Film Reviews by AS

Not quite as good as the first outing: the storylines are a tad ordinary and drag on too long; some of the violence is gratuitous; some of the action has become tongue-in-cheek, losing the hard edge of the original 'Sin City'. That said, the cast do a brilliant job of fitting into Frank Miller's noir city and the graphics alone are worth the trip. Razor-sharp dialogue and indeed dames to die for.

Simplistic narrative, but well executed action all the way. Only weak point is Brosnan who pops up unaccountably at odd moments without adding anything to the plot, looks like he was shoe-horned in just to add another 'name' to the poster; and what on earth was that accent? Irish? Cockney? Australian? Wilson was more than capable of carrying this on his own. Good to see him shucking off his usual chirpy chappie persona. Sparky direction, if a tad slow at the punctuation points, keeping you held right up to the will-they-won't-they-make-it closing moment.

Single-sentence synopsis dragged out to two hours. Plodding, repitive narrative and virtually no plot. Several points introduced but never pursued. One-dimensional characters: Hathaway far from manic enough; De Niro pulling his usual gamut of faces. The 'boys' were seemingly plucked out of a 1980s TV sit-com. The squeaky-voiced cute kid dates back to the '30s. If you want to see/hear how this sort of thing should be done, watch a Frank Capra movie, listen to some Garson Kanin/Ruth Gordon dialogue.

Excellent adaptation of the book. You just have to know who murdered them all; and this will keep you guessing to the very end. The flashbacks meld seamlessly with the present-day story. Theron carries the weight of the proceeding on her shoulders, creating a multi-layered memorable character. Sharp direction, choosing tough realism rather than fragile gloss. If you like a convoluted mystery, set against a stark backdrop, you'll like this.

Patrick Chesnais gives a masterclass in understated acting in this tale of a middle-aged artist who's reached crisis point in life and career. On the way to self-destruct he encounters a young woman at a similar emotional crossroads. The developing relationship could have been a saccharine-laced sob story, but wth subtle handling by director and writer the pair lead themselves and each other back from the brink without histrionics or sentimentality. Although the plot is sparse, the narrative arc is sufficient to hold the attention to the poignant end.

George C Scott lends his weighty presence to a run-of-the-mill spooky house tale. His major movie star status began to wane around this time and his later career shifted to television, albeit with some great performances. His real-life wife Trish van Devere joins him here, but this is not a good thing: she's an attractive lady but her acting is strictly by-numbers TV fare, and she adds no character to the proceedings. The scares are nothing new - dark staircases, empty rooms, self-motivating furniture, noisy plumbing. The ending is completely over the top. Worth a look for ghost story lovers.

A lot of Academy members voted this as Best Film Oscar. What were they on? There are three things wrong with this tripe: direction, screenwriting, Bradley Cooper. All of these racket around with no sense of purpose or destination. The only saving grace is Christian Bale who gives a stand-out performance, running the gamut of emotions in a weird accent and even weirder wig. Cooper is a persistent annoying noise in the background. Jennifer Lawrence aquits herself okay. Amy Adams runs through her usual (sparse) set of facial expressions and shows her tits a lot. At over two hours this is more of a crawl than a hustle.

Everything here is dire: acting, direction, cinematography, production. The scriptwriting is beyond dire. This has nothing whatsoever to do with Agatha Christie's Tommy and Tuppence stories. It is simply a mish-mash of silly crime, silly sci-fi and slapstick. At best it is puerile; at worst it is just plain stupid.

It's unbelievable. So what? Robert Downey Jr gives a stand-out performance in a zingy, slightly crazy, feel-good movie. Anybody who doesn't like this unpretentious romp is just a sourpuss.

Acting, writing and direction utterly flat for a true story that deserved much better. Looks like made-for-daytime-TV with English actors playing Czechs speaking English with Czech accents and behaving like petulant public school boys. Aside from the semi-botched assassination attempt on Heydrich very little happens during the first 80 minutes. The final 20 minutes are taken up by a gunfight. A far superior realisation of this slice of WW2 history is 'Operation Daybreak' (1975).

This is almost incoherent. The plot is all over the place. Looks like something cobbled together from bits off the cutting room floor. Po-faced Damon is just going through the motions. Tommy Lee Jones looks utterly exhausted by the entire shambles. Alicia Vikander, ridiculously young for the CIA position she is supposed to hold, lends her character all the personality of tapioca.

Six middle-aged men (though the dead one is somewhat younger) doing what only they can do. Just watch and worship

Nothing remarkable about any aspect of this. If you've read the synopsis you've seen the movie. You'll like it if you like Downton Abbey. Slow, gentle, unoffensive.

If you enjoy the speed and excitement and originality of modern sci-fi, stay away from this. Gareth Edwards' effort is as clunky as a 1950s B-movie - but nowhere near as gripping. This is supposed to be cutting-edge CGI: Ray Haryhausen did it ten-times better with stop-motion 50 years ago. Much of the plot makes no sense; the acting has no depth; half the characters are irrelevant; and with so many scenes being nothing more than padding the whole farrago clatters on for at least an hour too long.

Very funny and extremely hair-raising from start to finish. Clever plot. Brilliant climax. A New Zealand film that far outdoes some of the Hollywood spooky house efforts. Infinitely better, much less juvenile than the 'Scary Movie' series.