Smurfs (2025) – Movie Review

TL;DR – A complete mess of a film that fundamentally does not understand who it wants to be for, and in its attempt to be for everyone, it becomes a movie for no one.

Rating: 2 out of 5.

Post-Credit Scene – There is a mid-credit scene.

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

Warning – There are sequences with flashing lights.

Smurfette.

Smurfs Review

Sometimes, as a reviewer, you have to contend with reviewing films that you are clearly not the target demographic for, where you need to pull yourself out of the setting for a bit and experience it like the intended audience. But that all depends on one thing: the film actually working with the people they want it to.

So, to set the scene, a long time ago, four evil wizards captured four magical books and tried to steal all that is good in the world, but luckily, one of the books escaped and the spell was ruined. Some time later, all the Smurfs of Smurf village have come together to sing their daily song. But there is one Smurf out of sync: No Name Smurf (James Corden). Smurfette (Rihanna) tries to help No Name Smurf to find his thing, when even Shark Trainer Smurf was taken. However, as they were getting Smurfberries, No Name Smurf finds his secret talent, magic. But there has never been a Magic Smurf, and we find out why when a magical pulse tips off Razamel (JP Karliak) as to where Smurf Village is, and he captures Papa Smurf (John Goodman) so he can tell him where the last book is. Now the Smurfs have to go on a rescue mission to save Papa Smurf and the whole world.

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Ticket to Paradise – Movie Review

TL;DR – It shows why casting is so important because if you cast a divorced couple, picking good friends that swing for the fences helps sell everything.      

Rating: 4 out of 5.

Post-Credit Scene – There is a mid-credit scene

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

Love in the seaweed fields

Ticket to Paradise Review

Many components go into making a film. Might you need to dress up one location to look like another? You might need to manage a large crowd in the background. Maybe make a set look like it is outside while filming it on a soundstage. Yet you could have the locations, script, and crew, but if you get the chemistry with the cast wrong, it could all fall apart. Today we look at a film that nails all of those factors you need when your main protagonists high-key hate each other.    

So to set the scene, there was one time when David (George Clooney) and Georgia (Julia Roberts) were deeply in love, but that was a long time ago, and unfortunately not in a galaxy far, far away when they had to come into contact with each other at their daughter Lily’s (Kaitlyn Dever) graduation. Wanting to get away from the stress of the upcoming job in a law firm in Chicago, Lily and her friend Wren (Billie Lourd) head out to Bali to chill for a couple of weeks. But when they get left behind by the boat in the middle of the ocean and get rescued by the charming Gede (Maxime Bouttier), Lily thinks there may be more for her here in the country. Hearing of the pending nuptials, David and Georgia dash out to the country and put aside their differences for their daughter’s sake, but it is hard to let bygones be bygones.  

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Movie Review – Star Wars: The Last Jedi

TL;DR – The Last Jedi is charting its own story and this is where its strengths and faults lie.

Score – 4 out of 5 stars

Star Wars The Last Jedi. Image Credit: Disney/Lucasarts.

Review

Ok here we go, I didn’t think The Last Jedi was a fantastic film, nor did I think it was a really bad film. It was a film which had some aspects that really worked and some things that just didn’t, which made it a fascinating film to watch. However, this was also a problem for me because I wasn’t sure just how I felt about this film, and indeed for the first time this year, I actually went and saw the film twice before writing my review because I wanted to be sure about my feelings. Now in today’s review, I am going to set the scene and then give a general overview, and then we are going to go full spoiler with my analysis.

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