Retro Movie Review – Run All Night
The 2008 film Taken recast Neeson as one of the big screen’s true bad asses and reenergized his career. This change was helped by the actor buffing up and having the innate physicality to play those roles with enough authenticity to be featured close up in fight and action scenes. No soft filter or distant set up shots were needed to hide the fact that almost all of the fight scene featured stunt doubles (i.e. Roger Moore in all the Bond films).
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This time out, ...
Retro Movie Review – The Accountant
Affleck plays Christian Wolff, an autistic certified public accountant that also moonlights as an assassin. Wolff’s inability to really connect with other human beings adds a chilling reality to his actions and Affleck’s stoic portrayal feels accurate. Even the love angle is suitably underplayed.
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The film’s structure mixes enough back-story to flush out Wolff’s beginnings but not so much as to rob the film of its forward momentum. It builds to a satisfying ...
Retro Movie Review – Arrival
Amy Adams is Dr. Louise Banks, a linguist expert that the government recruits to help communicate with one of the alien entities that have arrived at twelve points around the globe. She is the soul of the story. Joining her is Jeremy Renner as Ian Donnelly, a theoretical physicist with a very well developed sense of wonder about the world.
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The story is told in a non-linear manner and subsequently every scene must be paid attention too. The film is also shot with a ...
Retro Movie Review – Jasper Jones
The story is set in a small town in Western Australia and it mirrors small town life with a loving feel. The surrounds are idyllic and its inhabitants are not portrayed as yokels but as a community with compassion but one coloured by conservatism and some degree of racism. Into this mix we focus on Charlie Bucktin (Levi Miller), a soft spoken and sensitive 14 year-old boy who is about to get pulled into a world previously unknown to him.
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The cast is peppered with ...
Retro Movie Review – Split
McAvoy is in top form and uses all the means in his substantial bag of thespian tricks. He commandingly inhabits the central character of Dennis, who suffers from multiple personality disorder. It’s a twitchy and mesmerising performance that keeps the audience in an almost constant state of unease. He accomplishes this almost entirely with physical acting that uses a minimal amount of make up and costume support.
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The movie dips into the horror film approach ...
Retro Movie Review – Bridge Of Spies
Based in the murky waters of the shadowy world of espionage back in the late fifties, the film does an admirable job of keeping the audience in the know. There was such a litany of enemies (both real and perceived) of the American way of life presented back then that the story could have easily diffused into myopic rubbish. It steers mostly clear of easy slogans.
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Hanks plays super hostage negotiator James B. Donovan as he tries to trade a Russia spy to secure the ...
Retro Movie Review – Sicario
This is a modern day tale of drug running and Mexico/America border politics and it draws you in with bold strokes. It then details the character’s action in such a way as to illustrate the horrors that both the innocent and guilty have to endure during these drug wars.
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The screenplay leads you to make certain assumptions about the main protagonists actions and it’s to its satisfying complexity that right up until the end of the last reel there are still ...
Retro Movie Review – Chappie
The story revolves around a computer sciences geek Deon Wilson (played by Dev Patel, he of Slumdog Millionaire, The Newsroom and Best Exotic Marigold Hotel fame) who creates an Artificial Intelligence program to help his robots achieve a level of human consciousness. His place of employment has already used his technology to build robots that the police use to enforce the law in Johannesburg. Upper management is opposed to this, so he goes rogue to complete the task. This is when the story ...
Here is the Specialty Trailer for ANTEBELLUM – in Australian cinemas August 20!
ANTEBELLUM is a terrifying new thriller from the producer of the acclaimed films GET OUT and US, and groundbreaking directors Gerard Bush and Christopher Renz (Bush+Renz) - an exciting new voice in filmmaking.
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ANTEBELLUM is directed by Gerard Bush and Christopher Renz and stars Janelle Monaģe, Eric Lange, Jena Malone, Jack Huston, Keirsey Clemons and Gabourey Sidibe
ANTEBELLUM is in cinemas August 20, 2020.
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Retro Movie Review – The American
The story revolves around a hit man played with icy cool by George Clooney who is on the lame after the tables have been turned on him and he finds himself an intended target for termination. He hides out in a small Italian town that seems familiar to him and pretends to have a somewhat normal life.
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Unfortunately this normalcy is only applicable to someone with no discernable job but lots of money and one whose only real human contact is with a priest with a ...
