Because Everybody Else Has One

Sorry for the delay but here are a few of my own thoughts on the somewhat underrated latest Hunger Games movie. Once again, a quick reminder and disclaimer that I haven't read a word of the novels and all my usually effusive views on the series are based almost entirely on the films themselves. I have no idea how close this is to the novel, in other words, and I don't particularly care - but I fully understand that if you're one of those fans who have devoured the books multiple times, your views may well be very different to mine. Continuing in the recent tradition of splitting adaptations of popular kid- or YA novels into two or more films, the latest Hunger Games movie captures only the first part of the final book in Suzanne Collins' massively popular series. It's unquestionably true that this is a decision based almost entirely on monetary concerns, what with the Mockingjay novel not being significantly longer than its predecessors and everything, but th...

It's Christopher Nolan's most ambitious film yet, of course I was going to talk about it... Also, this is probably going to be a bit of a long one so I have included heading breaks for ease of reading.  Finally, I will do my utmost to reveal as little about the plot as is humanly possible because, despite some fairly predictable story beats, it's probably best to go in knowing as little about the film as possible. Consider this review free of spoilers but if you haven't seen the film yet, you may want to avoid the section marked "plot and themes". Drawing heavily from all sorts of existent science fiction (novels like Childhood's End, TV shows like Babylon 5 and, of course, films like 2001: A Space Odyssey, Contact and Silent Running), Christopher Nolan's latest is both his most ambitious film ever and his most intimate, spiritual and sentimental. It's also highly divisive, unquestionably flawed - though what the actual flaws are, is perha...

Quite a nice week at the cinema this week and I especially hope to have a fairly in-depth look at Interstellar up soon but, for now, here's my take on what must surely be the best romantic comedy of the year - if not last couple of years. This review is also up at Channel 24 . What it's about Wallace (Daniel Radcliffe) is still struggling to get over a particularly painful breakup that left him depressed, anti-social and professionally adrift, but when he meets and quickly forms a connection with Chantry (Zoe Kazan) at a party he is begrudgingly forced to attend by his roommate, he believes that he has finally found a way out of the darkness and towards the potential of his first real romance in years. Unfortunately, Zoe is in a happy, committed relationship with her boyfriend of five years, Ben (Rafe Spall). Trying instead to be “just friends” with her, Wallace, is forced to come to terms with whether he can ever really be friends with someone with whom he is ho...

There are a bunch of films I haven't seen thanks to a mixture of Jewish holidays and a lack of screenings but here are my thoughts on a few films released over the past couple of weeks that I haven't managed to touch on. What, you didn't really think I'd pass up my turn to pass judgement on the new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie, didja? As a child of the '80s, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles   obviously have a particularly special place in my heart so you would perhaps understand my trepidation when I heard that Michael Bay and one of his hellish acolytes would be foisting upon the world their own interpretation of this apparently unkillable franchise. The acolyte in question, incidentally, is none other than Jonathan Liebesman, whose Battle Los Angeles and Wrath of the Titans are so bad they manage to give Bay's own Transformers travesties a run for their money in the blockbusters-from-hell stakes. Things did not look promising. And, would you know ...

Probably the most scary film released this Halloween... This review is also up at Channel 24 What it's about A documentary about how people eat too much sugar and how the food industry contributes to this unhealthy habit. What we thought Fed Up is a movie that has something very important to say about our diets, our understanding on health and weight-loss and about how the international food industry is not necessarily working in the best interests of the public. Unfortunately, it's also a movie that uses shock sensationalism to make its point and the picture it paints is so dire that rather than having the intended effect of having its audience want to change their dietary habits, it's bound to leave them dejected and demoralized with an overall sense of powerlessness to make any real change in their lives. On the positive side, what we have here is a film that deals quite extensively with what is clearly a very real problem that affects the dail...