Change Your Image
jwmthurgood
Ratings
Most Recently Rated
Reviews
Sisu (2022)
The Grindhouse movie Tarantino wish he could have made
Suspend that belief, turn down the lights and get you favourite cinema snack ready because what Sisu delivers is a lean mean action machine with no fat, and very little dialogue, but it never feels empty, it doesn't lurch from scene to scene like the latest superhero flick.
Sisu is a love letter to the b movies of the 70's but with some beautiful scenery and some real crowd pleasing moments and is the type of movie rarely made these days.
Everyone delivers and I'm looking forward to what the director/writer delivers next.
If this had a decent box office run it would have slayed at the cinema and for just $6m it would have made it money back 10 fold.
Boar (2017)
Practical FX shine but little else does
The Boar itself is a beauty of fx work but unfortunately everything else from the cgi, acting and script is maddingly poor which is a shame as this could have been a spiritual sequel to the classic Razorback.
You're gonna need around 4 beers in to forgive this movie its sins.
Killing Gunther (2017)
*warning* This is not a film about hitmen...it just has them in it.....
Killing Gunther is fun. That's all you really need to know - it's not a hitman movie and though it borrows the basic conceit of Man Bites Dog don't be fooled into thinking that this is going to be an amusing take on the genre. It's a film about obsession with a comedy tonal change towards the end in the way that the gags are delivered - but it's still funny
The comedy comes from the disparate group of hired guns who are out to end Gunther and the way they interact with one another.
Performances for all involved are good and it moves along at a sprightly 93 mins without getting bogged down at any point.
Shame that this hasn't had more noise as it would have done good numbers in certain international regions - judging from some of the user reviews I don't think that they appreciate the type of humour that is on offer here.
Look forward to more stuff from Taran Killiam who wrote, directed and starred in it.
Only negative, I would have preferred Arnie to be a surprise - he's only in it for a short amount of screen time and the poster over sells his contribution, Killam, Moynihan and Simone are the stars and play off of each other really well.
So in short, if you like absurdist, character driven humour with a little bit of surrealism thrown in for good measure then you should like this. But if you after Commando pt 2 - steer clear.
Lake Placid: Legacy (2018)
Despite obvious flaws this is actually an okay movie.
This is the sixth movie in the franchise and the first to take it in a more serious direction - there is no comedy to be found here. And this is where one of the first issues arises.
Because of the low budget and it's tv origins there is no gore, no (perhaps 1) kills - most occur off screen, and this is where humour could have supplanted the lack of "horror".
The second and most glaring issue is the lack of croc - she is glimpsed in the shadows and there is swish of tail here and foot there, but until the final act we little. This would have been fine if this was the first in the franchise and the killer was an unknown entity, but when you are six into the franchise it's a failing.
Thankfully it doesn't prove to be a massive one as the acting is above par for this type of flick, photography is good and at least one scene bathed in a red glow impressed me enough to check out the directors back catalogue and the dialogue is as expected, cringe inducing in some parts, but actually okay in others.
There is nothing original here, it's competent, tightly directed and quite engaging towards the end. Rated R in the US it's yet to get a UK classification but I would go for PG-13 or 12A and would be happy for my 8yr old to watch it without fear of nightmares, questions about sex or hearing her tut every time someone swears.
With a bigger budget, some decent kills and possibly some flesh this could have been a massive shot in the arm to the franchise that, by number 3, had turned into a poor Piranha knock off.