TST Film Review Thread

Are the unlimited cards worth it for the cinemas? Quite fancy one but there seems to be a no under 16's rule at most cinemas for these passes which is a shame.

Sausage party - 8/10
If it wasn't for the ending I would have rated it about 5 but it was hilarious!

Seen 51 films with mine so far, definitely worth it

The Jungle Book 2016 - I was quite apprehensive at first, this new trend by Disney of making live action versions of their animations is happening quite fast, not to mention they're taking on my all time favourite Disney film and turning it live action - The Lion King. After watching The Jungle Book my worries have been somewhat alleviated. The film is fantastic, adorable, heart breaking and all the cast are fantastic. The CGI was outstanding and they kept true to the original source material. I'm also less worried about The Lion King re-make as the director of The Jungle Book is pegged to direct The Lion King. A must see 9/10

Edge Of Seventeen 4.5/10
Watched upon Nicole's request, found it rather boring but it isn't my type of film. Still had some funny bits in and wasn't a bad film, just not my thing. The plot didn't feel great and with her spiralling out of control, I found myself not caring as I wasn't engaged in it. Half the characters were well written, the other half weren't written at all.

Moana 5/10
Big disappointment. Zootropolis was a step forward for Disney earlier this year and this undoes the progress. A musical that would have been better without it being so with its completely forgettable songs. The ocean being her friend didn't make sense as half the time it decided that the special one needed a light drowning session instead of help, also where was it at the end? It could have sorted the final boss out quickly and easily.

The Girl with all the Gifts = solid 8/10.

Definitely one of my favourite zombie films, and I'm a big fan of zombie films. Like, seriously, one of my favourite genres.

1= Shawn of the Dead
2= 28 Days Later
3= Girl with all the Gifts
4= Zombieland (love them ZomComs)
5= Train to Busan

If you've ever played The Last of Us and enjoyed it, I'd highly recommend watching it as the infection is based off of the same virus (or rather Cordyceps, a type of viral fungus). Pretty tense throughout and its quite a interesting perspective of a young girl exploring the world for the first time after being in a bunker her entire life. There's a good sequence that shows that off, although (slight spoiler) she literally eats a cat at one point... So, yeah.... That happened.

Spoilers:
The reason its not higher on my list for zombie films is that I just wasn't satisfied with the ending. Don't get me wrong its quite nice how the main character is trying to get her life back to the way it was at the beginning of the film by having a class lesson again, but it just wasn't as satisfying as it could of been. I think if they went with the way they teased in near the end with her sacrificing herself to save others that would have been better, more predictable, but better.

A Monster Calls - 4/5
An incredibly heavy but very well told story. A cross between a kids and an adults film. Unlucky not to be up for Oscars.

La La Land - 4/5
I generally despise musicals but La La Land was different. The soundtrack is world-class, the cinematography, performances and overall production flawless, only the actual story lacks slightly.

Split - 3/5
James McAvoy is so so good in it, he carries this film as some of the other performances are weak. Thought provoking but gets a bit silly at the end.

Rogue One - 3.5/5
Saw it a second time a couple of weeks ago. Initially a 4/5 but on second viewing I didn't enjoy it as much, still good though. Yet to see a bad Mads Mikkelsen performance.

Inferno - 2/5
A bit of mess really. Tom Hanks and Felicity Jones are typically good but the plot is a mess and a bit silly really.

Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them - 3.5/5
Seen this twice. First time I wasn't overly keen but enjoyed it a lot more the second time. Eddie Redmayne nails it. Katherine Waterson is a bit irritating.

Arrival - 4/5
I love a good sci-fi and really enjoyed Arrival. One of the better films of 2016.

Moonlight - 7/10 - Watched this a couple of weeks ago. Not sure what to make of it exactly, but it did keep me interested and I quite enjoyed it. Worth a watch.

Hacksaw Ridge - 8.5/10 - Saw this last week. Proper film this one. Was looking forward to it for a while, and it didn't let me down. Some really good action shots of battle (not for the squeamish really), and a good story. It's not quite up there with Saving Private Ryan and a couple of others, and it went on a bit much with the heroism towards the end, but a good solid film that I would recommend to people.

Hell or High Water 7.5/10 - Good honest entertaining film. It won't go down in history as one of the most amazing films ever, but it's a good way to pass a couple of hours of your time. Again, definitely worth a watch.

Hoping to watch Lion, Fences and Manchester By The Sea at some point in the near future as they're supposed to be decent. Not really interested in LaLaLand as I'm not really into all of that singy dancy stuff. Probably a really good film if you are into musicals and stuff though.

T2 Trainspotting: A good film, very good acting and a fairly decent story. Plenty of callbacks to the original (which I saw yesterday for the first time) and a touching tribute to a dead guy from FIV/AIDS XD 7.5/10

Watched Lion last night. Cracking film. Held my interest all of the way through. Almost got a bit teary at times. Definitely recommend it!

8.5/10

Sorry to double post. I blame other people for not giving film reviews for 25 days!

Anyhow, I watched a wonderful film last night. Better still, you can get it on BBC I-Player at the moment as it was on Storyville a week or so back.

It's called 'Notes on Blindness' and is a true story about an academic who becomes blind. It's made up from audio tapes that he recorded in the period featuring his whole family which gives a great insight into the condition, and is, well, one of the best things I've seen for a while. Something really worth watching. Really well done. Give it a go, honestly. Link here:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b08f1bw3/storyville-notes-on-blindness

What We Do In The Shadows
@Bench.addict introduced me to this gem last Monday. It's a fake documentry following a group of vampires living in Wellington, New Zeland, from the people behind Flight of the Concords. Let me put it this way:

Vamp 1: Why do we prefer virgin blood? I don't know. I guess it sounds cooler.
Vamp 2: Let me put it this way... If you were going to eat a sandwitch... you would just prefer it if nobody had fūčked it".

Troll 2:





......





... I...

... I jus...

I don't even....

....l mean for the love of...


.....


....



...

Four Lions. 7/10.

Rubber Dingy Rapids bro, a weird film, who'd thought they could make suicide bombings funny without mocking the entire religion? Still I rather enjoyed it.

Pirates of the Caribbean: The curse of the Black Pearl 9/10

This is the tale of Captain Jack Sparrow... An enjoyable film, enjoyed the swashbuckling nature of it.

Thor. 7/10

Not my favourite, but still a good movie, with a plot that kept moving nicely.

Johnny English Reborn 8/10

Rowan Atkinson does another brilliant job with this film, plenty of laughs, and a great spoof of action films.

Hot Fuzz 10/10

The best of the cornetto trilogy, Simon Pegg and Nick Frost nail this and the pace of the movie is fantastic with the important plot events coming thick and fast, It's always a great film to watch, and deserves to be given 10/10.

Resident Evil: The Final Chapter:

So I've said before that zombies is one of my favourite genres of films, and as Resident Evil falls into that genre (very loosely) I thought I would give it a watch...

Ho...ly... shit was this film absolutely abysmal... I'm not just talking as a zombie film. This film is just an awful film full stop.

Here's the list of a few things that are wrong with it:

1- The script... Did they even spend an hour going planning it out? Did they just have a monkey sat in a room with boxing gloves taped to its hands and then put a typewriter in front of it? I've heard better conversation coming from a 2 year old that can barely string a sentence together. You can predict pretty much every line of the movie before its even said.

2- Story...
'Oh we've finished with this scene now, how can we get from here to the next scene?'

'I know, why don't we just have Alice get knocked unconscious and then wake up somewhere else.'

I genuinely believe that was the conversation that took place while writing the film because I think it happens about four or five times throughout the film. Not only that (Spoiler, not that you probably care) you can guess the traitor as soon as its mentioned there's a informant, its so fucking obvious.

3- Action... Half the time you can't even tell what the fuck is going on because there's so many jump cuts happening you can't keep up with who's punch/shooting who. Think this scene from Taken 4 on steroids. I think this entire film was produced by a group of Monkeys...

4- The ending... Single worst ending to any film I have every seen. It plays off that whole 'you have become the person you always meant to be, nobody knew how powerful you would ever become' bullshit.

I think throughout the hour and a half I said what the actual fuck is this film about six times... That's once every 15 minutes.

Before, if you asked me what the worst film I'd ever seen was I wouldn't really know, Avatar (both Avatars would be up there) but now, without a shadow of a doubt, Resident Evil: The Final Chapter is THE single worst film I have ever watched.

Long post but I just needed to get that out there...

Beauty and the Beast
I hadn’t actually seen this film until a week ago on the train down to London, and it was worth waiting for. Especially with the new one out now – I wanted to see the original first. It was truly charming, and the songs were wonderful, though I did know most of the songs anyway. I’m not sure if I quite understood some bits, but I’ll very happily watch it again. 8/10

The Wicker Man (1973)
Following a discussion with Diogo and Hils about the potential name of SW8 being ‘The Wicker Man’, and how inappropriate it is for a ride in a family theme park, I said I’d never seen the film before. It subsequently went on. Ended up watching the director’s cut, too, with some extra 15 minutes of footage. I’m not gonna lie, it’s a bizarre film, what with the focus on paganism, and for those who haven’t watched it before, the twist at the end is a shocker. One thing I will say about it, though, is that Christopher Lee is excellent as Lord Summerisle – he even said that he felt The Wicker Man was his best film. As the credits rolled, I then realised just how bad an idea it would be for Towers to go for a ride themed around something like this! Still, it’s a great film. A subtle horror, I felt, with that twist at the end, and I think it’s one that needs to be watched more than once to get a better understanding of it. Not in a bad way, mind! I almost want to watch the 2006 version with Nicholas Cage now. Just to see how truly awful it is. 8/10

Team America: World Police
This is frankly one of the most bizarre films I’ve seen. It’s so blatantly obvious that it was created by Trey Parker and Matt Stone of South Park fame. So many parodies…As soon as ‘Everyone Has AIDS’ started, I was laughing away! Another really good film. 8/10

South Park: Bigger, Longer and Uncut
Seriously, what needs to be said about this film? The best way to watch it is by having a swear-along. Again, it’s a parody of a few musicals, though it does raise some serious issues about freedom of speech and censorship, which is typical of South Park. 8.5/10

Troll 2
I…Just…What? The concept of the film isn’t too bad, but the execution is just completely and utterly diabolical. The dialogue is wooden and stilted, and the acting is pretty horrific. The best actor in the entire film was the little boy. There’s honestly no wonder why this film is considered to be one of the worst films ever made. I want to call it ‘so bad it’s good’, but I just can’t. It’s more ‘so bad it’s hilariously bad’. 2/10. And that’s me being generous! By far the worst film I've ever seen.

Braindead
I’ve never really been one for zombie films – mainly because my parents just wouldn’t have let me anywhere near them as I was growing up. It was made by Peter Jackson back in 1992, and admittedly bombed at the box office, but then came to prominence again following the success of the Lord of the Rings trilogy. All I’m going to say is the following: rat-monkey bite; zombies; tranquilisers; housewarming party; lawnmower. When it got to the gory bits, I mainly laughed (especially with the bit when the baby fell into the blender, which perhaps gives an insight into my mind ), but I’ll admit I did get a little bit squeamish at times. And at least the film did kinda have a happy ending with Lionel and Paquita walking off together! 7/10

You're welcome....

Beauty and the Beast (2017) - 9/10
Great film with great songs! Little slow in the middle but really picked up at the end!

I thought beauty and the beast was a solid 9/10. I worked in the cinema industry for 7 years and saw a huge variety of films and since I left i still manage to see the odd (star wars) film.

When i went to see it i was worried that it wouldn't do the cartoon justice but it 100% did. There were a few bits which weren't needed but in all I think it was a beautiful film

Hidden Figures - 4/5
Finally saw it last week. A proper film. An inspiring story, and unbelievable at the same time. Flawless performances.

Beauty and the Beast - 2/5
I'm still waiting for one of these live action remakes to bring something new to the table. I felt that visually it was good but not great. They did at least do a great job with the classic songs like 'Be Our Guest' and 'Beauty and the Beast'. Emma Thompson, Ewan McGregor and Sir Ian were typically great, though the latter underused. However, the opening scene was an embarrassment and the film lacked any sort of charm. Emma Watson's performance was terrible. In what's become the most expensive musical ever, I am so disappointed. The more I think about this film the more I find flaws in it. It was so hard for Disney to fail with this one, but they did.