The Pa Boys: Movie Review

The Pa Boys: Movie Review

Cast: Francis Kora, Matariki Whatarau, Juanita Hepi, Roimata Fox
Director: Himiona Grace

From the producer of such Kiwi cinematic luminaries as Eagle vs Shark and Boy comes this new feature, hitting cinemas on Waitangi Day.

Set in contemporary Wellington, it's the story of a reggae band, The Pa Boys, who are made up of two mates, and a new flattie, Tau. Deciding to go on a pub tour "down north", the boys face the inevitable tensions of life on the road.

But for Danny (Fran Kora) it's a bigger issue - the appearance of the spiritually centred and in-touch-with-his-ancestors Tau (Matariki Whatarau) causes wider concerns, with his feeling of displacement coming to the fore.

And these worries and insecurities threaten to derail the band's easy musical rapport....

The Pa Boys has a relaxed and gently soulful vibe to it that's hard to deny - if you're expecting another Mt Zion style film, then you'll be in for a shock because Grace's put together a flick which addresses spiritual concerns and accepting your roots ahead of any major musical influence.

While Danny has a growing sense of resentment and alienation, the opposite can be said of Tau in this simply told story and the gentle push and pull helps propel it along. Occasionally, the movie drifts a little as its focus wanders and it can in the odd moment or two, feel like a Maori history lesson as Tau waxes lyrical about how the North island was fished up, but along with the strong use of the scenery and spiritually reflective tone of the movie, The Pa Boys is a measured movie which will strike a chord with some more than others.

The music scenes give an eclectic glimpse into the pub touring circuit and encapsulate the small town vibes and attitudes towards bands heading their way; and the music benefits from having an actual singer on duties.

The ensemble cast are solid with Danny (Kora) giving enough of a feeling of alienation and loss.

All in all, The Pa Boys is a solid debut from Grace; with a little more editing and potentially a little more story, it could have soared a little higher.

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Are We Officially Dating?: Movie Review

Are We Officially Dating?: Movie Review

Cast: Zac Efron, Imogen Poots, Miles Teller, Michael B Jordan, Mackenzie Davis
Director: Tom Gormican

Buddy boy rom-coms get another once over with this comedy with Zac Efron.

Efron is Jason, a lothario, who's all about the booty call and the lack of commitment. A book cover designer by day and barfly by night, he lives his life in the now, and always avoids that awkward moment in a relationship when it's about to turn serious.

But when his friend Mikey discovers his wife is cheating on him, he decides, along with their other lady killer buddy, Daniel (the ever impressive Miles Teller), that all three of them will stay single in a bromance commitment to each other for as long as they can.

However, that plan hits a roadblock when Daniel falls for the group's wingman (actually a woman) Chelsea (Mackenzie Davis) and Mikey keeps trying again with his wife. And things get worse for Jason, who falls for Imogen Poots' Ellie in a bar. After a one night stand, the pair bump into each other at Jason's work - and complications ensue.

Are We Officially Dating? aka That Awkward Moment is the kind of romcom that tries to appeal to the boys as it celebrates the bonds of bachelorhood but gets caught up in the schmaltz of typical romcom tropes.

It isn't always so during the start of the movie; there are playful moments and laugh out loud raunchy moments as a naked Zac Efron pivots on a toilet after taking Viagra and Michael B Jordan masturbates over a coaster from a woman whose number he got in a bar. But those moments fade pretty quickly as the script and story settles for something formulaic and entirely unenticing.

It's not really Efron's fault though - the story's lacking in any real fizzing moments as it plays out; Teller has some nice moments as he realises that the girl who's been helping him to hook up is the one for him and Jordan comes full circle as he realises that married life will never be the same. However, it's Poots' character who suffers the worst in this - she's initially feisty and a little bit independent but gradually begins to crumble as time goes on. Her worst crime is taking on Jason after he abandons her in an hour of need, just because of fears that by showing up, it would prove they're dating and committed.

All in all, Are We Officially Dating? has no incisive insight into modern relationships, nor does it offer enough of the stupidity to appeal to the male spectrum of cinema-goers. It's weak, lacking in ribaldry and fails to hit the spot at all.

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Captain America: The Winter Soldier Superbowl spot

Captain America: The Winter Soldier Superbowl spot

Here it is - the Captain America: The Winter Soldier Superbowl spot.

Chris Evans stars as Captain America in the film coming in April from Marvel.

Watch the Captain America: The Winter Soldier Superbowl spot below.

Noah SuperBowl spot

Noah SuperBowl spot

The Superbowl spot for Noah has been released.

Starring Russell Crowe as Noah, the film is due later this year.

Transformers: Age of Extinction -- First Look Spot

Transformers: Age of Extinction -- First Look Spot 

It's here, the very first look at Transformers: Age of Extinction.

The Michael Bay helmed film is due for release on June 26th and stars Mark Wahlberg.

Take a look at Transformers: Age Of Extinction below:

Saving Mr Banks: Movie Review

Saving Mr Banks: Movie Review

Cast: Tom Hanks, Emma Thompson, Colin Farrell, Rachel Griffiths, Ruth Wilson, Paul Giamatti, Bradley Whitford, Jason Schwartzman, BJ Novak
Director: John Lee Hancock

A Disney film about the making of a Disney film that was so beloved by so many?

Yep, that's Saving Mr Banks - about the creative wrangles and 20 year fight good ole Walt faced to get Mary Poppins author P L Travers to hand over her creation to the Mouse empire.

Emma Thompson is Mary Poppins author P L Travers in this film which begins in 1961 in London with her accountant urging her to reconsider and sign the rights to Disney before she goes bankrupt. After years of wooing her, Tom Hanks' Walt Disney wants her to come to Hollywood so he can mount one final push and show her that he will be careful of how she's committed to celluloid.

But old Walt, despite the charm offensive, has reckoned without the over-protective and over-bearing nature of Travers, whose pernickerty ways could signal the end of Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious before it even hits the screen.

However, through flashbacks to her childhood, Travers' reasons for wanting to protect Mary Poppins are gradually revealed - and it looks like Walt may have to break a promise he made to his own daughters some 20 years ago over the making of the film....

Emma Thompson excels as the controlling Travers, a woman whose life has been precariously built up around the nanny, who saved her in more ways than one. There are plenty of guffaws as Travers dishes out withering looks or put downs as she deals with growing exasperation with the songwriting Sherman brothers (Schwartzman and Novak) and the dwindling patience of Disney. It's a bravura performance, one which soars thanks to the self control of Thompson herself - from the very beginning to the very end of this, she owns and commands the screen with incredible cinematic aplomb - and I'd be very surprised to see her passed over in the forthcoming awards season.

If anything, Hanks' solid performance as Disney is a little overshadowed by the greatness of Thompson. He delivers a slick and subtle turn as the slick showman, so determined to win and fulfil his dream of making Mary Poppins part of the House of Mouse. From bombarding Travers in her hotel room with a plethora of plush stuffed toys, he lays on the charm. It's only really in the final scenes that Disney's ruthlessness comes to the fore as he refuses to have Travers at the premiere of the movie, for fear she could damage its reputation.

So with these two at loggerheads and Travers' antics in the rehearsal room proving the meat on this backstory's bones, it's a shame to say that Hancock over-eggs the narrative pudding with more than just a spoonful of sugar by over-using flashbacks to Travers' life as a youngster in Australia. Complete with Colin Farrell, these are used too often when sparing insertion into the story would have proved more effective. No more is this apparent than in the final sequence as Travers watches Mary Poppins and the director chooses to overstate the sentiment by cutting back and forth - a little subtlety and easing up would have worked wonders, instead of plumping for mawkish, heavy-handed manipulative film-making.

Overall, Saving Mr Banks soars because of Emma Thompson's uptight PL Travers; it's a fascinating dramatisation of what happens when British stiff upper lip meets a bombastic American charm offensive; it's just a shame that in parts, it's a terribly hollow and typically manipulative piece, which cries out for more simplicity and subtlety.

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Labor Day: Movie Review

Labor Day: Movie Review

Cast: Kate Winslet, Josh Brolin, Gattlin Griffith, Clark Gregg, James Van Der Beek, Tobey Maguire
Director: Jason Reitman

The director of Up In The Air returns for a masterful take on a Joyce Maynard novel.

It's 1987, small town America, and young teen Henry (Gattlin Griffith) is planning to spend Labor Day weekend, dreaming of life and getting ready to go back to school. But Henry's already grown up, having to care for his depressed mother Adele (a washed out Kate Winslet), who's never been the same since her husband Gerald (Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D's Clark Gregg) left.

Unable to really live or even leave the house, Adele's prone to only occasional visits out, accompanied by Henry. However, one day, heading out to the shop for their monthly pilgrimage, Henry's approached by a man called Frank who is in dire need of help. Corralling Adele into helping as well, Frank, along with Henry, heads back to their home....it's here that they realise Frank is a criminal on the run.

Suddenly, the tension's palpable and Labor Day weekend is going to be a long weekend in more ways than one.

Labor Day is a gorgeously shot and utterly resonant piece of film-making from Up In The Air director Jason Reitman, who has, in one fell swoop, substantially upped his game (which was admittedly already pretty high).

Through beauteous tracking shots and occasionally portentous music, this surprising drama unfolds in a manner that's both engrossing and utterly compelling, forcing you to wallow in the story. There's a pensive, almost summer dream-like quality to the images as they fall from the screen; through gradual reveals and flashbacks, Reitman weaves together a cinematic tapestry that's subtle, nuanced and utterly hard to ignore.

Winslet's mightily impressive as the single mom, who's battling depression and anxiety after years of being solo and homebound after a break up devastated her. Even that is only the tip of the iceberg for her story, but her performance is never less than captivating as she struggles with trying to come back to life and delusions of a happy ending.

Josh Brolin also deserves praise too for his understated and initially menacing turn as the escaped convict Frank. He brings a palpable sense of dread to start off with as he intimidates Henry and Adele into helping him; but unsurprisingly in this tale, there's more to his story than you first realise. The coming of age / unconventional - yet somehow conventional - bonding he shares with Henry is surprisingly poignant and tugs at your heart strings for all its rugged sensitivity. Add into that a scene which stirs the steaming bubbling pot of sexual tension in the creation of a pie and you've got something hot and sizzling that's all about the interpretation rather than the reality.

It's not revealing much to say that events and neighbours conspire against this Stockholm Syndrome story, but the main trio put in such quietly understated and impressive performances that you can't help but get captivated in this moody tale. All three are hoping for a dream outcome to what can -and must be- a doomed reality. Henry wants a father figure, Adele a release from years of not living and loving and Frank wants to atone for the past, regain what he lost and of course, be free.

All of these are doomed to failure as the bittersweet journey continues, but Reitman handles each with such deftness and directorial dexterity that we're captivated, swept up in the hopes and fears and ensconced in the story telling.

There are a couple of flaws in it though - a scene with Tobey Maguire seems surplus to requirements and some of the flashbacks seem a little unnecessarily dragged out and interspersed too randomly, but these are minor quibbles in a piece of film-making that luxuriates in the finer details of long lazy weekends.

All in all, Labor Day is a superior serving of drama that deserves your time.

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