Film Reviews by GI

In many ways this tale of a dysfunctional family reminded me of Animal Kingdom (2010) where an innocent joins a loving and close family only to discover they are a ruthless crime lords. This narrative is familiar and stretches back to The Godfather (1972) and this Scandinavian film takes the basics and lends it a modern, disturbing edge. Ida (Sandra Guldberg Camp), a seventeen year old withdrawn girl, is sent by a stretched social services to live with her Aunt Bodil (Side Babett Knudsen) after her mother dies in a car accident. Welcomed by Bodil and her three adult sons she soon discovers that the Club they run is a front for a loan shark business where intimidation, threats and violence are used on defaulters. Ida finds herself easily drawn into the life of crime until one day things go very wrong and she realises there's a price to pay. This is an interesting film and Kampp gives a subtle performance of a girl both trapped yet unleashed into a world she doesn't understand. It's in the complex relationships between the family members that the film is focused and consequently this is not a film with action although shocks do occur. Worth checking out.

There's something quite magical, mystical and uplifting in this tale of true love and destiny. A wonderfully clever idea and beautifully structured romantic film that posits that love will find a way and that memories are important even when relationships end. This is a story about Joel (Jim Carrey) and Clementine (Kate Winslet), who meet, fall in love and each brings out a side in each other they didn't know they had. Joel tends to be withdrawn while Clementine in impulsive but when their relationship sours Joel is heartbroken and angry when he discovers Clementine has undergone a revolutionary procedure to have all her memories of Joel erased. Partly in revenge and partly for self preservation Joel decides to have the same treatment but whilst under the anaesthesia he fights to retain at least one memory of Clementine as they all gradually start to fade. With a large section of the film told from the perspective of the unconscious Joel trying to control his memory this is an intricate story edited perfectly and balanced with the involvement of the four members of the team carrying out the procedure: Tom Wilkinson as Harold the pioneer who devised it, Mark Ruffalo and Elijah Wood as his assistants and Kirsten Dunst as the office girl. Their part in the story is far more involved than at first revealed. The film is humorous, sad and delves into the shadows of the inner self and the human desire to eradicate painful memories, it's a wonderful and unforgettable film and one to revisit every so often because it's a real joy.

John Carpenters cult sci-fi thriller still entertains even though in many respects it hasn't aged well. Viewed as an alternative future story where a dystopian USA, heavily crime ridden, with the world in the throes of a world war, is now a fascist state. To cope with crime there is now only one prison, a walled in Manhattan island, with a heavy security force surrounding it and one rule, "Once you go in, you never come out". When the President's plane crashes inside the prison the Security boss, Hauk (Lee van Cleef) has to send in former special forces soldier Snake Plissken (Kurt Russell), who is a new prisoner just arrived, with a promise of freedom if he gets the president back. There's a time clock running to add to the tension. Plenty of gritty action and chases through the rubbish strewn streets at night before the hero gets captured and has to battle to escape. Russell, here shaking off his Disney persona and channelling a Clint Eastwood impersonation, has managed to create a hugely memorable character, a classic American anti-hero. " Call me Snake" has become one of the most famous quotable lines in this superbly fun film. It's actually set in 1997, hence the need to view it as an alternative future, and the technology on display is very dated but once you get past that this is a film all about an iconic character facing insurmountable odds to win the day. Carpenter brings in horror aspects with his depiction of the world inside the prison, with 'crazies' who live in the sewers and other weird and violent aspects including the dangers of driving down Broadway! In many ways this is a satire on America, the fear of the night and gang culture. Veteran British actor Donald Pleasance plays the President as a cowardly narcissist and Harry Dean Stanton is great as a prisoner that is forced to choose sides. The film boasts Ernest Borgnine and Isaac Hayes as the main baddie. This is one of Carpenter's best films and definitely a must see, and you'll hum the theme music for days afterwards.

An incoherent and muddled film from director Abel Ferrara who seems to be channeling Michael Mann type stylings with chiaroscuro lighting in city nighttime scenes and blurry handheld camera work offering lots of grainy close ups. Even the soundtrack is very reminiscent of Mann's films. But there's an incomprehensible narrative that ultimately leads to a boring film. You watch hoping something good is going to happen but no, you're just disappointed. Ethan Hawke, no doubt attracted to getting to play two parts, is ostensibly some sort of American soldier cum mercenary who is in Rome to prevent a terrorist attack on the Vatican. He's also interested in finding his twin brother who may be dead, maybe in prison or held hostage... to be honest I'm confused about this. There's some strange scenes involving Russian gangsters and lots and lots of characters watching footage on cameras or computers which after awhile becomes all very meaningless. This ends up as a boring exercise in indulgent film making and it's not worth your time believe me.

You will laugh, you will gasp and you will groan at this, another hi octane yet imbecilic comedy action movie that has Quentin Tarantino mixed with Michael Bay stylings all over it. There's little doubt everyone is having loads of fun in this romp full of cartoon violence, sassy dialogue and an occasionally confusing story. It's all about a silver briefcase, acting as the film's McGuffin, that is on a Japanese bullet train heading to Kyoto where it's to be collected by the big baddie (Michael Shannon) channeling a sort of Keyser Söse. On the train are an assortment of professional assassins who basically fight for possession of it during the course of the film including Brad Pitt as an underworld fixer with a new found attempt at positivity despite being plagued by bad luck, Aaron Taylor Johnson and Brian Tyree Henry as a pair of gangster types who get most of the best lines, and Joey King as a schoolgirl like assassin who has a more devious agenda. There's a few more too, oh and there's a poisonous snake loose too. It's all very Kill Bill without the originality. It's not a dead loss and there's some fun to be had watching this especially on the big screen but ultimately it's a mindless comedy actioner with a good cast.

A 'David vs Goliath' story, based on a real one and with an award winning performance by Julia Roberts. She plays the title character, a sassy, street smart single mother who struggles financially while trying desperately to get a job without any qualifications. She eventually finds a job as a clerk in a small LA law firm owned by lawyer Ed (Albert Finney). But unpopular with the other staff because she's very direct and dresses provocatively Ed allows Erin to look into what he sees as a small property case involving a big power company. But Erin, who is extremely smart, uncovers a scandal where the company have dumped a cancer causing poison into a small town's water supply and are trying to hide their culpability. This soon turns into the biggest lawsuit case Ed has ever been involved in much to his consternation. Not only is this a great character piece but it's also a fascinating and uplifting story of fighting a massively rich company whose corruption knows no bounds. There's sadness here and also anger that in the land of the free this casual disregard for human life to secure profit really happened on such a scale. Roberts plays Erin as a larger than life charismatic person but who hides her demons. This is played out at just the right pitch in her new and gentle relationship with biker George (Aaron Eckhart). The film ensures that whilst Erin is the focus of the narrative she never overrides the drama of the victims in the story. In that sense this is a first class story and a film that deserves rediscovering.

The Predator franchise hasn't been very successful, after the stunningly brilliant original film (1987) came a series of dafter and unfulfilling sequels that have never been well received. But now we have a new film and it's a corker too. Returning to the essence of the original film and some neat links to it we have a prequel set 300 years before the first film. A young Comanche woman Naru (Amber Midthunder) is an expert tracker and keen hunter, she joins her brother's hunting party despite their attitudes to her being just a woman. But an alien predator is also in the forest and so begins a battle between them. This has everything a Predator movie should have, it's tense, neatly gory and essentially a battle of wits as the Indian warrior has to learn how to defeat this incredible enemy. The effects are good and there's neat details for the Predator fan to check out. Some of the script's lines reflect back to the original film and there's also links to Predator 2 (1990). It's a real pity this has not been given a cinema release and you'll have to check it out on Disney+ in the UK. Thoroughly enjoyable and exciting.

A great prison escape drama based on real events and the last collaboration between Clint Eastwood and director Don Siegel. Typical of both star and director it's a film that doesn't waste anything, it's a taut, well told story with an occasionally clumsy script moment and interestingly it isn't structured as a star vehicle considering Eastwood's box office pull in the 70s. Shot on the actual Alcatraz island this tells the story of the escape by three men, Frank Morris (Eastwood) and the Anglin brothers (Fred Ward & Jack Thibeau) who managed to burrow out of their cells and with makeshift life rafts disappear into the San Francisco Bay. Not only is their plans for the escape create the usual tense drama as discovery is always potentially possible but Siegel also has time to deviate away to reveal the sort of life at Alcatraz as a maximum security prison was for the prisoners. To ensure the film sides with the escapees (and to some extent the prisoners in general) the story creates a fictional head warden played with delicious nastiness by Patrick McGoohan. His casual coldness to all things exemplified in his crushing of the emblematic flower which is part of the narrative centring on the character of Doc (Roberts Blossom) who acts as the films heart. Interesting story in a lean and well made film and a solid Eastwood performance. Definitely a film to seek out if you've never seen it.

Director Ron Howard has the straight forward story telling ability to draw tension, stress even, from stories where the viewer already knows the outcome, Apollo 13 (1995) for example. Here he does it again with a simple story of the rescue of twelve Thai schoolboys and their football coach who become trapped in a large 'tourist' cave when monsoon rains unexpectedly arrive and cause the cave to flood. It's a story of ordinary heroism when Thai Navy SEALS assisted by cave diving experts Rick Stanton (Viggo Mortensen) and John Volanthen (Colin Farrell) at first find the boys all alive after several days of their being alone in the cave and having to navigate treacherous passages and strong floodwater currents to reach them. The expected claustrophobic scenes make for a thrilling and occasionally edge of your seat experience. But this is only the first part of the story as how to get them out becomes the major plot issue. With casualties forecast by the straight talking Stanton he comes up with the daring and highly risky plan to use Australian cave diver and qualified anaesthetist, Harry Harris (Joel Edgerton), to put the boys to sleep one by one and drag them through the long, torturous dive to get them out. Howard draws every emotion from the scenario including the plight of the smallest boy forced to be the last to make the journey as finding a facemark to fit him proves difficult. On the surface there is the political struggles of the local Governor who realises he's to be the fall guy if anything goes wrong. Howard also rightly and smartly doesn't overcook the potential 'white' saviour issue which is partly unavoidable by making sure that Mortensen, Farrell etc play their parts as unassuming as possible, they're simply experts who volunteer to help. The narrative does introduce a slight friction between the Thai SEALS and these foreigners but it's never pushed as a major plot device. Overall this is a riveting and moving story of a real event allegedly quite accurate, as a film it's definitely worth checking out.

Highly entertaining action science fiction with Tom Cruise playing against type as a cowardly soldier who has to find his courage and save the day. There's lots of films that this has clearly been influenced by not least Aliens (1986), Starship Troopers (1997) and War Of The Worlds (2005) and the basis of the narrative is a repeating 'Groundhog Day' timeline. Cruise plays Major Gage a PR man for the huge multi national army that is fighting an alien invasion. When he foolishly tries to blackmail his commander (Brendan Gleeson) to avoid being sent on a massive offensive he gets busted and ends up in the first wave of D-Day against an enemy that has taken over Europe. But by strange circumstances he ends up reliving the day over and over after a confrontation with an alien. He learns that they are able to control time and consequently are able to reset the day in order to win the war. Managing to get help from super soldier Rita (Emily Blunt), who is the only one to believe what is happening to him Gage must die over and over until he finds a way of destroying the aliens. The creatures are well done and fast moving enough to always be just unable to study closely. This all works well as this is essentially a combat war film with slick weaponry, great set pieces, the usual bunch of pumped up grunts and a story that never gets dull with fast editing that moves the whole thing along at a good, solid pace. It's a big brash slice of hokum but brilliantly entertaining and it has the great Bill Paxton as a tough NCO. What more do you need?

A big greenscreen heavy childrens adventure film based on a video game. It steals heavily from Indiana Jones, The Goonies and even Mission Impossible with Tom Holland essentially playing an unmasked Peter Parker type. He's Nate a streetwise, parkour loving thief and conman who gets involved with an untrustworthy treasure hunter played by Mark Wahlberg. The story is the hunt for some old treasure and they have to sort out a load of clues and ancient booby trap devices to find where it is and all the while a load of baddies are after it too. There's a side plot involving Nate's long lost brother and post credit sequences that signpost a possible sequel. It's a silly film really, aimed at lovers of the game which I'm guessing are aged 8 to 12 and Holland is just reaffirming his action credentials but he's a long way from nailing a gritty role based on this.

Similarities with Howard Hawks Rio Bravo (1959) are inevitable especially as both films were scripted by Leigh Bracket who admitted the films had the same narrative structure. Whilst the earlier film is a classic of the genre El Dorado is a film that is a star vehicle for John Wayne, who at 59 years of age when this was released is too old to convince as a famous and lightening draw gunfighter. Perhaps this is all the reason why this film is played more for laughs and in a Fordian way the comedy is what makes it very watchable. The mid 60s was the time when Wayne is starting to look overweight and less the classic western hero and more of the curmudgeonly father figure. It's consequently quite daft to have him as the love interest to Charlene Holt's widow and Wayne plays the lothario very reluctantly. It's still a film that worships the law of the gun and despite deaths this is a bloodless film that lacks Hawks previous eye for the majestic side of the western. This is a western that has no truck with the usual legends and myths of the genre, there's no frontier to discover, no Indians to fight and no wilderness to survive in, this is a pure cinematic western with a theme park style town and standard gunfights, punch ups and stock characters. Wayne here is Thornton who gets embroiled in a small range war to help his old pal, Harrah (Robert Mitchum who steals the film), an alcoholic sheriff, to deal with the bad guys. Like Rio Bravo the central story has the good guys holed up and besieged in the jailhouse but the climax here pales in comparison to the earlier film's fantastic ending. This has its entertainment value and if you grew up on a diet of westerns this is a nostalgic revisit to the time before the classic western disappeared, indeed it came out right in the middle of the spaghetti western boom although El Dorado was still a huge hit. The added bonus is James Caan in a breakout role as a young, naïve guy who joins Wayne and Mitchum. There's loads to enjoy here and a fair bit that will annoy too and it's a western that would struggle to find a modern audience and yet it is a also a fine example of a major star doing what he does best.

Based on a true story although most of the events in the film are fictional, this is a wonderful historical drama and I have to say one of the most emotional films I've seen and it certainly bought a tear to my eye. Renowned for his surreal and enigmatic narratives this is one of David Lynch's most accessible films, indeed his first commercial film, but his style including the bookending of two nightmarish sequences , and his recreation of the 'dark, satanic mills' of industrial Victorian London are superb and add to the overall atmosphere of suspense, even dread, that pervades the narrative even when it appears to be turning into a happy conclusion. Lynch tricks you here as this story of John Merrick (played wonderfully by John Hurt) is a story of intolerance and of the fear of difference. His vision of a polluted city with it's smoke, dust and pumping machinery shot in an authentic black and white adds to the sense of disease and bodily corruption that is the focus of the story. Merrick is a grotesquely deformed man rescued from a freak show carnival and a violently abusive man, Bytes (Freddie Jones) by surgeon Frederick Treves (Anthony Hopkins). Given sanctuary in Treves' hospital Merrick reveals himself to be a young man of intelligence and gentleness despite his horrible deformities and the terrible abuse he has suffered. Befriended by a famous actress (Anne Bancroft) Merrick becomes the talk of the town until abuse returns in the form of the nasty Bytes and a lowly hospital caretaker (Michael Elphick) who makes money by allowing drunks to view him at night. With a superb cast including John Gielgud, Wendy Hiller, Dexter Fletcher and Hannah Gordon this is a tearjerker that shows the benefits of human kindness contrasted with the violence shown towards those that don't fit or look different. Even though Merrick's case is an extreme one this is still a film that thematically resonates today. A fantastic film and one that you should see.

This historical film is constructed and directed like a thriller, it's full of political intrigue, murder and conspiracy. It's a well paced and gripping story about Elizabeth I ascent to the throne during a time of religious unrest between the Catholic hierarchy and the new Protestant monarch. A relatively unknown Cate Blanchett received an Academy nomination for her performance as the young Queen forced to deal with enemies both at home and abroad. Director Shekhar Kapur creates a fascinating imagery of Elizabethan England and adds great doses of bloody violence and romance. The support cast are fantastic especially Geoffrey Rush as the Queen's bodyguard and spymaster, Walsingham; Christopher Eccleston as the egocentric Duke of Norfolk and Richard Attenborough as her chief adviser. There is also a young Daniel Craig, Kelly MacDonald, Emily Mortimer, Joseph Fiennes and John Gielgud in his last film role to add to the mix. With it's opening shocker of a scene as three heretics are burned at the stake (and very realistic it is too) to the final executions of the traitors this is a gritty and very interesting film of a famous part of English history even though it plays fast and loose with the truth. Never mind that though because this is entertaining and well worth checking out if you've never seen it.

First rate thriller from Director Tony Scott with his trademark fast editing and fantastic story telling ability. This has a great twist & turn plot and a cast to die for. It's also one of, if not the, best film that Will Smith has ever starred in, he's a lead actor who has picked some strange films although there are exceptions, here he is note perfect. He plays Robert, a smart Baltimore based lawyer in a top echelon firm, happily married to Carla (Regina King) although they've had their problems (a plot issue). His life is turned upside down when he unknowingly comes into possession of a recording that shows the murder of a US senator by Reynolds (a neatly nasty Jon Voight), an ambitious deputy in the National Security agency who uses his covert agents to mess with Robert's life to try and get the tape back before Robert can expose him. Robert's only help comes from Brill (Gene Hackman) a former agent who has dropped out of sight for years. The action here is sharp, with some very fast paced and realistic chase scenes. There's murder and conspiracy throughout the story, mixed with Smith's wisecracking screen persona that works well with the character. It's a very well written film that concerns itself with state surveillance and the implications if it gets out of control, NASA supposedly refused to cooperate with the film. The support cast are impressive and include Lisa Bonet, Tom Sizemore, Barry Pepper, Ian Hart and Gabriel Byrne has a great cameo. As an action film this hits every note in a modern thriller filmed in a gritty realistic style. Highly entertaining and worth a revisit if you've not seen it in awhile and a must if it's passed you by.