Dan Says its Alright

  The Blackening begins like a cross between Scream and Saw, with a couple getting offed after being made to "play a game". Said game being an offensively racist board game that gives the movie it's title.  After this set up we are introduced to the various characters of the film who are getting together to mark the anniversary of finishing college. The relationships between the group are more complicated than you usually encounter in a slasher film and their dynamics helps flesh out the story.  Said story consists of the group playing the game and fighting off slashers. This, it turns out, is a lot easier when you make logical decisions rather than indulge in the clueless floundering you usually see in movies with this set up. The protagonists actually being pro active is one of the many meta black culture jokes running through the film. Other examples include the group being asked to name a horror film where the black character survives and told to decide which of them ...

  Strays sees Will Farell voicing nieve pooch Reggie who is abandoned in the big city . He teams up with  live wire terrier Bug (Jamie Foxx), failed police dog Hunter (Randall Park) and stylish Australian Shepard Maggie (Isla Fisher) in a bid to get back home and chomp his waste of space former owner in the nether regions. In case the plot doesn't make it clear, this comedy keeps it's paws firmly in the gutter. Toilet humour, penis gags and dogs humping things are the order of the day, and to be fair, it is pretty funny. Most of the time. The reason so much of the humour lands is the great voice cast. Will Ferrel brings a dignity to naivety that perfectly fits a trusting terrier and Jamie Foxx does aggressive little guy talking trash as well as anyone. Those two are the stars of the show so Park and Fisher have less to work with but round out the group nicely. It's also worth mentioning how good the talking dogs look, they somehow manage to make the dogs look completely rea...

  It's tough times at the box office these days but if there's one film this year that doesn't need to worry about ticket sales surely it's Gran Turismo. In addition to being a feature long advert for the game it's named after there is so much product placement packed into the production that it must have been in the black before a single person saw the finished movie. Even after paying Orlando Bloom for the world's most expensive Ross Kemp impression. Bizarrely, due to the racing setting and overall kitsch factor, the excessive marketing doesn't derail the film.  The basis of Gran Turismo is that back in 2008 Sony and Nissan got together to offer players of the Gran Turismo videogame the opportunity to train as real life racing drivers. This is based, albeit with a massive slice of creative licence, on one of the successful contestants.  What follows is the most by the numbers sport story you could imagine. Plucky kid with big dreams tested in all the ways ...