Starring Jason Statham, Li Bingbing, Rainn Wilson, Ruby Rose, Winston Chao, Cliff Curtis
4 STARS (out of 5)
If there’s a movie which ever deserved to get made, it’s The Meg. The adaptation of Steve Alten’s 1997 novel about a prehistoric shark getting unearthed and going on a human-eating frenzy has been in development hell for 20 years. Initially, the... read more »
Starring Paul Rudd, Evangeline Lilly, Michael Pena, Walton Goggins, Bobby Cannavale, Judy Greer, Tip ‘T.I.’ Harris, David Dastmalchian, Hannah John-Kamen, Abby Ryder Fortson, Randall Park, Michelle Pfeiffer, Laurence Fishburne, Michael Douglas
3 STARS (out of 5)
It hardly seems five minutes since the last Marvel Studios movie hit the big screen, and while we’re all likely still reeling from where Infinity War left off, there was clear need for Marvel to come forward with something of a palate cleanser. That arrives in... read more »
Starring Adam Sandler, Andy Samberg, Selena Gomez, Kevin James, David Spade, Steve Buscemi, Keegan-Michael Key, Molly Shannon, Fran Drescher, Kathryn Hahn, Jim Gaffigan, Mel Brooks
3.5 STARS (out of 5)
Love them or find them a little irritating, Hotel Transylvania is now very much part of the animated movie landscape, and for the most part – while I may not be part of the majority for saying this – these movies are surprisingly enjoyable. While any... read more »
Starring Tom Cruise, Henry Cavill, Ving Rhames, Simon Pegg, Rebecca Ferguson, Sean Harris, Michelle Monaghan, Angela Bassett, Alec Baldwin
4.5 STARS (out of 5)
Anyone who is tired of seeing Mission: Impossible movies rolling out has either never seen one in its entirety, or simply isn’t part of the core demographic. These movies have been on the crest of a wave for several years now, far outstripping the perhaps... read more »
Is it hard to believe that Mamma Mia – as a musical – is set to celebrate its 20th anniversary next year? Perhaps it’s harder to believe that the original movie adaptation – originally led by Meryl Streep – is around a decade old on its... read more »
Starring Craig T Nelson, Holly Hunter, Sarah Vowell, Huck Milner, Samuel L Jackson, Bob Odenkirk, Eli Fucile, Catherine Keener, John Ratzenberger, Brad Bird, Jonathan Banks
4.5 STARS (out of 5)
Is the Pixar slump well and truly over? It certainly seems that way. Controversial though it may seem, I believed we weren’t truly on the other side of the slump – which reportedly started with the sub-par Cars 2 – until Finding Dory had come to... read more »
The Purge series of movies is seen as somewhat of a cult endeavour despite now approaching its fourth instalment and despite generally being something of a success, at least critically, with its core audience. These movies are, on the face of things, rather niche... read more »
Starring Ed Helms, Jon Hamm, Jeremy Renner, Jake Johnson, Hannibal Buress, Isla Fisher, Annabelle Wallis, Leslie Bibb, Rashida Jones
2 STARS (out of 5)
Earlier this year, I reviewed a comedy movie that outstripped all of my expectations – Game Night – which offered genuine character development, unexpected twists, humour that didn’t slap you around the face with sledgehammer intensity and a plot... read more »
Starring Toni Colette, Alex Wolff, Milly Shapiro, Ann Dowd, Gabriel Byrne
4.5 STARS (out of 5)
This is, perhaps outside of Infinity War, the most hyped movie of the past few months – and considering it’s a horror movie, that really is saying something. Social media and viral news marketing have helped to make Hereditary something of an... read more »
Starring Sandra Bullock, Cate Blanchett, Anne Hathaway, Mindy Kaling, Sarah Paulson, Awkwafina, Rihanna, Helena Bonham Carter
3.5 STARS (out of 5)
Sequels are hardly anything new – far from it – though in recent years, it’s the remakes and the rehashes – not to mention the most dreaded of them all, the reboot – which seem to have come along and taken control of the Hollywood gravy... read more »
Starring Chris Pratt, Bryce Dallas Howard, Rafe Spall, Justice Smith, Daniella Pineda, James Cromwell, Toby Jones, Ted Levine, BD Wong, Isabella Sermon, Geraldine Chaplin, Jeff Goldblum
3.5 STARS (out of 5)
Yep, here we are again – if there’s anything that moviegoers seem to really lap up time and time again, it’s big, bustling dinosaur adventures – and why not? The Jurassic series has continued to wow audiences for over 20 years now and –... read more »
Starring Diane Keaton, Jane Fonda, Candice Bergen, Mary Steenburgen, Craig T Nelson, Andy Garcia, Don Johnson, Alicia Silverstone, Richard Dreyfuss, Ed Begley Jr
2 STARS (out of 5)
There are some movies you feel you’ve already seen before you actually do. You have your genres, your copycat movies, your recycled scripts – and then you have movies like Book Club, which, on paper, reads so familiarly and is marketed in such a... read more »
Starring Alden Ehrenreich, Woody Harrelson, Emilia Clarke, Donald Glover, Thandie Newton, Phoebe Waller-Bridge, Joonas Suotamo, Paul Bettany
4 STARS (out of 5)
Out of all the Star Wars movies which were emerging in recent months, this one remained perhaps the most interesting – and that’s despite the mystery of The Last Jedi at the time. We’ve only ever had one other Star Wars spin-off thus far, the... read more »
Starring Ryan Reynolds, Josh Brolin, Morena Baccarin, Julian Dennison, Zazie Beetz, TJ Miller, Brianna Hildebrand, Jack Kesy
4.5 STARS (out of 5)
Was Deadpool 2 wise to stay out of theaters until after Infinity War was out of the way? Perhaps – but then again, as any comic book movie aficionado will know, the Avengers and Deadpool lines of movies are rather different fish. So much so, in fact, that the... read more »
Starring Zhang Hanyu, Masaharu Fukuyama, Qi Wei, Ha Jiwon, Jun Kunimura
2.5 STARS (out of 5)
John Woo is a name that’s synonymous with action movies of pretty much all calibres – he’s not afraid to parody his own sense of super-fast, hyper-cheesy action – and in his latest effort, Manhunt, this has never been more evident. Manhunt is... read more »
Starring Adam Sandler, Chris Rock, Rachel Dratch, Steve Buscemi, Alison Strong, Noah Robbins
2.5 STARS (out of 5)
It should be fairly old news by now that Adam Sandler has had a partnership set up between his production company and Netflix, and this fourth movie – The Week Of – seeks to perhaps try and do something a little different. Sandler’s name is one... read more »
Starring Robert Downey Jr, Chris Hemsworth, Mark Ruffalo, Chris Evans, Scarlett Johansson, Benedict Cumberbatch, Don Cheadle, Tom Holland, Chadwick Boseman, Paul Bettany, Elizabeth Olsen, Anthony Mackie, Sebastian Stan, Danai Gurira, Letitia Wright, Dave Bautista, Pom Klementieff, Zoe Saldana, Josh Brolin, Chris Pratt, Bradley Cooper, Vin Diesel
5 STARS (out of 5)
This was always going to be the big one. Anyone who has been following our movie reviews for some time now will know that I have continued to see increasing merit in Marvel’s line-up of comic book adaptations – and while the phenomenally successful Black... read more »
Starring Natalie Portman, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Gina Rodriguez, Tessa Thompson, Tuva Novotny, Oscar Isaac
2.5 STARS (out of 5)
Horror movies still seem to be seeping out of every cinematic crevice right now, even when we’re neither at the start of the year nor even close to approaching Halloween – is this the ‘Get Out’ effect in play? Regardless – Annihilation... read more »
Starring Emily Blunt, John Krasinski, Millicent Simmonds, Noah Jupe
4 STARS (out of 5)
If you’ve heard of John Krasinski before it’s likely for good reason – while he’s been in a fair number of projects in front of the camera, A Quiet Place marks what looks to be his breakout hit as a director. Many people will know him as Jim... read more »
Starring Dwayne Johnson, Naomie Harris, Malin Akerman, Jake Lacy, Jeffrey Dean Morgan
3 STARS (out of 5)
This is an odd one. Is it complete sacrilege for me to grade what is, by all accounts, a big, daft, action movie about giant animals literally going ape – in line with what many are calling another sublime effort from Steven Spielberg in Ready Player One? I... read more »
Starring Tye Sheridan, Olivia Cooke, Ben Mendelsohn, TJ Miller, Simon Pegg, Mark Rylance
3 STARS (out of 5)
Despite the overwhelmingly positive Rotten Tomatoes score it appears that this movie is on course to receive, it goes without saying that this one is dividing critics like crazy. Ready Player One is based on the popular book written by Ernest Cline, and some who... read more »
Starring Jason Bateman, Rachel McAdams, Billy Magnussen, Sharon Horgan, Lamorne Morris, Kylie Bunbury, Jesse Plemons, Michael C Hall, Kyle Chandler
4.5 STARS (out of 5)
Getting comedy right in this day and age is more difficult than you’d imagine. Is this because we’re refining our tastes as to what’s funny and what isn’t? Hardly – many people, myself included, would argue that comedy is becoming more... read more »
Starring Oprah Winfrey, Reese Witherspoon, Mindy Kaling, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Michael Pena, Storm Reid, Zach Galifianakis, Chris Pine
2 STARS (out of 5)
Based on a critically lauded book written by Madeleine L’Engle many years ago and having already been developed by Disney for a TV movie in recent years, A Wrinkle in Time is a story which, while it may have been out of public consciousness for some time, is... read more »
Starring Sally Hawkins, Michael Shannon, Richard Jenkins, Doug Jones, Michael Stuhlbarg, Octavia Spencer
4.5 STARS (out of 5)
By the time you read this, Guillermo Del Toro’s latest movie may well be the first-ever Best Picture winner to feature inter-species romance. It may also be the first movie to ever win the coveted Oscar featuring a mute lead – with Sally Hawkins also in... read more »
Starring Matt Damon, Christoph Waltz, Hong Chau, Kristen Wiig, Udo Kier
0.5 STARS (out of 5)
Downsizing has been out in cinemas for some time now, and while I have only had the chance to watch and review the movie in recent times, I genuinely feel it is worth doing for a number of reasons. Last week, I reviewed the third instalment in the critically... read more »
Starring Chadwick Boseman, Michael B Jordan, Lupita Nyong’o, Danai Gurira, Martin Freeman, Daniel Kaluuya, Letitia Wright, Winston Duke, Angela Bassett, Forest Whitaker, Andy Serkis
4 STARS (out of 5)
2018 is a very big year indeed for Marvel as a brand, particularly as it seems that everything is building up towards a particularly dramatic conflict with Avengers: Infinity War, which is due to head to the big screen by the summer. In the meantime, there is still... read more »
Starring Daniel Bruhl, Elizabeth Debicki, Aksel Henie, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Chris O’Dowd, John Ortiz, David Oyelowo, Xhang Ziyi
2 STARS (out of 5)
Cloverfield is an odd phenomenon. There’s perhaps nothing much else like it out there in movieland right now. Since the first movie’s debut in 2008, all sorts of questions have been flying around regarding exactly what happened in JJ Abrams’ initial... read more »
Starring Helen Mirren, Jason Clarke, Sarah Snook, Angus Sampson, Laura Brent, Tyler Coppin
1 STAR (out of 5)
I’d like to preface this review by getting my bias out of the way first – as a priority. I am not the biggest fan of Helen Mirren on the planet – though I do recognise her appeal and talent – but I’m even less a fan of dodgy horror... read more »
Starring Eddie Redmayne, Tom Hiddleston, Maisie Williams, Timothy Spall, Richard Ayoade, Selina Griffiths, Johnny Vegas, Mark Williams, Gina Yashere, Simon Greenall, Rob Brydon, Kayvan Novak, Miriam Margolyes, Nick Park
3.5 STARS (out of 5)
Aardman are back – and for those of us who are truly into our animation, they couldn’t arrive soon enough. Animated movies have been up and down for some time now, and while the likes of Disney, Pixar and Laika have certainly led the way in terms of their... read more »
Starring Gary Oldman, Kristin Scott Thomas, Lily James, Stephen Dillane, Ronald Pickup, Ben Mendelsohn
3.5 STARS (out of 5)
History is, of course, well trodden when it comes to cinema. It’s no surprise that we know so much about the various conflicts and historical twists and turns that have culminated in our present day situation – when there are so many historical dramas... read more »
Starring Anthony Gonzalez, Gael Garcia Bernal, Benjamin Bratt, Alana Ubach, Renee Victor, Ana Ofelia Murguia, Edward James Olmos
4.5 STARS (out of 5)
Despite Finding Dory having largely been a return to form for Pixar last year, the animation studio still had more than a little ground to make up after Cars 2 shook the very image of the brand – while Inside Out, the aforementioned Dory and even Cars 3 have... read more »
Starring Meryl Streep, Tom Hanks, Sarah Paulson, Bob Odenkirk, Tracy Letts, Bradley Whitford, Bruce Greenwood, Matthew Rhys
4 STARS (out of 5)
It’s awards season again – and this does of course mean that many audiences around the world will be getting set to start enjoying some movies with exceptional casts and gravitas. It is rather nice to experience these movies during winter – when... read more »
Roll up, roll up – if you’ve ever wondered about how the first traditional circus came around, this is a tale that will certainly appeal to you – as it’s half period study and half musical, taking delight in being one or the other as the... read more »
Starring Michelle Williams, Christopher Plummer, Mark Wahlberg, Romain Duris, Charlie Plummer
3 STARS (out of 5)
Despite its Golden Globe nominations – despite its gravitas with Ridley Scott at the helm – and despite Christopher Plummer having turned out a suitably good performance in a stunning nine days, this will always be the movie that is known as ‘the... read more »
Starring Dwayne Johnson, Jack Black, Kevin Hart, Karen Gillan, Nick Jonas, Bobby Cannavale
4 STARS (out of 5)
Jumanji is one of those beloved properties from the 1990s that has taken on that modern-day reverence amongst those the media likes to call ‘Millenials’ – the original movie is fairly beloved, perhaps bolstered by the fact that it was one of the... read more »
Starring Mark Hamill, Carrie Fisher, Adam Driver, Daisy Ridley, John Boyega, Oscar Isaac, Andy Serkis, Lupita Nyong’o, Domhnall Gleeson, Anthony Daniels, Gwendoline Christie, Kelly Marie Tran, Laura Dern, Benicio Del Toro
4.5 STARS (out of 5)
This is the big one. Disney has already had a marvellous year at the box office and they were still holding out on their ace in the hole – Star Wars Episode VIII. After The Force Awakens opened to mass acclaim in 2015, interest in the franchise, too, had been... read more »
Starring James Franco, Dave Franco, Seth Rogen, Alison Brie, Ari Graynor, Josh Hutcherson, Jacki Weaver
4.5 STARS (out of 5)
Anyone already aware of the incredible ‘so bad it’s good’ quality that lies in Tommy Wiseau’s 2003 epic ‘The Room’ will already likely know that it is a film that is just as infamous behind the scenes as it is to watch. An... read more »
Starring Dan Stevens, Christopher Plummer, Jonathan Pryce
2.5 STARS (out of 5)
Yes, December’s here at last – and that, for the most part, means that our cinemas will start filling up with yuletide fare alongside all of the potential Oscar-grabbers, the latest in terms of Star Wars tales and, if we’re particularly unlucky, a... read more »
Starring Will Ferrell, Mark Wahlberg, Linda Cardellini, John Cena, John Lithgow, Mel Gibson
1.5 STARS (out of 5)
Well, here we go. It’s that time of year again – when comedies seem to roll around for the sake of the festive season – and, unfortunately, more of them wobble than stick. It takes real craft to make a family movie that lasts the ages –... read more »
Starring Ben Affleck, Henry Cavill, Amy Adams, Gal Gadot, Ezra Miller, Jason Momoa, Ray Fisher, Jeremy Irons, Ciaran Hinds, Diane Lane, Connie Nielsen, JK Simmons
2.5 STARS (out of 5)
Justice League was always supposed to be the big movie that finally put DC on the same pedestal as Marvel – the one which allowed them to start competing alongside the rival comic brand that has, in a big way, dominated this bizarre comic book/cinematic... read more »
Starring Ben Whishaw, Hugh Bonneville, Sally Hawkins, Brendan Gleeson, Julie Walters, Jim Broadbent, Peter Capaldi, Hugh Grant
4.5 STARS (out of 5)
Anyone who remembers the original Paddington Bear stories and their TV adaptations will likely remember the unease that surrounded its movie adaptation in 2014. Despite such fears, Michael Bond’s affable, clumsy, duffel-coated ursine living in London... read more »
It’s rather strange that movies like this are being made – surely everyone knows the story behind Agatha Christie’s most famous murder mystery by now? Maybe not – and what better way to really relaunch the story than by filling it chock-full... read more »
Starring Chris Hemsworth, Tom Hiddleston, Cate Blanchett, Idris Elba, Jeff Goldblum, Tessa Thompson, Karl Urban, Mark Ruffalo, Anthony Hopkins
4.5 STARS (out of 5)
There’s come a point now that we feel we’ve seen all that we think comic book movies have to offer us. After all, how many ‘saving the world/universe’ stories can we feasibly see in one lifetime? The Marvel line has, however, done extremely... read more »
Starring Dave Franco, Justin Theroux, Fred Armisen, Abbi Jacobson, Olivia Munn, Kumail Nanijani, Michael Pena, Zach Woods, Jackie Chan
3 STARS (out of 5)
The Lego franchise of movies has now proposed a rather funny thing – an expectation or two. The brand is now synonymous, not only as perhaps the most popular toy of all time (sources pending), but with two movies that could have been quite, quite different. ... read more »
Starring Ryan Gosling, Harrison Ford, Ana de Armas, Sylvia Hoeks, Robin Wright, Mackenzie Davis, Carla Juri, Lennie James, Dave Bautista, Jared Leto
4.5 STARS (out of 5)
The original Blade Runner – of course, based on Philip K Dick’s Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep – never really fared too well on its first outing at the cinema. It was one of many movies to have been heralded as ‘great art’ and a... read more »
Starring Taron Egerton, Colin Firth, Mark Strong, Julianne Moore, Halle Berry, Channing Tatum, Jeff Bridges, Elton John
3.5 STARS (out of 5)
The original Kingsman movie – The Secret Service – was a massive sleeper hit. It was inevitable that a sequel was going to follow, particularly as there doesn’t seem to be many movies actively cornering the spy spoof market at present – and... read more »
Starring Dylan O’Brien, Michael Keaton, Sanaa Lathan, Taylor Kitsch, Scott Adkins, David Suchet, Navid Negahban, Shiva Negar, Alaa Safi, Trevor White
2 STARS (out of 5)
Everyone still seems to be keen to get a slice of the elusive ‘Bourne Pie’. Lee Child’s Jack Reacher character has been brought to the big screen to middling effect; we’ve been seeing Jack Ryan movies since the 1990s, and while long-running... read more »
Starring Judi Dench, Ali Fazal, Eddie Izzard, Adeel Akhtar, Michael Gambon, Tim Pigott-Smith
2.5 STARS (out of 5)
Queen Victoria – the second-longest reigning monarch in British history – has been the subject of what must be hundreds of different works of fiction, TV serials, movies and more besides. The Queen was a rather different monarch to those who had come... read more »
Starring Jaeden Lieberher, Bill Skarsgard, Jeremy Ray Taylor, Sophia Lillis, Finn Wolfhard, Wyatt Oleff, Chosen Jacobs, Jack Dylan Grazer, Nicholas Hamilton, Jackson Robert Scott
4 STARS (out of 5)
This was always going to be a big deal. It seems to be a summer of Stephen King right now, with The Dark Tower having recently made its way to cinemas – and having received largely mixed reviews leaning towards negative – and, as summer draws to a close,... read more »
Starring Bill Nighy, Olivia Cooke, Douglas Booth, Daniel Mays, Sam Reid, Maria Valverde, Henry Goodman, Morgan Watkins, Eddie Marsan
3 STARS (out of 5)
Horror is an odd genre – it certainly seems to vary from country to country and from culture to culture. While US cinema has been happy to perpetuate slasher flicks since the dawn of film, the influence of the Japanese has helped to make the genre evolve into... read more »
Starring Algee Smith, Anthony Mackie, Will Poulter, John Boyega, Jacob Latimore, John Krasinski, Jason Mitchell, Hannah Murray, Kaitlyn Dever
4 STARS (out of 5)
The release of Kathryn Bigelow’s Detroit is rather prescient – after the horrendous scenes in Charlottesville, Virginia in recent weeks, the topic of race relations and violence that can stem from such issues has reared its head once again. Violence in... read more »
Starring Matthew McConaughey, Idris Elba, Tom Taylor, Dennis Haysbert, Ben Gavin, Claudia Kim, Jackie Earle Haley, Fran Kranz, Abbey Lee
2 STARS (out of 5)
Stephen King is one of the most adapted authors to the big screen bar none. Many of his most famous tales have gone on to make award-winning and critically-lauded movies in their own right – consider The Shining, Stand By Me, The Green Mile, Misery –... read more »
Starring Ryan Reynolds, Samuel L Jackson, Gary Oldman, Elodie Yung, Salma Hayek, Richard E Grant, Joaquim de Almeida, Kirsty Mitchell
4 STARS (out of 5)
Anyone who reads my movie reviews regularly will already be well aware of the fact that I do enjoy buddy movies in all shapes and forms – generally, anyway – and unless you really throw everything at the wall and it fails to stick the way Baywatch and... read more »
Starring Will Arnett, Katherine Heigl, Maya Rudolph, Jackie Chan, Isabela Moner, Jeff Dunham, Bobby Moynihan, Peter Stormare, Bobby Cannavale, Tom Kenny
1.5 STARS (out of 5)
When The Nut Job 2 is one of the more palatable animated movies released in any given season, you know you’ve been in for one heck of a rough ride – at least, if you’re parents of cinema-thirsty kids. Short of Pixar’s... read more »
Starring Ed Helms, Kevin Hart, Thomas Middleditch, Nick Kroll, Kristen Schaal, Jordan Peele
4 STARS (out of 5)
Oh, boy. Just look at that title. Last week, we had the likes of Dunkirk and War For the Planet of The Apes. This week, we have Captain Underpants and The Emoji Movie. Yes – the summer holidays have started – and so, you’d be forgiven for... read more »
Starring TJ Miller, James Corden, Anna Faris, Maya Rudolph, Steven Wright, Jennifer Coolidge, Patrick Stewart, Christina Aguilera, Sofia Vergara, Rachael Ray, Sean Hayes, Jake T Austin, Tati Gabrielle
0.5 STARS (out of 5)
It’s hard to hit low when it comes to animated movies. For every Norm of the North there’s Finding Dory, there’s Kung Fu Panda 3, there’s Zootopia. For every Top Cat Begins, there’s Moana, there’s Kubo and the Two Strings –... read more »
Starring Andy Serkis, Woody Harrelson, Steve Zahn, Karin Konoval, Terry Notary, Toby Kebbell, Amiah Miller
3.5 STARS (out of 5)
The new series of Planet of the Apes movies have done something that many other reboots and relaunches have failed to do – in that they have largely revitalised an already well-loved property with genuine intrigue, with both Rise and Dawn of the Planet of the... read more »
Starring Fionn Whitehead, Aneurin Barnard, Mark Rylance, Tom Glynn-Carney, Jack Lowden, Tom Hardy, Kenneth Branagh, James D’Arcy, Harry Styles
4.5 STARS (out of 5)
Here’s a big question - how do you perfect the war film? Heaven knows that it has been a genre with plenty of contributors – going back decades, to even within a few years of the end of the Second World War – but to many, the idea of watching... read more »
Starring Owen Wilson, Christela Alonzo, Nathan Fillion, Larry the Cable Guy, Armie Hammer, Chris Cooper, Bonnie Hunt, Tony Shalhoub, Ray Magliozzi, Paul Newman (archive recordings)
3 STARS (out of 5)
Cars has always been the black sheep of the Pixar line-up. While Brave and The Good Dinosaur may have its dedicated fans amongst the naysayers, the Cars franchise has, over the years, become something of a punchline. Granted, it is arguably one of Pixar’s... read more »
Starring Tom Holland, Michael Keaton, Robert Downey Jr, Jacob Batalon, Marisa Tomei, Donald Glover, Zendaya, Laura Harrier, Jon Favreau, Tyne Daly
4.5 STARS (out of 5)
Spider-Man is the one character – comic book or otherwise – who really does seem to keep coming back again and again. It can be hard to really nail a character with so much iconic status and image right the first time – and while there are fans of... read more »
Starring Ansel Elgort, Jon Bernthal, Jon Hamm, Eiza Gonzalez, Lily James, Kevin Spacey, Jamie Foxx
4 STARS (out of 5)
Action thrillers may come and go, but it certainly takes something special to be able to turn what would be a relatively standard heist caper into something of a pop culture musical – that is, at least, without all of the cheesy trappings and forced nuances. ... read more »
Starring Steve Carell, Kristen Wiig, Trey Parker, Miranda Cosgrove, Dana Gaier, Nev Scharrel, Steve Coogan, Julie Andrews, Jenny Slate, Pierre Coffin
3.5 STARS (out of 5)
There’s little doubt in the fact that the Minions have become something of a phenomenon in recent years, having broken away from the original franchise that brought them to light – and it’s therefore more than a little bizarre that the original... read more »
Starring Mark Wahlberg, Josh Duhamel, Stanley Tucci, Anthony Hopkins, Laura Haddock, Isabela Moner, John Turturro, Peter Cullen, Erik Aadahl, Frank Welker, John DiMaggio, Jess Harnell, Ken Watanabe, John Goodman
1 STAR (out of 5)
Oh boy. Oh boy, oh boy, oh boy. If there’s another sequel lined up this year that faces as much morbid curiosity as Transformers 5, I’d like to see it – perhaps Cars 3, point taken – but the Transformers series is one which seems to be able... read more »
At a time in the release schedule where cinemas are pretty much saturated with big box office record-grabs, it is interesting to see the odd melodrama seep through once in a while. Melodrama is sort of a dirty word these days – it’s arguably the most... read more »
Starring Luke Wilson, Eddie Izzard, J.K. Simmons, Lewis Black, Kenan Thompson, Mae Whitman, Jorge Garcia, Matt Dillon, Sam Elliot
2.5 STARS (out of 5)
If you cringed at the name of this movie or even at the trailer, then the likelihood is you won’t be alone – but, as we’ve come to discover here at One News Page, it really doesn’t pay to judge a book by its cover too often. Rock Dog comes to... read more »
Starring Tom Cruise, Russell Crowe, Annabelle Wallis, Sofia Boutella, Jake Johnson, Courtney B Vance, Marwan Kenzari
2 STARS (out of 5)
This was always going to be a big one. The Mummy is one of the biggest and best-known monster movie staples, with the idea of a zombie wrapped in bandages escaping from sarcophagi having been around for as long as pretty much any of us can remember. It’s a... read more »
Starring Gal Gadot, Chris Pine, Robin Wright, Danny Huston, David Thewlis, Connie Nielsen, Elena Anaya
4 STARS (out of 5)
DC Films? This – this is more like it. I don’t normally lead into reviews with this type of statement, but after a series of misfires – it seems that the studio finally has the chops to match Marvel at its own game.read more »
Starring Johnny Depp, Javier Bardem, Brenton Thwaites, Kaya Scodelario, Kevin McNally, Geoffrey Rush
2 STARS (out of 5)
The Pirates of the Caribbean are some of the most celebrated and even the most derided movie franchises in recent history. There’s a good reason for this – for a movie series based on a popular ride at Disneyland, it has done extraordinarily well to rise... read more »
Starring Dwayne Johnson, Zac Efron, Priyanka Chopra, Alexandra Daddario, Kelly Rohrbach, Jon Bass
1.5 STARS (out of 5)
There has been a trend in movies resurrecting old TV properties in recent years that really seems to have come to a head – while sometimes this can certainly work well, it has been a long time since anything particularly amazing has been derived from an old... read more »
Starring Michael Fassbender, Katherine Waterston, Billy Crudup, Demian Bichir, Danny McBride, Carmen Ejogo
3.5 STARS (out of 5)
The Alien franchise has had a remarkable amount to live up to over the years, and after five instalments of varying quality – we didn’t even know Prometheus was really linked until the final few frames – we return once again to the world of... read more »
Starring Charlie Hunnam, Astrid Berges-Frisbey, Djimon Hounsou, Aidan Gillen, Jude Law, Eric Bana, David Beckham
2 STARS (out of 5)
There are one or two public-domain legends, even stories, which seem to be reliable to roll out once in a while. Last year, we had the forgettable (if not for Christoph Waltz) Legend of Tarzan hit the big screen in an attempt to cash in on the ape-man stories of old... read more »
Starring Josh Gad, Dennis Quaid, Peggy Lipton, Bryce Gheisar, KJ Apa, Juliet Rylance, Luke Kirby, Gabrielle Rose, Michael Bofshever, Britt Robertson
1.5 STARS (out of 5)
Animal movies are, of course, always guaranteed to pull in a certain crowd – and when done well, they can actually resonate across several audiences. However, when executed in a predictable or even hokey fashion, they are sadly doomed to circle the bargain... read more »
Starring Julian Barratt, Andrea Riseborough, Essie Davis, Steve Coogan, Kenneth Branagh, Russell Tovey, Harriet Walter, Simon Callow, Jessica Barden, Simon Farnaby, Nicholas Farrell
4 STARS (out of 5)
They say that British humour is its own beast – hard to emulate, and even hard for native speakers across the pond to fully understand. This is, perhaps, down to the fact that it doesn’t necessarily come in all the same flavour. While modern British... read more »
Starring Oscar Isaac, Christian Bale, Charlotte Le Bon, Daniel Gimenez Cacho, Shohreh Aghdashloo, Andrew Tarbet, Angela Sarafyan, Jean Reno, Marwan Kenzari, Tom Hollander
2.5 STARS (out of 5)
War films seem to have sprung up a little lately – while the UK’s own Their Finest dealt with the theme of propaganda during a time of great unease on British soil, Terry George’s latest film attempts to put forward a historical event which still... read more »
Starring Chris Pratt, Zoe Saldana, Dave Bautista, Vin Diesel, Bradley Cooper, Michael Rooker, Karen Gillan, Pom Klementieff, Sylvester Stallone, Kurt Russell, Elizabeth Debicki
4 STARS (out of 5)
No one – not even those responsible for it – was prepared for quite how massive Guardians of The Galaxy was going to be. Adapting from one of the weirder Marvel comics in the library – where three humanoids, a trigger-happy raccoon and an... read more »
Starring Gemma Arterton, Bill Nighy, Sam Claflin, Jack Huston, Eddie Marsan, Helen McCrory, Richard E Grant, Henry Goodman, Jeremy Irons
4 STARS (out of 5)
Light-hearted British drama is, at best, very difficult to live up to. It’s almost a genre in itself – not quite comedy, not quite high drama – but they all tell stories in a very similar way. They often have home-grown casts you’ve seen... read more »
Starring John Gallagher Jr, Adria Arjona, Tony Goldwyn, Michael Rooker, Sean Gunn, John C McGinley
2 STARS (out of 5)
‘Hell is other people’, as they say, and there have been more than plenty of movies which have handled this premise and have run with it in all manner of directions. The way people react to certain situations brings out organic, intriguing drama –... read more »
Starring Morgan Freeman, Michael Caine, Alan Arkin, Ann-Margret, Peter Serafinowicz, Joey King, Matt Dillon, Christopher Lloyd, John Ortiz
2 STARS (out of 5)
This is a movie with plenty of star power and incredible talent, both in front of and behind the camera. Zach Braff, of course, has taken on several directing projects in recent years, and he takes the reins here on a remake that’s been scripted by Theodore... read more »
Starring Vin Diesel, Charlize Theron, Dwayne Johnson, Jason Statham, Michelle Rodriguez, Tyrese Gibson, Helen Mirren, Elsa Pataky, Kurt Russell, Scott Eastwood, Nathalie Emmanuel, Chris ‘Ludacris’ Bridges
3 STARS (out of 5)
It’s quite difficult to believe quite how far the Fast and Furious franchise has come – from its early days as a series of cult movies surrounding underground street racing to the critically lauded Furious 7, the big name cast have been thrilling and... read more »
If Ghostbusters was last year’s big controversial remake, Ghost in The Shell will certainly be 2017’s. Over the past 20-30 years, Japanese anime has transitioned well into Western culture and cinema, with the appealing Studio Ghibli – offering dubs... read more »
Starring Anna Kendrick, Stephen Merchant, Lisa Kudrow, Craig Robinson, June Squibb, Tony Revolori, Wyatt Russell, Amanda Crew
2.5 STARS (out of 5)
With examples of comedies such as CHiPS and Fist Fight setting the bar rather low for the genre early on this year, it’s high time that a humorous script should come along to set things straight – while we were waiting some time for a solid comedy last... read more »
Starring Alec Baldwin, Miles Bakshi, Jimmy Kimmel, Lisa Kudrow, Tobey Maguire, Steve Buscemi, Conrad Vernon, James McGrath, ViviAnn Yee
2.5 STARS (out of 5)
DreamWorks’ story is an odd one – and it’s a long one we don’t have time to go into today – but while Disney have generally weathered the past five or six years well (as have Pixar, barring one or two false starts), Jeffrey... read more »
Starring Demi Lovato, Mandy Patinkin, Jack McBrayer, Ellie Kemper, Joe Manganiello, Danny Pudi, Julia Roberts, Michelle Rodriguez, Rainn Wilson
2 STARS (out of 5)
It’s that time of year again – while we may not have the equivalent of Disney’s superb Zootopia to set us up nicely for the family-friendly movies due to descend on us over the next few months, it is at least a time of year where it is nice to see... read more »
Starring Dacre Montgomery, Naomi Scott, RJ Cyler, Ludi Lin, Becky G, Elizabeth Banks, Bill Hader, Bryan Cranston
3 STARS (out of 5)
Did Power Rangers really need rebooting? Has it really been that long since we saw spandex-suited pugilists beating up aliens from another planet in the name of dinosaur totems? The series has, in one form or another, been ongoing since the early 90s, and while the... read more »
Starring Dax Shepard, Michael Pena, Adam Brady, Jessica McNamee, Vincent D’Onofrio, Kristen Bell, Ryan Hansen, Maya Rudolph, Adam Rodrigues, Rosa Salazar, Jackie Tohn, Mara Marini
1 STARS (out of 5)
It seems that more and more comedies are coming out of the woodwork now that sporting has finally arrived, and while this can sometimes bring a nice antidote to the wealth of cheap horror movies and Oscar-bait pictures that saturate the market in the first quarter of... read more »
This is a movie that has seemingly come out of the blue from its native France, and yet it will very likely come under scrutiny very quickly for more than one reason – and these are largely down to the genre it occupies, and its lead – and mainly only... read more »
Starring Emma Watson, Dan Stevens, Luke Evans, Ewan McGregor, Josh Gad, Emma Thompson, Ian McKellen, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Stanley Tucci, Kevin Kline, Audra McDonald
3.5 STARS (out of 5)
Disney really is atop the crest of a very big wave – they had an absolutely enormous 2016, and while 2017 looks to be relatively quieter for the firm – after all, they released not one but two films in their animated canon last year – they are still... read more »
Starring Charlie Day, Ice Cube, Tracy Morgan, Jillian Bell, Dean Norris, Christina Hendricks
1 STAR (out of 5)
No one ever said that comedy was easy – far from it. In fact, it’s somewhat hit and miss in the current cinematic climate. Last year’s The Nice Guys arguably set the bar high – but this didn’t mean that more traditional Hollywood... read more »
Starring Tom Hiddleston, Samuel L Jackson, John Goodman, Brie Larson, Jing Tian, Toby Kebbell, John C Reilly, Terry Notary
3.5 STARS (out of 5)
On paper, Kong: Skull Island is a mixture of two beasts. It boasts a solid, reputable cast that could bring even the wettest of screenplays to life, and it is playing off and adding to one of the most famous cinematic franchises of all time. King Kong is widely... read more »
Starring Mark Wahlberg, JK Simmons, John Goodman, Michelle Monaghan, Kevin Bacon, Jimmy O Yang, Vincent Curatola, Alex Wolff
4 STARS (out of 5)
The Boston Marathon Bombing of April 2013 will go down in history as one of the most sudden and intense terrorist attacks on US soil. Two bombs took the lives of three people while hundreds were left fighting for survival, and while an investigation to find the... read more »
Starring Hugh Jackman, Patrick Stewart, Boyd Holbrook, Stephen Merchant, Dafne Keen, Richard E Grant, Eriq La Salle, Elizabetha Rodriguez, Elise Neal, Quincy Fouse
4 STARS (out of 5)
Hugh Jackman has been portraying Wolverine for so long now that it will be improbable that anyone ever picks up his claws – and while some of the X-Men adventures that have been brought to the big screen have dipped and succeeded in varying measures, it can... read more »
Starring Dev Patel, Rooney Mara, Nicole Kidman, Sunny Pawar, David Wenham, Abhishek Bharate, Priyanka Bose, Tannishtha Chatterjee, Nawazuddin Siddiqui
3.5 STARS (out of 5)
Much of this year’s Best Picture Oscar nominees are based on true stories – from Hidden Figures to Garth Davis’ Lion, it certainly seems once again that the most captivating movies, at least for Academy voters, are those which are loosely based on... read more »
Starring Matt Damon, Tian Jing, Pedro Pascal, Willem Dafoe, Hanyu Zhang, Eddie Peng, Han Lu, Kenny Lin, Xuan Huang
2 STARS (out of 5)
There really is still a good market for a great ‘battle’ movie – when done well, films based around epic fights can either make for visual spectacles or they can risk becoming dull, trudging flops that fail to engage with audiences due to poor... read more »
Starring Dakota Johnson, Jamie Dornan, Eric Johnson, Rita Ora, Luke Grimes, Victor Rasuk
1 STAR (out of 5)
Where do you start? Some years ago, the Fifty Shades of Grey novels became something of an overnight success. EL James, the author, had admitted to basing the stories on her own Twilight fan fiction – while this is not necessarily a bad thing, as it does... read more »
Starring Trevante Rhodes, Ashton Sanders, Alex Hubert, Andre Holland, Jharrel Jerome, Jayden Piner, Naomie Harris, Mahershala Ali, Janelle Monae, Patrick Decile
4.5 STARS (out of 5)
Despite Damien Chazelle’s La La Land largely taking much of the attention in terms of awards nominations and plaudits in recent months, the Oscars season that is just around the corner is really shaping up to be one of the most hotly-contested. For one, there... read more »
Starring Michael Keaton, Nick Offerman, John Carroll Lynch, Linda Cardellini, Patrick Wilson, BJ Novak, Laura Dern
3.5 STARS (out of 5)
‘True stories’ are fast becoming hot property on the big screen once again, and with good reason – there are still many stories left to be told, and with a host of fascinating takes on even the most well-known stories also in the pipeline, it seems... read more »
Starring Rebecca Hall, Michael C Hall, Tracy Letts, Maria Dizzia, J Smith-Cameron, Timothy C Simons
4 STARS (out of 5)
The first of two films reviewed this week that focus on real life stories – two which are very different in tone and relevance – is Campos’ third motion picture, which focuses on a small Florida news network during the height of the Nixon scandal. ... read more »
Starring Taraji P Henson, Octavia Spencer, Janelle Monae, Kevin Costner, Kirsten Dunst, Jim Parsons, Mahershala Ali, Aldis Hodge, Glen Powell
4 STARS (out of 5)
Society has come a long way in such a short period of time, certainly in terms of human rights as well as technology and the way in which we conduct our everyday lives. Hidden Figures, which is up for a slew of Oscars this month, is a film that tackles a pivotal... read more »
Starring Will Arnett, Rosario Dawson, Zach Galifianakis, Michael Cera, Ralph Fiennes, Jenny Slate, Channing Tatum, Jonah Hill, Ellie Kemper, Jemaine Clement, Jonah Hill
4.5 STARS (out of 5)
In the January-February period where Oscar-nominated movies are shuffling around and taking the majority of our box office tickets, screen space is largely dedicated to far ‘lesser’ films. Horror movies that don’t quite hit the mark. Big, daft... read more »
Starring Vin Diesel, Donnie Yen, Tony Jaa, Nina Dobrev, Deepika Padukone, Kris Wu, Ruby Rose, Rory McCann, Samuel L Jackson, Toni Collette, Michael Bisping, Hermione Corfield
2 STARS (out of 5)
In an age where it still seems inappropriate to label sequels with a number after they pass 2 or 3, xXx returns to the big screen in a third instalment that, while not trying to gain anyone’s intelligence, seems to be doing so to appease fans who were waiting... read more »
Starring Rachel Weisz, Timothy Spall, Tom Wilkinson, Caren Pistorious, Andrew Scott, Alex Jennings, Harriet Walter, Jack Lowden, Mark Gatiss
3.5 STARS (out of 5)
Is there a film that is perhaps more better-timed for release than Denial? Maybe not. Denial is a movie which has arrived at a point of time in world politics and mass media coverage where both are threatened to change dramatically as a result of recently elected... read more »
Starring Andrew Garfield, Teresa Palmer, Vince Vaughn, Hugo Weaving, Rachel Griffiths, Sam Worthington, Luke Bracey, Nathaniel Buzolic
4.5 STARS (out of 5)
The war movie is something of a genre which, for those who aren’t captivated by it, may feel far too well-tread. The sad fact is, war movies exist due to war existing – full stop – and the very best of these films serve to showcase what the bravest... read more »
Starring James McAvoy, Anna Taylor-Joy, Betty Buckley, Haley Lu Richardson, Jessica Shula, Brad William Henke
4 STARS (out of 5)
M. Night Shyamalan. It’s a name that conjures up all sorts of thoughts and opinions, particularly if you’re an avid movie-goer – he’s a writer, producer and director that arguably changed the game when it came to suspense thrillers with the... read more »
Starring Matthew McConaughey, Reese Witherspoon, Seth MacFarlane, Scarlett Johansson, John C Reilly, Taron Egerton, Tori Kelly, Rhea Perlman, Jennifer Saunders, Garth Jennings, Nick Offerman
4 STARS (out of 5)
Illumination Entertainment have really started coming into their own in recent times – while their animated movies may not have picked up the critical plaudits or attention that Pixar or Dreamworks have added to their arsenal over the years, they have remained... read more »
Starring Lucas Till, Jane Levy, Thomas Lennon, Barry Pepper, Rob Lowe, Danny Glover, Amy Ryan, Frank Whaley
2 STARS (out of 5)
For anyone out there that has, at one time or another, bemoaned a lack of originality in cinema, now might be the time to reassess the situation – or might it? Monster Trucks appears to be an odd beast before you even hit the cinema – it not only boasts... read more »
Starring Ryan Gosling, Emma Stone, John Legend, JK Simmons
4.5 STARS (out of 5)
What ever happened to the musical film? It’s safe to say that the concept of a movie being half drama, half music rather went out of the window around the same time that the big screen started taking itself far too seriously. Too many critics may yearn for the... read more »
Starring Michael Fassbender, Marion Cotillard, Jeremy Irons, Brendan Gleeson, Charlotte Rampling, Michael Kenneth Williams
2 STARS (out of 5)
The videogame curse, as it is known, is hardly the stuff of urban legend – you only have to cast a cursory glance at some of the biggest gaming properties that have been made into movies over the years to understand that it’s a move that really... read more »
Starring Chris Pratt, Jennifer Lawrence, Michael Sheen, Laurence Fishburne
2 STARS (out of 5)
It’s been an up-and-down year for science fiction at the cinema – while we’ve seen brilliance in Arrival, we have also faced middling fare from Star Trek Beyond and Midnight Special. While both of these films have their fans, they can hardly be... read more »
Starring Felicity Jones, Diego Luna, Forest Whitaker, Riz Ahmed, Ben Mendelsohn, Donnie Yen, Alan Tudyk, Jian Weng, Guy Henry, Peter Cushing
3.5 STARS (out of 5)
One of the last movies of the year and it’s a very big one indeed – Rogue One is a very big deal for anyone following the Star Wars universe, particularly as it’s the very first movie in the franchise to tackle a story without any of the main... read more »
Starring Will Smith, Edward Norton, Kate Winslet, Michael Pena, Helen Mirren, Jacob Latimore, Naomie Harris, Keira Knightley
1.5 STARS (out of 5)
The holiday season always seems to bring around a certain type of movie – for better or for worse – ones which attempt to inject cheer into our lives and to give us some festive spirit at the end of what may have been a trying year. 2016, certainly, has... read more »
Any Disney followers or fans can hardly say they’ve had nothing to enjoy this year as the studio has really pushed the boat out when it comes to both their animated material and their Marvel line. Captain America : Civil War, at the time of writing, sits atop... read more »
Starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Shailene Woodley, Melissa Leo, Zachary Quinto, Tom Wilkinson, Scott Eastwood, Nicolas Cage, Rhys Ifans
1.5 STARS (out of 5)
The story of Edward Snowden is one that has been widely reported across the past few years – in a day and age where the information that is kept on us by the government and associated agencies is constantly under criticism, the actions carried out by the ex-CIA... read more »
Biopics and ‘true story’ movies are once again in vogue, and while some may attempt to get you to smile, others try to give you a genuine insight into a life you’ve only briefly heard about. This year we’ve seen The Finest Hours, Eddie the... read more »
Starring Brad Pitt, Marion Cotillard, Jared Harris, Simon McBurney, Lizzy Caplan, Matthew Goode
2.5 STARS (out of 5)
Allied is a strange movie to be creeping along into the final days of November – romantic thrillers don’t normally pop in in the dying moments of the year, but then again, it’s hard to say exactly where they fit in best. That being said, this type... read more »
British documentary mainstay Louis Theroux is no stranger to some of the world’s more sensitive topics – he’s visited prisons that are home to some of the world’s most notorious criminals, he’s spent weekends with the now infamous Jimmy... read more »
Starring Luke Treadaway, Ruta Gedmintas, Joanne Froggatt, Anthony Head, Beth Goddard, Darren Evans
3.5 STARS (out of 5)
Regardless of the good, the bad and the indifferent in terms of movies that we’ve seen in 2016, there has at least been a genuine mix of genres and stories that directors and studios are trying to tell. It’s always a genuine pleasure, too, to sit down... read more »
Starring Eddie Redmayne, Katherine Waterston, Dan Fogler, Alison Sudol, Colin Farrell, Samantha Morton, Ezra Miller, Jon Voight
4 STARS (out of 5)
This was always going to be a big one – and arguably one of the ‘big ones’ of the fall/winter movie season. The Harry Potter universe is so ingrained in our popular culture now that it has become something of a fragile beast, fans are wary of any... read more »
Starring Ben Affleck, Anna Kendrick, J.K. Simmons, Jon Bernthal, Cynthia Addai-Robinson, Jeffrey Tambor, John Lithgow
4 STARS (out of 5)
Action films come in three varieties – big and dumb, slow and overly-contrived, and genuinely thrilling. There’s been a fair share of all three modes in the past few years – London Has Fallen being a prime example of how to muddle big and dumb into... read more »
Starring Amy Adams, Jeremy Renner, Forest Whitaker, Michael Stuhlbarg, Tzi Ma
5 STARS (out of 5)
The most enjoyable movies, for me at least, are the ones that stay with you – the ones that reverberate on you for days afterwards, the ones which make you feel like the journey was worth it. Some movies are built to be funny, some are built to simply pass the... read more »
Starring Anna Kendrick, Justin Timberlake, Zooey Deschanel, Gwen Stefani, James Corden, Russell Brand
3.5 STARS (out of 5)
I am more than happy to hold my hands up – when I first saw the initial trailers and advertising for Trolls, I was more than cynical. I believe this was around a similar time to Norm of the North and Top Cat Begins having descended on unsuspecting families and... read more »
Starring Benedict Cumberbatch, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Rachel McAdams, Tilda Swinton, Mads Mikkelsen, Benedict Wong
4.5 STARS (out of 5)
Is there anything that the Marvel universe can’t do? Certainly, the past few years have been host to what is becoming akin to a golden run for comic book movie adaptations, with this year’s Captain America : Civil War remaining 2016’s... read more »
Occasionally, when writing movie reviews, I like to watch and talk about pictures that are a little different from the norm. I did this most recently with the divisive Swiss Army Man, arguably the most difficult film I’ve watched this year – and... read more »
Starring Tom Hanks, Felicity Jones, Omar Sy, Sidse Babett Knudsen, Irrfan Khan, Ben Foster
2 STARS (out of 5)
There appear to be thrillers abound at the movies just lately – and while some, such as The Girl on The Train, take one route to creating suspense, others go in a completely different direction. Anyone familiar with other Dan Brown adaptations – The Da... read more »
Starring Emily Blunt, Rebecca Ferguson, Haley Bennett, Justin Theroux, Luke Evans, Allison Janney, Edgar Ramirez, Lisa Kudrow
1.5 STARS (out of 5)
Every so often, the thriller re-invents itself – and for good reason. For years, carbon-copies of Hitchcock’s best ran rampant across the silver screen, none of them quite coming as close to the sheer terror and suspense that audiences felt when watching... read more »
Starring Paul Dano, Daniel Radcliffe, Mary Elizabeth Winstead
2.5 STARS (out of 5)
Where do you start with a film like Swiss Army Man? Perhaps in the running to be one of the most consciously bizarre movies of the year – a year in which we have seen Sausage Party make huge money at the box office – One News Page reported earlier this... read more »
Starring Mark Wahlberg, Kurt Russell, John Malkovich, Gina Rodriguez, Kate Hudson, Dylan O’Brien, Ethan Suplee
4 STARS (out of 5)
Sometimes, movies made out of real-life disasters really do resonate well with an audience or two – particularly if they are well-timed, prescient, and handled with empathy for those involved. Earlier this year, The Finest Hours attempted to tackle a real-life... read more »
Starring Andy Samberg, Katie Crown, Kelsey Grammer, Keegan-Michael Key, Jordan Peele, Ty Burrell, Jennifer Aniston, Danny Trejo
2.5 STARS (out of 5)
The rulebook on making animated children’s movies has been rewritten so many times, it’s hard to keep track. On one hand, you have movies from Disney – the old guard – who have rarely put a foot wrong in terms of the quality of animation they... read more »
Starring Julian Dennison, Sam Neill, Rima Te Wiata, Rachel House, Oscar Kightley, Rhys Darby, Taika Waititi
4 STARS (out of 5)
Any complaints made regarding the lack of original comic cinema in 2016 were quickly shot down when Hunt for the Wilderpeople made its way to festivals and various countries earlier this year – while it may only recently have seen a UK release after a long... read more »
Starring Art Parkinson, Charlize Theron, Matthew McConaughey, Rooney Mara, George Takei, Ralph Fiennes
5 STARS (out of 5)
Laika is an animation studio that has been growing a reputation over several years now for going against what is perceived as the ‘norm’ of animation. They are independent from much of Hollywood’s hustle and bustle and have broken through... read more »
Starring Seth Rogen, Jonah Hill, James Franco, Kristen Wiig, Michael Cera, Salma Hayek, Edward Norton, Paul Rudd, Danny McBride, Nick Kroll
2.5 STARS (out of 5)
Out of all the movies I have reviewed so far this year, this has perhaps been the most difficult for me – while Nine Lives may just have edged it in terms of being the more inexplicable to describe and summarise, Sausage Party is on a whole other level of... read more »
Starring Daniel Radcliffe, Toni Collette, Tracy Letts, Sam Trammell, Nestor Carbonell, Chris Sullivan, Devin Druid
4 STARS (out of 5)
Movies that handle real-life issues often try to hit home harder than they can normally handle – after all, it is only the brilliant few that can really connect with an audience. ‘True stories’ have built up a reputation over the years, and while... read more »
Starring Teresa Palmer, Gabriel Bateman, Alexander DiPersia, Billy Burke, Maria Bello
3.5 STARS (out of 5)
The horror genre seems to be coming back into its own in recent months, with a fantastic reception to The Conjuring 2 earlier this year – and while it’s likely we won’t be seeing the bulk of the scary or gory movies that 2016 has to offer until... read more »
Starring Jack Huston, Morgan Freeman, Ayelet Zurer, Toby Kebbell, Rodrigo Santoro, Nazanin Boniadi, Sofia Black-D’Elia
1.5 STARS (out of 5)
Remakes and reboots, as any good movie-goer will know, come and go like the drawing of breath – and while some do exceptionally well at drawing upon their source material and create an entirely new adventure and premise for current generations to enjoy, others... read more »
Starring Emma Roberts, Dave Franco, Juliette Lewis, Emily Meade, Samira Wiley, Kimiko Glen, Miles Heizer
2.5 STARS (out of 5)
Some movies are written, produced and released at exactly the right time – and while some films such as Nine Lives are released years or even decades after they appear to be relevant, there are occasional glimpses of hope in original screenplays that challenge... read more »
Starring Kevin Spacey, Christopher Walken, Jennifer Garner, Malina Weissman, Teddy Sears, Talitha Bateman
0.5 STARS (out of 5)
Every once in a while, a movie concept arrives that really jumps out at you – for a variety of different reasons. 2016 has been a fantastic year for movies on one hand, but on the other, pictures such as Gods of Egypt and Norm of the North made it to global... read more »
Starring Bryce Dallas Howard, Oakes Fegley, Wes Bentley, Karl Urban, Oona Laurence, Robert Redford
3.5 STARS (out of 5)
Some remakes and reboots are vastly different to others – while some may try and recapture the spirit of an original work, so many can fall short of the mark and can come off as poor imitations. Certainly, movies this year that fail to capture such magic... read more »
Starring Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto, Karl Urban, Zoe Saldana, Simon Pegg, John Cho, Anton Yelchin, Idris Elba, Sofia Boutella
2.5 STARS (out of 5)
Some franchises may come and go, but Star Trek is a pioneering sci-fi staple that truly has withstood the tests of time – and changing tastes and technology. While there may have been scores of TV episodes across numerous teams within the Federation over the... read more »
Starring Mila Kunis, Kathryn Hahn, Kristen Bell, Christina Applegate, Jada Pinkett Smith, David Walton, Jay Hernandez, Annie Mumolo
2.5 STARS (out of 5)
Comedy continues to seep into 2016 cinema thick and fast, and while some have been subversive, others have stuck to tried and tested formulae. Others, according to some critics, have been downright unfunny. What makes people laugh in 2016? No one really ever seems... read more »
Whatever happened to the shark movie? It’s debatable. Jaws has a fair bit to answer for – notably, starting a wave of quasi-horror movies that saw wild animals take on unsuspecting humans in a variety of supposedly creative and gruesome ways. ... read more »
Starring Will Smith, Margot Robbie, Viola Davis, Jared Leto, Jai Courtney, Jay Hernandez, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, Cara Delevigne, Joel Kinnaman, Adam Beach, Karen Fukuhara
1.5 STARS (out of 5)
2016 has been host to a number of huge movies with an awful lot riding on them. Batman V Superman, Deadpool, Ghostbusters, Finding Dory – audiences all very much holding their breath in the hope that they would all pull off something magical. In some of these... read more »
Starring Frank Grillo, Elizabeth Mitchell, Mykelti Williamson, Joseph Julian Soria, Betty Gabriel, Terry Serpico, Edwin Hodge, Kyle Secor
3 STARS (out of 5)
In a reality mirroring our own, every year in the US, all crime becomes legal for twelve hours on one night known as ‘Purge Night’. There have been two preceding movies addressing the reasons for such a night existing, while the third instalment observes... read more »
Starring Mark Rylance, Ruby Barnhill, Jemaine Clement, Penelope Wilton, Bill Hader, Rebecca Hall, Rafe Spall
2.5 STARS (out of 5)
To many, it’s a match made in heaven – Roald Dahl wrote some of the most beloved children’s literature of the past fifty years, and Steven Spielberg is responsible for directing some of the most enchanting and memorable family cinema over the past... read more »
Starring Melissa McCarthy, Kristen Wiig, Kate McKinnon, Leslie Jones, Chris Hemsworth, Neil Casey, Andy Garcia
1.5 STARS (out of 5)
Anyone with a passing interest in the Ghostbusters franchise will know that the intention to make a second sequel to the smash hit 1980s comedy was always being thrashed out behind the scenes, largely with stars Dan Aykroyd and Harold Ramis at the helm of such talks... read more »
Starring Ellen DeGeneres, Albert Brooks, Ed O’Neill, Kaitlin Olson, Hayden Rolence, Ty Burrell, Diane Keaton, Eugene Levy, Idris Elba, Dominic West, Sigourney Weaver
4.5 STARS (out of 5)
Pixar have had a mixed year or two in terms of how their content has been received both by critics and by the general public. While they may have found their feet again thanks to movies such as Inside Out, they will be looked on with some caution as a result of Cars... read more »
Starring Jesse Eisenberg, Mark Ruffalo, Dave Franco, Lizzy Caplan, Woody Harrelson, Daniel Radcliffe, Michael Caine, Morgan Freeman
3 STARS (out of 5)
Ensemble stories are always difficult – and oftentimes, they’re also incredibly popular – meaning that, to get them right, you’re always going to need a good balance of sound acting talent and a capable script to balance multiple personalities... read more »
Starring Alexander Skarsgard, Samuel L Jackson, Margot Robbie, Christoph Waltz, Djimon Hounsou, Jim Broadbent
2 STARS (out of 5)
Some stories find themselves retold again and again – some of them enduring, some of them grating – and while the tales of Tarzan have been handled well in the past, particularly in Disney’s 1999 animated adaptation, the story of the man raised by... read more »
Starring Kevin Hart, Dwayne Johnson, Amy Ryan, Danielle Nicolet, Aaron Paul, Megan Park, Ryan Hansen, Timothy John Smith
4 STARS (out of 5)
2016 is shaping up to be a year where cinema seems relatively happy to borrow from a number of genres and styles that haven’t seen the life of day on screen for some time – with The Nice Guys having single-handedly revived my interest in cinematic comedy... read more »
Starring Liam Hemsworth, Jeff Goldblum, Bill Pullman, Jessie Usher, Maika Monroe, William Fichtner, Sela Ward, Brent Spiner, Judd Hirsch
2 STARS (out of 5)
Many would argue that the original Independence Day had a lot to answer for – effectively revitalising the ‘disaster’ or ‘event’ movie, it spurred on a spate of copycat movies well into the late 90s and early 00s that could barely hold a... read more »
Starring Louis C.K., Jenny Slate, Eric Stonestreet, Kevin Hart, Bobby Moynihan, Albert Brooks, Lake Bell, Hannibal Buress, Dana Carvey, Steve Coogan, Ellie Kemper
3 STARS (out of 5)
Animated movies are still very much big business, regardless of how much of the market Disney and Pixar may be covering – and it is therefore heartening to see studios such as Illumination continuing to make great-looking, appealing and funny family pictures... read more »
Starring Patrick Wilson, Vera Farmiga, Madison Wolfe, Frances O’Connor, Simon McBurney, Maria Doyle Kennedy, Simon Delaney, Franka Potente, Robin Atkin Downes
3 STARS (out of 5)
Horror, much like comedy, is a cinema genre that is becoming increasingly hard to pin down – while psychological horror continues to occasionally pop up on the big screen, there has been a spate of traditional ‘jump scare’ horror that has pervaded... read more »
Starring Melissa McCarthy, Kristen Bell, Peter Dinklage, Ella Anderson, Kathy Bates, Kristen Schaal, Michael McDonald, Cedric Yarbrough
2 STARS (out of 5)
Comedy is hard to get right when it comes to the movies. There’s all manner of different genres, tastes to cater for, and the maze of getting comic timing and genuine talent all together in one place. Generally, certain types of comedy have done well over the... read more »
A mark of a good movie is one that shines either without - or even despite - huge visual flairs, pomp and circumstance, and everything else besides – a movie that has genuine heart, genuine appeal, and provides a thought-provoking narrative along with a clear... read more »
Starring Russell Crowe, Ryan Gosling, Angourie Rice, Margaret Qualley, Keith David, Beau Knapp, Kim Basinger
4.5 STARS (out of 5)
The problem with modern cinema – if you ask just about anyone – is that it’s not original enough. People are getting their fair share of comic book movies, reboots of old franchises, cheap animated movies and lightweight rom-coms more so now than... read more »
Starring Travis Fimmel, Toby Kebbell, Paula Patton, Ben Foster, Robert Kazinsky, Ruth Negga, Dominic Cooper, Daniel Wu
3 STARS (out of 5)
Warcraft is another movie this year that has had much riding on its success – not only is it a fantasy movie, but it is also one that has been derived from arguably the most successful MMORPG (Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game) of all time. As... read more »
Starring Mia Wasikowska, Johnny Depp, Helena Bonham Carter, Alan Rickman, Anne Hathaway, Sacha Baron Cohen, Matt Lucas, Lindsay Duncan, Stephen Fry
2.5 STARS (out of 5)
Tim Burton’s 2010 take on Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland was not only ideally suited to his unique style of direction and pacing, but it was also a chance to show a darker, more ‘alternative; side to Disney. As it transpired, it was an... read more »
Starring Jason Harris Katz, Chris Edgerly, Matthew Piazzi, Benjamin Diskin, Bill Lobley
0.5 STARS (out of 5)
Movie adaptations of popular TV shows and beloved cartoons are nothing new. It can be a mixed bag, as it happens – and in 2011, no one really saw Top Cat : The Movie coming. A Mexican-Argentine production, it managed to become one of Mexico’s biggest... read more »
Starring James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender, Jennifer Lawrence, Sophie Turner, Oscar Isaac, Rose Byrne, Kodi Smit-McPhee, Nicholas Hoult, Alexandra Shipp, Tye Sheridan, Evan Peters
2 STARS (out of 5)
Comic book adaptations are rife across theaters in 2016, and with the R-rated Deadpool and Captain America : Civil War having notched up box office glory for Marvel this year so far – and with DC’s Batman V Superman also pulling in ticket sales despite... read more »
Starring Tom Hanks, Alexander Black, Sarita Choudhury, Tracey Fairaway, Eric Meyers, Sidse Babett Knudsen
1.5 STARS (out of 5)
‘Fish out of water’ stories aren’t exactly as ten-a-penny as they once may have been at the cinema – with Sofia Coppola’s Lost in Translation being the most memorable example in recent years – and, when done well, they can be... read more »
Starring Ewan McGregor, Stellan Skarsgard, Naomie Harris, Damian Lewis, Jeremy Northam, Alicia von Rittberg, Pawel Szajda
3.5 STARS (out of 5)
Spy films are, sadly, not as ten a penny as you may think. While last year’s Spooks movie revival and the Gary Oldman fronted Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy remain some of cinema’s best espionage thrillers in recent years, it is still a genre that is lacking... read more »
Starring Emilia Clarke, Sam Claflin, Charles Dance, Steve Peacocke, Jenna Coleman, Brendan Coyle, Samantha Spiro, Matthew Lewis, Joanna Lumley
2.5 STARS (out of 5)
There is still very much a viable audience and market for love stories – and while some may be regarded as ‘rom-coms’ and others as ‘weepies’, it’s often hard for some screenplays to bridge the gap between the two. Certainly, most... read more »
Starring Jason Sudeikis, Josh Gad, Maya Rudolph, Danny McBride, Kate McKinnon, Bill Hader, Sean Penn, Peter Dinklage
4 STARS (out of 5)
If there’s any movie that releases this year with as much stigma to it as The Angry Birds Movie, I’d like to see it. Movies adapted from video game franchises and plots are infamous for not converting brilliantly to the big screen – with only... read more »
Starring Meryl Streep, Hugh Grant, Simon Helberg, Rebecca Ferguson, David Haig, Nina Ariadna, Stanley Townsend
4 STARS (out of 5)
True stories never seem to stray too far from the cinema – and with Eddie the Eagle and The Finest Hours having been the most memorable in recent history, they don’t always hit straight out of the ballpark. Of course, some stories are embellished or... read more »
Starring Chris Evans, Robert Downey Jr., Scarlett Johansson, Chadwick Boseman, Sebastian Stan, Anthony Mackie, Paul Rudd, Tom Holland, Jeremy Renner, Elizabeth Olsen, Paul Bettany, Don Cheadle
4.5 STARS (out of 5)
Comic book movies make up a huge amount of box office money – and indeed the number of films that are on the listings for your average multiplex – and Civil War was always set to be one of this year’s biggest comic draws. Following on from... read more »
Starring Helen Mirren, Alan Rickman, Aaron Paul, Iain Glen, Barkhad Abdi, Phoebe Fox, Kim Engelbrecht, Jeremy Northam, Babou Ceesay, Aisha Takow
3.5 STARS (out of 5)
Most of the movies that I’ve been able to see this year have mainly had big, sprawling stories to tell – some overly ambitious and lacking in key areas – so it’s a refreshing change to watch something like Eye in The Sky that, while intense... read more »
Starring Kevin Costner, Gary Oldman, Gal Gadot, Ryan Reynolds, Tommy Lee Jones, Alice Eve, Michael Pitt
2.5 STARS (out of 5)
The action movie genre is certainly seeing itself put to task this year, with London Has Fallen having already fulfilled much of the box office quota for ‘big dumb shoot-em-ups’, Hardcore Henry having played to an audience that appreciates gimmicks... read more »
Starring Neel Sethi, Bill Murray, Ben Kingsley, Idris Elba, Lupita Nyong’o, Christopher Walken, Scarlett Johansson
4.5 STARS (out of 5)
Regardless of whether not you’ve read the original Rudyard Kipling book in its entirety, there’s a very good chance that you already know the story of Mowgli the man-cub and his jungle adventures fairly well already. Thanks to Disney’s original... read more »
Starring Sharlto Copley, Haley Bennet, Danila Koslovskiy, Tim Roth
3.5 STARS (out of 5)
It’s probably wise to preface any review of Hardcore Henry by stating that it’s unlike much of what you’ve ever seen before, certainly at the cinema – while the idea of a first-person action movie has probably been bouncing around in... read more »
Starring Michael Shannon, Joel Edgerton, Kirsten Dunst, Jaeden Lieberher, Adam Driver, David Jensen, Scott Haze
2.5 STARS (out of 5)
Anyone looking at recent box office listings recently could be forgiven for thinking that movies appear to fall into four or five categories – quirky comedies, comic book movies, ‘true’ stories, reboots of old franchises, pop culture-laden animated... read more »
Starring Chris Hemsworth, Charlize Theron, Emily Blunt, Jessica Chastain, Nick Frost, Sheridan Smith, Rob Brydon, Alexandra Roach
3 STARS (out of 5)
Fantasy, as a genre in entertainment, has evolved more in the past ten to fifteen years than perhaps any other – thanks to the rise and rise of the Lord of The Rings and Hobbit movies, the Harry Potter franchise, and arguably Game of Thrones – and with... read more »
Starring Mary Elizabeth Winstead, John Goodman, John Gallagher Jr., Bradley Cooper
4.5 STARS (out of 5)
2016 seems to be host to a number of movies this year with an awful lot hanging overhead. Batman V Superman has been met with lukewarm to negative reception. People everywhere await Paul Feig’s take on Ghostbusters this summer with baited breath. 10... read more »
Starring Ben Affleck, Henry Cavill, Gal Gadot, Jesse Eisenberg, Amy Adams, Diane Lane, Laurence Fishburne, Jeremy Irons
2 STARS (out of 5)
This is a film that is fairly rare in that it divided opinion before it even reached theaters. The concept of a Batman/Superman mashup movie was almost too much to bear for those of us with more than a passing interest in DC Comics, and with the promise that it... read more »
Starring Rob Schneider, Heather Graham, Ken Jeong, Colm Meaney, Bill Nighy, Maya Kay, Loretta Devine
0.5 STARS (out of 5)
Before Norm of The North started at the screening I attended, a well-timed trailer for Zootropolis aired – almost as if to say, “This is what you could be watching.” Thankfully, while I’d already seen Disney’s latest movie recently,... read more »
Starring Ginnifer Goodwin, Jason Bateman, Shakira, Idris Elba, J.K. Simmons, Jenny Slate, Alan Tudyk, Bonnie Hunt, Don Lake, Octavia Spencer, Tommy Chong
4.5 STARS (out of 5)
Expecting anything less than greatness from Disney is a fairly poor move – and while their flagship release of 2016 has been slightly delayed (and even renamed) in certain territories, it is refreshing to see that the umbrella continues to allow creative,... read more »
Starring Taron Egerton, Hugh Jackman, Jo Hartley, Keith Allen, Tim McInnerny, Mark Benton, Ania Sowinski, Christopher Walken
4.5 STARS (out of 5)
It’s great to be surprised, sometimes – particularly when it comes to TV and movies – and while Eddie The Eagle seemed reasonably promising in the multitude of trailer runs that came out for the movie earlier this year, 2016 has seen a number of... read more »
Starring Jack Black, J.K. Simmons, Dustin Hoffman, Bryan Cranston, Angelina Jolie, Lucy Liu, Seth Rogen, David Cross, Jackie Chan
4 STARS (out of 5)
The Kung Fu Panda series is one that has been met with both critical acclaim and box office success alike – a rare balance for an animated movie in its period that hadn’t been borne out of Disney or Pixar – and rightly so. The series so far has... read more »
There is a trend in certain movies being released early on in a year that many movie fans and critics alike have picked up on in the past – it’s that horror movies released in the early quarter will not likely be very watchable. The Forest, which came... read more »
Starring Josh Brolin, George Clooney, Scarlett Johansson, Alden Ehrenreich, Ralph Fiennes, Frances McDormand, Tilda Swinton, Jonah Hill
3.5 STARS (out of 5)
2016, so far, has been a mixed bag in terms of new movies – and, thankfully, the Coen Brothers have returned to theaters to make things a little more interesting. However, because it’s a Coens movie, many film buffs will already assume that this... read more »
Starring Gerard Butler, Aaron Eckhart, Morgan Freeman, Charlotte Riley, Melissa Leo, Jackie Earle Haley, Angela Bassett, Colin Salmon
1.5 STARS (out of 5)
It’s hard to review and rate a movie that entertains in such a way that it detracts from what it initially set out to do – and in the case of London Has Fallen, I believe I may well have seen one of the funniest movies of the year – and it’s a... read more »
Starring Casey Affleck, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Anthony Mackie, Kate Winslet, Aaron Paul, Norman Reedus, Gal Gadot, Clifton Collins Jr., Woody Harrelson
2 STARS (out of 5)
The key to a good thriller is keeping a fine balance between pacing, exposition, character development and plot twists. Having recently reviewed The Finest Hours, I was excited to watch Triple 9 as it seemed to promise what the former didn’t –... read more »
Starring Chris Pine, Ben Foster, Casey Affleck, Eric Bana, Holliday Grainger, Rachel Brosnahan, Kyle Gallner, Graham McTavish
2 STARS (out of 5)
Some true stories adapted for TV or film can be hard to watch – and easy to sympathize with – and, in a lot of ways, The Finest Hours satisfies the necessary criteria for a real-life story of heroism and bravery to be fictionalized. The story of young... read more »
Starring Jack Black, Dylan Minnette, Odeya Rush, Ryan Lee, Amy Ryan, Jillian Bell
3.5 STARS (out of 5)
In the 1990s, Goosebumps was an essential children’s franchise. R.L. Stine’s kid-friendly horror stories inspired a generation of schoolchildren to pick up and read book after terrifying book, often marked by bizarre twists, modern takes on classic... read more »
Starring Lily James, Sam Riley, Jack Huston, Douglas Booth, Charles Dance, Lena Headey, Matt Smith, Bella Heathcote, Sally Phillips
1 STAR (out of 5)
With a title like Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, it’s actually rather easy to conjure up an image of what to expect. Back in 2009, author Seth Grahame-Smith successfully pitched a novel of that very name on title alone to a world of Jane Austen lovers that... read more »
Starring Ryan Reynolds, Morena Baccarin, T.J. Miller, Ed Skrein, Briana Hildebrand, Gina Carano
4.5 STARS (out of 5)
It’s hard to believe how far the Comic Book Movie has come – not too long ago, we were only ever able to get a glimpse of various interpretations of Batman in the 1990s, culminating in the universally reviled Batman and Robin – which, arguably,... read more »
Starring Toby Jones, Catherine Zeta Jones, Bill Nighy, Michael Gambon, Daniel Mays, Bill Patterson, Tom Courtenay, Blake Harrison, Felicity Montagu
1.5 STARS (out of 5)
TV to movie reboots are nothing new – in fact, they’re big business right now – and sometimes they work really well. Other times, they fall flat for various reasons – they either fail to capture the magic of the source material, or they simply... read more »
Starring Mark Ruffalo, Michael Keaton, Rachel McAdams, Liev Schreiber, John Slattery, Stanley Tucci
4 STARS (out of 5)
Oscar season is barely under a month to come and a number of big movies and names are lining up for the usual spoils – no less Leonardo DiCaprio, who has been unlucky to evade the honor of a ‘Best Actor’ Academy Award on a number of occasions; and... read more »
Movies : Graham's Movie Reviews
4 STARS (out of 5)
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