99 Homes: Film Review

99 Homes: Film Review

Cast: Michael Shannon, Andrew Garfield, Laura Dern
Director: Ramin Bahrani

That 99 Homes leaves you seething is a testament to the power of this drama and the moral turpitude it throws you into as this take on the American dream and the obsessions with property play out.

In an entirely relevant parallel given how over-heated the world's property markets are, Garfield is Dennis Nash, a father whose Orlando family home is foreclosed by the bank in 2008. Believing he has 30 days to fight the repossession, Nash's shocked to find the police on his doorstep the next day, demanding he, his mum (a solid Laura Dern) and his son leave immediately.

Also on the scene of the repossession is the lizard-like Rick Carver (an excellent Michael Shannon), a former real estate agent who is now head of his own realty company and who specialises in taking homes and turning profits - whatever the cost and with no regard for the emotional fall-out.

Humiliated and homeless, Nash is forced to work for Carver in a (contrived) series of events, but soon finds his desire to ensure his family has somewhere to live is over-stepping his basic humanity as his Faustian deal with Carver descends to new depths.

99 Homes is a powerful searing drama; it gives a human and inhuman face to the property crisis that beset America and that teeters on the edge worldwide currently.

Shannon's nothing short of electric and horrifying as Carver, a man whom we first meet at the scene of a suicide of an owner whose home has been taken by Carver's realty business. But in typical anti-hero stance, Carver doesn't care about the human cost of his business and Bahrani isn't really interested in fleshing out his character other than a few piecemeal scenes that give chilling insight and horrifying human touches to this monster of a man.

Equally, Garfield's Nash is played well; the conflict he feels is clearly marked early on, but the gnawing sickness of reality and desperation provides plenty of dramatic fuel as well as plenty of debate over what you would do. The line between black and white blurs easily in this morality tale, given human form and faces which can't be blocked from memory.

As this suspenseful thriller plays out and Nash dances ever closer to the devil, the intensity of the film ramps up, even if the credibility of some of the situations edge dangerously close to convenience rather than natural drama. Certainly, the balance of rational from Nash compared to Carver's clinically cold and despicable attitude is nicely struck early on, and both Garfield and Shannon's performances remain the real reasons to stay so engaged with 99 Homes throughout.

If anything though, 99 Homes is Shannon's film - it's a blistering turn that sees him blow smoke on the fire of who's fuelled this situation and Bahrani fans it by insinuating everyone is to blame, given that the banks lend more money when the home hunters are eager to gobble it up.

Ultimately, 99 Homes is a recession drama and a searing, sickening commentary that will eat at your soul long after it's done  - and thanks to its morally compromised leads, the desperation of Nash and the almost vulture like behaviour of Carver will pick at you long after the lights have gone up.

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Halo 5: Guardians: XBox One Review

Halo 5: Guardians: XBox One Review

Developed by 343 Industries
Platform: XBox One

To say the return of MasterChief on the next gen console is highly anticipated is perhaps a massive understatement.

But it is with nerves too, given how disastrously the MasterChief collection last year launched online capabilities. It was beyond a mess and gave the series a kind of wake up call that perhaps it really didn't need.

So, 343 Industries seized the mettle on this and simply ran with what they thought may make the game as popular as it once was. Their solution? Throw in some mystery, give yourself a chance to head 2 teams and split the action.

It's an intriguing mix and in some ways, it doesn't quite work.

The best way to describe the campaign mode of the game is a slightly frustrating experience that may baffle newcomers to the franchise but will leave others who love the series relatively happy and enthralled with the goings on.

There are 15 missions in the campaign mode, and you get to oscillate between Fireteam Osiris, headed up by the Spartan Locke and the Blue Team, headed up by the legend that is MasterChief. The bad news though - is that you will spend most of your time playing as Locke, and not Chief (potentially something which will enrage fans of the Chief).

Essentially, the game is a hunt the Chief down with a bigger story arc playing out in the background, that taps into the wider Halo universe and will reward those who've been with the franchise from the start or who played through the MasterChief collection last year. The reasons for the hunt I don't want to get into as that's part of the mystery, but needless to say, it does all become explanatory later on.

Locke's team is the more fun one, made up of a scrappy bunch who revel in banter and whose number includes internet fave Nathan Fillion. The great thing about Osiris is the banter as you're on the missions; the bad thing is that as Locke, you can't add to the banter, merely serving as an observer - it's a surprise that since that side of the game is so well-developed you have little to no chance to get involved in it, with the only thing Locke can do (much like MasterChief) being to point to locations to order your team into position.

Graphically, the game is smooth, as waves of enemies head your way. And there's certainly no lack of weaponry dropped to help you take down the masses and hordes - guns drop with regularity and running out of bullets is no problem whatsoever. The speed of the fight sequences are impressive too - you really do have to have your eye on the ball to ensure your own survival. Though, if you're a bit gungho and don't use your team, your death is not necessarily the end as your team mates can be sequestered into reviving you. Enemy AI is improved as well, with critters avoiding walking into fire, hiding from bullets and appearing to invoke their own strategies - a touch that makes this feel responsive and requires you to have some smarts.

Sadly though, not all of the smarts are all of the way through.

Piloting space vehicles is laughable, an exercise in gravity frustrations and physical impossibilities. One mission requires you to fly through the air but doesn't penalise you or your shields as you bounce off structures like a tennis ball batted back and forth. And driving vehicles isn't much better either; the responsive controls fail miserably to cope with anything resembling simplicity.

Equally, there's a lot of Halo 5 that looks damn impressive - but you'll find most of that stuff is limited to the cut scenes. The in-house cinematics are nothing short of awesome; incredibly well executed and beautifully realised, showcasing the absolute best of the next gen console grunt. But there's a degree of frustration with them too - as they show off key scenes, crucial battles and big boss takedowns - of which you have no control. It's a puzzling move from 343 Industries and a real slap in the gaming face; why it was decided upon I don't really know.

I won't yet come to the Warzone Multiplayer review portion as that deserves a separate entry, but Halo 5: Guardians has some highs and some lows on its campaign mode. There are moments which serve it badly and moments which see it soar. For some, the fact that it is a new Halo that's smooth, powerful and enjoyable will be enough to convince them to part with their cash and hours of their lives, but for others, the frustrations of the execution of the campaign mode will prove to be enough of a hindrance.

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Unfinished Business: DVD Review

Unfinished Business: DVD Review

Rating: R16
Released by 20th Century Fox Home Ent

Re-teaming director Ken Scott with his star of Delivery Man Vince Vaughn isn't quite the magic touch you'd perhaps be expecting in this latest.

Vaughn is a brow-beaten Dan Trunkman, a minerals salesman who decides the plans of his boss Chuck (Miller) to restructure is a bridge too far and walks out. The problem is Trunkman needs a job and spotting two fellow ex-employees in the car park (Tim and Mike aka Tom Wilkinson and Dave Franco), the group forms their own splinter company.

A year later, and Trunkman is chasing a deal which could see them beat their final boss - if they can just get some face-time with a big boss in Europe...

So the trio sets off to secure the handshake - despite the G8, a gay fetish event, Oktoberfest, and a marathon taking place at the same time in Berlin where the boys need to go.

Unfinished Business is a film whose title says it all.

The scrappy non-comedy cum drama reeks of inconclusive writing, an inability to know what it wants to be (Is it comedy? No, as there's not enough funny in it. Is it sentimental drama? Nope, because that side is under-cooked too) and a central trio of leads who just really don't have what it takes.

If you've ever wanted to see a film where Dave Franco plays dumb and gets off on seeing naked breasts or a flick where Tom Wilkinson demands to see more "titty" from an overweight sex maid that he ordered, makes a filthy Iron Man pun and does ecstasy, then this is the film for you. Equally, if you've ever wanted to see Nick Frost in a leather clad outfit doing business from a toilet cubicle, then rush off because this film clearly floats your boat.

The problem is that Unfinished Business could have actually made something of itself if it had decided what it wanted to be - you soon get tired of Wilkinson's overtly sexual banter and Franco's innate stupidity (it's never quite explored why he's as dumb as he is and it's frankly, embarrassing) and the raunch that the poster would promise is never remotely delivered. It's the tamest, lamest EuroTrip ever.

So, what are you left with?

Bizarrely and perhaps to its credit, Vaughn plays it all straight, with an air of a man about to crack in a mid-life crisis with his James Corden lookalike son being bullied and his family struggling for cash.

If it were a drama, then there could have been something of the sincerity that the father / family scenes strive for (even if they are a little after school special) and occasionally achieve. If it had been a look at the desperations and struggles of a man teetering on the edge in a society and work-force that's savage, then it would have hit something.

Instead, Unfinished Business is a film that squanders everything; it's an excruciatingly unfunny journey that hits none of the highs on its route and manages to rankle from its Jerry Maguire-esque beginnings right to its very end.

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Slow West: DVD Review

Slow West: DVD Review

Rating: M
Released by Transmission Home Ent

Fresh from Sundance success, the blackly wry Western Slow West gives the genre something a little different and proves a welcome tonic to the usual genre fare.

Smit-McPhee stars as Jay Cavendish, a kid whose determination to reunite with his love Rose has seen him head across the plains of the Wild west of Colorado. But Jay is an effete, naive dreamer, whose first moments see him cross paths with Silas (a cigar-chewing Fassbender, who's terrific as the drifter who hides a secret). Realising that Jay's out of his depth, he offers to pay Silas to get him to his destination.

Which is probably a good thing - as there are all manner of hidden dangers in the Wild West, including Payne (a brilliantly quiet and menacing Mendelsohn) who's following them...

Packed with gallows humour and a heart as black as can be, Slow West is a terrific piece, shot in MacKenzie country, that packs a touch of the buddy road movie along with some unexpectedly humorous sight gags to great effect.

With diametrically opposed ideals, Silas and Jay make queasy road buddies, each with different reasons for doing what they need to do to survive (though Jay is completely out of his depth, his emotional touch gives us the cornerstone we need to connect).

Packing in philosophy with musings on how the west was (an anthropologist remarks at one point that soon all of this will be a long time ago) with some dark humour that shows the horror of the west (Jay tries on a suit at a trading post, only to discover it has a bloody bullet hole), Maclean's managed to create something that simultaneously embraces the Western tropes while adding something new. In among the uneasiness and violence on the road to resolution, there are laughs to be had, pratfalls to observe and some terrific musings on the nature of life and love. (As well as one particularly cruel but immensely funny take on the salt in the wound comment)

Smit-McPhee adds an ethereal almost sickly touch to his pasty Jay, a dreamer whose recollections of his time with Rose hint toward trouble ahead; equally, Fassbender's drifter has a touch of the classic western man with no name ethos around him (though his change of heart seems to come from leftfield) but he embodies the gruff Marlboro men of the time as the mournful score progresses.

With its off-kilter sensibilities and its 4:3 aspect ratio, Slow West is something different; a take on a tale of the Frontier previously unwitnessed but yet reverent to its roots. It's an exciting fusion of daring; a shaking up of the genre that embraces, then subverts the romance of the Wild West and gives the audience a breath of cinematic fresh air.

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GTA Hallowe'en is here

GTA Hallowe'en is here

Grand Theft Auto Online: Halloween Surprise

Hi all,

From now through November 16th in GTA Online, special Halloween treats will be available to the residents of Los Santos and Blaine County on PS4, Xbox One and PC. And no tricks here – once acquired these special items will remain in players’ inventory, even after November 16th.

2 NEW VEHICLES: LURCHER HEARSE AND FRANKEN STANGE

Navigating the freeways of Los Santos just got more terrifying with the addition of these two ghastly new vehicles. Players can show their dark side while getting around in the Lurcher Hearse and the Franken Stange – both available for a limited time only, along with 20 ghoulish new Bobbleheads that can be added to the dashboard of any customizable Lowrider.

NEW MASKS & FACE PAINTS

Strike fear into opponents by donning one of the horrific new masks now available in the Monsters section of Vespucci Movie Masks. Crews tackling a Heist between now and November 16 will see a new Halloween mask category as the default option on all Heists. 30 Spooky new styles of Face Paint are also available to help players get into the spirit of the season.

SLASHER ADVERSARY MODE

Enjoy thrills and suspense with the lights out in this tense new Adversary Mode for up to 8 players. Run, hide, and fight to survive in the darkness as the player designated as the Slasher stalks his prey with a Shotgun. Players can use the new Flashlight to navigate if they dare, but risk revealing their position and quickly becoming prey. Survive for 3 minutes and get the chance to return the favor with a Shotgun of your own.

SPECIAL HALLOWEEN WEEKEND EVENT & LIVESTREAM

Stay tuned for details on this weekend's special Halloween activity, including a livestream this Friday October 30th at 5pm ET featuring the Rockstar Broadcast team and special guests to be announced.

The Dressmaker: Film Review

The Dressmaker: Film Review

Cast: Kate Winslet, Liam Hemsworth, Hugo Weaving, Judy Davis, Sarah Snook, Rebecca Gibney

Director: Jocelyn Moorhouse

Set in an Aussie small town where everyone is an oddball, The Dressmaker's quirkiness begins to grate pretty quickly.

The deranged and nutty tone sets the scene for a story that's as steeped in tragedy as it is over-the-top garishness. 

A perfectly cast Winslet plays Myrtle, a woman scorned from the small fictional Aussie backwater Dungatar with the belief she caused the death of a boy. Returning to her mother, Mad Molly (a wonderful Judy Davis who imbues her bitter mother with as much heart as she does black humour) after a spell working in high fashion, Tilly sets feathers flying with her seamstress skills and her vampish figure, reminiscent of a Hollywood siren.

But she also captures the heart of Liam Hemsworth’s rugger boy and neighbour Teddy (who gets shirtless on numerous occasions) and begins to melt back to the charms of Dungatar while trying to exact her revenge for years of ostracism.

The Dressmaker is a curio, which is verging on high campery too as Winslet's Myrtle arrives back in town with revenge on her mind and snarling out a "I'm back ,you bastards" from under an icy veneer as the film starts, channelling a wild western showdown soundtrack and signalling something is in the water.

But under the high 1950s fashion is a simple story of reputations unfairly gained and rumours viciously spread among the ghouls of a small town, a trope that many who have tried to flee their past only to run home will recognise. The film heads more for farce and a parody of grotesques in its execution, rather than giving the supporting players a touch more humanity.

For this is a small town where the police are more interested in high fashion than high crime, where one man drugs his wife to rape her in her sleep and where a secret truth has festered for years rotting the community from within – it’s not exactly the most pleasant place to dwell, and Moorhouse works reasonably well from the Aussie ocker source material the Gothic book written by Rosalie Ham.

Of the leads, Davis seriously impresses, giving Molly the emotional arc she needs as the prodigal daughter returns home; elsewhere Winslet’s thawing of the stark and severe Myrtle seems as inevitable as the wonderful dresses she wears but her turn gives the predictable story a kind of watchability that’s welcome among all the frocks and barbs. It’s the mother and daughter relationship that is the real thrust of this film and proves to be the reason to plough on through the nuttiness and extreme stereotypes.

Weaving’s cop also deserves mention; a policeman who is more interested in the fripperies that Myrtle brings from Paris and whose cross-dressing is indulged but never revelled in. Granted, it’s like watching another variation of Weaving’s turn from Priscilla, Queen of the desert but he’s a small oasis in a backwater of confused tone, overlong pacing and dusty yesteryear drama.

Ultimately, The Dressmaker is a celebration of the absurd, a gallery of grotesque and unfortunately, a grating film that will surprise many who are expecting something else than what the poster appears to promise.

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Rock the Kasbah: Film Review

Rock the Kasbah: Film Review

Cast: Bill Murray, Zooey Deschanel, Bruce Willis, Kate Hudson, Scott Caan, Danny McBride
Director: Barry Levinson

If you ever wanted to see a film with Bill Murray trussed to a bed, bedecked in a blonde wig and wearing a diaper, then Barry Levinson's latest is for you.

Murray plays washed up verging-on-con-man music manager Richie Lanz who spends his days listening to awful karaoke singers and promising them the world in return for cash. But his world turns around when he takes his last remaining client (Zooey Deschanel) on a USO tour of Afghanistan, believing fame and fortune lie around the corner.

However, having been ripped off and left without any means of escape from Afghanistan, Richie has to try and turn his fortunes around to make it out alive - and things get more complicated when, for the first time in his life, he discovers a genuine talent. Could his shot at redemption also be his undoing as he travels to Kabul to get his female singer on Afghan Star?

If you're expecting a hoot-a-moment film from the man who cocked a snook at the armed forces with the Adrian Cronauer story in Good Morning, Vietnam, then Rock The Kasbah is not the film for you.

It lurches wildly between tones as it negotiates a lunatic sensibility with a social commentary - and not always entirely successfully. Murray brings his usual deadpan laconic stylings to the table and there's just something about this rapscallion and his louche outlook that gets you on side. Certainly, in parts, Murray looks like he's having a blast.

The rest of the supporting cast don't fare as well - Hudson gets some extra time in the final furlong as the Armed forces tart-with-a-heart (even if one scene looks quite obviously like it was re-shot and re-scripted); Caan and McBride make the most of their extended cameos as black-market dealers - and even Willis shows up to whisper some lines before slinking off into the sand dunes of both the desert and the movie, only to reappear when dramatic fortune requires him to do so.

Equally, the film's sensibilities border on abrasive too, with the sentiment that Lanz can do whatever he wants with his client simply because he's American. Want to ride roughshod over years of cultural issues and oppression of women without any consequence? Sure, then Lanz is your man - and the script crassly precipitates this with Lanz getting his way for Afghan Star. Granted, it's morally questionable and perhaps a tighter script or a neater plotting of the arc could have helped, but this last third push within the film rankles and feels grossly awkward despite Murray's innate charm propelling it along.

That's the main problem with Rock The Kasbah; its tonal inconsistencies end up providing a patchy affair that's scrappy and amusing in equal measures. As the Clash remarked, the Shareef don't like it - and for large parts of this film thanks to its cultural awkwardness, if you'll forgive the pithiness, neither did I.

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