What: Toy Story 3
Where: Nuneaton Odeon
Who: Me, Becky & Mark
When: Sunday July 25th 2010 at 8pm
An impromptu trip to the cinema for the second time in a week saw me rack up nearly 2500 points on my premier card. Meaning that so far this year I have spent almost £250 in the cinema not surprising when you consider that this film alone cost me an extortionate £10.35. Yes you heard that correctly as once again I got sucked into the hype surrounding the third dimension and again I was left disappointed with the effect as once again it is not needed not worth it and not very good.
That is the only time I will be using the phrase “not very good” in this review because Toy Story 3 is very good and is equal in quality to its 2 predecessors. In 1995 the original Toy Story came along and provided a bench mark for all computer generated animation that would follow and there has been a lot. Have any of them matched up to Toy Story? It’s a debateable point but in my humble opinion no. Toy Story was the first full length computer animated feature and to this day is still the best. A few years after Toy story the all star cast reunited and in 1999 Toy story 2 was released to critical acclaim and to this day still sits in IMDBs top 250 films of all time. Not bad for a sequel. And then it just stopped. The Toy Story franchise was buried and inferior quality product started cropping up all over the place. So can you imagine the excitement that surrounded Pixar when they announced that Toy Story was alive and well and more importantly was back.
To get a cast as good as the Toy Story line-up back together is quite an achievement and apart from the late great Jim Varney (slinky dog) every single one of them returned to provide voices for Toy Story 3. Even the now 26 year old John Morris (Andy) who hasn’t worked on any move since Toy Story 2.
So is this film any good? The simple answer to that is, yes it is. It is easily equal to the 2 originals and in years to come will not feel out of place in the trilogy. It is not better and it is in no way worse it just feels like it fits in and it brings the whole Toy Story franchise full circle and now the story feels complete. This film will make you laugh (a lot) it will scare you, If that monkey and that creepy as hell big baby doesn’t scare the pants of you you’re not human. And it will probably make you cry. If you are prone to crying at films then make sure you take a box of tissues with you because when this film is leading up too its inevitable conclusion you are going to need them.
Again I can’t really give a stand out performance in this film but I can tell you who to watch out for and the show stealer in this film is Ken (Michael Keaton). Barbies long time love interest is a camp show off who is easily led due to his hang ups about being a girls toy, it is a perfectly written brilliantly well done character and along with the usual favourites fits perfectly well in to the Toy Story world.
In summary this film is a great conclusion to the Toy Story story and like I said earlier it doesn’t feel hooked on or out of place which is probably the highest praise I can give this film. Don’t watch it in 3d, to be perfectly honest I’m getting very close to just telling you to boycott 3d all together, but do watch it! You owe to all the toys in your life that you don’t own any more.
8.5/10
Tuesday, 27 July 2010
Wednesday, 21 July 2010
Inception
What: Inception
Where: Nuneaton Odeon
Who: Me, Becky, Mark, Nick and Emma
When: Tuesday July 20th 2010 at 9pm
Where on earth do you start writing a review of a film like Inception? 3 months ago nobody knew anything about this film it literally came from nowhere and like Christopher Nolan has done before it changes the world.
Inception will quite rightly draw inevitable comparisons with 1999’s The Matrix. But the fact of the matter is and this is going to be highly controversial. Inception is better!
In 1999 The matrix came along, nobody knew it was coming and after a slow start everyone sat up and listened and the effect that that film has had on cinema in the last 10 years is phenomenal. Inception didn’t have a slow start it opened with an opening weekend box office of $60million and make no mistake about it this film is as inspirational as the Matrix if not more so.
It scares me how good Inception is. It is directed by an academy award nominated director and it stars no less than 6 academy award nominees (Tom Beringer, Leonardo DiCaprio, Pete Postlethwaite, Lukas Hass, Ken Watanabe and Ellen Page) and 2 winners (Michael Caine and Marion Cotillard) How DiCaprio doesn’t have a little gold man in his trophy cabinet yet is staggering. DiCaprio over the last 10 years or so has cemented himself as the most consistent and, I am going out on a limb again here, the best working actor in Hollywood at the minute. Christopher Nolan is a director that is on top of the world and can not put a step wrong. So what do you get when you cross the best director in the world with the best actor? Well you get Inception.
Inception has a handful of British stars. It is no secret that I am not a fan of British cinema and when you see this and find out what some of our stars are capable of it makes you wonder how British cinema fails so badly. (Don’t you dare scream Slumdog millionaire at me, that was 2 years ago. get over it.)
Everybody in this film is an incredible talent and Nolan gets the best out of every single one of them. If I had to pick a stand out performance which I do,(not including Di-Caprio I’ve already praised him) I would have gone for former sitcom star Joseph Gordon Levitt but then Tom Hardy turned up and threatened to steal the whole show with his campy performance as Eames. This guy is a talent to watch out for and to think I thought he could only play British east end gangster types. Stay in Hollywood Tom leave this island behind it wont do you any favours.
At this point in my review I would normally pick out the parts that I didn’t like or areas that let the film down. Please find these bullet pointed below.
•
•
•
Honestly and this is something that I very rarely say about anything in life. This film has nothing wrong with it. It couldn’t be better. IT IS PERFECT.
10/10 films don’t come along very often in fact in my whole life I reckon I have only seen about 10. Make that 11
10/10
Where: Nuneaton Odeon
Who: Me, Becky, Mark, Nick and Emma
When: Tuesday July 20th 2010 at 9pm
Where on earth do you start writing a review of a film like Inception? 3 months ago nobody knew anything about this film it literally came from nowhere and like Christopher Nolan has done before it changes the world.
Inception will quite rightly draw inevitable comparisons with 1999’s The Matrix. But the fact of the matter is and this is going to be highly controversial. Inception is better!
In 1999 The matrix came along, nobody knew it was coming and after a slow start everyone sat up and listened and the effect that that film has had on cinema in the last 10 years is phenomenal. Inception didn’t have a slow start it opened with an opening weekend box office of $60million and make no mistake about it this film is as inspirational as the Matrix if not more so.
It scares me how good Inception is. It is directed by an academy award nominated director and it stars no less than 6 academy award nominees (Tom Beringer, Leonardo DiCaprio, Pete Postlethwaite, Lukas Hass, Ken Watanabe and Ellen Page) and 2 winners (Michael Caine and Marion Cotillard) How DiCaprio doesn’t have a little gold man in his trophy cabinet yet is staggering. DiCaprio over the last 10 years or so has cemented himself as the most consistent and, I am going out on a limb again here, the best working actor in Hollywood at the minute. Christopher Nolan is a director that is on top of the world and can not put a step wrong. So what do you get when you cross the best director in the world with the best actor? Well you get Inception.
Inception has a handful of British stars. It is no secret that I am not a fan of British cinema and when you see this and find out what some of our stars are capable of it makes you wonder how British cinema fails so badly. (Don’t you dare scream Slumdog millionaire at me, that was 2 years ago. get over it.)
Everybody in this film is an incredible talent and Nolan gets the best out of every single one of them. If I had to pick a stand out performance which I do,(not including Di-Caprio I’ve already praised him) I would have gone for former sitcom star Joseph Gordon Levitt but then Tom Hardy turned up and threatened to steal the whole show with his campy performance as Eames. This guy is a talent to watch out for and to think I thought he could only play British east end gangster types. Stay in Hollywood Tom leave this island behind it wont do you any favours.
At this point in my review I would normally pick out the parts that I didn’t like or areas that let the film down. Please find these bullet pointed below.
•
•
•
Honestly and this is something that I very rarely say about anything in life. This film has nothing wrong with it. It couldn’t be better. IT IS PERFECT.
10/10 films don’t come along very often in fact in my whole life I reckon I have only seen about 10. Make that 11
10/10
Friday, 2 July 2010
Get Him to the Greek
What: Get Him to the Greek
Where: Nuneaton Odeon
Who: ME, Becky, Tom, Wayne and Lisa
When: Friday 25th June 2010 9:15
Just back off Holiday and straight to the cinema the next day. I actually got the invite whilst sitting on a runway waiting for take off but didn’t answer until the next day. Now those of you that know me will know that I don’t usually go for comedy films but the one man who I make the exception for is Russell Brand. This man in my eyes is amazing and can do no wrong. I’ve seen him in live stand up twice and was an avid listener to his weekly radio show which was cut short because of the ridiculous over-reaction of the British media. However He is fresh funny and unique and his performance as Aldus Snow in Forgetting Sarah Marshall stole the whole show. So could a starring role as the same character in a film that is not a sequel but more of a spin-off produce the goods. Sadly the answer is no.
Don’t get me wrong this is not a bad film and in parts is very funny but it doesn’t compare to its predecessor and unfortunately to succeed it really had too. FSM was brilliantly written by the very funny Jason Segal who is missing from the credits on GHTTG except for a token “based on characters created by”
At it’s heart Get Him To the Greek is a traditional buddy comedy starring Russell Brand and Jonah Hill as drug addled rock star and producer however to do a buddy comedy well you need a funny guy and a straight guy however Johan ruins this film by constantly trying to out funny his obviously more talented counter part. However Brand is not perfect either, the character is a riddled cliché and nothing about the writing of Aldus Snow is original.
Normally at this point I’d give you a lesser character that is played well and stands out however this time I have to give you a lesser character who is so distractingly bad it almost ruins the whole film and that is Jonah’s girlfriend played by Elisabeth Moss. She is 100% awful in this film and I am not in the business of slagging people off I respect anyone who can make it onto my cinema screen and I am sure she is a very competent actress but she really is terrible in this. If I had to pick a stand out performance from someone I would say Sean “P Diddy” Coombs who is incredibly funny as Jonahs boss Sergio.
In conclusion I realise I’ve been very negative in this review but I can’t deny that there was some very funny moments in this film, “Rub the furry wall”
6/10
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