Film Reviews by PV

I enjoyed this. Like many biopics, it fits a well-worn mould of overcoming adversity to succeed, with flashbacks, emphasis on bad experiences in the past, and ending in victory and redemption. I do wonder how much of it was true though - esp the WWII 'event'. No mention of that in the Wiki page. I suspect it is pure fiction, intended to make visual possible guilt and trauma of the war. Trautman did serve with his unit on the Eastern Front where most were killed and must have seen horrors.

What is true is that he broke his neck while goalie for Man City in the FA cup final they won. Trautman was also VERY lucky to be caught by the British after the war and not the Russians (90% Germans they took prisoner died) or the Germans (who would have shot him as a deserter). One senses he knew that which is why he stayed here after the war.. Not a football fan really and most sports films are awful but this is a good watch (as is the distinctly weird Escape to Victory of 1982). I believe there is a statue of Trautman in Manchester? One hopes the usual suspects do not want to tear it down for whatever reason they choose to make up (well he was married 3 times). The sad story of the son is true too - though there is no mention of his other children who came later or a pre-existing daughter or 2 later wives, not even at the end. That does not fit with fairytale romance eh?

Sport and movies do not mix - quite simply because of what Bert says in the film about football being in 'the moment', in 'the now'. SPOT ON. So if you're making a film with a sporting context, you have to decide on the genre - and here and in many other sport films (like the awful 'Wimbledon') that is romance. A love story (no mention this marriage ended in divorce in real life of course though the end credits do reveal she died 1989 while Bert died 2013 aged nearly 90). Or a thriller/war story (Escape to Victory). Sport is not a genre in itself - it is always in 'the now' while a football match is happening. After that it is over. I mean, who watched football matches from the 1970s as we do with films? Sport is immediate. So this film is romance. Fairytale too.

Anyway, I very much enjoyed most of it. This is set in the 1940s/50s some some things jarred - people did NOT whoop back then. In fact not until the 1990s! And some slang used was too modern too. Most people won't notice or care. But I do. It matters.

One also wonders if working class women of the time would have behaved as the two young women featured behave. That is a very common issue in so many films set in the past - whether earlier 20th century of 19th or earlier. Thee are modern 21st century women transplanted into the past so are not authentic for their times. Not most costume drama for this - where women as standard now are 'strong and independent' and say stuff no 16th C court lady would have done. It is pure fiction, fantasy and metoo wishful thinking. Most of all, it is tiresome and predictable and pc - though we can thank the gods that there was at least no colourblind casting at least.

A decent good old-fashioned biopic which succeeds at being that rare thing: a film about sport that works. 4 stars.

Perhaps the biggest rule on all story-telling is ensuring the reader/viewer/listener knows what is going on - not everything and certainly not all at once. Reveals are needed later. BUT some clarity is called for, not the confused and confusing third act of this.

I mean, I read the review which said look the ending up online, so I did - and I have to say it did not OCCUR to me that that was the plot and 'reveal'. Not good.

Prior to that this is well done - creepy, creaking haunted house plot basically - a horror film with added #metoo perhaps.

I liked the dementia carer theme which was original. The other so-called twists etc were definitely not.

Made me jump at one point and that gets a star. First act and second worth watching. The ending? Oh dear...

And I do get so sick and tired of any film with child abuse plots - that palled after the first 3000 of em. And these plots always portray older white men as the abusers which is not only racist and sexist, but ageist. Most of all though it is tiresome and lazy.

A great shame it all goes wrong in the third act. I'd have rewritten the script, to be honest, all that part. Forgotten the supposed big reveal surprise which I did not get anyway, and...but...well. The writer/director comes from a background of Waterloo Road, so maybe that is why it is how it is. No good male character in this film at all. Like most UK TV drama these days then eh, esp on the BBC...

2 stars, one for the jump.

So, this is co-created by Bryan Cranston and anything with him in is worth watching. It's what he did after the sublime Breaking Bad (the pilot for series 1 is the best ever in US drama arguably though later series jumped the shark somewhat). No way can this reach the masterpiece standard of Breaking Bad, of course.

Both series rely on the same central dramatic tension of 'will the deception be discovered' - as did excellent spy drama (2013-2018) The Americans - and 2 actresses here also feature in that (though the accent of one is the weirdest I have ever heard in any US TV drama series - I think an acting class taught her how to to an English or Scottish accent, but the Klingon version she speaks has no known planet!)

The imposter plot is an old one and there have been many true-life examples - and attempts - in history. A 16th French case was made into the 1982 film The Return of Martin Guerre. The Talented Mr Ripley is another, based on a Patricia Highsmith novel. The Tichbourne Claimant (1998 British film based on a true 1854 case) and the deeply weird documentary The Imposter (2012). Not to mention many Elizabethan plays and ancient myth.

Plenty of conman - and conwoman - films too, of course. The Sting, Paper Moon, American Hustle, Catch Me if you Can, Mississippi Grind. All good - and the card playing plot here certainly adds interest, for the cleverness of the cons and tricks etc. I like magic and card tricks etc so that aspect always appeals to me.

What I disliked was the convoluted plot which involved just too many characters. I suspect some were added just tick inclusion/diversity boxes too. But when, say, female characters look very similar it can get confusing! Some added little or nothing to the film or story in any way, just appeared in a couple of scenes to add colour. Needs a character cull. A good script edit to fight the flab! I think 10 episodes could become 8 too.

The plot is pretty incredible all round BUT then many are, so if you suspend your disbelief it's OK. Though the fact many characters have to explain stuff or that dialogue is deliberately set up to do so rings a few alarm bells. Very clunky at times.

And I hated the constant soundtrack in the background playing like some video game. I suspect this is an attempt by the producers/direct to mimic movies like American Hustle, the Kingsman films and the Now You See Me movies (which I find annoying). No doubt all to appeal to a younger audience with a small attention span - though I doubt many of them would stay with a 10 part series like this with a complex plot.

BUT I enjoyed it and will watch the next series. 4 stars. Just.

This was like a cartoon caper. The baddies (the racist cartoon character skinheads BOOOOOO!) versus the goodies (Finnish hippies and non-white asylum seekers). It is all two-dimensional cartoon characters If I'd wanted a lecture or sermon I'd have gone to a church. This pc preachiness is not all, however.

As a film which claims in its pose to be against racism and liberal-minded, it does a rather great job of promoting offensive stereotypes against the Japanese (in a point section of the film which has no reason to exist, like others too - all the alleged 'comedy' scenes which are not comedy as I define it).

The plot is not credible and the story does not flow at all.

I suspect the usual adore this film as it is woke and on trend, because that is their way.

However, looking at the film objectively, it is an utter mess. Badly written, with tacked-on musical interludes to pad it all out, and alleged comedy sketches. Time REALLY dragged when watching this mess. It felt like 5 hours. Never again.

No stars.

I wanted to like this movie and it has some memorable scenes.

However, it meanders terribly at times and does glamorise gang culture too.

The plots darts here and there, which may be because it follows the source material novel too close. Some should have been cut.

I like it more than Gomorrah though so 3 stars.

I doubt the Naples tourist authority will use it to attract visitors though.

This is as brilliant as series 1. So well made in every way - plot, writing, pace, acting, setting, music.

The murky and slippery world of south American politics is brought to life in all its hideous horror - and the end, when it comes., manages to elicit sympathy for a man who killed so many.

Pablo Escobar was clearly a fascinating Narco - he was not the only one at all, but he liked the fame and wanted to be loved by the people. The money was secondary even though at one time he was the 7th richest man in the world. That makes him fascinating

I could watch it all again now.

Brilliant. 5 stars

Series 1 and 2 of this were so brilliant, especially with the presence of the actor who played Pablo Escobar (Wagner M), so it was unclear if the same standard would be reached after the charismatic kingpin P.E. had left the stage.

No need to worry because despite Escobar being replaced by 'the gentlemen of Cali', this series is as watchable, horrific and exciting as the first two. Most fascinating perhaps is the gay narco, and the extras on the DVD discuss this. The inevitable fate of these Narcos ensues as does the sad fate of many of the good guys.

Yet again, the way the series mixes Spanish and English, and the way it cuts real news footage from the 1990s with drama, make this something special.

5 stars

I loved the original film Fargo (though the Oscar-winning actress in it is now seriously over-rated as she wins yet more Oscars).

This spin-off, however, irritates as much as pleases. It's what is known as 'milking it'.

It reminds me of self-consciously quirky, preppy, US humour - like Frank Zappa. I found him unfunny and unenjoyable too.

There's a lot of flab here and way too much self-conscious quirkiness, acting up for the camera in an unrealistic setting - a bit like a panto. Not to my taste really.

There are so many - far too many - unlikely random events happen to look good or move the plot forward. Deus Ex Machina on steroids then. I know the Coen brothers films are well-known for this sort of thing - but then this is just a spin-off of the original movie which was entertaining.

The acting is fine, with Martin Freeman finally emerging from typecast Office hell. And he gets the accent spot on.

In short, this is nowhere near as funny or clever as it thinks it is. So 3 stars. Watchable but unremarkable.

This may be over 80 years old yet is way more entertaining than most modern movies.

Also it is prophetic - made in 1938 and set in a fiction central European state, it somewhat predicts the way the continent would be ravaged by war within a year.

Based on a short story, I believe, and full of the spy-sage mystery reminiscent of The Riddle of The Sands and other fiction post 1904 when Britain signed the Entente Cordial with traditional enemy France, and instead faced the enemy of 'new' country Germany. This is very much a post WWI story.

I loved it. I also find it shocking how bad so many modern pc woke movies are by comparison, No CGI here just clever use to backdrop film reels. Some clever direction. Amusing too how most of these old films (anything before the 1990s maybe) has scenes which would now get labeled sexist or racist or even 'sexual assault', Show how much we have regressed maybe from a better unwoke age.

5 stars.

I had heard of various murders in the Scandinavian death metal scene in the 1990s and this is a drama based on a true story of one such band called Mayhem.

This is a well-made band biopic with added extreme violence - the viewer is not spared anything, and the camera lingers on it actually. The actors nail it too - I was impressed by them all.

But then, violence and murders and suicides happened. Based on a book about what happened, this film has been called 'truth and lies' - like all biopics then! Bohemian Rhapsody and Rocket Man were hardly documentaries either and twisted the truth for dramatic effect.

The script is witty and funny at times which shows just how pathetic these young people were. An interview with a journalist here nails it.

A quick search on Wiki reveals the fate of the real-life characters. One released from prison after 9 years for a murder; another still there but due to be out soon as 21 years is the maximum allowed in Norway.

To be honest, this movie is great in exploding the perfect Scandi myth promoted by so much TV detective drama - life for people in these places is very conformist and collective, which arguably stifles individuality. Norway is also hideously expensive (£10 a pint I heard) and of course left the EU too - in order to protect its oil reserves from greedy Brussels Eurocrats.

4 stars.

I would have given this achingly woke pc B-movie one star, but gave an extra star for the anti-poaching message and especially the way there is a Chinese character shown as doing business with elephant/rhino poachers - the demand for ivory, rhino horn, pangolin, lion/big cat teeth bone, shark fins ALL comes from there. I have never seen another film dare do this or criticise China - the reference is subtle here to get past the studio monster/. But it is there at least.

The rest is like some B-Movie Jurassic Park minus the dinosaurs or fun. At least it is mercifully short as a film - though ROGUE by the same writer/director was more believable really. The same main female characters and obsession with woke issues pervades this movie which sounds like a Californian therapy session with Harry and Meghan at its worst. Of course we have a cis-gender white man who works in the oil business (boo!) and has failed (yay!), and his wife is sorted and shows the way as do his kids (one gay son the daughter who may well be trans - a gruesome metoo-type speech at the end is really vomit-inducing).

I saw the plot development, character arcs and alleged 'twist' coming a mile off, from early act one. Yawn. Also there is NO female-only anti-poaching unit in Kenya - and Africa is VERY traditional re gender roles as is Asia and most of the world - so that is all pc woke metoo fiction. Fake news then. BUT it shows women are goodie heroes and men as baddies - so YAY! That is how wokery ruins movies and truth.

The director of this is a man yet now claims to be trans, which no doubt helps his career massively these days, with female gender quotas and 'affirmative action' - there has been no worse time to be a white man wanting to get films made or books published. It;s racism and sexism, sure, but promoted as good. Hypocrisy does not even cover it.

This director also always casts his wife/daughter in his movies (she stars in no others) - now THAT is entitled privilege.

SO a great message BUT I much preferred Africa-set films such as the Last King of Scotland, Blood Diamond or the native film Wound.

Predictable, woke, slushy, pc preachy, teary, touchy-feely, huggy-wuggy nonsense. CGI passable except in the end. I felt sorry for the animals having to put up with the wokeworld nonsense, even though the rhinos were CGI., Nice leopard. Shame he missed a meal.

1 star for the film. 1 for the anti-poaching message.

I have no idea why this has got 5 star reviews - maybe because Robert Redford says it's his final film. well, fine, But the film itself is distinctly average and predictable. Not bad, no - not great either. Ultimately. a forgettable slice of Romantic Escapism cake. If that's your thing...

The noodling slushy piano muzak completes the Mills and Boon feel. I suspect women will like this more than men, which is the case for many of Robert Redford's films anyway, I think? If you want to rent a great movie, watch ALL THE PRESIDENT'S MEN a 1970s classic.

It may be based on a true story, via a magazine article, but the schmaltzy romantic portrayal of a career criminal is pure Mills and Boon. I doubt this has much relation to reality, to be honest, as a wasted life spent mostly in prison is not a good one ever. Not sure real life would have had such ethnic diversity either, in 1981, in middle America. I'd have liked a little doc on the Extras telling the REAL story of this career criminal (the script claims he was first arrested aged 13 for bike theft and the references to Catholic boarding school suggest cans of worms to be opened).

AND the dates and timeline are skewwhiff too. SO this is set in 1981 and the main character is supposedly 74 years old, so born then in 1907. Why, then, does a reform school scene in act 3, set in 1936, show a boy. A 29 year old boy? Yup. Sloppy.

BUT it passes the time. Forgettable though - 3 stars maximum. Just past 2.

Far better to watch TOUGH GUYS (1986) with Kirk Douglas (age just 70) and Burt Lancaster, or even NEW TRICKS the BBC oldie con artist drama series.

This is from 1989, back when TV could make drama for kids (or adults) that did not think its sole purpose was to preach and lecture a 'correct' way of thinking whilst shoehorning in social issues clunkily.

This 2 and a half hour drama series - all in one segment - is a great watch and puts the story and characters first/. I dread to think what TV would do with the story these days, what with colourblind pc woke casting. Some music hall jokes here would be deemed 'offensive' too, no doubt.

Thankfully we have good old-fashioned children;s TV to watch on DVD - and this should be watched with the Richard Attenborough 1992 movie 'Chaplin; which I also loved.

I loved the music hall routines - which still inform some good modern comedy, and esp the best TV comedy (much from the 1970s).

This may be a bit sanitised for the young audience, but nevertheless, it's a great and highly entertaining watch. It also never mentions that probably Charlie's real father was not Mr Chaplin senior (who in real life died of alcoholic liver failure aged 38).

The young actors do well - Lee Whitlock from from the classic TV Scene 'Two of Us' (1987) is 20 years old or almost 21 but plays down for 17. Joe Greary who plays the young Chaplin is 15 here and also plays down to age 12/13 - he did not do much acting after this, I think.

Twiggy is Twiggy and Ian McShane is superb as always (watch 'Deadwood').

Good to see Stan Laurel in music hall - he was the brains behind Laurel and Hardy - and other acts.

One interesting fact: 'silent' film grew from music hall slapstick which had no dialogue so as to avoid the wrath of any censors. These days, the censors would want woke pc cuts - as with some of the impressions of Chinamen and Japanese. Sigh...

Anyway, for kids or adults, this is a solidly entertaining 2 and a half hours - I loved it.

This is as good as series one, or maybe even better. EVERYTHING is right - the casting, the acting, the writing, the setting, the plot progression, the music. Filmed in Colombia too which is great, and I do not mind subtitles at all. So authentic and fascinating. The way real-life TV footage of 1980s and early 90s is spliced into the drama really works - which surprised me. But it works. It just does. We even see real TV footage of Pablo's mum at the end.

I would watch this all over again, It is that good. The only people who maybe should be worried are South American tourist boards as the place looks dodgy and dangerous as hell really, with massive violence and enormous poverty, and so a destination to be avoided. For me, anyway.

The Brazilian (I think) actor Wagner Moura plays Pablo Escobar with class and style - PERFECT casting. Even if the belly prosthetic and fake beard look a bit off. That is very common in TV drama BUT the locations here look so authentic. You can almost smell the humidity and heat, not to mention the crime, corruption and danger.

Wagner and the writers of course manage to make Escobar, a brutal charismatic drug lord who murdered so many so ruthlessly, a victim in the end. This can be done - as with Hitler in DOWNFALL of the TV drama about Saddam. And it works - these people are all just human. They were all babes in arms once...

It is sad to say but maybe a TV version of this not made by Netflix would have played it safe, and censored the name 'Blackie' for a start and maybe insisted on more female roles as they do these days - I am SO glad the producers of this did not defer to the diversity quota orders common now. Of course, in many ways, the very word 'Gringo' for all white people is racist... It is authentic though so why the problem?

The extras on disc 3 here worth a watch too. The only thing I would have liked more is some on-screen information at the end about what happened to the characters who got arrested and also to Pablo's family.

5 stars. if this series has not won awards then it has been robbed.

Well Jurassic Park, it ain't! It's not even The LAnd that Time Forgot or its sequel, or the woeful Jurassic Predator. (Or the wonderful The Dinosaur Project). It is more like Watching-Paint-Dry-o-saurus.

This film stinks of state subsidy - the usual, BFI, BBC, lottery and sure enough, the end credits revealed all 3 funded it, BINGO! This also boasts its DIVERSITY credentials - as so many tedious new state-funded films do and that is why so many are flops. Most metoo movies have flopped and lost money. Just TELL A STORY WELL and stop painfully trying to tick all the diversity boxes, and you may make a decent film now and then.

Only 2 male speaking roles in this film and both men are portrayed as idiots, nasty users, in contrast to the poor repressed women (the victims, you see, of nasty-wasty patriarchy). CAN YOU IMAGINE a film where the only 2 female characters were portrayed as monsters or morons? It is pure sexism and misandry. AND not the historical truth at all. It is ALL SO BORING. It does not work on any level.

But costume drama can work - see THE TUDORS. See The Madness of King George. See the great 1960s and 70s films on Cromwell etc.

This is pure feminist fantasy - there is NO EVIDENCE whatsoever that Mary Anning was in any way lesbian. None. I suspect the male writer and director tagged it on 1) to get state funding; 2) because he seems to like a pity party blaming men for all that is bad in the world; 3) the story of walking on a beach finding fossils is not cinematic - so a script needs a beginning, middle and end 3 act structure. SO what to do? Tack on some repressed 1840s lesbianism. I suspect Mary Anning would be appalled.

This veers into soft porn and if that is your thing, fine. But why not just watch 'Desert Hearts' and be done with it. ALL fabricated and false, and unnecessary too. There is a story here without that.

The facts are there: the Anning family found fossils to sell to tourists as extra income and THOMAS ANNING Mary's father started it. He gets forgotten AS DOES Mary';s older brother Joseph WHO FOUND THE Ichthyosaur fossilised skull, NOT Mary. He is forgotten and as a boy was forced to do an apprenticeship and give up fossil hunting/. "Their first well-known find was in 1811, when Mary Anning was 12; her brother Joseph dug up a 4-foot ichthyosaur skull, and a few months later Anning herself found the rest of the skeleton. " As with Pierre Curie, and many men, these men and boys and written out of history by the pc metoo feminist industry and woke historians.

They are the facts though. The fossil was found by JOSEPH ANNING., Not Mary. Natural History Museum take note. Mary found fossils by herself later on - plesiosaurus and pterosaur BUT they are not shown here. The ichthyosaur skull shown here was found by JOSEPH ANNING not Mary.

The social class issues are more interesting and much is made of the deaths of many of Mary's siblings BUT that was not unusual for this time at all - it was standard. And NO WAY were males more privileged than females - many men and boys were forced down mines, out to sea, into the army. Working class women did not have it easy but arguably the men had it harder. AND women should know that men did not have the vote either for most of history - and working class men got the vote just 30 years before women, 'White male privilege' my fanny A! Read some history.

The FACTS show Mary was actually quite well off financially in the 1810s and 20s and bought a house. She then did a bad investment and like many in Britain of the 1830s suffered poverty BUT then got a decent special pension from the British government after a campaign by scientists - she was hardly a victim then.

If this is the future of British film then I shall stop watching all ne British films.

On the plus side, I enjoyed the scenery of Lyme Regis. 1 star for that.