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Reviews
The Hidden II (1993)
OK sequel if you are a fan of The Hidden
Despite its flaws, if you like The Hidden then you must watch The Hidden II, if you expect it to be terrible (as most of the reviews say) then you will enjoy it, not love it.
Sure the first 10 minutes I skipped, having recently watched The Hidden, its the exact same footage, not even a directors cut with some differing shots thrown in. This part is really really lazy cinematography, and I can understand some people slating the film for this. I suggest skipping forwards until you see a dog, skip back a little and forget that the first 10 minutes existed.
You're left with just over an hour of sequel, on balance I'd say watching this adds to the total story of The Hidden, and its therefore a worthwhile watch.
If you did not like the original for sure skip this film, go in with low expectation and you will like it.
Oppenheimer (2023)
Wait for it on TV - Dreary take on momentous project
The cinema was full, properly full for the first time in at least 3 years, everyone eagerly anticipating this major Hollywood take on the world shaping events of the Manhattan Project.
Within a half hour my wife was asleep, I was still hopeful that the film would step up a gear and start to build, only it never really does, it ambles along for well over an hour before we really hear anything about the project itself. Even then it remains pretty dull.
Do not pay to see this film ! Its a sad fact that, along with the bomb test itself, the other major highlights involve Florence Pugh, playing girlfriend Jean Tatlock, and her most impressive breasts.
The focus of the film is really the, largely irrelevant, aspects of Oppenheimers life before and after, his friendship with some left wing and communist party members.
The Sixth Commandment (2023)
Stuck with the first episode - wish I hadn't
My daughter told me that it had a great review from The Times, so three of us settled in to watch it. After a dismal 30 minutes we were really willing someone to die, just to create some spark in the programme.
Very cringe the way the old guy and very young guy get together, honestly I could hardly watch the "bedroom scene", if I get so desparate in my old age I hope someone does do me in quickly,
At the end of the first episode, we all looked at each other and agreed we would under no circumstances watch any further episodes.
In future I will perhaps look at Times reviews as an indication of what to avoid ... but I see IMDB rating is also super high, so conclusion is I need to find a review site that I can really trust, because this was DIRE with a very large capital D.
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 (2023)
Terrible edit and poor music spoils good film
Makes no sense for quite a while, looks like they cut some key initial scenes. If you do watch it, be prepared to be confused for the first 20 minutes, you'll get there eventually.
Characters, action and acting all fine, so it's a real shame. Perhaps a future directors cut can fix it.
One of the best features of the original was the soundtrack, worth a listen on its own, sadly they seem to have decided to go for more niche music for volume 3, they ended up just choosing bad music (notable exceptions being Since You've been gone by Rainbow and No sleep till Brooklyn by the Beasties Boys).
Worth a watch on a rainy day, not worth paying for, certainly wish I hadn't.
The Menu (2022)
Kept waiting for it to improve ...
Like Knives Out but with no plot, this film does however achieve 2 amazing feats. Firstly it manages to get a 7 out of 10 on imdb, despite being one of the worst films ever made. Secondly it kept me watching until the end, I just kept waiting for the interesting ending , then fizzled out into nothing at the last minute.
If you do make the mistake of paying for this trash, do yourself a massive favour and cut your losses after the first 30 minutes, please know that it only gets worse from there.
Fortunately I didn't pay anything to watch this utter garbage, but admittedly I did waste a chunk of my life on it.
Thor: Love and Thunder (2022)
Cringe-fest on steroids
Occasionally a film is so so bad goes beyond s*** and becomes great, this isn't the case with this film, its just plain terrible. I've loved all the films to this point, but for some unfathomable reason the director decided to try comedy, unfortunately he didn't have a clue what he was doing.
Film has NO redeeming features, really it's best you pretend it never existed, just erase it.
The Limehouse Golem (2016)
Tedious watch
Managed an hour and then gave up, slow and tedious storyline. Acting is good, but the meandering screenplay is a difficult watch, also seems like someone turned the colour saturation to near zero in an attempt to make the film look authentic.
Death to 2021 (2021)
Mostly funny...
Worth sticking with, second half more funny. The US political pieces are the most funny ... I see many pro Trump reviewers don't agree ... boy those guys have no sense of humour at all. I guess Trump supporters are an easy target, they are a GLOBAL laughing stock after all.
Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021)
Lame storyline for a well made film
The cinematography, the acting are excellent, however you cannot escape the fact that the storyline is unbelievably lame. As I write this the films rating is over 9, so maybe this is just me (and my wife).
I won't "spoil" the film (if that is possible) by revealing the "storyline" but lets just say its a film that you should wait to come on TV, unless you are a Marvel fan .... in which case you'll probably be one of the ones voting the film to 9/10 and you'll obviously love it.
McDonald & Dodds (2020)
Dreadful acting bad effects AVOID
Season 2 episode 1 - Started really badly, bad acting, terrible green screen flying effects. Thought I would give it the benefit of the doubt, but acting did not improve. One of the worst pieces of prime time drama in many years, barely good enough for mid afternoon.
Gisaengchung (2019)
Great ... until the end-game
I see people really raving over the film and the awards it won, so I was keen to see it, sounded great. And it was great until about two thirds through when the ending kicks in.
The ending was just so-so, seemed to build up to a crescendo and then the plot let the actors down.
Tenet (2020)
Confusing first time, nonsense second time ...
Made less sense after the second watching. The more you think about the details the worse it seems to get, by comparison Momento is entirely straightforward. If you think about the little details, like when he gets shot when did the bullet go in his arm, it makes zero sense.
Nothing But the Truth (2008)
Terrible ending
Just ended with a whimper, a real shame following a good film. Great acting, really poor screenplay. Apparently the real journalist had a short stay in prison and a good career after, maybe they should have stayed closer to reality with the ending.
The Invisible Man (2020)
Wait for it to appear on TV
Nice suspense, but ultimately not a brilliant film, difficult to say what is missing. A good film to watch but not worth paying to go to the cinema to see it.
Stan & Ollie (2018)
Slow and unfunny
Just watch a Laurel & Hardy film instead!
Wow, how did this get such a good rating , I gave it 30 minutes to warm up but still it plodded along with them playing small theatres in Northern England, to tiny audiences. Snippets of routines were really poor. A really poor effort
Ad Astra (2019)
Just about watchable, avoid
Acting is great, effects believable, but storyline is barely there. Feels like they were aiming for a film 1 hour longer and were told to make cuts, trouble is half the story went with it. Might be worth checking if there's a directors cut. Real shame, looks like it could have been a good film.
First Man (2018)
Slow, confused, very long
I just managed to see it to the end, the rest of the family gave up an hour in. Not only is it slow, but when something does happen you are often left wondering quite what did happen, or what the relevance was. Then there's the many frantic spinning, shaking and over cut scenes which just make you sick.
Don't pay to watch this, it's simply not that good.
A Most Wanted Man (2014)
Buy a can of paint, watch it dry
A film that slowly develops interesting characters, and then ends. It's like they made the first chapter of a book into a feature film and threw the rest of the book away. Totally without merit, avoid at all costs. Quite how it got 6.8 on IMDB, well maybe someone hacked the site, I cannot explain it.
Stuart: A Life Backwards (2007)
Redefines bad
The film starts of as a boring film about a charity worker writing a book about a homeless guy, Stuart, at one point about 10 minutes in Stuart tells him how awful such a book would be – man he got that right. The film goes on to save a little bit of cash buy substituting expensive flash-back sequences (that might require additional actors) by poor quality cartoons. The film progresses to get worse from that point.
If you really want to listen to the fairly realistic but random ramblings of a drunk homeless guy, set within a low budget film, this is the one for you. For EVERYONE else I suggest doing the world a favour by going to the supermarket/video-store and destroying all copies of this "film".
After watching half of the film I managed to convince my wife to press stop and cut our losses, so there is a chance, although unlikely, that the second half of the film is the best film in cinematic history, I'll not be renting the film again to find out.