It's a Wonderful Afterlife: Movie Review

It's a Wonderful Afterlife: Movie Review

It's A Wonderful Afterlife
Rating: 3/10
Cast: Goldy Notay, Shabana Azmi, Sendhil Ramamurthy, Sanjeev Bhaskar
Director: Gurindha Chadha
From director of Bend It Like Beckham comes this latest cinematic outing.
It's A Wonderful Afterlife is the tale of Mrs Sethi (Azmi) an Indian mother living in London whose daughter Roopi (Notay) is a constant unlucky in love girl.
Continually rejected Roopi stands no chance of being married off - but her mother has other plans turning to the murder of those who have disrespected or mocked her daughter.
However, she finds the spirits of the slain coming back to haunt her - as the police continue to investigate the killings.
And things get further complicated for Mrs Sethi and Roopi as Roopi falls for Sendhil Ramamurthy Raj, a DI investigating the case..
It's A Wonderful Afterlife feels like a film harking back to the 1960s - while director Chadha has said she was after channeling Ealing comedies, it's the script and some terrible jokes which don't help. Everyone gives fair performances but with such a clunker of a script, it's hard for any of them to rise out of the mire.
It's supposed to be a horror comedy - with homages to Carrie and Alien, it's clear Chadha has honourable intentions - but with a succession of unwelcome fat jokes, it's, to be frank, a major disappointment.
I get that it's supposed to reflect and to some level parody attitudes within Indian communities towards marriage (and even reincarnation) but it just doesn't rise out of clichéd humour and stereotypes which are frustrating in the extreme. And it builds and builds towards a staged but at times amusing homage to Carrie - complete with curry explosions.
Of the ghosts which haunt Mrs Sethi, UK comedian Sanjeev Bhaskar has the lion's share of the funny lines (as you'd expect) as a philandering husband whose stomach explodes at the start of the film thanks to a poisoned curry - and then spends the rest of the film with his innards hanging out.

Maybe 20 or 30 years ago this film would be welcome - but in this 21st century, it leaves as much of a terrible after taste as a over seasoned curry reheated two days after a night out on the town.

Beneath Hill 60: Movie Review

Beneath Hill 60: Movie Review

Beneath Hill 60
Rating: 8/10
Cast: Brendan Cowell, Harrison Gilbertson
Director: Jeremy Sims
There's nothing worse than imagining the hell on earth that is war.
Beneath Hill 60 is the latest recreation of World War I's horrors and is based on the true story of Aussie miner Oliver Woodward (an outstandingly compassionate turn from Brendan Cowell) and his part in the war effort in 1916.
After initially being held back from the war to help mine for munitions supplies, Woodward joins the Western Front and with a successful attempt at removing an Allied threat, he and his team are pushed up the line to try and help them take Hill 60 - by working underground.
But the Germans are also keen to ensure that the famous Hill 60 doesn't fall, thus setting up a game of cat and mouse.
Beneath Hill 60 is a claustrophobic, grimy affair - as you'd expect from a film about mining and the first World War. The recreation of the trenches and the daily horrors only serve to make me appreciate how much was given at the time by those who fought.
Woodward's story at the western front is interspersed with flashbacks to his time in his homeland - and the burgeoning relationship he forms with the daughter of a neighbouring family. Sadly some of these scenes don't quite give the action in the trenches the emotional depth it needs. But there's still an everyman appeal to Woodward and his compadres.
When the action (such as it is) cuts back to the trenches, there's plenty of nail-biting moments to be had - from scenes of men getting lost in No Man's Land to German miners getting ever closer to discovering what Woodward and his men are up to. Because of the quiet character moments of this film, when the shocks come, some of them are real surprises. Much like the atmosphere at the time, there is an inevitability that something will happen and when it does, you can guarantee you'll be jumping out of your seat.
Brendan Cowell is mightily impressive as the lead character - with a laid-back humour and an Aussie battler attitude. His quiet steely determination anchors the whole picture in heart and humanity - the only minor disappointment is the relative ease in which he makes a major sacrifice at the end of the film - the lack of emotional pay-off is disappointing (although perhaps inevitable given the nature of the film).

Beneath Hill 60 is one of the better war films I've seen. It stays away from the grandiose, prolonged war scenes of some of its bedfellows and sticks more to a story painted on an intimate canvas, so is likely to resonate with many long after the very impressive and moving credits have finished.

Predicament: Movie Review

Predicament: Movie Review

Predicament
Rating: 5/10
Cast: Jemaine Clement, Tim Finn, Hayden Frost, Heath Franklin, Rose McIver
Director: Jason Stutter
Adapted from the novel by New Zealand author Ronald Hugh Morrieson, this is the tale of naive teen Cedric Williamson (newcomer Hayden Frost).
Cedric is bullied at school and has an odd family life (to say the least). His father (Tim Finn) is building an enormous tower in their front yard from rubble, as he copes with the loss of his wife.
One day Cedric meets Mervyn Toebeck (Heath Franklin aka comedian Chopper) and the pair forms a friendship, with Mervyn abusing the bond to bludge off Cedric and his family.
When pasty white oddball Spook (Jemaine Clement) shows up, the trio hits upon the idea of blackmailing the locals - and Cedric's determined to use the scheme to get revenge against the Bramwells (the developers who stole his family land).
But things go more than awry.
Predicament aims for Gothic comedy and tries to reveal the seedy underbelly of the New Zealand small-town community - but it doesn't quite make it.
With scams aplenty, suspicion, paranoia and oddball characters, it is really a reviewing predicament too. Clement is great as Spook, the nasally weird character who trots out some bizarre lines here and there; Franklin is good as the confidence trickster Mervyn - who adds "old son" to every sentence - but Hayden Frost has a lot to carry with the film and sadly falls a little short of the mark.
His Cedric is a stuttering, blinking nerd who you're never really 100% behind - and when the tension and drama steps up, his character tends to resort to facial tics. To be fair, some of this may be due to the direction rather than Frost's interpretation.
What is wonderful about this film though is the look and feel - its creepy, Gothic small-town look is brilliantly evocative and a tribute to the recreation of 1930s Taranaki. Also it puts me in mind of Tim Burton's best at times.

Overall, I have mixed feelings about Predicament - I think there will be some who will adore all of it from beginning to end and there will be others (like myself) who are just a little disappointed with what's seen on the screen.

Piranha 3D: Movie Review

Piranha 3D: Movie Review

Piranha 3D
Rating: 7/10
Cast: Steven McQueen, Elisabeth Shue,Ving Rhames, Kelly Brook, Jerry O'Connell, Lots of piranha with sharp vicious teeth
Director: Alexandre Aja
Seriously - you want a plot? Most of it's there in the title...
OK - It's spring break in Arizona and with thousands of randy ready to party teens heading to town and on Lake Victoria itself, local sheriff Julie Forester (Elisabeth Shue) has her hands full.
But matters are made worse when an earthquake rips open a prehistoric cavern where thousands of vicious death fish live (See I told you the plot was minimal) and they plough into the Lake ready to feast.
However, Julie's woes are further compounded by the fact her son Jake (McQueen) is on the sea having fallen in with sleazy sex film maker Derrick Jones (O'Connell) who's out to exploit everyone and anything in a bikini to help make a new series of Girls Gone wild style videos during this peak time of nubile nudity.
And as if that wasn't bad enough, Jake's foregone his baby sitting duties and left his brother and sister to their own devices for the promise of some babes - let's just hope that those cutesy kids don't wander off and end up on the lake.
- This just in - That's exactly what the kids have done....
So with the promise of gore, nudity and minimal plot exposition, it looks like Spring Break is going to be one to remember.
Look, it's time to fess up - you can file Piranha under guilty pleasure and bloody good fun - if you like countless deaths, gratuitous nudity and B movie acting. It's a remake of the 1978 film (which was itself a parody of Jaws) and works well in places because you actually care about some of the characters (such as Jake and his sheriff mum).
Sometimes, cinema isn't about anything more than the pure pleasure and putting your brain in a jar outside the door and collecting on the way out - this fish porn gore combination isn't going to win any major awards but it is destined for cult notoriety with its quotable lines and high bloody death quotient.
It's a worthy successor to Jaws for our generation (admittedly without the real tension) - the Facebook short attention span generation who want everything bigger, better and nastier than before - sure some of it is pure exploitation (such as the topless paraglider who goes into the water when the camera suddenly switches to underwater 3D mode) and the carnage unleashed by feeding frenzy when the piranha hit is ferocious - those alone will satiate a certain section of the audience.
Every ingredient is there - the kids who disobey authority, the sleazy guy who's selfishly only after his own gains, the teens who choose to ignore warnings - it's like a check list of cliches but thanks to the tongue in cheek acting, you know exactly what you're getting.
Of the cast, kudos have to go to Richard Dreyfuss' opening cameo which parodies his Jaws role, Christopher Lloyd for his mad marine shop owner (sample line - "This one vanished 2 million years ago") and Elisabeth Shue for keeping a straight face when those around her are being slaughtered and dismembered by fish and idiot teens alike. Admittedly, there's some pretty gross out ways that the spring breakers are dispatched which keeps the audience's blood lust in check.
A sequel's inevitable and has been green lit - so you may as well see the start of the franchise before it's culled and the fun's drained out of it.

Oh and you'll never ever be able to listen to Lakme's The Flower Duet without recalling certain moments of this film again...

Charlie Bartlett: DVD Review

Charlie Bartlett: DVD Review

Charlie Bartlett

Rating: M
Released by Roadshow Home Entertainment

Robert Downey Jr continues to be the man of the moment - his laconic turn in Kiss, Kiss, Bang, Bang sent him back into the stratosphere of acting and confirmed that despite his battles with his own demons, he's still a talent to watch. Indeed, his role in Iron Man cemented his stature, and in Charlie Bartlett, while he's only one of the supporting players, he simply blows everyone off the screen.

Anton Yelchin of Star Trek fame is Charlie Bartlett.

On first meeting, he's being kicked out of school for making fake IDs - and when he's signed up for another school run by Downey Jr's principal, you know their paths will cross at some point.

Particularly when he starts dating the principal's daughter.

There's sardonic humour aplenty - the film feels fresh, funny and darkly comic.
A wonderful treat.

Extras: Commentary with director and stars Yelchin and Kat Dennings make this great.

Rating: 7/10

Harry Brown: Movie Review

Harry Brown: Movie Review

Harry Brown
Rating: 7/10
Cast: Michael Caine, Emily Mortimer, Liam Cunningham, Iain Glen, Ben Drew
Director: Daniel Barber
Crikey, if this is an even remotely accurate view of life in England these days, then I'm glad I'm here.
In what's rumoured to be his acting swansong, Caine is ex serviceman Harry Brown, who lives his life on a council estate and getting by since being recently widowed.
His one real friend in life, fellow pensioner Leonard (David Bradley) drinks with Harry but confides in him one day that he's frightened and being terrorized by the estate's hoody brigade.
When the police show up on his door - in the form of Emily Mortimer's quiet and thoughtful DI Frampton - one day and tell him that Leonard's been found in a local underpass brutally murdered, Brown realizes that the fight against the lawless has come to his door.
So he decides to take his own measures to ensure the clean up of the estate begins.
Touted as the UK's answer to Clint Eastwood's Gran Torino and Charles Bronson's Death Wish, there's certainly plenty of similarities in this one man campaign for violent vengeance.
But it's thanks to Caine's studied and underplayed performance, that it's more shocking when the quiet soulless eyed pensioner Brown finally explodes into a murderous rampage.
And it's also thanks to Daniel Barber's direction, that you really can't blame him for going postal on the hooded gangs and yobs who're spreading fear around - and liberally bashing whomsoever they want. With a hand held shot opening that sees the group getting high and going on a drug fuelled rampage (which culminates in the callous shooting of a mother), there's never really any chance to offer any sympathy to these foul mouthed tykes.
Sure the message is somewhat heavy handed and the agenda somewhat liberal, but it's very hard to find yourself not rooting for Caine's Harry Brown, the vigilante pensioner who police dismiss as being behind the escalating violence. Emily Mortimer's DI Frampton is also good - with her quiet desperation at the lack of support from her superiors etched across her face. Though it has to be said she's somewhat lacking when faced opposite the towering Caine.
There's plenty of dark humour buried well within the grime and horror which unfolds on the screen; a sequence where Brown ends up buying a gun from a drug dealer is a masterclass in itching tension and uncomfortable horror; but there's also unfortunately a risible end which makes Harry Brown a slightly botched opportunity and detracts a little from what's gone before.

That said, this is Michael Caine's best performance in a while - his sad sack ex-serviceman is a simmering formidable foe for the dregs of society. But it's his moments of quiet dignity on the screen which remind you that if this really is his last role, we're losing someone monumental.

Salt: Movie Review

Salt: Movie Review

Salt
Rating: 5/10
Cast: Angelina Jolie, Liev Schreiber, Chiwetel Ejiofor
Director: Phillip Noyce
In the absence of any kind of new Bond film, there's always a new contender ready to step up.
This year's entry is Angelina Jolie's Salt.
Jolie is Evelyn Salt, a CIA agent whose life is turned upside down one day when, on the eve of her wedding anniversary, a Russian defector comes in from the cold and fingers her as a Russian sleeper agent.
And things go from bad to worse when Salt's accused of being the one who will kill the Russian president in America, igniting fears of Day X (a feared day when America and her allies will be attacked on all sides) coming true.
Mind you, Salt doesn't help herself by running - to try and clear her name.
Soon, everyone wants a piece of Salt - and the clock is ticking.
Salt is a thriller which doesn't thrill as much as it could. It's fine in the action stakes and kudos need to be given to those involved as the majority of the stunts are done without the use of CGI...but it's the story which has hokum written all over it.
Right - here's your warning; this is where things get a little spoilery.
If you're after a bit of a story where the plot holes are apparent but want to just put your brain in neutral, then this is the film for you.
As Salt swaps sides left right and centre, it gets a bit dizzying as you try and keep up with who she is and isn't - but it's almost as if the film makers have considered that and when she goes bad, she wears black (just like in the wild west) and when she's Russian, she wears Russian furs.
While that sounds fine, that's indicative of how the overall film is - it's not amazing and it's not terrible either - it's just ok. There's a clever idea in there about sleeper agents - and one twist did catch me unaware - but all in all, the film feels a little bit of a disappointment.
And the fact it's set up for a sequel didn't leave me wanting more (not a good sign).
The main trio of actors involved- Schreiber, Ejiofor and Jolie acquit themselves fine - they're all very dour and G man in various ways - and the whole film does take itself rather seriously. Jolie's ok when she's kicking some ass but she looks so slight that it's a hard ask to be convinced that she'd be the one to better the bad guys (or are they the good guys?).
Unfortunately Salt is lacking a little bite and tension at the end - while there are some signs those involved wanted this to be a female Bourne Identity, it doesn't quite measure up and is ultimately underwhelming.

(Although having watched Salt, I've learnt how to turn an ordinary office chair into some kind of rocket launcher - so my colleagues had best watch out...)