This Week at Home

The Nun 2 is a weak follow up to a weak film. Has a couple of somewhat interesting visual flourishes so is slightly better than it's predecessor but that is a subterranean bar to clear. Plot is pointless and exists only to fill time between the scares, which would be fine if said scares weren't so lame. The Conjuring franchise is seriously patchy but as long as even the rubbish entries keep bringing home the bacon we're gonna keep getting them.

The Players is a new Netflix rom-com, although it's light on both romance and comedy. Centres on a group of friends whose lives seemingly revolve around helping each other con people into sleeping with them. The lead character being female and one of the crew being bisexual doesn't cover the whiff of early 2000's, although it has neither the raunch or the banter of comedies of that era. What it does have is people in their late thirties talking like frat bros and being so unlikable you'll be annoyed they get the traditional rom-com happy ending.

Its third film lucky with the excellent The Outfit, an under appreciated 2022 period gangster thriller now on Netflix. The entire film is set inside a cutter (don't call him a tailor) shop as the owner has to use his whits to stay one step ahead of the mob goons who commandeer his place of business. Slow but tense with well placed twists the film is elevated by an outstanding performance from star Mark Rylance (is he ever anything else?). Maybe a reveal too many come the end but a great little film that deserves more attention.

Mission Impossible 2 is regarded as the black sheep of the franchise but I've always loved it. I mean its a John Woo film starring Tom Cruise, what's not great about that? Sure, going from the shadowy subterfuge of the first film to the bombastic, sun dappled explosions here is a bit jarring but being a product of their directors is what makes the MI films interesting and the combo of whooshing cameras, slow mo, doves and The Cruiser bicycle kicking people rocks. Add in the soundtrack and you have quintessential late 90's/ early 2000's.

Film of the week : The subtler The Outfit just beats out the loud Mission Impossible 2, mainly by virtue of being a first watch. The other two can get in the bin.

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Whisky in the Jar

Glenrothan has been sold as "a love letter to Scotland" and given that it features two of Scotland's most accomplished actors, whisky, folk music and stunning landscape shots, it's hard to argue. Is it anything more than that? Not really, but maybe that's OK. Alan Cumming and Brian Cox (who also directs) are Donal and Sandy Nairn, estranged brothers and heirs to a beloved whisky distillery. Growing up, big brother Sandy was desperate to leave their idyllic village and its distillery behind, while Donal wanted to be nowhere else. Family issues resulted in them both leading the life that the other used to dream of, as Donal left for America and Sandy took over the family business when their father's health began to fail. When his blues bar burns down, Donal makes his first trip back to Scotland in forty years, accompanying his daughter and granddaughter to visit his ailing brother. A quick look at the trailer tells you everything you need to know about Glenroth...

Listening to the Sounds in Silence

The tagline for breakout indie horror hit Undertone is, "The Scariest Movie You'll Ever Hear". This declaration sets out the film's stall as a uniquely audio based horror, and that is exactly what it delivers. The result is something that will chill some people to the bone and leave others falling asleep in their seats. Originally made for a meagre $500,000, the film takes place entirely in one location (director Ian Tuason's childhood home) and centres on podcaster Ivy, played with impressive range by Nina Kiri. Ivy is caring for her dying mother (the only other person who appears onscreen) so has to wait until the early hours of the morning to record her paranormal podcast with friend Justin (the voice of Adam DiMarco). She plays the role of sceptic to Justin's believer but her rationality is tested when her cohost begins playing some eerie audio files he received from an anonymous listener. Although Undertone isn't a found footage film, it very much t...

Husband and Strife

If the purpose of cinema is to make the audience feel something, then few films succeed as completely as The Drama. The fact that said feeling is one of wanting to curl up and die of awkwardness shouldn't even be taken as a warning. Like a masochist munching down on a giant bowl of ghost peppers, you will likely find every bite delicious. Robert Pattinson and Zendaya play soon to be married couple Charlie and Emma. They have the picture perfect relationship. They have successful jobs, a beautiful Boston apartment and look like Zendaya and Robert Pattinson. Little differences in their attitudes toward a wedding dance rehearsal and their potentially drug smoking DJ hint they may not be completely on the same page, and when a drunken game leads to Emma disclosing something from her past, their relationship experiences some severe turbulence. It's tricky to fully discuss The Drama without spoiling Emma's revelation (and it absolutely should not be spoiled), but it points to ...

Fight For Your Right

The debate about the "Great American Novel" (a book that encapsulates the spirit and character of the United States) continues to rage. While One Battle After Another is loosely inspired by a book (Thomas Pynchon's Vineland), it feels like Paul Thomas Anderson's second stab, after "There Will Be Blood", at crafting the Great American Movie. This is a very different beast to his 2007 masterpiece, both in setting and tone, but is just as epic and wide reaching in its own way. Perfidia Beverly Hills (Teyana Taylor) is the leader of militant revolutionary group "The French 75" and her partner Pat Calhoun (Leonardo DiCaprio) is the team explosive expert. The movie opens with the self-styled freedom fighters breaking a bunch of detained immigrants out of a holding camp. This brings them into the crosshairs of Colonel Stephen J. Lockjaw who begins pursuing the group. After being arrested, Perfidia disappears, leaving Pat to raise their baby daughter in hi...

Ghostbusted

Ghostbusters : Frozen Empire continues the trend of diminishing returns from Ghostbusters as a franchise. Worse, it's the first time a 'Busters film has fallen into outright bad territory. After the classic 1984 original 1989's sequel was considered a disappointment (although it raked it in at the box office) but still had the charisma of its predecessors iconic cast. The female led reboot in 2016 was fun action comedy but didn't stand up the legendary original. In 2021 they started again with Afterlife, pitching Ghostbusters as Stranger Things in order to move things to a small town and test the water without having to bust the bank. Frozen Empire is a direct sequel to that film (and by extension the first two) but feels like little more than a corporate exercise in mud flinging to see what sticks. We start off with a ghost chase through New York, where Callie Spengler (Carrie Coon), her kids Trevor (Finn Wolfhard) and Phoebe (Mckenna Grace) and Gary Grooberson (Pa...

Fifty Shades of Chrononberg

If you've been missing pure David Chrononberg then Crimes of the Future has you covered. It has the lot; body mutilation, main character undergoing a metamorphosis, questions about what defines being human, integrity of the mind, the collision of different world views and pretty much every other recurring theme of his is present and correct. So needless to say, it isn't for everyone. The film takes place in the (possibly near) future, when most humans have evolved to no longer feel pain and in some cases grow mysterious new organs. Viggo Maortensen and Lea Seydoux play a pair of performance artists whose act revolves around removing Mortensen's excess organs in front of a live crowd. Fittingly, given its focus on artits, the film takes place in the orbit of the protagonists with little shown of the world at large. Everything is dingy and grimey, hinting things aren't going swimmingly, and there are vaugue hints at ecological disaster but the characters are all far mor...

Smile for the Cameras

The October horror train continues with Smile 2 , follow up to 2022 breakout hit Smile. Director and writer Parker J. Finn returns with a much more textured character story that is let down by retreading the same beats and half frights as its predecessor. After a brief segment involving Joel from the first movie we focus on pop star Sky Riley (Naomi Scott) as she attempts to mount a comeback a year on from a drug induced car crash that claimed the life of her boyfriend and left her needing extensive surgery. Unable to get strong painkillers due to her addiction problems she visits an old drug dealer friend to procure some Vicodin but when he smashes his own face in with a plate weight she inherits "The Smile" curse. She begins to experience bizarre goings on and people creepily grinning at her as she enters a race against time to discover what's going on and find a way to rid herself of the demon. By far the strongest element of Smile 2 is the character of Sky and the...

It Sure Does

Love Hurts is Ke Huy Quan's first ever lead role. After decades out the game and struggling to keep his insurance prior to his Oscar winning turn in "Everything Everywhere, All At Once", you can hardly blame him for taking the chance to front a movie. Unfortunately, in Jonathan Eusabio's directorial debut, he has landed in a misfire. Quan plays Marvin Gable, a cheery real estate agent living his best life as he crushes the sales game and keeps everyone in the office (except for his depressed assistant) happy with his home baking. Unbeknownst to his colleagues he used to be a gangland hitman for his mob boss brother "Knuckles" and when the mysterious Rose, who Marvin was supposed to have killed, remerges, big brother dispatches the goons to get some answers from him. Cue high jinks as Marvin battles henchmen kung fu style while trying to keep his current and past lives from colliding. It's a fun idea but nothing quite comes together in the execution. Th...

Killing in the Name of

Mortal Kombat II is, unsurprisingly, a sequel to 2021's Mortal Kombat and the latest attempt to adapt the long running fighting game franchise for the big screen. There has been a bit of a shift in Hollywood over the five years since the last instalment and this film has a very different attitude. Gone is the attempt to "serious-up" the material as MKII fully embraces its dumb its video game roots. It still isn't exactly good, but at least this time round it's bad in an enjoyable way. For those unfamiliar with the games, they are based around a fighting tournament that decides if an evil empire from another dimension, or "realm", gets to take over Earth. Think "Enter the Dragon" with superpowers and a hefty dose of inspiration from "Big Trouble in Little China". In terms of this movie, eight people from Earth take turns fighting eight people from "Outworld". Sounds simple enough but the script makes no attempt to create a...

Infinity Cruel

Infinity Pool is first and foremost a critique of the kind of people who go to gated luxury resorts, the ones that have armed guards to keep away the impoverished locals. Therefore everyone here is disgusting. Uber handsome Alexander Skarsgard is a loser writer who spends most of the film sweating and dishevelled, Mia Goth goes from alluring to screeching alcaholic state, Thomas Kretchmann's local detective hates the entitled holiday makers but is happy to enable their explotation of his countrymen for financial gain. Pretty much everyone is morally bankrupt. This does create the slight problem of having nobody to get behind but that isn't really the point and this isn't the place you would find heroes. The plot revolves around an outrageous piece of (maybe) technology unique to the unamed country the film is set in. How a seemingly underdeveloped land came to posses such a thing is never really explored and neither are the ramifications of its existence beyond how they pe...

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