievably tender love scene where, before she starts the treatment for cancer, the couple "say goodbye" to the body that she has before it changes forever.

I have not had experience of the trauma that is shown in the film, but one thing which did also resonate with me was that there is in these situations, no perfect answer. One scene where everything becomes too much and the characters are having their own seperate breakdowns in different rooms only highlights that whilst they may feel so far from each other, they also are so close.

Thoroughly recommended and wonderfully performed

A deeply unsettling and disturbing film about the way outsiders and loners, especially those with mental health problems, exist in the world today. The very low budget actually really helps the film’s look and atmosphere, whether in the grimy shots of Tony walking around London or the scenes inside his flat.

Where the film also works well is in how the violence is shown and acted. The scenes bristle with menace and the actual violence itself is extremely unpleasant, restrained and emphatically not gratuitous, which only adds to the heft.

Peter Ferdinando, who has an incredible and chameleonic ability to transform completely into these different characters, gives a very good performance and the film would fail without him.

I did feel that at points the film seemed to meander and get lost, and it's just over 90 minutes runtime was stretching the story just that little bit too much. But this is a solid and impactful film and shows how great micro-budget British films can be.

Color of Night is many things. Whilst masterpiece is definitely not one of them, not for a single second was I bored. It is an extremely dated, silly, corny, cheesy product of its time. It is filled with cliched characters, silly plot twists, but also really beautiful cinematography and two committed performances from Bruce Willis and Jane March.

March, in particular, was coming off the extremely well-received film The Lover and was in many ways the hottest actress in Hollywood. To me, she was the stronger of the two performances because it would be so easy for her to play the part as/the film portray her as a ditzy beautiful woman who is there simply for eye-candy. But she really draws you into her performance and the chemistry she has with Willis genuinely works.

This is also the film debut of Rubén Blades and he also imbues what could simply be the corny stale cop role with charisma and gravitas.

For many people, the most memorable part of the film is the extremely protracted sex scene, which manages to utilize almost every room in the mansion that Willis’s character lives in. But again, how you view this film as a whole is the level of enjoyment you’ll get out of it.

If you start watching it expecting anything other than a schlocky dated piece of fun, you’ll be disappointed. But take it with a pinch of salt and tongue firmly in cheek and you’ll have a fun 2 and a bit hours.

Disability, when portrayed on film, can not only be an incredible and powerful way to see the world from a different perspective, but also a sure-fire awards winner. My Left Foot, The Theory of Everything and Rain Man have not only stood the test of time, but also been highly coveted by the different academies and won plenty of prizes. Whilst this might be a cynical way of approaching this review, these were the emotions that I felt when watching A Beautiful Mind.

For all Russell Crowe's incredible talent in films such as Gladiator and Cinderella Man, watching him in this was like he had played Dustin Hoffman's performance of Raymond Babbit on repeat and then tried to take inspiration from the various tics and emotions. In no way am I saying that he did not try and there are some moving moments, but the film did not work for me. So much so that I stopped watching after about an hour as I simply had no interest in finishing it.

The right elements are all there: good performances from the supporting cast, including Paul Bettany and Jennifer Conolly who met and fell in love on this film; lovely music and good cinematography. But it did not work as a film for me and sadly is not one I can whole-heartedly recommend.

In a world where, once you reach a certain age (especially older women,) there are almost no films starring or made about you, The Mother was a welcome & startling revelation. Back in 2003 when it was released (I reference the year deliberately as this was before Daniel Craig was cast as James Bond/well-known,) it started a heated and much needed debate about how we as a society treat & represent the older generation. It was also a film which clearly & compassionately showed that just because people age, doesn't mean that they don't also want & need love and affection.

The central premise is a good one: a husband & wife go to see their grown-up children in London. They are treated as outsiders & ignored/ostracized. Whilst staying with their family, the husband dies suddenly & the wife/mother May is left rudderless and adrift. She tries to return home but cannot face the empty house or memories, so ends up coming back & staying with first her son then her daughter where she becomes an inconvenience which they cannot manage or deal with. The only person who starts to show any kindness or concern towards her is Darren, the builder in her son's home, who is also in the middle of a messy divorce and sleeping with May's daughter. This then turns into an affair between Darren & May, who are effectively 2 lost souls looking for meaning.

The best parts of this film are far and away the scenes between Darren & May. Daniel Craig and Anne Reid have the kind of chemistry which, if it didn't work, would mean the film would totally & utterly fail. The acting here is stripped back & completely naturalistic, and the moments with Darren & May alone work perfectly. Even though there is the much-talked about age gap, this works so well in conveying the difference the two characters have and the experiences they have both had and will be having as they grow older. The isolation that they also both experience, May in her older and now single life; Darren in how he cannot keep himself from repeatedly going off the rails with the litany of poor decisions he makes.

Unfortunately, the film also has some very big & serious issues with it, the most obvious one being just how unbelievably unsympathetic & horrible some of the characters are. These affect not only the smaller parts (the daughter-in-law is pretty much a spoilt narcissist who is shown as shallow & only interested in spending all of her husband's wealth on creating failing clothing shops,) through to May's daughter Paula.

Paula should, given the fact that her mother basically steals her boyfriend & has an affair with him, be someone who you feel intense sympathy for and relate to. But she is written as a screeching, angsty and extremely immature woman who, every time she goes off on a rant, makes you wonder how on earth she could function as an adult or indeed even be a teacher/support children. I absolutely detested her. There are several nails down a chalkboard moments, which add to this feeling, such as when she makes Darren keep reading something she has written, for no other reason than to keep the attention on her, even though you can see he would rather be anywhere else than there. It is intimated that this is partly due to childhood trauma, but I also felt that this reason was basically doing a lot of heavy lifting for her horrible personality.

The other massive flaw with the film was that when the affair is discovered, which was obviously going to happen, it is done in the most stupid & far-fetched way. This actually in one sense ruins the whole story, because the events shown are so ridiculous, it stretches credibility. Separately, on a technical level, there is a cut during the climatic scene which is so obvious, it draws attention to the film editing & ruins everything that was building up to that moment.

To summarise, somewhere in here is a great film with an important message, but a flawed script & some questionable choices leave much to desired.

Ever since Pulp Fiction, people have clamoured for the latest film from QT, hoping that it will in some ways equal that masterpiece. But the honest truth is that nothing has ever come close. I really enjoyed various parts of both Kill Bill's and the best recent film of Tarantino's is still Inglourious Basterds. But even that has sections which were overlong and could have been cut out or shot differently.

Once Upon a Time in Hollywood definitely has some great qualities to it. The scenes are perfectly shot, the costumes are great and a lot of the references from other QT films are present and correct. There are also great performances, especially from Margot Robbie. There has been some, in my opinion stupid, controversy about the fact that her character doesn't have many lines and this is another example of Hollywood maligning, patronising and insert every other negative description takes your fancy towards women. But as Tarantino has rightly said, you don't need a lot of dialogue to be able to convey a whole character and the various elements of them. And in OUATIH, Sharon Tate is probably my favourite character, precisely because we are allowed to see a very natural and honest portrayal of a woman who lives in the moment and lets the world around her exist. And Margot Robbie was also nominated for an Oscar for her performance, so the charge of not allowing her character to shine through is completely without foundation.

Brad Pitt and Leonardo Di Caprio are good company and the chemistry between them is great. There are some great cameos, particularly from Timothy Olyphant and Michael Madsen.

The problem is that the film as a whole takes a very long time to not really say very much, until the final 20 minutes, when it does jump into life. The ending is absolutely crazy, but in a good way and is very funny. It just about pulls the wheel back and rounds off what is at times a frustrating, but in parts enjoyable ride. And yes, I am looking forward to seeing QT's final film, to see exactly what he has to go out on.

This is one of the greatest films ever made.

Whilst there is a lot I could write or say about it, for once I am simply going to let the title to my review speak for itself.

Not one thing in this film is out of place, not one performance less than perfect.

This film is one of the reasons people love cinema. See for yourself the reason why.

I loved God's Own Country (GOC,) so when I heard about Francis Lee's new film & the incredible cast starring in it, I was immediately on board. GOC was in many ways a film which subverted the normal romance film, in that it was absolutely a film which you "felt," whether it was the cold in the air up on the farm, or the smell from the farmyard animals, or the warmth from a crackling fire. It was also a film which showed sex & intimacy in a realistic & mature way.

Ammonite starts off very well & in this kind of vein: everything that you loved about GOC is present. Kate Winslet is always fantastic and, ever since I saw her in Brooklyn, Saoirse Ronan is probably the most skilled & perfect young actress working today, able to convey so much with just a look or a sigh. The chemistry is great between them, and there are fantastic supporting characters as well. Welcomingly, Gemma Jones & Alec Secareanu return from GOC, and their characters add nicely to the film. There is also a welcome amount of letting the characters breathe & letting the actual acting shine through, something which is a rarity in many films today.

But after about 30 minutes, there then are some quite significant problems...

The biggest one for me was the fact that the "coldness" theme, either in reference to the temperature outside on the beach or inside the house; or the temperament of some of the main characters, was so overplayed it then started to undo a lot of the good work that the film had started to build. By this, I mean that after an hour, we as the viewer don't need it constantly shoved in our faces in a very direct and blunt way that the location the characters are in is cold. Whereas GOC set this up then let it rest in the background, Ammonite will constantly put this front & centre, at the expense of other elements which we are then distracted by.

The coldness of predominantly the main character was also something which became extremely wearing after a while, in the sense that as things went on, you wanted & also expected that the warmth & care shown to her would then start to change her, not necessarily in a stereotypical way, but in some way. And yes, at times you did see this. The problem was that any time it was shown, it then immediately gets snapped shut and dourness & miserableness returns. This in turn then makes the character unlikeable, when all I really, really wanted was to like her, both as a person and for the achievements and decency she has as a person. The zenith of this was the love scene, which was shot and acted so beautifully and really seemed to be the pay-off that the audience needed, followed by the next few scenes totally undoing this great work.

I appreciate that I am comparing this film a lot to God's Own Country, but when that as a piece of work was so great, and this film carries over many of the elements which had worked before, plus had a large number of the same cast/crew, I actively wanted it to work.

For me, far and away the best thing about the film is Saoirse Ronan and I hope that she is richly rewarded for her work come awards time. What she does with, in many ways a very limited amount of material, is incredible. She is vulnerable, feisty, loveable, naive, strong and resilient in every way you could imagine. The horror that she has been through before the story starts is one which is unimaginable, and one that she is expected to simply bounce back from. And this is where her performance really does lift the film. Her arc is the one which I was totally lost in. And in the final scenes, where she is trying to love & help Mary Anning, only to be shut down brutally & almost without emotion are very difficult to watch.

Whilst I really wanted to love this film and it absolutely has great elements, I still find it very hard to wholeheartedly recommend it, given the script & structure. But still a great & moving effort, with some flashes of genuiene inspiration.

One of those great documentaries which simply shows you what was going on behind the scenes and lets you take it all in. There is no narration, but plenty of footage of the communication between the crew and ground control, so you can follow what is happening.

The newly discovered and restored footage looks spectacular on 4K UHD Disk and well worth renting.

Finally, there was a joke me and my friend watching shared at the end: with the level of detail/showing behind the scenes all of the different people involved with this mission, it sort of makes a mockery of the conspiracy theory that the moon landings were faked...

I'd seen Hyena many years ago, after it got very good reviews. I liked it because it showed a very different side to the law & also was not afraid to go to very dark places and give us characters who, whilst they were detestable, were also fascinating to follow. Another trait of Gerard Johnson is his ability to get incredible performances from & to attract amazing actors to his films, and this continues with Muscle.

The film is about a down-on-his-luck guy called Simon who is slowly sinking into nothingness and irrelevance. This all changes when he gets taken under the wing of the enigmatic Terry, played by Craig Fairbrass. What follows is about how far down you can sink, whilst thinking that your life is actually going forward and you are making progress.

It also is very clever to make a mockery of a certain element of "Gym culture," which shows how underneath all the muscle and "power," there are deeply lost and misguided people, although mainly men, who make terrible judgements and live in absolute chaos.

The performances are what make this film stand out and elevate it into so much more than you would expect. Craig Fairbrass in particular is the face you have seen before on a hundred straight-to-DVD schlocky mis-fires, which are all terrible and tell basically the same story with as much gratuitous violence as possible. But here he is a complete revelation, showing a great range, along with the presence which before was only used as the one-note image to put on the cover of previous film poster. His character of Terry is a guy who on the surface is un-fearing and confrontational, but in smaller moments is shown to be as weak and scared as the people he so readily mocks.

Opposite him, Cavan Clerkin is also sensational, not only for the journey and arc we go through with him, but also for his Christian Bale level of commitment to the role. His physical transformation from meek and portly office worker to musclebound and thickset gym addict is totally believable. His chemistry with Fairbrass is also totally authentic and real, looking as naturalistic as it's possible to be.

The choice to shoot in black and white is one which many people may think is a gimmic, but actually really works well and fit the tone of the film perfectly. Likewise the soundtrack also beautifully works within the story.

My only issue with this film which prevents it getting 5 stars is that towards the end, it does start to run out of steam and the events become so far-fetched that the credibility is stretched. But the journey you go on is well-worth the watch. I hope that both Fairbrass and Clerkin are able to get more roles like this, which showcase their great talents.

I rented this film because of the stellar cast and seeing it pop up on the recommended list.

I was unaware of the film's extremely troubled production, which clearly shows and also is a massive reason why I found it to be so difficult to become involved with. Like many people, I was drawn because of the powerhouse of talent that was there. Benedict Cumberbatch is always watchable, Michael Shannon again an actor of immense gravitas, Nicholas Hoult very adept ect ect.

The film is shot in a very strange way, in that the camera is always moving and, unlike this being done in a clever and subtle way, it actively draws attention to it. This, along with an extremely clipped and rushed script, makes the film very discombobulating and difficult to get on board with. I actually stopped watching it after about an hour, because I was finding it very difficult to actually maintain an interest in what was going on.

I will say that, despite the huge difficulties affecting production due to the exposure of the crimes of Harvey Weinstein, I am not convinced that had these events not happened, the film would be radically different. Whilst I am all for stories being told in different ways, you have to bring the audience along with you with these stories. And I think that the film's deep narrative problems would cause problems with any director who was attached.

Whilst not a complete write-off (hence my 2 star score,) it wasn't something which I was interested or motivated to keep watching. Let's hope that the next time someone manages to get all of these incredible actors and crew together again, the results are fitting of their talents.

The Has Fallen franchise is one which, like many other actions staples, wears proudly on its sleeve exactly what it is. There will be action, laughs and big set pieces; logic will often be suspended but if you go with it, then you can have a silly 2 hours of fun. And one of the biggest strengths of this franchise is Gerard Butler. Whilst much has been written about his often-similar performances, which basically started with 300 and has then morphed slightly into whichever film he is doing, he is also at times a very skilled and capable actor. His finest performance for me will always be Tullus Aufidius in Coriolanus, where he comfortably stood toe-to-toe with Ralph Fiennes and was totally believable, at times carrying the film.

I mention Coriolanus because one thing which sets Angel has Fallen apart from many other action films like it is the focus in the first chunk of the movie on the PTSD suffered by Mike Banning. And this is something which I feel was a real missed opportunity by the film-makers to not elaborate more on. It is a very welcome thing that more and more, mental health issues are brought up and shown in these types of films and it is also stated clearly and emphatically that this is not a sign of weakness. I remember being very moved by the suffering shown by Rambo in Rambo: Last Blood, and that in many ways was better at conveying it than Angel has Fallen, but that the limited amount that is shown was moving and I wished that it had been fleshed out more. And I have no doubt that Butler would be up to this task.

When the proverbial does hit the fan, Angel has Fallen then comfortably falls into the familiar pattern of the previous movies, albeit this time the focus is on Mike Banning proving his innocence whilst being hunted. The set pieces are on the whole, good, but the standout sequence is Banning seeking out his father, played by Nick Nolte. There is not only comic relief, but also another broaching of the massive damage done by PTSD and war, albeit in a reduced capacity.

The final action sequence is again everything you’d expect, but the final discussion between Banning/Butler and President/Morgan Freeman is something which leaves the movie on a real high, in that the difficulties shown earlier and the subsequent concerns of how Banning thought he would be treated were shown to be totally unfounded. To have this explicitly said in a blockbuster film shows the progress that is being made and extremely welcome.

There is another sequel being made, with the same team (actors and director) coming back, so hopefully this trend can continue.

The Souvenir arrived with massive critical praise, including the blurb on the front of the Blu-Ray saying “It feels like the only film in the world that matters.” These plaudits, plus the casting of Honor Swinton Byrne (daughter of Tilda, who also stars with her,) made it feel like a must see. But, as has often been said regarding critics, their opinions verses the audience who are watching it can be completely opposing. And this is what a very large number of people, including myself, feel about this film. One look at the comments section on Cinema Paradiso or indeed any legitimate review site exposes this massive gulf, (and please don’t start saying “It’s all trolls and people hate this film because they hate women making films ect ect.)

The biggest problem that I, and the friend watching it with me had, was the complete lack of ANY chemistry at all between the two leads. The film may be trying to portray a difficult or different relationship, which I welcome due to the vast numbers of films that follow the same metric and suffer creatively as a result. But when you have a film which is trying to convince you that these two leads have a burning, passionate and intense romance, yet all you see on screen is characters who are so indifferent to each other and have so little in common that nothing the film tries to do is believable, things just hit a brick wall.

And that in turn then affects the narrative and nothing can rescue it. The events that subsequently play out have no meaning and the only thing you are left with is an empty shell of a film. Much has been made of the fact that there was a lot of improvisation with the script and also that time is allowed for scenes to play out, with minimal dialogue and allowing the actors to act. But again, the same brick wall is hit: when you have two characters, one of whom literally does things that defy logic and yet the status quo “continues”, you get more and more alienated. And when the film in question is also unbelievably long and slow paced, everything becomes exacerbated.

The one shining light in all of this is Honor Swinton Byrne. Despite the material she is given, she is absolutely fantastic and a real revelation. She has a very ethereal quality to her and tries her best to try and make sense of everything that is on screen. My 2 star rating is in no way related to the quality of her acting. The way the film is shot is also very good, and the real grainy quality of the cinematography gives the film a very distinctive look.

Finally, a sequel has been filmed and is due to be released this year (2021.) Apart from critics and one or two of the audience reviews, there doesn’t seem to be a massive clamoring for this...

Peter Mullan is an actor who I have seen in mainly supporting roles over the years, but who always makes an impact. Whether it’s his role as the Mother Superior in Trainspotting, Les in Young Adam or lead role as Joseph in Tyrannosaur, his impact is always felt and there are not many people who do brooding and threats of violence better than him. I rented My Name is Joe on a complete whim, because I was reading an interview with an actor (I forget who it was,) who stated that Mullan’s performance as Joe was one of the best they had ever seen. I also saw that Mullan had won Best Actor at Cannes for his performance, so hopes were high.

And they were met and massively exceeded. Mullan is the absolute stand-out and flat-out best thing in this film. From the opening scene, where you do not see him, but hear his voice over the credits, talking about how he came to be where he was, you are totally immersed and believe in the life that has been created by him.

Louise Goodall also makes a strong impression, and her chemistry with Mullan is fantastic. The power of her performance, for me, was the ability she had to communicate so much just with a look or a few quietly spoken words. The rest of the cast were also great, and as is with all Ken Loach films, many of the extras were not actors but members of the local community, who were able to add their own authenticity to the mise-en-scene.

The story and how Joe got to where he was is a difficult but inspiration one. This is the second Ken Loach film I have seen, but in reality the first one I have properly taken in, as like most people, the first one I saw was Kes when I was at school. Loach has an incredible way of building up and creating worlds which feel authentic and lived in, and the actors are not actors but people who are a part of their environment, which is the essence of great film making, in the same way that Mike Leigh is able to do with such skill.

The only problem I have with this film is the ending, which basically finishes extremely abruptly and leaves several questions unanswered, as well as leaving the story in a situation that it wouldn’t be in following the events. But this is a minor gripe and the journey that you go on, and the impact that is left after the credits roll, is significant.