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Tuesday, December 31, 2024

Wallace and Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl 



Wallace, after foiling a diamond robbery by a penguin disguised as a chicken, invents a smart garden Gnome which is then hacked by the penguin robber for vengeance's sake. If you've never seen a Wallace and Gromit film, you need to correct that immediately. Nick Park the creator has one of the most clever and imaginative minds in animation and the fact that these films function equally for adults and children (well more for the adults really) is remarkable and a task taken on by only the most ambitious animation makers. W&G do it time and time again with smashing success. A complete and total home run. Hysterical, clever and imaginative are the operative words here...


Saturday, December 28, 2024

LOTR: The War in Rohirrim


 


A good, but not quite great entry into the world of Middle-Earth. 200 years before Bilbo, a war breaks out in Rohan ending with another siege at Helm's Deep (two towers) The art work is great, the story is not too complicated and the voice acting is good. 6.6 is about right, but you can tick it up a notch for fans of Middle Earth, fantasy fiction or animation.

Thursday, December 26, 2024

Gladiator II


 

OMG...Based on the fantastic original with the same Ridley Scott at the helm, Pedro Pascal and Denzel Washington anchoring the cast. You would think this is a cant miss right? Wrong, an absolute shit show of cliches, copy catting and ridiculously premises like filling an the roman coliseum with water and then sharks? I mean C'mon, I guess it was built to hold water and they must have kept a bevy of great white sharks on hand right? Or is it the killer monkeys they had to fight? How bout the two little sniveling rat faced emperors of Rome? I immediately wanted every one to die....It's 2:30 long and every bit of it is painful, hackneyed and a complete waste of time....Avoid like the plague

Juror #2


 


This is just a horrid waste of a great cast With a script that will not hold up to the tiniest bit of scrutiny. It's definitely not one for the thinking man. First Off, There is not enough evidence for this to have ever gone to trial in the first place. And then Toni Collette midway through starts doing the job of what any detective who investigated this homicide would have in the first place. The courtroom shots look simply stunning but again the script fails and the trial itself is ridiculous. And then we get to know the jurors and it gets truly cringeworthy. ...A waste of time


Saturday, December 21, 2024

La Palma


 


A Norwegian family vacationing in the Canary islands faces a volcanic eruption, landslide and ensuing tsunami. The current #1 tv show on Netflix is a typical disaster film/series that really doesn't stand out much. Done in Norwegian, Its only 4 episodes of about 40 minutes, so it doesn't cost much and does provide some entertainment, but there are script issues preventing it from being really good. Throwing in the teen lesbian thing seemed tacked on and the subsequent consequences threw the whole script into tilt. To be fair, these disaster films are often like this, so if disaster thriller is in your wheelhouse this is for you. If not, you won't be missing a whole lot. 6.3 is about right

Friday, December 20, 2024

Say Nothing


 


This is a terrific series that tells the True Story of the Price sisters and their involvement in the IRA from the lates 50's until the 1990's. This will go a long way in helping you to understand how tough life was in Ireland during this period and the history of England's occupation of Northern Ireland. There isn't much wrong with this show it checks all the boxes script, acting, direction, etc, so don't hesitate. I don't know if it will get the recognition come awards season, but a BAFTA and an emmy nod would not surprise me...Highly Recommended 8.3 IMDB rating is right on the mark

Tuesday, December 17, 2024

Black Doves


 


I knew I would like this as soon as the opening scene featured A Fairy Tale in New York, the best Christmas song of all time. A spectacular British Cast and some very cheeky, bone dry dialogue are the stars here. Set during Christmas season (obvi), Knightly is a member of the Black Doves, who are a for hire intelligence agency operating in London, when she becomes embroiled in the death of a Chinese ambassador after the man she is having an affair with (Andrew Koji Warrior) is murdered. It feels as if Netflix is trying to answer Slow Horses and in doing so they have created a really good, but far from perfect series. Some of the script is questionable when put up to scrutiny and one has to wonder if any police at all exist in England or do they just allow spies to operate with impunity all over London? Nevertheless, this is completely worth the time and a solid 7.

Monday, December 16, 2024

Senna


 


There has been a rapid influx of Auto racing movies lately. Ford vs Ferrari, Rush, Ferrari, and Gran Turismo, but this still has its place and is superior to all of these with the exception of FvF. An in depth look at the life of Aryton Senna formula 1 racer from Brazil is told with love and care. The series is done in Portuguese and English, but don't let that bar you from entry. This is fantastically entertaining stuff and a must for fans of sports bio pics or auto racing. Plenty of crossover appeal as Luda, Hunt, Ferrari all have characters in the film....Take the plunge

Friday, December 13, 2024

Love, Death and Robots


 


Why I haven't seen this until now, even I don't know. I took the plunge on this because of Ken Lui who did Pantheon which i just finished and I also found out Lui is the same guy who did the English Translation for The 3-Body Problem one of my favorite Science Fictions series. This show is many things but at its heart it is an animated science fiction collection of Short stories and is an anthology. Episodes range in length from 7 minutes to over 20 in some cases. Some episodes are comedies, others horror or drama and several different animations styles are used. Taking all that into consideration means you will never be bored and an anthology means you never be lost no matter how long you take a break from it. Not every one of the 36 episodes so far is a home run, but there are enough of them to keep the episodes steamrolling. And a precious few are so well written, entertaining and, in some cases, trippy that they can't be missed. This has already won 12 Emmy's and a bunch of animation awards, so if you don't believe me, believe the committees...This is an absolute Must See.

Carry On


 


Egerton is a TSA agent working LAX during Christmas when he gets caught up in a terrorist plot. A great cast with Bateman and Theo Rossi really helps this to be enjoyable enough to watch. There are some plot holes (there always are in these types of films) but if you can ignore them, this is worth the time. You can tell they were going for a Die Hard vibe with an action thriller set during Christmas thing and there is absolutely nothing here you haven't seen before but it's not that bad, 6.7 is about right

Monday, December 9, 2024

Pantheon


 


Trippy and fantastic with a crackerjack script good enough for a live action series deals with UI uploaded intelligence and the corporations mastering the tech. You will recognize most of the voice actors and passing on this because it is animation would be a mistake. The story is incredibly original and science fiction to its core. At some point you'll start to wonder why they choose animation for a script this good and then its gets all trippy and you'll understand why. It is worth every second you will spend watching it.... This AMC+ show's S1 just hit on Netflix and much to my delight i found there is a s2, just not a NF yet. that 8.4 IMDB rating is spot on...

Saturday, December 7, 2024

The Day of the Jackal


 


This just may be the best show of the year. Based on the same titled 1973 film, Eddie Redmayne plays the Jackal, a top of the food chain contract killer, who plays a little game of cat and mouse with Lynch, the MI6 agent trying to track him down. Redmayne shines as the Jackal in a performance that is bound to show up during awards week. The opening sequence is straight out of a James Bond Film, but that's where the similarities to Bond end. Instead, we are treated to a gripping examination of a hit man trying to complete his contracts while avoided capture and hiding his profession from his wife and kids. I imagine Redmayne performance won't be the only thing nominated come awards season as this one should be up for multiple Emmy's and BAFTA's and rightly so. There is one more episode left to complete s1, but the jury is already in, and the verdict is YOU MUST WATCH this show. All the hearts....

Friday, December 6, 2024

The Madness


 


A CNN editorialist gets caught up in the murder of a white supremacist which leads down the rabbit hole of corruption and power. Not bad, but ultimately the script falls apart upon examination, still not a complete waste and what may get lost is the subtle digs on the disinformation campaign of the republicans, which completely rings true. Everything else about this is average...6.5 IMDB rating is fairly accurate.

Tuesday, December 3, 2024

Trying


 


Set in Camden Town England, a borough/suburb of London, Nikki and Jason are trying to adopt a child....That's it.... Doesn't sound all that interesting does it? Well, you'd be right in thinking so, but it's a mistake, its absolutely brilliant. It's one of those rare shows that gets better with every single episode. Asthe more we get to know the characters the more you we come to love and relate with them. There are 4 seasons thus far, through which we navigate the adoption process and then first time parenthood. Jason and Nikki are surrounded by close family and friends all with issues of their own. You will probably cry as much as you laugh at this very real, very funny series. Splendidly acted, (there are no Jennifer Aniston's or Zac Efron's here), This is just a story about real people, living real lives in the east-end of London. The show is British through and through so it will help if you can understand some of the references to British culture, but other than that, this is yet another in a long line of hits from Apple TV in conjunction with the BBC...A Must See...Yes there SHOULD be a s5.