Film Reviews by Champ

I saw this film at the cinema when first released in 2015, and loved it. Since then I have read the book, which is also excellent, and I was interested to see how the movie stood up a few years later.

And the answer is - it stands up very well indeed. There's some very good hard science in it, which it revels in instead of dumbing down. Sure it, takes some dramatic licence - after a character says that each message takes minutes to round-trip, people are then seen communicating as if in real time. But I can forgive it that.

Matt Damon is truly excellent, and I love the way he, and the film, play some scenes for laughs. The rest of the cast is a little mixed - while some of the supporting characters are excellent (Benedict Wong and Chiwetel Ejiofor stand out), others, such a Sean Bean, are more than a little wooden. But the film is good enough overall that it can stand a few lines of stilted dialogue, poorly delivered.

I also have to mention the movie makes Mars looks. This is reason alone to watch this on blu-ray! I never wondered how they did it, I just marvelled that it genuinely felt like Matt Damon was on Mars.

And if you really like the science in this movie, then I can highly recommend the book :-)

I don't like horror, so was pleased that this didn't turn out to be one. I did watch a couple of bits through my fingers, but that's more about me being a wuss than any real gore in the movie.

And what an enjoyable movie! The performances were all great - Bill Nighy was his usual reliably brilliant self, but new to me were Douglas Booth and Olivia Cook, who were just as good. The plot genuinely kept me guessing, as a good whodunnit should.

This might be the blackest of black comedies that I've ever seen - but to call it a comedy pigeon-holes it and undersells it.

I really enjoyed it, but I felt a little uncomfortable in my enjoyment. Some of the events referenced and depicted are so awful, that laughing at the way they are satirised just feels wrong! But it's a sign of the supreme skill of Armando Ianucci's writing and directing that he's managed to pull this off. I should stress that this film is much more than a satire, and I while Beria, Kruschev, Molotov and Zhukov are names I knew from history, I didn't know about Malenkov, or Stalin's son and daughter, who I then went and read about them.

In a way it's a lesson from history, about how power can utterly corrupt and destroy the things it professes to value.

Watch it - and forgive yourself when you laugh!

This film looks wonderful, is beautifully acted, and covers ground that mainstream cinema is only now starting to embrace. It's received great reviews, which is why I rented it, but ultimately my reaction was "what was the fuss about". The characters were interesting, but never really grabbed me, and I found myself urging the film to get on with telling me the story.

This film is a great antidote to the usual Hollywood shoot-em-ups, where bullets either kill you immediately or miss completely.

The setup was great, with Tarantino-esque dialog, delivered by distinct characters, and it built a sense of real tension. When the tension finally explodes, the film really delivers, and keeps you on the edge of your seat. But then...it's just more of the same, and it started to feel like the film only had the one idea. But, having said that, it's still a good idea!

And the film should definitely get extra kudos for its use of John Denver :-)

To criticise the script as not being quite as good as Aaron Sorkin's work is perhaps unfair - little is, after all. But it tries hard, and is full of smart people with smart dialogue trying to show they're the smartest person in the room. I understand that this isn't everyone's cup of tea, but it's definitely mine. If you like the West Wing, you'll like this.

It does require some commitment, however - the first 30 minutes especially require all your attention to keep up, but your focus is rewarded as the story unfolds.

Everyone has commented on how Chastain carries the film, and she does - an absolutely riveting performance.

Normally I'd avoid a zombie movie like the plague. I don't like horror films at all, and am just not interested in anything about zombies.

But this had good reviews, so I thought I'd give it a go, and I'm really glad I did. The zombies themselves are just the driver of the movie, the reason other people do things, and the real people are the interest in this movie. The range of characters and their motivations are broad and deep, and that's what drives the movie along, and it felt like an action thriller rather than a horror to me.

Happy to recommend it to non-horror fans. And this might be an anti-recommendation for horror fans, as I didn't really find it scary (and I *hate* being scared in a movie, hence my dislike of horror).

Prompted by the great review from Mark Kermode, I added Captain Underpants to my list, but wondered how much I'd really enjoy a "kids film". I needn't have worried - this film works for the inner 10-year-old in all of us, and I laughed out loud all the way through. It's a great family film, but great for just adults too.

Plot Spoiler: the Hahaguffawchucklealamus is the part of the brain responsible for laughter, which the evil Professor Poopypants wants to destroy to stop people laughing at his name.

This film is breathtakingly beautiful. That is the overwhelming sensation I have when I recall it. Often such praise is used to cover failing elsewhere in a film, but there were no such failings here - the story is strong, with great characters and excellent voice work from an A-list cast.

It's very difficult for me to comprehend that this is a Hollywood movie - it just *feels* so Japanese - like something that should have come out of Studio Ghibli. Which just goes to show how trustworthy our preconceptions are.

I don't like horror films, including zombie movies, so just reading the synopsis of this film should really put me off. But I loved the book, and knew it was not a typical zombie story. The film brilliantly trashes any genre expectations - you care about the characters, especially the protagonist, Melanie.

I didn't think I would be prey to a traditional yarn like this, but I loved it. It felt like one of the Sunday afternoon films of my youth, but scratch the surface and it's not that old-fashioned at all. The story gave a real sense of women starting to take advantage of the new opportunities that the war enabled for them, and how high the mountain was that they had to climb to gain equality.

The performances were all great, with Bill Nighy stealing the show, and Gemma Arterton giving a pitch perfect performance of a young woman in the 40s. I loved the romance, but (retrospectively) admire the decision the film-makers made to make the main story much bigger that the romantic sub-plot.

This film is an incredible piece of work, and it really really moved me. At some points I was shouting at the screen, with tears streaming down my face. Robert Ebert famously said that cinema is a machine for generating empathy, and this film perfectly illustrates the power of that statement.

This is not an easy watch, and definitely not a 'feel-good' movie. But everyone should see it - especially our political leaders.

I found this film a little slow to get going, but once I was in, it really had me. I thought I had it pegged as an 'unreliable natrator', which it was, but the twist completely caught me out.