Seems the picture was attached to something called Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire. This collection of moving images is called a movie. Now most rooms that show these moving images don’t allow puppies, can you imagine? So when my humans realised my attraction, after many nudges, they found a place for me and my fellow doggies to enjoy these moving pictures.

Turns out it was outdoors as well. When we arrived, there were so many potential new best friends I couldn’t contain my excitement and there were good smells everywhere as well. As the images flickered all the humans were laughing and having a good time but there was a problem. Almost all of them had these hot food discs that smelled wonderful and I wasn’t allowed any of them. What gives? Don’t they make any puppy-approved ones?

All of the humans seemed to love being outdoors with their dogs and I got so many cuddles and pats, it was so much fun. So humans out there don’t forget that we, your four-legged friends love to be outdoors and see the moving images too, especially if Paul Rudd is in them.

The Dendy Powerhouse Outdoor Theatre with have a its next dog-friendly screening – Challengers – on Sunday May 19.
Nina Hudson
www.powerhouse.dendy.com.au

The much-maligned attempt at a reboot in 2016 featured an all-female cast consisting of Saturday Night Live alumni and was very unfairly treated by the press and public, it wasn’t great but was more fun than it was given credit for. A lot of that was a gender bias. Then the brains behind the series handed it off to Paul Feig for 2021’s Ghostbusters: Afterlife. It told a story outside the original but was still set in the same world. It made $204 million worldwide against a budget of $75 million.

Now, in 2024 we have Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire. This time it combines cast members from the original two films and the last one, Afterlife. The action also moves back into the big city. The pace in the first half is more leisurely and story-based while things get intense from mid-way on. Even with the crazy advancements of computer-generated imagery throughout the years, they have kept a mostly quaint and lo-fi look to the apparitions on show. Even with the much-ridiculed all-lady version still in some people’s minds, this is still a story that features very strong female characters.

It’s all good fun and is a throwback to the time when just entertaining an audience was paramount to the big studios. The dialogue is clean and the spectre of evil is very cartoon-like and not that threatening. It has a few scary moments but shouldn’t traumatise the little ones too much. Also, people who know the first Ghostbusters films (the ones from decades ago) will have a great time and revel in this latest edition.
Rob Husdon
www.facebook.com/SonyPicturesAUS/

In Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire, the Spengler family returns to where it all started – the iconic New York City firehouse – to team up with the original Ghostbusters, who’ve developed a top-secret research lab to take busting ghosts to the next level.

But when the discovery of an ancient artifact unleashes an evil force, Ghostbusters new and old must join forces to protect their home and save the world from a second Ice Age.

Starring Paul Rudd, Carrie Coon, Finn Wolfhard, Mckenna Grace, Kumail Nanjiani, Patton Oswalt, Celeste O’Connor, Logan Kim, Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, Ernie Hudson, Annie Potts, In Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire – opens March 21!
www.facebook.com/SonyPicturesAUS/

In Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire, the Spengler family returns to where it all started – the iconic New York City firehouse – to team up with the original Ghostbusters, who’ve developed a top-secret research lab to take busting ghosts to the next level.

But when the discovery of an ancient artifact unleashes an evil force, Ghostbusters new and old must join forces to protect their home and save the world from a second Ice Age.

Starring Paul Rudd, Carrie Coon, Finn Wolfhard, Mckenna Grace, Kumail Nanjiani, Patton Oswalt, Celeste O’Connor, Logan Kim, Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, Ernie Hudson, Annie Potts, In Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire – opens March 21!
www.facebook.com/SonyPicturesAUS/

In Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire, the Spengler family returns to where it all started – the iconic New York City firehouse – to team up with the original Ghostbusters, who’ve developed a top-secret research lab to take busting ghosts to the next level. But when the discovery of an ancient artifact unleashes an evil force, Ghostbusters new and old must join forces to protect their home and save the world from a second Ice Age.

Starring Paul Rudd, Carrie Coon, Finn Wolfhard, Mckenna Grace, Kumail Nanjiani, Patton Oswalt, Celeste O’Connor, Logan Kim, Dan Aykroyd, Ernie Hudson, Annie Potts
www.facebook.com/SonyPicturesAUS/

But when the discovery of an ancient artifact unleashes an evil force, Ghostbusters new and old must join forces to protect their home and save the world from a second Ice Age.

Starring Paul Rudd, Carrie Coon, Finn Wolfhard, Mckenna Grace, Kumail Nanjiani, Patton Oswalt, Celeste O’Connor, Logan Kim, Dan Aykroyd, Ernie Hudson and Annie Potts, Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire will be in cinemas March 28, 2024!
www.facebook.com/SonyPicturesAUS/

Original writer (along with Dan Aykroyd and Rick Moranis) and lead player Harold Ramis, who sadly passed away in 2014 is given a lovely presence in this new effort. The young Reitman fills the film with wonderful easter eggs of both the subtle and obvious kind for established fans and newbies alike.

Transferring the setting to small-town USA gives the new cast less competition in regards to iconic locations and places the emphasis on character development and it’s here that the film is less consistent. There seem to be cuts to move the story along that leave the occasional gap in continuity but this certainly speeds up the narrative.

Ghost-filled action scenes are peppered throughout the film and this makes for an entertaining and lively romp while still leaving room for a big finale. This is also slightly scaled back so things don’t play out in a competitive way as how can you really top a marshmallow man the size of a large building? Ghostbusters: Afterlife is a great example of how to both respect what has come before and invest in a new future.

Rob Hudson
www.facebook.com/SonyPicturesAUS/

With Double Tap, you have the same core actors, the same director and two of the same screenplay writers but it just doesn’t consistently hit its targets. Adding new cast members doesn’t really enhance things either. Except for Rosario Dawson, whose new character is well written and gets to kick serious ass.

The script also makes some strange choices in structure with two of the main cast members (Emma Stone and Abigail Breslin) leaving the action after the second reel and one not even returning until the film’s final conclusion. They have wisely let Woody Harrelson do what he does best and he enlivens most of the scenes he’s in.

The filmmakers have really tried to keep thing fresh and there are a good number of laughs along the way. It just feels like it could have worked so much better with a more well thought out script. It’s like the chemistry was slightly off and the recipe was missing those final one or two ingredients to make a really memorable meal.

Rob Hudson
www.facebook.com/SonyPicturesAUS

Pixels follows on from the likes of Wreck It Ralph and TRON, mashing up the real world with that of the video game. This time around it turns out that a videotape of classic arcade games was sent into space in the early eighties and discovered by aliens who used its contents to model weapons with which to attack us. It all makes perfect sense really. Naturally the best hope for Earth’s defence are former classic gamer champions who suitably proceed to kick all kinds of pixelated ass. Yes, it’s silly. Yes, it’s fun.

There’s enough pop culture references from the eighties to the tweenies to poke fun at both gens X and Y whilst remaining supremely entertaining for gen Z. There’s plenty of visual gags, generation specific quips and some outstanding CGI to tie it all together and only the hardest of sardonic hearts could fail to be entertained, even if it were only the slightest bit.

Adam Sandler, Kevin James, Michelle Monaghan, Peter Dinklage and Josh Gad are joined by some remarkable star power that includes Brian Cox, Sean Bean and Dan Aykroyd among a slew of other cameos wanting to get their face into a big budget movie. Most of the performers deliver their expected shtick and in a movie of this nature, there’s nothing wrong with that.

The film’s climax is a fantastic exercise in classic game character spotting, incumbent with the obligatory in-game sound signatures that accompany each of them.

Pixels is a mindless, fun blockbuster. Will history hold it in the same esteem as TRON or Wreck It Ralph? No, it’s much more disposable than that. But it delivers more than you’d expect from a film that is clearly derived from a popular trend set by better predecessors.

Stuart Jamieson
www.pixels-movie.com