Because Everybody Else Has One

So simple a title, such a mess of a movie. This review is also up on Channel 24 What it's about After his personal life is ripped apart by a brutal terrorist attack, Mitch Rapp starts a one-man war against radical Islamist terrorism. His actions soon catch the attention of the CIA who enlist him to be part of their most elite counter-terrorism group – if, that is, he can survive training by Stan Hurley, a celebrated, tough-as-nails CIA and army veteran known for breaking his recruits. What we thought American Assassin has the sort of title that immediately brings to mind fairly straightforward action-thrillers that, more often than not, find their home on late night TV, where they can be enjoyed by insomniacs and undiscerning action junkies. I've long railed against these kinds of films taking the place of much worthier films in our local cinemas – and I stand by that – but in the case of American Assassin things aren't quite so simple. And, sadly, ...

Question: How do you turn 15,000 pages of story into a 90-minute movie? Answer: You don't. This review is also up on  Channel 24 What It's About Loosely based on the Stephen King fantasy series, the Dark Tower tells the story of Jake, a teenager whose visions of another world may be written off as a sign of madness by his parents, doctors, teachers and friends but when a series of events leads him to that other world, he comes face to face with his visions brought to life: an eternal battle of good and evil between the The Man in Black who wants to bring darkness and death to multiple worlds and Roland, the last Gunslinger, the one man who could stop him. At the centre of their conflict is the Dark Tower, a single structure that lies at the centre of reality and is the only thing standing between the Multiverse and whatever darkness lies outside it. What we thought Spanning three decades, seven novels, a number of spin-off books, comics and thousands up...

Exceptional? Maybe not. But pretty worth seeing. This review is also up on Channel 24 What it's about Set during the height of World War 2 where Adolf Hitler had effectively exiled the German monarch, Kaiser Wilhelm, and his wife to the Netherlands to “wait out the war”, a young soldier is assigned to the Kaiser's home as head of security but whose main mission is to spy on the household and to report any seditious, anti-Nazi activities going on there. He quickly falls for a bold, outspoken housemaid who has plenty of secrets of her own – not least of all being that is Jewish. What we thought Despite its setting and its plot, it would be a stretch to call the Exception a “Holocaust film” - both because it only touches on the Holocaust and the rampant anti-Semitism going on in Europe at the time and because these truly dark historic events are used mostly as context for the story it's trying to tell, rather than the story itself. The result is a film th...

Too soon? This review is also up on  Channel 24 What it's about As the Twin Towers are attacked on that fateful day in September 2001, a group of people stuck in a broken down elevator in the North Tower struggle to survive, while confronting their own and each other's personal demons. What we thought 9/11 is an uncomfortable watch – unfortunately, not always for the reasons that the filmmakers clearly want it to be. On the one hand, it is a taut, if overly generic survival thriller with, to be honest, fairly b-grade level performances from most of the cast and some seriously creaky dialogue. On this level it works, just about, even if there's little about it that demands paying the high price of a cinema ticket to see it. The problem is that this perfectly adequate b-movie is taking place within the context of a still fairly recent tragedy; a tragedy whose effects still resonate with even those of us who have never been within a thousand miles of...

Soon to be known as the one where Anakin Skywalker acts John McClane off the screen. This review is also up on Channel 24 . What It's About A big-time city man returns to his small-town home to take his young son hunting but while they're on the hunt they witness one man shooting another after a clearly illicit deal goes wrong. Things quickly go from bad to worse as they are drawn into a web of dirty cops and dangerous bank robbers. What we thought It says something about just how far Bruce Willis has fallen that he is acted off the screen at every turn by Hayden Christensen. Christensen will clearly never be able to escape being the man who played Darth Vader as a whiny adolescent but, to be fair, he is probably never going to be a genuinely good, let alone great, actor. He's certainly a much better actor than the Star Wars prequels suggested but when you consider the pool of seriously talented young actors out there right now, he seems destined to co...

Cruise is back! That didn't take long... This review is also up at Channel 24 What It's About Barry Seal is a successful TWA pilot whose small-time smuggling side business catches the eye of the CIA who enlists him to help spy on communist training camps in Latin America. It's not long, however, before he comes to the attention of the up and coming Medellin drug cartel who in turn make him an offer he can't refuse to smuggle their drugs into the United States while on his missions for the CIA. Based loosely on a true story. What We Thought After the Mummy proved to be Tom Cruise's first genuinely bad movie in a very long time, it's particularly pleasing to see him back on such fine form just a few months later in a role that seems all but written for him. Cruise's particular mix of serious charisma and just the right amount of crazy has long made him one of Hollywood's most undeniable movie stars and it's that very combination t...

Because 14:22 isn't catchy enough a title... This review is also up on  Channel 24 . What it's about Dylan is an air-traffic controller whose preternatural ability to see patterns in everyday events makes him both very good at his job and gives his life a certain amount of predictability. His life soon takes a turn for the decidedly unpredictable, however, after he nearly causes two planes to crash into one another and meets the woman of his dreams – who also happens to have been a passenger on one of those planes – on the same day. It's around this time, as well, that he starts to notice certain events repeating themselves day in and day out – all culminating in a “bang” at 2:22 PM – a “bang” that may be related to an act of violence that happened decades previously. What we thought The fact that 2:22 bears more than a passing resemblance to a mixture of the Buffy: The Vampire Slayer episode, “Amends”, the X-Files episode, “Monday”, and whole chunks of ...

So, I apparently like this more than most critics. Who knew? Oh, also why isn't this the only poster for the film, rather than that bland action-pose poster we have in all South African cinemas? I literally chuckled at this play on the old Bodyguard poster. But then, I'm apparently more easily amused than some... This review is also up at Channel 24 What it's about A disgraced bodyguard is called on to transport a notorious hitman from the UK to the International Court of Justice at the Hague so that he can testify to the crimes of of a brutal Eastern European dictator, with whom he once had dealings. What we thought Take your basic Midnight Run premise, mix it with Deadpool's irreverence (and star) and add some Fast and Furious chase scenes and you have the Hitman's Bodyguard, an unoriginal, silly and way overlong action-comedy that is also frequently funny, effortlessly enjoyable and immensely likeable. Ryan Reynolds' career has taken ...

Tear Jerker/ Vomit Inducer/ Whatever This review is also up at Channel 24 What it's about A high-powered recruitment agent neglects his family for his job but when his son turns gravely ill, he is forced to confront his priorities in his life and just what he's really living for. What we thought Taking a hiatus from his usual wham bam action fare with a convincing enough turn as a (spoiler) douchebag-turned-softie in this by-the-numbers tear-jerker, Gerard Butler headlines a perfectly good cast in a film that is to family dramas what the Olympus Has Fallen series is to action films. It's not egregiously terrible and it's not even entirely unmoving but the only thing that really sets it apart from your average made-for-TV weepie that used to find a home on the Hallmark channel is just how often it manages to miss its mark – which is actually not something you could say about those otherwise pretty rubbish melodramas: they do, at the very least, mana...

A bit of an odd pairing this but bear with me... Despite their pronounced war aspects, Dunkirk and War for the Planet of the Apes are two rather different films. One is a fantasy that makes heavy use of metaphor to talk about real-world issues, while one is an on-the-ground look at a real military event of some 300 000 Allied Soldiers being evacuated from German-occupied Belgium. One is actually a war movie with its emphasis firmly on military battles; one just uses its war trappings as the dressing on what is basically a near-Biblical fable. One centres on the trials and travails of ordinary young men during a horrific historical incident; one features talking apes in a rather (one hopes) unlikely future. These are not the same film by any stretch of the imagination and, yet, as I slouched out of Dunkirk in a state of abject disappointment, all I could do was think back to the latest - and best - Planet of the Apes movie. Both films, you see, are staggering technical achiev...