About Time

IT MAY not be the best film of all time but there's something about About Time that I loved.

(I'll try to keep spoilers at a minimum but watch the trailer)

Domhnall Gleeson, who you probably better know as Bill Wesley from Harry Potter, stars as lead Tim Lake.
When Lake turns 21 his father, played by Bill Nighy, reveals to him the family secret: the men of his family can travel back in time. But not just any point in history - it has to be a time and place they've already been before.
Lake is discouraged to use his power for monetary gain or fame, so the red-haired, seemingly socially awkward man uses his gift to improve his love life.

Time travel is a gift many people wish they had. Whether it is to lead more financially lucrative lives or find fame, or if its simply to change the way an interaction, conversation or meeting played out, a lot of people, myself included, have wished they could simply go back in time and do it better.
Lake gets to do just that but he uses it for his love life, though it doesn't work out exactly as he hopes it would the following summer with sister Kit Kat's (Lydia Wilson) friend Charlotte, played by Neighbours alumni and future Harley Quinn Margot Robbie.
A move to London opens the door for a chance meeting with Rachel McAdams' Mary, with whom he shares a night flirting at a restaurant. The two connect, but Lake learns another lesson of his unique gift: if he changes the past, he will inevitably change his future.

My major beef with this film is Gleeson is a little too creepy.
When he meets Mary for the first time (again), he is the type of creepy of which would have police and security called within seconds. Defying utter logic (and obviously feeding on rom-com aspect), she instead agrees to meet him for dinner.
It just doesn't make sense.
If it was someone like Ryan Gosling or Hugh Grant in that scene, their natural charisma and charm would've made it a totally plausible outcome. Gleeson is just creepy all round - the way the lines are delivered coupled with the scary intensity of his eyes sends shivers rather than the suggestive signals he was supposed to.
His social awkwardness and reactions to certain situations do deliver some extra laughs, and to his credit Gleeson softens up in different times of the film.

McAdams is perfect as always, Nighy adds energy to the family, Wilson's free-spirited Kit Kat is a troubling yet refreshing sidestory to the main plot, and Richard Cordery's minor role as Uncle Desmond is hilarious.

Even though Gleeson is a little on the creepy side at times About Time is a film that will make you smile, laugh, and leave you coming back for more.

The Man with the Iron Fists

The DVD case splashes "Quentin Tarantino presents" in red across the top while the tagline "You can't spell kung fu without F and U" sit prominently in white under the main image. Any expectation you have of the film is then shattered when you see a cast littered with the likes of Russell Crowe, RZA, Lucy Liu and Dave Bautista.

This film can only be described as wild.
The epic opening sequence fuses the rap of RZA and Howard Drossin with a crazy fight scene in which the leader of the Lion Clan, Gold Lion, is murdered. The film's plot comes from this event, with his son Zen-Yi (Rick Yune, Day Another Day) seeking revenge when he learns of what happened.
We soon meet Russell Crowe's Jack Knife - "I am Mr Knife, but you can call me Jack" - an opium-addicted British soldier named after his weapon of choice. Knife takes refuge in a brothel which is home to several hilarious Crowe scenes.
Dave Bautista plays Brass Body, a massive unit capable of turning his body to metal. The character wouldn't be out of place in an X-Men film, and his existence in this simply bizarre world RZA and Eli Roth have created I don't think has been answered.
Meanwhile RZA, the film's director, producer, screenwriter, and half of the composing team (with Drossin), plays the lead role as "The Blacksmith". The Blacksmith's main role is to rescue his lover Lady Silk (Jamie Chung) from the Pink Blossom - the same brothel in which Mr Knife took refuge.
The four are brought together by the common purpose of stopping the Lion Clad, and through 90 minutes of terrible scripting and gravity-defying fight scenes featuring tunes from Wu-Tang Clan and RZA we are ripped through RZA's homage to the martial arts film genre.

I felt the film wasn't necessarily bad but it isn't good either. It's 90-odd minutes of top-quality entertainment with glimpses of humour, but it is a film that most will smirk when they read the blurb and continue on by.
Is it worth 90 minutes of your time? Only if you want to hear pearlers like "These motherfuckers got a Gatling gun" and see a bunch of throats get ripped open.

One more thing: the trivia section on IMDB says RZA wanted this film to be four hours and split into two. Thankfully Eli Roth stepped in and said 90 minutes is enough.

The Hobbit trilogy

A central place for my reviews of Peter Jackson's film adaptations of JRR Tolkien's The Hobbi.
Click the links to read the reviews:

The Hobbit
An Unexpected Journey
The Desolation of Smaug
The Battle of the Five Armies

The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies

I remember watching The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug and despite enjoying the film more than I did The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, had hope the third and final chapter would be even better.
After watching The Battle of the Five Armies I can't help but feel a little disappointed.
The final chapter in Peter Jackson's adaptation of Tolkien's masterful works set in Middle Earth finally came to Australian screens on Boxing Day 2014, more than 10 years after he started (with Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring).

One of the criticisms of the LOTR trilogy was their length, but even with the excessive run times (more than three hours-odd each) Jackson had to cut a lot of content from the book (Mr Bombadil's story arc anyone?). The same criticism can easily be directed at The Hobbit, in which Jackson manages to stretch a single novel - which is smaller than each "third" of LOTR - into three long films.
The main criticisms I have for The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies stem from this issue.
Instead of one or two action-packed films that could sweep audiences across Middle Earth at a brisk pace as Bilbo and the Dwarves complete their quest, fight Smaug/orcs/elves/men/each other, and try to overcome their greed (I'm looking at you Thorin Oakenshield), we are treated to three films that lack any real punch.
As a big fan of the series it pains me to say The Battle of the Five Armies was boring.
Way too much time was spent on the negotiation sequences between Thorin, the bunch of Elves with a grudge and the Men whose town was destroyed by Smaug (thanks Thorin/Bilbo). The way the Dwarves were chilling up top looking down at Bard (from the destroyed city of Laketown) and Thranduil (leader of the Elvish army) looked like it came straight out of a Monty Python film.
Richard Armitage (Thorin) did his best to look as if he was slowly being overcome by evil as the film mercilessly dragged on, which was capped by a dream sequence in which I'm certain he drowned in a pool of gold (which, funnily enough, was the point at which he woke up from his evil/greed/lust).
Despite those two main problems, there are several positive aspects.
The multiple combat/battle sequences were all outstanding, even though a) it takes a REALLY long time for several characters to die, and b) I'm not sure how the injection of just nine Dwarves can change a battle being waged by several armies each numbered in their hundreds. Yes I know they are our heroes (and I know it's fiction and follows a source text) but am I seriously expected to believe that could happen? Even if a film is set in some mythological/fictional place I will happily accept whatever happens if I believe it could. Had it been nine wizards or Ents, yes I'd cop that battle-winning change. Nine Dwarves? Nup.
The way Jackson slipped his nods to the events of LOTR were expertly done. He included just the right amount of information (Legolas' instruction to track down Strider/Aragon for example) to make fans want to run back home and buckle in for the next leg of the ultra Middle Earth marathon.

The Battle of the Five Armies does its job, albeit poorly after being let down by previous chapters, decision making, and the corporate dollar (whatever you believe to be the reason The Hobbit was stretched into a trilogy). The loose ends from Desolation of Smaug are tied up, we get a resolution to Bilbo's quest and get to see him get home to the Shire (I'm still filthy over its omission from Return of the King Mr Jackson), and there is just enough included to set up LOTR.

>I would like to know whatever happened to Radagast the Brown however. He is seen in the climatic scenes of Battle of the Five Armies but doesn't appear in the film versions of LOTR at all (he is in the books).

Perhaps we will find out if/when Mr Jackson tackles The Silmarillion...

Lucy

I’ve never been one for drugs but I imagine Lucy is best described as a bad trip.

Luc Besson’s latest effort features Scarlett Johansson in the titular role and Morgan Freeman as world-leading scientist Professor Samuel Norman. But even the combined star power of The Avengers star and the world’s most regonisable voice can’t stop this film from descending into a farce.

Highly successful French director Besson sprung to Hollywood’s attention with his 1997 effort The Fifth Element but more recently produced The Transporter and the Taken series.

He forces you to keep an open mind, and as shown by the films of which he has directorial, screen-writing and production credits he isn’t afraid to go all out on action and leave plausibility at a minimum.

Lucy not only forces an open mind; it blows it apart.

But not in a good way.

The ambitious film explores the idea of humans using only 10% of their brain power, and attempts to show what could be possible if one person accessed the full 100%.

We are thrust straight into the story, with Lucy forced to cooperate with a drug deal which goes horribly wrong.

She is made a drug mule without her consent, and she (and three other men) are forced to fly to four different world destinations with a bag of drugs sown into their stomachs to complete the deal.

Lucy is kept in captivity but passed to a new group, and it all goes downhill once the new gang’s leader literally lays the boot in, splitting the bag inside her stomach and allowing the drug into her system.

The drug itself is interesting. Dubbed CPH4, the drug is a highly valuable synthetic that essentially unlocks the 90% of the brain we don’t use.

As it is absorbed into Lucy’s system, she begins experiencing heightened abilities, and it all goes downhill very quickly from there.

For the next 70-odd minutes we’re taken on a wild ride across Europe as Lucy races to stop the other three packages from reaching their intended receivers.

But for the same 70-odd minutes we’re left wondering what the hell is going on.

 Lucy’s sole saving grace is an awesome car chase through the streets of Paris that is highly unbelievable but highly entertaining.

Yes, it is quite simple to follow how Lucy accesses more of her brain power thanks to the massive white numbers on a black background that pop up throughout the film, but the presentation is so ridiculous you spend it scratching your head and deciding whether or not to walk out.

I’m glad to say my record of not leaving films early still stands, but Lucy is the closest I’ve ever been to an early exit.