Because Everybody Else Has One

Lets just round off last week with a quick look at Jobs. Despite the plethora of one-star reviews and largely apathetic audience reaction, Jobs really isn't that bad. It isn't much good, but it isn't that bad either. As you may have guessed by now, Jobs sort of tells the story of Steve Jobs, the legendary co-founder of Apple. I say sort of because the film can't quite seem to decide whether it wants to tell the story of Steve Jobs or about the company he started. The film, in fact, probably hues closer to being Apple: The Movie, rather than a true look at this brilliant but endlessly controversial cultural figure, but even then it still feels somewhat superficial. As for Jobs himself, we spend a bit of time with him in his young days in college, but the film spends little time before getting to tell the story of Apple - how it was started in a basement by one guy with a lot of vision and a bunch of his frankly more talented friends, how Apple basically invented ...

Guess what this one's about? No, really. Also at Channel 24 What it's about After making copious use of the company credit card after being laid off from his job at a major tech company, Adam Cassidy (Liam Hemsworth) is given a second chance by his old boss, Nicolas Wyatt (Gary Oldman) – all he has to do is spy on a rival company, run by Wyatt's old boss and mentor, Jock Goddard (Harrison Ford). It's not long, however, before he finds himself the pawn in a game where the ruthless primary players are playing on a whole other level. What we thought Paranoia is yet another generic thriller with an utterly forgettable one-word title that is perhaps even less memorable and impressive than its title suggests. It's especially impressive that a film with a couple of really fun supporting performances from Harrison Ford, Richard Dreyfus and Gary Oldman makes next to no lasting impression whatsoever. In fact, when I saw “Paranoia” on the release sche...

Mills and Boons goes the biopic? Also at Channel 24 What it's about Focusing on the last couple of years of her life, Diana tells the story of the elicit(ish) love affair between Princess Diana of Wales and the apparent last love of her life, heart surgeon Hasnat Khan. What we thought Is it really still to soon to talk about it? It's been, what, nearly two decades since Princess Diana's tragic death, but if Diana is any indication, we still have some way to go yet. Diana is the first major film to place its focus squarely on Lady Di since that day at the end of August 1997, but it's so listless, so anaemic, so bland an effort that one wonders why they even bothered in the first place. It is nowhere near the – if you pardon the unfortunate phrase – car crash that many of its one-star reviews have painted it as, but that's because it doesn't try hard enough to be that interesting. While watching Diana, it's impossible to shak...

I have a bunch of Channel 24 reviews for this week, but before I post them, I just want to say a quick few words about one of the year's most notable, often awe-inspiring releases, Alfonso Cuaron's Gravity. Gravity, the latest film from the frankly brilliant Alfonso Cuaron (Children of Men, Harry Potter and The Prisoner of Azkaban and Y Tu Mama Tambien) must have the highest Metascore  of any film released this year at a whopping 96/100 and, ya know what, it very almost deserves the dozens of 5 star reviews it has so far received. As a technical piece of filmmaking it is, indeed, flawless as its special effects are entirely believable, its visuals glorious and its use of 3D right up there with Hugo and Life of Pi. It is also, a white-knuckle thriller that will have you on the edge of your seat, if not hyperventilating, throughout  its sleek 90 minutes of catastrophic space adventure. And then, of course, there is the career-best performance by Sandra Bullock who very al...

The Good, The Bad and the Smackable... Also at Channel 24 What it's about Alain (Matthias Schoenaerts) leaves Belgium with his young son to live with his sister in Antibes, France where he forms a unique and powerful bond with Stephanie (Marion Cotillard), an orca whale trainer who loses both her legs in a horrible accident while on the job. What we thought Rust and Bone, Jaques Audiard's follow-up to his acclaimed, multi-award-winning A Prophet, is a consistently artful, often powerful film that unfortunately never quite manages to overcome its one, central flaw: its awful chief protagonist. Though the plot of Rust and Bone is remarkably straightforward, it's a thematically rich, complicated piece about two broken people finding first comfort then love in one another. On the one hand, we have Marion Cotillard's Stephanie, a woman who is physically maimed doing her job, while on the other, we have Matthias Schoenaerts' Alain, a man crip...

Not to be all monosyllabic about this or anything but meh... Also at Channel 24 What it's about Joey (Jason Statham), homeless and on the run from a military court martial, embraces the opportunity to assume someone else's identity and, while forming a relationship with the nun who helps out a local soup kitchen, begins a crusade against the scum of his local neighborhood. What we thought First, before we get into the film itself, can we just deal with its title. “Redemption” is an unspeakably terrible name for a film. It has all the generic pointlessness of calling a film “Film” or “A Man“ but without any of those titles' post-modern zing. It's especially stupid as it has the more cryptic and much more interesting title of Hummingbird in the UK – I have no idea what its marketing people were thinking or if, indeed, they were. “Redemption”? Rubbish! Title aside though, the film itself is... kind of OK. Nothing great, nothing special, nothing even parti...

Wait, a good Halle Berry movie? Whodathunkit? Also at  Channel 24 What it's about After failing to save a young girl from a murderous home invader, 911 operator Jordan Turner's (Halle Berry) confidence in her job is badly shaken but when teenager Casey Welson (Abigail Breslin) is kidnapped and locked in the boot of her kidnappers car with her cell phone as her only means of escape, Jordan is soon forced to face her own demons and ensure that that tragic night does not repeat itself. What we thought The Call is a refreshingly terse, stripped down thriller that would easily be one of the best films of its kind to come along in a long, long time had it stayed its course all the way through. As it is, it's still a pretty damn excellent exercise in suspense for its first two acts, before turning into a ridiculously ill-fitting, narratively confused slasher flick for its closing half hour. Admittedly, the final act is still really good fun and it concludes with an ...

Late again, I know. Look out for a good ol' roundup soon, but for now, here's another disappointing effects movie. Also at Channel 24 . What it's about After being murdered by his partner, a dirty cop gets a second chance to make amends and take revenge as he joins the Rest In Peace Department, a post-mortem law enforcement agency tasked with stopping the dead from wreaking havoc on the living. What we thought R.I.P.D, the 674 th comic book movie to be released this year, looks, at the outset, to have plenty going for it. It has a good director, a cast that ranges from solid (Ryan Reynolds) to excellent (Jeff Bridges, Mary-Louise Parker) and a really neat high-concept premise. Unfortunately, though it's nowhere near the turkey that most critics have deemed it to be, it squanders most of its promise, even as it constantly hints towards better movies and its own underlying potential. It's especially irritating that the film could so easily be bette...