Reviews

Don't get me wrong, Mystery Road is a good concept, and tells stories we all need to hear. Miserable stories, granted, but important social commentary. In this origin story the young detective returns to his home town to work in the local police station, and to reconcile with his family. He's a "good, honest cop" and has all the tropes we come to expect from the title. Prefers to be alone much of the time. Suspicious of everyone and everything. Strained relationship with his father... where Jay differs is that he doesn't drink, doesn't smoke and isn't running away from some past misdemeanour. Where he also differs is that he's fundamentally annoying and unlikeable. Conversations with him are mostly one sided. A smouldering look is his usual answer to any question. He doesn't involve his team mates and partners in his decisions. At one point he drives off and leaves his partner Cindy stranded. When she asks why he said he had a hunch. When she says they should share these hunches he demeans her and leaves her standing . Awful. He's arrogant and stubborn, incommunicative and introverted. He has an awful taste in hats and clearly has never heard of a launderette. I hope they are planning a sequel. Can't wait to see if Mary can wake him up a bit.

Two completely separate stories are overlayed here and only one of them makes sense. The supernatural one has holes all over the place. Yes ok things happen in her presence which leave room for speculation but when Elevators and lobby doors move without her being there what does that mean? The endless text messages are lazy and cheap. Stewart's hangdog expression becomes tiresome quite quickly but to be fair she's the best thing in this tedious movie.

Pratchett aficionados will hate this. How DARE someone change a Discworld story. The characters don't look like I imagined them. It's not funny enough. The dwarfs are too tall. The posh lady is too black. The werewolf isn't busty enough. Just STOP. All right? This is something else. And I like it.

This over-long piece of fluff is essentially Avatar crosses with The Fifth Element. Nothing surprising happens and it's quite clear who the good guys and bad guys are from the moment you meet them. The very three dimensional virtual sets are epic in scale but overwhelming and difficult to follow so that action scenes become breathless and confusing. Yet this is an enjoyable film to watch. Despite the smug snappy dialogue there's some real humour in there and yes of course the costumes and creatures are amazing. This will never be remembered as one of Besson's classics but if you're a fan you won't want to miss it.

It's good to see that Ridley Scott still has the same vision for stylistic sets and atmospheric lighting.Lots of dripping water and eery shadows as one might expect from the old master. The special effects are impressive, the CGI is great, the technology is plausible for the turn of the next century. But - and I'm afraid it's a big but - the plot is disjointed, the characters two dimensional and the script is, well, not the best. Far too many things happen which simply make no sense at all, or just don't tally with "what we know already" about the Alien universe. Far too many plot mechanisms, bits of tech and even shots and scenes are borrowed from other films - Serenity, independence day, The Mummy, Indiana Jones and the Crystal Skull, Pitch Black, X- Files. I won't go into detail because I can't do that without using spoilers, but try it yourself. Watch the film and see how many ripped off bits you can spot. Spectacular, yes. A great film? No. sadly not.

I'm not given to flights of extravagant praise, being old and cynical, but this is the best film I've seen in years. Stylistically it's an absolute feast for the eyes, incredibly tight and economical. The actors attack their roles with a real enthusiasm, and some of the performances, particularly Micky Rourke and Clive Owen, are superb. It's great to see Rourke back, albeit unrecognisable in the prosthetics. Perhaps not Bruce Willis's best ever performance, but he's good too, though not as old and grizzled looking as he could have been. The women are beautiful and sexy, the men are dark and dangerous, the scenery is brooding and uncomfortable. OK I admit I'm a fan of Miller's graphic novel work, but I don't know the Sin City series at all. From that standpoint I have to say that it really doesn't matter if you are a fan of Frank Miller's work or not. However, the violence in this film is constant, ripe, and graphic. Even with the duotone look of this movie, and the fact that blood is generally shown white, not red, it's gory and not for the faint-hearted. I only remember ONE real laugh in it too. But the fact is that this is an amazing movie. The foyer of the cinema I went to had framed prints from the books alongside the same frames from the film, and if anyone has any doubts about it being true to the original - I've never seen such attention to detail. Awesome. Go and see it. You'll be talking about it for weeks.

I have no idea why I liked this film, but I really liked it. Absolutely nobody in the film is shown in a positive light. Everyone is a loser, a geek, a nerd, weak, pathetic, brainless, shallow, charmless or just plain out there. But starting from such a low level of expectation, these hopeless characters are able to shine. That's the bizarre thing about it - in a world where every person is pathetic, it only takes a tiny thing to redeem each character.

Napoleon's mind is buzzing with superheroes, ninja warriors, knights, mythical beasts, and yet his boring life couldn't be further from his ideals. As he confesses, "I have no skills" and he's right. He and his friends don't even know how to talk to each other - they look at each other sideways, body language screaming "run away!" and sentences short, clipped and painful. This is what it's like to be the loser, the bottom of the food chain.

Yet this is a film about triumph against adversity, the victorious underdog - a great Hollywood tradition, but turned on its head. No great hero emerges, there's no rallying cry of "we can do this if only we work as a team", there's no "love conquers all" just inept people bungling their way through. So is it worth watching? Well yes.

If you have a taste for the absurd, the surreal, for subtle and quite dark humour, you'll like it. There are a few laugh out loud moments, like the time machine Kip buys on the internet, Napoleon taking Pedro's bike off a "sweet jump", Kip testing the plastic bowl, Kip at the self- defence class. But the charm of this film is its slow pace, oddball characters and disjointed dialogues. The actors are amazing, totally convincing in their deadpan deliveries. It's peculiar and different but I think I like it.

The thing that sets this film apart is the look of it. From the opening scene in the skies above a 1930s New York, through Paltrow's hairstyle and clothes, the vehicles, the architecture, the planes, the "Day the earth stood still" giant robots, Dex's ray-gun, the almost monochrome colour cast, the entire outing has a convincing retro feel about it. You can't help but be reminded of Fritz Lang, but with a touch of sci-fi B Movie and a hint of Bogart thrown in. The Art Deco Americana and pseudo Nazi imagery nail the timescale to the inter-war years, as befits the plot, but the gadgets and science point to the futurism of the fifties.

Jude Law is one of my favourite English actors, which is strange, because I can't think of a single convincing role he's played! He's very much at home in the midst of all this artificiality, a cartoon character in a comic book film. This Joe, though not as silly as the Joe he played in A.I. is charming, daring, but a bit on the docile side. Paltrow looks gorgeous, like a Lauren Bacall or a Lana Turner in those immaculate pencil skirts and shoulder pads.

Ignore the gaping holes in the plot, the unexplained untied loose ends, the "huh??" moments, and enjoy it for what it is - a feast for the eyes, a yarn, a romp, a proper adventure film in the grand old style. A reminder of the days when films looked forward to an uncertain future.

I liked this film. I like the way Bruce Willis is expertly cast as the same character he played in the die Hard films, Armaggedon, and most of his others too! He's the reluctant hero, the one who saves the world in his vest even though he's retired, and doesn't want to get involved. Milla Jovovitch is actually very attractive for a change, Ian Holm is great (well he's ALWAYS great) and Gary Oldman - great part for him, but REALLY bad accent!

and...

The sheer look and feel of the film is superb. The costumes are spot on, the aliens are great, the effects cool (I loved the "cruise ship".

So much so that I just went with the flow, ignoring the holes in the plot and the series of very wooden incidental cameos from has-been musicians and loving the STYLE of it. Very compelling, like Bladerunner, very silly, like Galaxy Quest, and very stylish, like Lynch's Dune.

Highlights: "Anyone else wanna negotiate?" "I'm very disappointed" "Multipass" the bit with the "red button" and "I'm Korben, and you are...?" "Leeloo Minai Lekarariba-Laminai-Tchai Ekbat De Sebat"