3DD!3

The massacre in Gallipoli with excellent direction by Peter Weir is a perfect example of how old Britain despised its colonies. A classic story through and through about friendship, just enhanced by the environment where it takes place. Sand everywhere, whether in Australia or Africa, gets under your skin. Young Gibson is excellent, as is his mate Mark Lee. The First World War isn’t the subject of many films, especially not the Australians’ part in it, so just for information it’s a must watch.

A pure-blooded genre piece, for the current times untraditionally languid. The casting is great and Darabont’s steady hand can be felt. Let’s see what else the cards reveal... So in the end they maintained the quality, even though nothing had me absolutely gobsmacked. Jon Bernthal is flawless, and the entire acting ensemble was perfectly cast. Knepper is on better form than he has been in a long time, Burns too. In story terms, rather flat, faithful to the old genre with an emphasis on detail (the nail in the window), that only becomes surprising if the viewer accepts the genre game and absolute trueness to a time when you could lie and killing was much easier to keep secret. I wouldn’t mind at all if they served us up another six-episode portion.

So far an excellent series. Interesting environment and time and the casting is first-rate. Cillian Murphy proudly walks the line of the anti-hero and Sam Neill commands respect. I can’t wait for their confrontation... Best series of the year by far. Cillian Murphy is a perfect (positive) swine and he gives the character of Tommy Shelby the right, iconic contours. In terms of story, no complaints, everything is running smoothly, sometimes along familiar, sometimes along altered rails. The charged ending could be a great conclusion or cliffhanger. We’ll see what side the producer’s coin lands on. Season two: The scenes with Tom Hardy are worth playing again and again. His Alfie gives the Blinders a stamp of uniqueness. A great continuation of the already excellent first season which again goes a little further. The whole show has incredible style enhanced by a top-rate soundtrack. I would go as far as to say that you won’t find a better British serial on the box right now. Season three: An incredibly hyped ride, spiced with Russians, a seductive but depraved princess (almost Joker caliber) and great music again. The precisely chosen cast runs at one hundred percent. Amazingly written. Tommy taken down a few pegs. A surprising ending. Season four: Flirting with The Godfather... Italo-Americans arrive to perform their vendetta and Tommy at last has his hands full. Certainly one of the best series, also thanks to the fantastic build-up of tension in the finale. Tom Hardy is awesome. Alfie is certainly the best and least predictable character of the entire series. It really makes you think about blindness. Season five: Steven Knight trumps himself again and again with each new season. This time round, Peaky Blinders flirts with Nazism. The political flavor of this season thickens the atmosphere adding to the brew erratic elements such as the “strong young generation" = junky clever-clogs Michael and junkie idiot Finn. First-rate acting and at the end we are treated to one cameo that I hadn’t imagined in my wildest dreams. The zenith of British drama series. Why not?

I think that people today won’t get this movie. It’s intended to be deep, but it’s terribly superficial. Which results in tense friction between both surfaces. The Counselor demonstrates just how Hollywood Scott’s style is. McCarthy wrote an incredible screenplay that breaks all the rules, unfortunately he didn’t make sure that the director applied the necessary parable to the movie. For something like that, I think someone else would be more suitable, Nicolas Winding Refn seems to me to the best choice. Personally, I like Scott’s style, so I was able to get over this point. The cast that he put together is admirable, but it maybe goes against the type proportions of the actors themselves. Fassbender is unusually nice, the evil that they talk about consists of just greed and snobbery. Pitt is fine, although a bit forced in places. Reiner is completely wrong for Bardem, he doesn’t play the role badly, but he’s simply the wrong type. Penny Cruz should be younger and more crazily in love, but she doesn’t make much of an appearance. And then there’s Cameron Diaz as Malkina. A monstrous, calculating bitch and probably the second most important character. McCarthy has probably never written a stronger female part. And Diaz took it on with flying colors. She’s good at swines, but Angelina would have suited better. And now we come to the biggest problem, which is the age rating. The Counselor hovers cleverly along the edge of the 15 rating, but this makes all the murder and sexual tension too sterile. The scene with the Ferrari is special and well delivered, but it doesn’t have the necessary shock effect that the characters talk about. Any torture in this movie is just talked about. It could be due to the artistic intention, but this takes away the credibility, the chilling edge of the picture. What’s the point of polished dialogs about death and doom if we see almost none of it? The Counselor isn’t a bad movie, it’s just too strange to like.

Today Paul Walker zoomed off into eternity in his red Porsche and the news has hit me harder than I would have expected. A real nice guy who was also capable of swearing and smashing anybody’s face in. I’m going to miss him, particularly in F&F. I was originally planning on watching the Pawn Shop Chronicles today, but because he plays a quirky junkie in it, it wouldn’t really be the right choice. Here he plays a new dad whose wife died during childbirth. The baby is put into an incubator and the hospital is hit by Hurricane Katrina. The generator breaks down and the battery is junk that requires charging every three minutes. Just one of those days. Three minutes to get rescued, three minutes to get some sleep, to find food... and time is running out. An unobtrusive movie with an excellent idea that could definitely have been a little better. It’s an enjoyable to watch, hopes, fear and even jokes. Never a dull moment. The ending could have been driven to greater extremes, but good. So long, Paul, I’m sure we’ll see each other again a few more times. You aren’t playing fair, Mr. Ventilator.

Today the concept of flying off somewhere the space seems a bit silly. But the Alien’s secret which unravels at the end of the movie left me completely gob-smacked. That takes the movie onto a completely other level. Thanks to Goldsmith’s music, even the long, sweeping shots of the spaceship are bearable.

Maybe it’s because meanwhile I’ve read the comic book original, but the sequel is much weaker than part one. For one thing, Jeff Wadlow comes nowhere near Vaughn. His directing is erratic and lacks invention. The story diverges from the comic book in the most interesting passages, while it sticks quite faithfully to the less interesting parts. Chloë Moretz is fine, unfortunately she’s grown a little too old and I simply can’t see the well-behaved, sweet little girl in her anymore. Most of the time the poor girl is hanging around in High School Musical mode and not only is it boring, it doesn’t lead anywhere. Christopher Mintz-Plasse is annoying, completely inappropriate as a bad guy and even Iain Glen who appeared on screen only for about a minute easily outplayed him. And the best characters - Carrey and Leguizamo are given too little space. The action is decent, but in places more distasteful than plain bloody entertainment. The cuts between dramatic and entertaining scenes are about as smooth as a slap in the face. Why am I even giving it 3 stars?

It’s fine to see Hanks acting again, even though in the second half he is more like an extra. Although this nerve-racking voyage loses tension a little in the slower, middle section, this is a minor flaw on an otherwise thrilling depiction of past events. This time Greengrass makes excellent use of the camera - shaky Somali vs. calm Yankee-Irish style. Wonderfully heated confrontations, the Somalis are great to a man and the movie is just dripping with authenticity. The finale where the US Navy arrive is a heavy-caliber military display (even my better half acknowledged the majestic beauty of the warships). Greengrass has certainly made more charged and even better movies, but it didn’t receive that stamp of humanity until Hanks got involved. If it weren’t for United 93, I would give it full marks.

Machete is back and making fun of old Bond movies. The motivation of the main protagonist is basically the same as in the first movie, the same goes for the locations. Even Danny Trejo is the same. Rodriguez follows loosely on the first movie and prepares the ground for the grand finale that we see at the end. The array of stars is colorful, but the one that stands out the most is the schizo dictator Demián Bichir who is responsible for most of the twists in the movie. Mel Gibson rather strangely underplays his role of the megalomaniac bad guy and Carlos Estevez as President Rathcock goes down in history as one of the most capable presidents of the silver screen. The action keeps on coming, even though in places it’s a bit repetitive, but mainly it has the unmistakable atmosphere of total mayhem. Bring on the part three!

Pilot: I mainly have positive feelings about this. A dream come true for Asimov robot book fans. AH bases it on “The Caves of Steel", regurgitating it in his own way. Then he adds a bit of Blade Runner, then some Judge Dredd, then a bit of Smith’s I, Robot and we have a lovely cocktail for TV to thrill the sci-fi lover’s heart. With any luck it will maintain the quality of the first episode and not be afraid to go further than the competition. This team certainly has it in it.