Tulip Fever: Film Review

Tulip Fever: Film Review

Cast: Alicia Vikander, Dane DeHaan, Christoph Waltz, Cara Delevingne, Holliday Grainger, Jack O'Connell, Tom Hollander, Judi Dench
Director: Justin Chadwick

Forever destined to be known as the film disgraced Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein left on the shelf for 3 years and also the first film to be released by the Weinstein Company post Weinstein's spectacular fall from grace, Tulip Fever is something of a tonal mess.

Future Tomb Raider star Alicia Vikander stars as Sofia in this period piece set in 17th century Amsterdam as the tulip market grows feverishly. Similar to the stock market, there's a great trade to be had in bulbs and speculation, and Sofia finds herself in the middle of it when she escapes the convent she's in by agreeing to be married off to Waltz's merchant.

With pressure to conceive, Sofia is found wanting and Waltz's Cornelis decides to commission a painting of the two of them from upcoming artist Jaan (DeHaan). But an illicit affair grows between the pair, culminating in tragedy for everyone in the house - including Grainger's maid and confidante and her lover (O'Connell).

It's hard to know exactly what Chadwick (The Other Boleyn Girl) wanted to do exactly with Tom Stoppard's mashed together screenplay.

From period drama, romance, farce and finally on to inevitable tragedy, the film flip-flops so badly and bounces between different genres that you get cinematic whiplash watching on.

It's not like any of the cast (with the exception sadly of DeHaan and Delevingne who prove to be the weakest links here) give it anything but their best and throw themselves into it with gusto. But a lack of coherence and cohesion proves to make this narrative bulb wilt and wither as its inevitable formulaic tropes are systematically ticked off.

Inevitably what emerges from Tulip Fever is a Carry On style drama film that even Shakespeare would have dismissed as too light for his attention.

And despite Vikander's continuing allure and dramatic chops for every role she takes, the film's fatal flaw causes the whole house of cards to come crashing down around everyone's ears.

Assassin's Creed Origins: PS4 Review

Assassin's Creed Origins: PS4 Review

Platform: PS4
Developed by Ubisoft

The tenth Assassin's Creed game to emerge blinking into the light is the first to take a break from the annual publishing release schedule - and it's actually quite an enjoyable one.

Set in ancient Egypt and placing you in the role of Bayek, the game's protagonist and the people's protector as change sweeps into Egypt. But as ever with Assassin's, there's more going on behind the scenes than you could realise.

Eminently playable (though still with the quirks of glitches that always blight these games), Assassin's Creed Origins is a stealth game that benefits from a greatly wider open world that's full of side quests, characters and moments that impress.

Mixing in elements of Destiny's weapons, Far Cry's progression system and previous Assassin's games, Assassin's Creed Origins manages to take all these all too familiar elements and processes them into their own beast.

With an engaging more personal story at its helm too, Assassin's Creed Origins involves you from the beginning as opposed to other iterations of the game which felt simply like they've placed you in a world and forced you to get on with it.

Weapons increase as your experience in the game does, which helps greatly, and the desire to progress is aided by the fact side quests are more entertaining than a necessary grind. It also helps that you can gain XP by smart use of the skills upgrade - upgrading more practical double points ability first rather than cooler ones actually pays off long term.

Graphically, the game looks great - even if occasionally riding your camel into walls is a real possibility and having half of it stick into the wall while the other half runs becomes a bit of a norm. The open world looks impressive and when you're raiding tombs (yes, there is that) the light flickering within and depth gives it a sizzle that looks good.

With a streamlined story and a massive world to explore, Assassin's Creed Origins actually gives you more the more time you spend within. It pays off immensely and reminds you why the games in the franchise work when everything gels.

Ultimately, a year off may have paid dividends for Assassin's Creed Origins - it's one of the best without a shadow of a doubt.

Win a copy of Una on DVD

Win a copy of Una on DVD

Thanks to Madman Home Entertainment, you could win Una on DVD starring Rooney Mara and Ben Mendelsohn.

Fifteen years earlier, Una ran away with an older man, Ray, a crime for which he was arrested and imprisoned. 

When she comes across a photo of him in a trade magazine, Una tracks him down and turns up at his workplace. 

Her abrupt arrival threatens to destroy Ray’s new life and derail her stability. 

Unspoken secrets and buried memories surface asUna and Ray sift through the past.

Una is available on DVD right now

To win a copy, all you have to do is email  your details to this  address: darrensworldofentertainment@gmail.com or CLICK HERE NOW!

Include your name and address and title your email  UNA!
Competition closes November 16th

Win Your Name on Blu Ray

Win Your Name on Blu Ray

To celebrate the release of the anime smash hit at the box office, Madman Home Entertainment is giving you the chance to win Your Name on Blu Ray.

Mitsuha and Taki are two total strangers living completely different lives. 

But when Mitsuha makes a wish to leave her mountain town for the bustling city of Tokyo, they become connected in a bizarre way. 

She dreams she is a boy living in Tokyo while Taki dreams he is a girl from a rural town he's never been to.

What does their newfound connection mean? And how will it bring them together?

Your Name is available in shops to buy now.

To win a copy, all you have to do is email  your details to this  address: darrensworldofentertainment@gmail.com or CLICK HERE NOW!

Include your name and address and title your email NAME!
Competition closes November 16th

Ingrid Goes West: Film Review

Ingrid Goes West: Film Review

Cast: Aubrey Plaza, Elizabeth Olsen, O'Shea Jackson Jr, Wyatt Russell
Director: Matt Spicer

A satire on the social media loving generation and a dark drama as well, Ingrid Goes West is the cautionary yet all too familiar tale of Ingrid (Parks and Rec star Aubrey Plaza).

Obsessed with a woman she's never met other than through Instagram, Ingrid's institutionalised after pepper spraying the woman at her wedding because she never received an invite. Upon release and with the spectre of her mother's death licking away at her background, Ingrid forms a new obsession with Elizabeth Olsen's Taylor, an Insta-celebrity whose life appears perfect.

Ingratiating her way in, Ingrid becomes firm friends with Taylor after moving out west to be near her....

In many ways, Ingrid Goes West is a Single White Female for the Insta-generational millennial on the go.

For those opposed to social media, it's a satire on the reality behind the filters, and while it loses its bite later on (bar its last scene), the film's desire to showcase the vacuousness of Taylor's life with Ingrid's borderline depression is a strong step for the Hollywood game to take (particularly in this ongoing war of Influencers and strategies).

As the soulless and lost Ingrid, Plaza is perfect, both encapsulating he dizzying highs of the social recognition and the gnawing desperation of the ignorance; she pulls off this indie with veritable aplomb and makes Ingrid both a nuanced, empathetic and yet obscene human being as well.

A breezy Olsen makes Taylor both empty enough and appealing, and while Russell gets some good lines as her beleaguered husband, who wants the earlier version of his wife back before she was an internet celeb, Straight Outta Compton star O'Shea Jackson Jr brings subtle life to the neighbour who's got an attraction to Ingrid.

While Spicer makes the film quite dark at times, this BFF dramedy has some serious bite and commentary to the social media generation and the divides within. A warning perhaps to the vacuous generation and the phone-obsessed millennials, it may fall short in its final 20 minutes, but all in all, Ingrid Goes West deserves to get more than just a social media thumbs up.

Blade of The Immortal: Film Review

Blade of The Immortal: Film Review

Director: Miike Takeshi

For his 100th feature, director Miike Takeshi has reached for the epic, and ended up in the cartoonish.

With plenty of choreographed samurai mayhem and blood and slicing a-plenty, it's the story of Kimura Takuya's Manji. Manji's cursed to live as an immortal after being healed by a witch following a fight to take down those who killed his sister in front of him.

Opening with a 11 minute pre-titles sequence that sets the stall out with gusto (fights and humour, including a line about how something's not a rice ball, but a horse turd), give you an indication of what lies ahead in this 141 minute film. Though, as the film goes on, it does feel like it needs more of this.

Hired years later as a bodyguard to someone called Rin who looks uncannily like his sister, Manji has to slice and dice his way through retribution, conspiracy, revenge and superstition.

Based on a Manga series and with an ethos that's more crowd-pleasing than arthouse fare, Blade of The Immortal is a film to wallow in rather than to over-analyse.

In many ways, Miike's 100th film is a traditional film; one with minimal dialogue that concentrates on the action and gives those who love the genre exactly what they'd want - and more.

A little long in the tooth in parts and with perhaps one too many slow narrative bits to balance out the action, it's more a film of atmospherics that genre fans will lap up and adore, rather than attracting new admirers to the cause.

But its ethos of revenge and vengeance is a universal one to savour and Miike's desire to expertly capture everything as it unfolds means that it's certainly going to have a cult appeal and be adored by those who already love the genre.

Daddy's Home Two: Film Review

Daddy's Home Two: Film Review

Cast: Will Ferrell, Mark Wahlberg, Mel Gibson, John Lithgow, Linda Cardellini
Director: Sean Anders

There's a moment in the ill-conceived and pathetically executed sequel to Daddy's Home where Linda Cardellini's character says she'll "leave you two morons" to it.

That's a general feeling as the lack of laughter malaise falls over you like soft snow in the weak sequel to the already pushing it first film from a couple of years back.

In this latest, it's coming up to Christmas time (much like Bad Moms Christmas) and Ferrell's baby Brad and his co-father Dusty (Wahlberg, initially sneery but eventually lost) decide the kids are suffering being buffered between parents.

So in the spirit of the holiday season, they decide to hold a together Christmas - which is then scuppered by the arrival of Dusty's absentee macho father Kurt, who's apparently a NASA shuttle pilot. When Kurt mocks Dusty for his softer approach to parenting and scoffs at Brad's wimpier father (John Lithgow), the rivalries between the pair are stirred up again.

Daddy's Home Two is a weak, unfunny film that provides zero laughs unless you're completely off your face on seasonal cheer. It's a family feud that lacks passion.

It has a truly bizarre finale, which tries to celebrate the joy of going to the movies and has everyone singing Band Aid's ode to famine, Do They Know It's Christmas, in a foyer.

In between that, there are barely any laughs to fill even the worst Christmas crackers on sale.

Standard, formulaic and in parts a retread of the first, the film's got nothing of a heart and very little in terms of memorable. Firing slapstick at Ferrell seems to be lazy this time around, and the moments that are supposed to see you spluttering merely see you end up yawning.

Gibson adds a bit of energy to this, but even his presence can't add much to Wahlberg and Ferrell's apparent coasting through the script.

There's a bizarre pro-NRA gun moment in the film too which seems desperately at odds given America's record with shootings this year and feels ill-conceived and executed.

All in all, Daddy's Home Two is a series of episodic psychological battles which give you little and feel like they've been contrived by committee rather than anything else.

It's a very average, very middle-of-the-road fare, that depressingly may amuse some.
But in many ways, Daddy's Home Two is one hell of a turkey that sticks in your throat like other leftovers at this time of the year.