Reviews

I'm bamboozled by how much love this gets because, for me, the silliness of the story was only matched by some of the truly rotten dialogue.

The series obviously has investment - the settings and production by and large are stunning. And there's some heavyweight acting chops available with Ford, Mirren, Dalton and others.

But there's a helix of story arcs that coil around each other without building to anything.

Jacob Dutton grumbles about the world changing and the horse gives way to the car ("Where's mah hitching post?!?") while the fight for the storied Yellowstone ranch heats up. Timothy Dalton's Uber-villain is so disgusting and arch (we know this because of laboured sexual deviancy scenes) he may as well be stroking a white cat.

Meanwhile, Jacob's nephew sets sail from his dream job of big game hunting in Africa to chart a course home, picking up a feisty damsel along the way. These two, Spencer and Alexandria, get the absolute worse of the dialogue but they sure do have some crazy adventures. Lion attack! Ghost ship! Shipwreck! Ship-board duel! These crazy kids can't catch a break.

Also meanwhile, young First Nations girl, Teonna, stolen from her family, is tortured into violent revenge by missionaries from central casting. While maybe the most compelling of the stories, it's a colour-by-numbers escape quest that, unsurprisingly, eventually leads to Montana.

Which, I guess, is where all roads lead for Season 2.

I rather enjoyed 1883 and have never seen a second of Yellowstone but even so, I hope that other seasons of this part of the canon make for better connective tissue between the two than this series is.

I'm not a sci fi nerd. I know that there IS gravity, but don't ask me to explain it.

But I do know that a crazy dude with full thickness burns is unlikely to survive for 7 years on a dusty, broken down ship. Is he microwaving a pie every day with his burnt up fingers and chewing it with his burnt up mouth? What is he drinking? How is he pooping?

I also reckon that a HAL-level computer might toot a klaxon when a complete stranger sneaks onboard and starts using his scorched up murder mittens to take out the good guys.

Like most others who didn't fall in love with this film, I found the first two acts ok. By now we've been inoculated against the idea of completely ill-equipped space crews being selected to undertake humanity's salvation. So the fact that each crew member occupies a trope so rigid they may as well be the Spice Girls is acceptable. The film looks good, the pace seemed right, the ratchet/release of tension was a bit sloppy but passable.

The third act is a such a bizarre left turn that it was like a separate movie was accidentally spliced in. Everything and yet nothing happens and the shudder-cam, stop/start, glitchy focus nonsense isn't a suitable replacement for an actual emotional or narrative resolution.

I just found it weird. And not in a good way.

We all love Stanley Tucci. And what's not to like about Kieran Shipka, Miranda Otto and that fella that was the nice boyfriend of Carrie's in SATC?

But no amount of likeable cast can make up for complete lameness in every other facet.

Monster movies should be about the monsters we are capable of becoming as much as the ones that arrive. However, The Silence under-delivers on both fronts with the plucky suburban Andrews dropped into a rapidily dystopianising world when a flock of hungry bats are unleashed on humanity.

The bats have epic hearing and so, yes, like Birdbox and A Quiet Place, people are robbed of one of humankind's natural advantages - our ability to communicate. And our unfortunate habit of just being really noisy.

In spite of a series of failures in logic and commonsense, the Andrews find themselves a safe harbour in a nicely decked out cabin. And while the fright bats pose an existential threat, that's trumped of course by the other monsters - people. Mysterious people with vague, rape-y ambitions.

Combat ensues, and while I was hoping Tucci would go full-Leeson, the confrontation is short and predictable.

In spite of the vast landmass involved, Team Andrews somehow navigate successfully to a happy ending at The Refuge, above the snow line where the bats aren't fond of the weather.

The plot line is succinct, but it's journey is ungratifyingly paced, without any great sense of urgency or relief to keep us engaged. It's silly, telegraphed, and poorly rendered. Not only does it measure poorly against its other mute counterparts, it doesn't meet any threshold of decent monster movie, and isn't camp enough to qualify as a terrible one. It's a sad fate for a good cast.

There are some really uncharitable reviews on here. Not necessarily about the film itself which is an ordinary production, but about its subject who, like it or not, is an actual person.

Privilege shouldn't equal excuse but neither should it equal dismissal. Does Paris Hilton have a privileged, largely vacuous life? It seems so, and in fact it's pretty much repeatedly admitted by Paris herself. But that doesn't protect her from either injury, nor the long-term consequences that can come from injury, especially when they are inflicted on a child.

Spoiler - Paris reveals, and is supported in her disclosures by multiple other victims, that as a child she was hauled from her bedroom during the night by strangers and taken to what might be described as a reform school. With the consent of her parents, upset by her teenage rebellion and it's stain on their conservative family brand, Paris tells of physical and emotional abuse. Her peers also refer to sexual abuse. In light of what we now know about institutionalised child abuse, these claims have a ring of truth.

Now an adult, an insomniac, a work-a-holic, a recipient of domestic violence, and largely friendless, Paris' fantasy lifestyle has all the hallmarks of a seriously damaged young woman, albeit on a very luxurious scale.

Enter the judgement of a lot of reviewers who can't get past the gowns and jewels to offer any sympathy to a woman who, to me, seems obsessively committed to creating a safe space she can cocoon herself inside of. All the 'stuff', the transient lifestyle, the collection of animals, the relationships with unworthy men, the creation of an alter ego - none of this will be unfamiliar to anyone who has spent time with damaged children who've grown to adulthood.

The film itself is patchy and while I'm sympathetic to Paris, it is, as any autobiography is inclined to be, an exercise in curation and indulgence.

Ultimately, it's not going to change any of our lives but maybe it could help Paris change hers.

From the first scene in which we see protagonist Lou Bloom, we know what he is. He's an amoral liar and thief who doesn't bat an eyelid when cornered, or when he sees a thing he wants. His first go-to is violence. Within minutes we also know he's a bizarrely confident slick- talker, albeit with delusions of grandeur. So what do you get if you cross a thug with a car salesman? A psychopath. And where better for a psychopath to find his niche than within the orbit of journalism as a collector of carnage video content for fee-for-service news programming? This package of information is delivered deftly in the first act but the trajectory for Lou Bloom is well sign-posted which, for me, deprives Nightcrawler of 'thriller' status. It does rate as satire, although the use of a psychopath to represent the distillation of our own most base and craven instincts and behaviours is a well-trodden (and more successfully trodden) path. Let's face it, since the chase that ended Princess Diana's life we've all known that it's our own weirdly voyeuristic drive to see each other, and our celebrities particularly, at our most vulnerable or hurt that feeds the paparazzi and shock journalism. Jake Gyllenhaal does do a pretty neat job of capturing Bloom's twitchy descent (or ascent, depending on your POV). Rene Russo is the most improbable local news director ever rendered and suffers from the weird, unresolved and ultimately unnecessary sexual interest sub-plot. Similarly, the glancing blow Bloom has with law enforcement feels lacking in tension and intent. For me, Nightcrawler was more an interesting film than a compelling or thrilling one. Props to Dan Gilroy - the film looks slick and gritty with Bloom's wild, shining eyes the focus of the frequent night-time scenes, then hidden behind sunglasses in daylight like he's developing into some sort of modern-day vampire. The soundtrack is grinding and unsettling. But for me these couldn't compensate for a lack of slow-burn and points of tension release that a really great thriller needs. A solid 7 though.

This is not documentary that's only about its titular subject. It's certainly an examination of cheerleading. Across the 6 hours of the series we learn a little about the history of the novelty-cum-billion dollar sporting industry of 'cheer'. We get some insight into the complexity of the sport, the athleticism required to compete, and the insane physical and emotional cost of the commitment needed to excel in the sport at an elite level. But it also reads as docu-drama. Head coach Monica is a post-millennial Mr Miyagi, a small-town gal who tasted the Big Wide World but eventually came home to find it was where she needed to be all along. Monica is both mother and mom-ager to the 40-strong cheer team. She supplies both hugs and butt kicks as she navigates through the difficult terrain of kindness and ruthlessness that's needed to refine the team to razor-sharp performance. The team members selected as feature characters could all have come from central casting and over the series we get back-story packages that press into some pretty raw points. Golden girl Gabi is an industry for her stage-parents. Lexi wobbles on and off the rails after her parents divorce, tumbling (literally) into cheer in spite of not fitting into any crevice of the cheerleader mould. Morgan, adrift of her own parents, anchors herself to Monica and triumphs as a disciple who commits herself wholely. Complex, prickly La'Darius is a tunnel-visioned survivor whose pursuit of perfection turns him from a joyful bro to acid-tongued meanboy in a heartbeat. Jerry is the husky, gentle-natured tryer whose sheer love of the sport (coupled with natural athleticism and commitment) propels him to success, and patches some of the devastating loss of his mother. A supporting cast of assistant coaches, team mates, family members and industry experts provide the scaffolding from which the arcs of the main cast curve. This is an interesting time in the lives of these young people. They're not children anymore but not fully formed adults either, and you get the feeling that the formative experience of being part of the Navarro cheer family is a bridge between those two worlds. And it's a bridge they could just as easily topple off as use to guide them to a happy path. The series is beautifully produced and thoughtfully paced, giving us just enough of the cheer to justify it a sports documentary while gaining our investment in the drama. It's easy to be cynical, and the manipulation is there, but Cheer still read to me as 'real' rather than profoundly confected 'reality'. There are heart catching moments, particularly in the finale as the months of build up lead us to the national championships in Daytona where just 135 seconds of performance will define this collection of characters as a team. Lexi's grandparents fumbling with their steaming tech. La'Darius' brother shedding a single, silent tear. Jerry being held by a team mate who urges him to "Look up - your mom's watching you". On paper, these moments could easily warrant editing out, but they touched me. So maybe I'm a sucker, but I'm a sucker who was genuinely moved. Also genuinely awestruck by the physical and mental conviction of these athletes. Also genuinely troubled by damage rendered on these young bodies. Also genuinely sad for the carelessness and even cruelty that adults can visit on children that leaves them in search of niches where they can belong and feel safe. Also genuinely grateful that, for some, a sport, a team or a coach is the niche where they find that comfort.

I honestly can't say this is the worst movie ever made, but mostly that's because I haven't seen every movie ever made. The plot has more holes than a pair of fishnets and every single person acts like they're being made to do it at gunpoint. Poor wasshername, who had some sort of career before Secret Obsession, hoppity hops from trope to trope as the Woman with Amnesia. The slow reveal includes a Sad Cop who is battling his way to redemption, a Nice Nurse who must be making a billion dollars a year because she seems to be the only person ever working at the hospital (although she also finds time to conveniently be in a car park for an accidental path-crossing) and a Mysterious Tattooed Guy who.... actually I have no idea what he was doing or why. Bad Husband slowly reveals his badness through general creepiness, the threat of sexual violence and then by being a total murderer. Gorgeous wood house in the woods where all the action happens is ironically less wooden than all the acting. (One of my fave bits is where hubby boasts that there's no shortage of wood for the fire, whilst gazing into the flames of a gas fireplace). Watch this with your friends and take a shot whenever something stupid or inexplicable happens. You'll be buckled by the end of the first act and possibly hospitalised by the time the credits role.