Kelly’s Heroes – True star power

There are some films that need little introduction. ‘Kelly’s Heroes’ is one of them.  However, in today’s Hollywood, movies about the Second World War are few and far between, so some may question the relevance of an ensemble piece set in the dying days of Nazi-occupied Europe.  First of all, I’ll probably stick my neck out and say that it’s probably not that ‘historically accurate’ (or at least not to my knowledge!).  By that, I don’t mean that Allied forces are fighting zombies or abducted by vampires.  From the little I know of the period, all the uniforms, military language and techniques look genuine enough to fool a layman like me.  When I say it’s not ‘historically accurate’ I mean that, whereas most films of this era concentrate (naturally) on the struggle between German and Allied forces, ‘Kelly’s Heroes’ offers more of a ‘crime caper’ set during the conflict.  If I could compare it to anything, I’d almost say it felt like an ‘Ocean’s Eleven’ in the middle of World War II.

Clint Eastwood plays the titular ‘Kelly’ – a war-weary soldier who’s had enough of potentially dying any day without anything to show for it personally.  So, when he learns of a bank full of gold behind enemy lines, he puts together a group of equally ambitious troops all willing to risk their lives for a slice of the bullion.  As I mentioned, it’s a bit of an ensemble cast, the two most notable additions are Telly Savalas and Donald Sutherland, both who vie for position of the cast member who’s trying to steal every scene they’re in.  However, just because the film is largely about the quest to blow open a bank vault, doesn’t mean that it’s not a war film.  The setting alone means that our ‘heroes’ come up against all the perils associated with the period and there are some pretty impressive set-pieces when it comes to the action. 

I think the best thing about ‘Kelly’s Heroes’ is that it has a pretty broad appeal.  Obviously fans of war films will enjoy it, but you have the added bonus of having Clint Eastwood in the lead (and in his prime, no less) supported by some amazing acting talent.  Then throw in the action element and the engaging crime plot and you’re really going to invest your time into caring whether these (not so heroic) heroes get the gold or not.  Don’t be put off by its age.  It’s as good – and more importantly fun – today as it ever was.  I will never grow tired from watching a tank freak out the opposing forces by playing music loudly as it comes into battle!

8/10 The Force is definitely strong with this one

The Awakening (2011) - Engaging and creepy  

Perhaps the biggest thing `The Awakening' has going for it is its setting. The huge house/school in the countryside truly is the stuff ghost stories are made of. It looks visually stunning (in an ancient and creepy kind of way) whichever angle it's filmed from. You can't help but believe that there has to be at least a few spooks running around somewhere.

Rebecca Hall basically plays a nineteen-twenties Ghostbuster (or rather Ghost-disprover, as she specialises in proving to the world that the supernatural don't exist). She gets called to a school to disprove the existence of an alleged ghost who has caused the death of a living boy.  She certainly proves that she's more than capable of headlining a movie all by herself and the other characters are all secondary to her.  Because it's set in a school there is naturally at least one child star.  Kids in adult-orientated films can be grating at the best of times, but here the boy does well enough that you won't find him totally irritating.

Naturally, her investigations lead her to start to doubt her previous beliefs about the lack of real ghosts. There are a few twists and turns and even a handful of red herrings. Don't try to figure it out too much, it'll explain itself eventually. But if you're hoping for every last detail being explained, you may find yourself scouring internet message boards for answers (especially when it comes to the ending!).

It's spooky, it's well-shot and it has a few bits that make you jump - if anything it's those 'jump-scares' that let it down.  Everything else is so well done that relying on something that suddenly appears on screen combined with a random noise isn't really needed to add to the mood. But, despite that, it has an overall premise that you may have seen variations of, but this one is decent enough for you to give it a chance. What more do you want from a ghost yarn?

7/10 if I woke up on Groundhog Day and had to watch this again, I could live with that

Godzilla (2014) - Godzilla really needs to get himself a better agent

Okay, I can see it from his point of view... if I was a thirty-storey tall lizard, I would accept that I wasn’t going to get that many offers from Hollywood producers.  It’s not like Godzilla could star opposite Jennifer Aniston in a cute, cuddly little romantic comedy.  So, when the ‘king of monsters’ got an offer to star in a Hollywood retelling using his very own name as its title, he must have jumped at the chance (possibly causing a minor earthquake in his city).

However, what the poor misguided monster didn’t know was that his role in the film was little more than a ‘bit part.’ The producers probably mentioned that they also had the great Bryan Cranston on board, fresh on the back of his success in ‘Breaking Bad.’ I don’t blame Godzilla for being optimistic.  He probably expected to be engaged in numerous deep and emotional scenes with the man who played ‘Heisenberg.’ Yet it turned out that he was merely duped.  The trailer for the film made it look like the two of them would be carrying the film together.  How wrong they were.

For a start, Cranston isn’t in it much as the trailer and marketing would suggest and, secondly, you hardly get to see the monster!

The film is two hours long.  For the first half an hour we have Bryan Cranston.  And, as you’d expect if you’ve watched Breaking Bad, you’ll know he’s awesome.  He has the drama and screen presence (or at least right kind of manic nuttiness) to hold your attention.  Then he goes out of it.  So, does the monster take over?  Well, not really.

We see Godzilla’s back.  Sometimes we see his thighs (and, yes, he is looking a little ‘out of shape’ after being off our screens for so long).  And occasionally we hear him roar.  However, every time he’s about to open up a can of whoop-ass on some bad monster, it reminds me of that scene in Reservoir Dogs where Mr Blond tortures a police officer and the camera pans away.  This happens every time in Godzilla.  As soon as the action starts, the camera cuts to something on the other side of the planet (kind of literally – if the monsters start a fight in Tokyo, the action switches to San Francisco).

Yes, the end of the film (and by that I mean the last quarter of an hour of a two hour epic) you get to see the monsters finally get stuck into each other.  But, between Bryan Cranston leaving the film and the ‘HALO jump’ right before the final stand-off, there really isn’t much to keep your attention.  I sort of get what they were trying to do.  I’m sure the producers would call it ‘building up tension,’ but they take it a little too far.  Imagine a Terminator movie where they only had the titular cyborg in it for give minutes.  How well would that work?  Oh, wait, they did – Terminator: Salvation.  And how well did that go down?!

I hear they’re already thinking of making a sequel to Godzilla.  I just hope the titular character gets his representatives to actually negotiate more screen time for the poor guy.

5/10 a hard trek, a bit like unicycling to Mordor and back

All the Boys Love Mandy Lane - Oh, go on... it’s not that bad

Slasher films – the lynchpin of the horror genre... a handful of good-looking, interchangeable teenagers go, er, somewhere desolate where mobile phones obviously don’t work and then get picked off one by one by locals/werewolves/monsters – take your pick.

Here, in ‘All the Boys Love Mandy Lane’ the affore-mentioned interchangeable teens go to a country farmhouse in order to – well – get with (for use of a better term) the much-adored Mandy Lane (played by Amber Heard, before her ill-fated romance with Mr Depp).  Unfortunately, before any of them even make it near first base with Ms Lane, a nutter starts slicing and dicing them.

Now, normally, there’s an element of mystery surrounding who the masked killer is.  Here, there isn’t – here you basically know who the murderer is straight away (and he doesn’t even wear a mask for very long).  So don’t expect to be guessing who-dunn-it with this one.  The plot is that basically one guy obviously loves the future Mrs Depp a little too much and has a novel way of dealing with his rival suitors.

So, there you have it – kids getting stalked and slashed – nothing new.  And that’s about it.  Basically, you’ve seen it all before and there’s nothing that will particularly amaze you (although I did quite l like the ending and thought it was a little different).  However, if you generally like your slasher films then this one should entertain.

Nothing special - it has all the normal clichés associated with the genre here, but if you’re a fan of the genre then it should fill an hour and a half of your time (although, personally, I thought Mandy Lane’s mate was prettier than the – much sort-after – lead!).

7/10 if I woke up on Groundhog Day and had to watch this again, I could live with that

Piranha DD - Dumb, silly and almost quite good fun 

I have to confess at actually really enjoying the first recent Piranha film. It was everything I expected - gratuitous, daft and plenty of blood flowing.

Therefore, I was quite happy to sit down and watch the sequel, expecting more of the same. To be fair, I got it, however, it just didn't seem to have worked this time.

What I got was a blatant Jaws clone - instead of a man trying to shut the beach because of a great white shark, you have a girl trying to shut a new fun pool because of the piranhas. I don't know whether this was some sort of `homage' to the superior Jaws movie, or whether it was sloppy writing. Either way, it just didn't sit well with me.

Yes, there is gore and plenty of women in bikinis, but it just didn't feel as fresh the second time round.

David Hasselhoff is in it, happy to lampoon himself, which goes some way to squeeze in a few extra laughs in the second half.

It's short too, just over an hour. You'd have thought they could have fitted better in, but, sadly, it was a bit of a let down.

I don't regret watching Piranha DD. It kept me entertained, but, if you're looking for blood, carnage and bikinis - just stick to watching the first one. You won't miss anything by not seeing this.

6/10 May just keep you awake if Freddy Krueger was haunting your nights

Now You See Me 2 – A trick too far

The original ‘Now You See Me’ film was an incredibly enjoyable affair.  It was possibly one of the finest examples of how, if you were willing to suspend your disbelief to epic levels, you really could have a great time watching it.  It was Hollywood glitz and popcorn-munching fun all the way through.  The – A-list – cast was perfect and played off each other brilliantly, depicting a quartet of modern day Robin Hood-style magicians who stole from the rich and corrupted through the use of their dazzling illusions and, in turn, gave back to the poor.  I suppose its success basically guaranteed a sequel would be greenlit.  And, where I do give the film credit for doing its best to follow-on closely from the events in the first outing, this time round it’s just too unbelievable to be convincing – no matter how hard you try to suspend your disbelief.

I really wanted to like this film – and I guess I did.  There were plenty of neat moments here and there, it’s just I wanted to like it a LOT.  And I didn’t.  The story picks up a little while after the events of the first one and the most noticeable difference for me was the fact that Isla Fisher hasn’t returned this time round.  She’s therefore instantly replaced by another female magician who slots into the team a little too well.  Then we get to the meat of the story where the twists and turns start to overtake general common sense and credibility.

The rest of the cast return, but the main newcomer is Daniel Radcliffe who entraps the magicians in an attempt to use their collective skills to steal something for him.  And, as I mentioned, the ‘magic’ set-pieces are indeed well-filmed and cool to watch.  However, the story just doesn’t add up.  One of the main complaints from the first one was the ‘twist’ which left some viewers feeling a little short-changed.  Here, the film tries to ‘out-twist’ the original by taking the story in all sorts of directions which leave you truly confused as to who is on who’s side and who is trying to double-cross who.

I know that part of the fun with watching magicians perform is trying to guess how the trick is done.  With the first film you could just about believe that the feats they carry out could just about be actually real if all the circumstances were just right.  In the sequel, everything feels a little cheap as you naturally try to predict how they accomplish these feats, only to find out that the ways they do them are tantamount impossible.

Overall, it’s an enjoyable enough film, but it does try to be a little too clever for its own good and therefore ends up being too unbelievable to be credible.

6/10 Should probably keep you awake if Freddy Krueger was haunting your nights

Children of the Corn (2009 remake) - Would a `corny' pun be too obvious?

Oh, dear, where do I begin? This is a remake of the Stephen King film of the same name starring Linda (Sarah Connor) Hamilton. In short: the remake doesn't cut it in any way.

We're introduced to possibly the most objectionable on-screen couple ever imagined. He doesn't seem to think twice about slapping her. She never stops whining and having a go at him. They stumble into a town that's been overrun by children, who have long since killed all the adults and are now worshiping their own (take) on God.

If that sort of plot interests you, look up Linda Hamilton's version. Avoid the remake like a town full of religion psychopathic under-eighteens. It contains a `child leader' who is about as threatening as Peppa Pig in a fairy outfit. He just barks lines with seemingly little understanding of what they mean.

According to the internet, this was remade because it's `closer' to Stephen King's original story. Apparently, this original story was only twenty-seven pages long. Therefore this remake has had to stretch out the twenty-seven pages to ninety minutes. And it shows. Much of it could be cut out. In fact, most of it could. You'll feel little for the two central protagonists' plight and just be longing for it to end (badly, hopefully).

4/10 You can watch this film while you're doing the ironing (you'll still get the general gist of it)