Because Everybody Else Has One

OK, this one isn't bad at all but, eh, for someone as super-talented as Rowan Atkinson, it's nowhere near as good as it should be either. This review is also up on Channel 24 , where you might have seen it over the past five days! What it’s about After a cyber-attack on British Intelligence leaks the names of all operative agents, MI7 are forced to call back into the field one agent they really hoped to have seen the last of: Johnny English. Now, with his trusty sidekick, Boff, at his side and a beautiful Russian spy on his tail, English is all that stands between order and technological Armageddon. Heaven help us all. What we thought You would think that by the third entry in this underwhelming spy-comedy series, I would have learned to temper my expectation that a Johnny English film would ever be anything more than a moderately amusing but instantly forgettable footnote in the career of one of the UK’s greatest comedic talents. Predictably enough, Johnny English...

Once again late with posting my Channel 24 reviews from last Friday. I feel particularly bad because some of you, my dear (few) readers, may not be aware of just how rotten this film, in particular, is. I mean, I've heard that there are other reviewers out there - all of whom feel the same way as me, apparently - but that can't be right, can it?  What it’s about The true story of John Gotti, the notorious mob enforcer who worked his way up the ranks of the Gambino crime family to become, the “Teflon Don”, the face of organized crime in Boston in the 1980s. What we thought It’s not often you come across a film based on a potentially interesting true story of one of the most notorious mobsters in history that turns out to be this much of a turkey. Gotti isn’t just a film that pales in comparison to dozens of gangster films – Goodfellas, being a particularly obvious touchstone here – but looks all the more embarrassing for how it looks like nothing more than the result...

And the other terrible movie of the (last) week. Though, not for nothing, this one is even worse! This too has been up on Channel 24 since this past Friday. What it’s about While deployed in South East Asia, James Silva, an elite American intelligence officer is approached by a police officer with some invaluable, deadly information, which he will hand over in exchange for asylum in America. With competing groups after the cop and the knowledge he possesses, Silva and his team need to get him onto a plane heading out of the country before time runs out. What we thought Including shorts and TV episodes, Mile 22 is Peter Berg’s 28th credited directorial effort. It is also the fifth film he made with Mark Wahlberg in the leading role. I bring this up not just because in Mile 22 Berg seems entirely unaware of Wahlberg’s strengths and weaknesses as a performer but because it is a film so ineptly put together on even the most basic levels that it’s almost impossible to believe t...

Between Rosh Hashana and my desire to expunge these two films from my memory, I forgot to post my latest reviews. Time permitting, I hope to write at least a short review of the brilliant BlacKKKlansman but for now, here is the first of two films to skip that came out this past Friday. Both reviews have, however, been up on Channel 24 since then. What it’s about A prequel to the Conjuring, the Nun picks up in 1952 when a novice, Sister Irene, teams up with a veteran priest, Father Burke, on a Vatican-sanctioned mission to investigate the mysterious suicide of a nun in an ancient convent in Romania. What we thought Building on the groundwork laid by 2010’s Insidious, the original Conjuring film cemented the return to more traditional horror after years of increasingly ghastly “torture-porn” and found-footage drew the entire genre (or at least the Hollywood version of it) deeper and deeper into the mud. It may not have ranked right up there with the very best horror films e...