Tag Archives: American Cinema

Disney’s Snow White (2025) – Movie Review

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TL;DR – While it is not the disaster that everyone fears, you can still see the narrative decisions that held it back from being quite remarkable.

Rating: 3.5 out of 5.

Post-Credit Scene – There is no post-credit scene.

Disclosure – I paid to watch this film

Snow White.

Snow White Review –

Now, I have not been the biggest fan of the current batch of Disney films that turn their classic animated works into live-action works, or if you are The Lion King ‘live-action’. They tend to struggle because they have a hard time finding a new voice when they are anchored to the past. Well, today, we go all the way back to the first-ever animated feature to see if it follows a similar fate.

So, to set the scene, in a kingdom of complete happiness, singing, and lots of apple pie, one snowy day, a princess was born. She was a delight for the whole kingdom and the King’s (Hadley Fraser) and Queen’s (Lorena Andrea) pride and joy. But when the queen unfortunately dies, and the king remarries a sorcerous, the Evil Queen (Gal Gadot), things start to change. Even more so when the King is sent away to the southern kingdom and never returns. Now Snow White (Rachel Zegler) is a servant, and the kingdom has fallen into darkness. Until one day the Evil Queen visits her Magic Mirror (Patrick Page) and discovers that she might not be the fairest one of all.

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Locked – Movie Review

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TL;DR – It was a good scenario, but it never felt like they had a good handle on what they wanted to talk about.

Rating: 2.5 out of 5.

Post-Credit Scene – There is no post-credit scene.

Disclosure – I paid to watch this film

A phone call appears on a car tablet.

Locked Review –

Most films need a hook to get you into the cinemas and part with your hard-earned cash. For me, sometimes that hook is a premise so interesting that you must see how they play it out. Well, Anthony Hopkins traumatising a Skarsgård locked in his car is absolutely one I had to see.  

So, to set the scene, Eddie (Bill Skarsgård) is a crook who is trying to turn his life around for his daughter Sarah (Ashley Cartwright). But the universe is not making it easy for him, and as a deadline looms, he looks to more nefarious ways to make a quick buck. Well, if someone leaves their car unlocked, well they are asking someone to come in and rummage around, and so Eddie does. The only problem is that when he tries to get out, he finds that the car is locked, his mobile can’t get a signal, and suddenly the in-car phone is ringing.

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The Alto Knights – Movie Review

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TL;DR – An interesting experiment that looks back on America’s past, anchored by Robert De Niro’s dual performances. Compelling right up to the point it starts meandering everywhere.    

Rating: 3 out of 5.

Post-Credit Scene – There is no post-credit scene.

Disclosure – I was invited to a press screening of this film.

Robert De Niro playing two different mobsters.

The Alto Knights Review –

When it comes to mobster films set in and around New York, there are few names as crucial as Robert De Niro. So, when you hear that he is taking not just one lead in a new mob film but pulling double duty as both of the main antagonists, based on a real event, well, that is a scenario that calls for attention.   

So, to set the scene, it is 1957 on the streets of New York City where professional gambler Frank Costello (Robert De Niro) has just arrived home after a charity dinner and is waiting for the lift up to his penthouse apartment when he hears his name called out from behind, and Vincent Gigante (Cosmo Jarvis) promptly shoots him in the head. Frank survives, but he is the boss of bosses, who would put a hit out on him. Well, a rival did not just betray him but the one person he once called a friend, Vito Genovese (Robert De Niro).   

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The Electric State – Movie Review

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TL;DR – What if you smashed The Creator into Ready Player One and then made something mostly soulless with the components?

Rating: 2.5 out of 5.

Post-Credit Scene – There is no post-credit scene.

Disclosure – I paid for the Netflix service that viewed this film.

A wall, Hiding a desolate landscape full of robot corpses.

The Electric State Review –

These days, it is hard to find big-budget films based on an original story or at least an unadapted work. Let alone a movie with a budget that is reportedly one of the biggest in cinematic history. But if you are going to spend that much on something, the question is: have you made something of real substance? And I am not sure that happened here.    

So, to set the scene, 1990 was a simpler time. It was before the war. Where Michelle (Millie Bobby Brown) can watch her brother Christopher (Woody Norman) destroy math tests that take college professors days to complete. But there is a growing anti-robot sentiment growing across the nation. That is because robots decided they didn’t want to do all the menial labour we were making them do and rebelled. It was war, a war humanity was losing, which was when Ethan Skate (Stanley Tucci) arrived as a saviour. Now, everyone is hooked into his SENTRE tech, and all the remaining robots are sent to an exclusion zone. In 1994, Michelle, who lives as a ward of the state, arrives at her house when a Cosmo (Alan Tudyk) bot changes everything.

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Mickey 17 – Movie Review

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TL;DR – Weird, I mean profoundly weird, but maybe not weird enough

Rating: 3.5 out of 5.

Post-Credit Scene – There is no post-credit scene.

Disclosure – I was invited to a press screening of this film

Warning – Some scenes may cause distress.

Starship over an icy planet.

Mickey 17 Review –

There are some movies that you will see just because they have a specific director attached to them. For me, one of those directors is absolutely Bong Joon-ho. My first introduction to his style of films was Okja, and what an introduction it was. Indeed, I’ll steal a moment from my conclusion and recommend watching Okja right now on Netflix, though it may change the way you view the world. This was followed by the phenomenal Parasite, which made me immediately hit yes when I got the invitation to see his follow-up: a weird political sci-fi about a man who can’t die.    

So, to set the scene, friends Mickey (Robert Pattinson) and Timo (Steven Yeun) made some bad deals on Earth, and to stop themselves from being cut up into little pieces by a load shark, they decided to jump on one of the new colony ships heading out into the beyond. Theirs is going to the icy world of Niflheim, and while Timo can sweet talk his way onto the ship, Mickey must sign up to be an ‘expendable’. This is someone who has his body and mind scanned so that they can take on dangerous jobs, and if they die, we just make a new one. Well, we start the film off with Mickey 17, who is currently in a very precarious position, and I am not sure anyone immensely cares.

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Inside Man (Gemini Lounge) – Movie Review

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TL;DR – It is an interesting character study, but I struggled to connect with any part of the film.

Rating: 2.5 out of 5.

Post-Credit Scene – There is no post-credit scene.

Disclosure – I was sent a screener of this film.

The perp board.

Inside Man Review –

Today, we are looking at a film that is steeped in tradition even before the ‘based on a true story’ moniker pops up on the screen. In the deep of the 1980s, New York who was full of mobsters, murders, and illicit substances. It has been a fodder for many films, including the one we are looking at today.   

So, to set the scene, we are in Brooklyn, New York, back in 1983 when Bobby Belucci (Emile Hirsch) was a cop at the crossroads. After finding another man with his wife and introducing that man to his fists, he was demoted to the backend of the department and stuck behind a desk. But one drunken night, Bobby gets the chance to change his fate when he saves the mobster Chris Rosenberg (Jake Cannavale), one of Roy Demeo’ (Danny Abeckaser) guys, from a stabbing.

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In the Lost Lands – Movie Review

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TL;DR – A dull, dreary production that is screaming to find something of substance, but it never happens.  

Rating: 1.5 out of 5.

Post-Credit Scene – There is no post-credit scene.

Disclosure – I paid to watch this film

Broken wind turbines.

In the Lost Lands Review –

There is a genre of film that exists when you pair Paul W. S. Anderson and Milla Jovovich up, most notably found in the many Resident Evil films. There is a visual and narrative styling to these films that you can see even when they jump into different universes like Monster Hunter. It is a style that some people love, but I have struggled in the past. However, we will see if today is different.  

So, to set the scene, the world as we know it is gone, destroyed in a great war long ago. Now, there is only one real human city left under the control of ‘the church’ and ‘the overlord’. Outside of those walls is where the Lost Lands can be found. Full of danger and monsters. In that one city can be found Gray Alys (Milla Jovovich), a witch that is sometimes hunted by the church for heresy and other times sought out by those in power to do favours that she can never refuse. When Queen Melange (Amara Okereke) seeks the skin of a shapechanger, Gray needs to find a hunter who can help, and in the gambling halls, she sees the one person who can ford the Lost Lands, Boyce (Dave Bautista).   

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The Gorge – Movie Review

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TL;DR – The oddest meet-cute I have ever watched, which could have been interesting if that narrative was there to support it.

Rating: 3 out of 5.

Post-Credit Scene – There is no post-credit scene.

Disclosure – I paid for the AppleTV+ service that viewed this film.

A helicopter over a gorge.

The Gorge Review –

When you have been poorly sick for a while, it is hard to get that motivating spark going again. The more you are away, the more content you miss and the deeper the backlog gets. But sometimes, it is best to just dive headfirst into something and see what happens, which is what we did with our film today.  

So, to set the scene, Levi (Miles Teller) is a very successful sniper who has been out of the Marines for several years, working for private military contractors until he was deemed unfit to serve. He didn’t have a reason or drive to contest the results, but maybe an old spook that could command the Army around might give him that drive. He is taken to an undisclosed location in the middle of a no-fly zone, so secretive that they have scanners to stop it from being seen by satellites. Western powers control one side, the Eastern powers control the other, and there is one person on each side. But they are not stopping people from getting into the gorge. Oh no, they have to make sure what is in the gorge never comes out.   

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Captain America: Brave New World – Movie Review

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TL;DR – It is a perfectly serviceable film saved by a strong rapport between the cast and perfectly fine action sequences, but it was aiming for a level it did not have the strength to reach.

Rating: 3 out of 5.

Post-Credit Scene – There is an end-credit scene.

Disclosure – I was invited to a press screening of this film.

Celestial Island.

Captain America: Brave New World Review –

There are some films where you walk in with a healthy amount of trepidation, and for me, this was one of them. The Captain America films were always one of the highlights of the MCU for me, with Captain America: The First Avenger, Captain America: The Winter Soldier & Captain America: Civil War all scoring high on my best of MCU lists. I even enjoyed The Falcon and The Winter Soldier series, even if it was a bit uneven. But something about the production just felt off, and the need to drop the Red Hand into every trailer made it feel like they didn’t have much else to go with. Having watched it now, I think this was both a fair and, luckily, unfair suggestion.  

So, to set the scene, it has been several years since Sam Wilson (Anthony Mackie) took over the mantle of Captain America, and while things have been going well, they are about to be tested with the election of Thaddeus “Thunderbolt” Ross (Harrison Ford) to United States President. We open in as Cap flies a mission in Mexico, recapturing a container captured by mercenaries led by Sidewinder (Giancarlo Esposito). The mission was a success, and Sam, Joaquin Torres (Danny Ramirez) and Isaiah Bradley (Carl Lumbly) were invited to the White House to see the Celestial Island Treaty be signed. It was a perfect night right up until Isaiah stood up and tried to kill the president. Chaos erupts, and suddenly, the world is on the brink of war.

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Conclave – Movie Review

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TL;DR – An exquisitely acted and produced film that takes you into a world rarely seen with the weight of a drama but with all the fascination of a political intrigue.

Rating: 4.5 out of 5.

Post-Credit Scene – There is no post-credit scene.

Disclosure – I paid to watch this film.

Red Cardinals against white marble columns.

Conclave Review –

It is tough to see honest explorations of faith and religion in modern cinema. When films exploring faith come out of Hollywood, they usually feel like hollow vessels divorced from reality. But then you watch movies that come out of the faith-based industry, and more often than not, you are watching trumped-up emotional blackmail hiding under the frame of faith. So, call me surprised when I sat down to watch Conclave and discovered something different.   

So, to set the scene, the Pope is dead, long live the Pope. If there is ever an organisation that has embraced the pomp and circumstance, it is the Catholic Church, and this happens in death just as much or even more than life. Cardinal Thomas Lawrence (Ralph Fiennes), who is Dean of the College of Cardinals, has to convene a conclave to pick the next Pope even though he feels unworthy of the task. However, as cardinals fly in from across the globe, it is clear that there is tension regarding how the Church will move forward. Will it embrace tradition or modernity? Or maybe somewhere in between.

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