Darkest Hour: Blu Ray Review

Darkest Hour: Blu Ray Review

Treading thematically similar territory as last year's Brian Cox-led Churchill, Darkest Hour sees Gary Oldman covered in liver spots and thrust into the political shenanigans and pressures of England's Darkest Hour in May 1940 during the second World War.

More inclined to seethe when it should roar, Joe "Atonement" Wright's film is more about visuals and framing of imagery than anything deeper within as the Anthony McCarten penned thriller follows Churchill as others swirl around him, unsure that their new leader could either negotiate a peace or deal with what's next.

Settling into a routine of plenty of scenes of old white men debating and discussing with a side of shouting thrown in for free, most of Darkest Hour is more about the machinations within the halls of power (but less of the West Wing snippy dialogue) than the human element.

It's hinted at in a few scenes here and there, but Wright and McCarten aren't as interested in pursuing that side of things.

Lily James' typist is troubled by the war for her brother, a woefully underused Scott Thomas' Clem worries her husband Winston isn't well enough for the job and concerns herself with money woes and one early scene with the children hint at the personal cost for Churchill's family, but it's slim pickings.

Central to all of this is Oldman's searing turn as Winston. With hints of vulnerability occasionally conveyed through the eyes and with thunderous emotion behind his speeches here and there, Oldman's immersed himself into the role and is all the better for it.

Equally as impressive is Mendelsohn as the stuttering King. Wisely underplaying, the Aussie's take on things is compelling, quiet and unassuming - and makes for great viewing.

Darkest Hour works best when it concentrates on him, but fails and falters when it casts the net wider.

Chiefly, a fanciful sequence on London's tube feels like something out of a propaganda piece and feels at odds with what's gone on - though is remedy for Winston's dark teatime of the soul.

In among all of Darkest Hour though are some wonderfully framed shots, some breathtakingly executed moments - including a whole room being soaked in red when Churchill delivers his first radio address and the 'Mic Live' bulb kicks in. It's here that Wright really grabs you and conveys the emotional heft which is needed.

With Nolan's Dunkirk being the perfect dessert to Darkest Hour's main meal, it's fair to see why Oldman is garnered some awards buzz for the role - he thunders when it's needed, but unfortunately the rest of the film feels lacking in his wake.

Shadow of the Tomb Raider Trailer Reveal

Shadow of the Tomb Raider Trailer Reveal

SQUARE ENIX OFFICIALLY UNVEILS

SHADOW OF THE TOMB RAIDER

Eidos-Montréal to Deliver Lara Croft’s Defining Moment

SYDNEY, 30^th April 2018 – Square Enix®, Eidos-Montréal™, and Crystal Dynamics® today revealed the full trailer for Shadow of the Tomb Raider™, the latest entry in the critically acclaimed and award-winning Tomb Raider® series. Created by a team of veteran Tomb Raider developers at Eidos-Montréal, in collaboration with Crystal Dynamics, the game will be available on September 14, 2018 for the Xbox One family of devices, including Xbox One X, PlayStation®4 system and Windows PC/Steam®.

Watch the full Shadow of the Tomb Raider Trailer

In Shadow of the Tomb Raider, Lara must master a deadly jungle, overcome terrifying tombs, and persevere through her darkest hour. As she races to save the world from a Maya apocalypse, Lara will be forged into the Tomb Raider she is destined to be.

The star of the critically acclaimed 2013 Tomb Raider reboot and the award-winning Rise of the Tomb Raider®, Camilla Luddington, makes her return as Lara Croft® with yet another stunning performance in Shadow of the Tomb Raider.

“Thanks to their incredible expertise, knowledge of the franchise and outstanding creativity, Eidos-Montréal, in collaboration with Crystal Dynamics, is delivering a powerful experience with Shadow of the Tomb Raider,” said Yosuke Matsuda, president and representative director of Square Enix Holdings Co., Ltd. “Shadow of the Tomb Raider will take the series to new heights and Lara Croft to new depths.”

“Shadow of the Tomb Raider will challenge Lara Croft in new and unexpected ways,” said David Anfossi, Head of Studio at Eidos-Montréal. “Our team has created a diverse set of skills, combat techniques and equipment for players to master, and they’ll certainly need them if they hope to survive the deadly jungle environments and tombs.”

Last Friday night, Square Enix welcomed fans, community leaders, press, and industry influencers to events in Montreal, London, and Los Angeles so they could experience Lara Croft’s defining moment as she becomes the Tomb Raider.  Now, a wealth of information, screenshots, and more is now available at TombRaider.com.

For full details on pre-order items, the Season Pass, key beats in the upcoming campaign, and more information on Shadow of the Tomb Raider, please visit the official website and follow us on Facebook and Twitter.

Related Links

Official Homepage: www.TOMBRAIDER.com

Official Twitter: @TOMBRAIDER

Official Facebook page: http://facebook.com/TOMBRAIDER

Official Tumblr: http://officialTOMBRAIDERblog.tumblr.com/

Official YouTube Channel: http://youtube.com/TOMBRAIDER

Sea of Thieves: XBox One Review

Sea of Thieves: XBox One Review

Studio: Rare
Publisher: Microsoft Studios
Platform: XBox One

Sea Of Thieves has arrived on the gaming ocean waves with as much fanfare as you'd expect for a title from a studio that's always been a pioneer.

Their latest has a very simple MO - you're a pirate, doing piratey things in a pirate's world.

Operating from first person perspective and thrusting you - whether you like it or not - into the multiplayer world to crew your ship and carry out various, Sea of Thieves is clearly aimed at being a co-operative game that wants to get you to work with mates or people you don't know.

But there's little else to it unfortunately, and it emerges as slightly underwhelming at this point, once you realise that all it is, at its core, is a simple go and grab something, protect it and return it.

Grind is the name of the game, and it's a little tiring to be frank in places.

Even though it's more fun with mates, and the whole Pirates are evil ethos which permeates the game is part of its MO, Sea of Thieves does suffer from a feeling that all your good work can be undone by some blaggard who simply wants to rob you. (Though, in fairness, that's what a pirate is.)

Graphically, the game's cartoony edges and the fact it presents the most wondrous water ever
committed to console history are big pluses.

There's a certain silliness that pervades proceedings, with sea shanties and cannon ball firing that's kind of catchy.

But much like the PUBG experience has been marred by the fact that the whole thing feels incomplete, Sea Of Thieves similarly suffers from a launched a little too early syndrome.

It's taken a while to get into games, and servers have been plundered by problems with too many gamers getting in on the action and it not coping. That's a frustration, especially given the numerous tests that Rare deployed.

Ultimately, as well, a lack of deeply immersive content makes Sea of Thieves hard to fully hoist the black flag of approval.

Sure, it's wacky fun and good for a gaming night with mates, but with a solo campaign that lacks depth and a reason to live, and not quite enough to keep you sailing the seven seas, there's a feeling that a content roadmap needs to be put out there.

All in all, Sea Of Thieves is commendable in parts, disappointing in others.

It has the potential, but at the moment, it feels like the treasure chest is half-full when it could be brimming over with golden gaming swag.

The Maze Runner: Death Cure: DVD Review

The Maze Runner: Death Cure: DVD Review

The Maze Runner series has generally been a good and ambitious YA adaptation from James Dashner that's pandered to little of the excesses of its literary genre and provided a good whack of dystopia for those missing The Hunger Games franchise.

The conclusion, Maze Runner: The Death Cure, arrives on screens after a substantial delay due to Dylan O'Brien being injured on set and filming being put back. After a three year delay, you could be excused for not remembering exactly how it The Scorch Trials ran into this latest. (Certainly, the latest has no desire to recap the series for newbies.)

With their friend Minho kidnapped by nasty organisation WCKD and apparently betrayed by Teresa (Pirates of The Caribbean and Skins actress Scodelario), what's left of the Gladers, headed up by Dylan O'Brien's Thomas, set in motion a plan to storm the city, snatch their friend and escape from the trials and adults once and for all.

Opening with a pre-credits' heist sequence that blows any potential for brooding out of the water, Wes Ball's The Maze Runner: The Death Cure seems intent on settling for action over anything else, as it pulls together the strands from the first two films.

Unfortunately, what emerges is somewhat hindered by a lack of real emotional edge (potentially due to the exorbitantly long yet unavoidable delay) and prefers to favour solid yet formulaic sections of action over anything else.

The set pieces are delivered dependably by Ball, but there's little flair in the formulaic here, more a solid representation of what you'd expect at this point in the series. As the revolution grows and the parallels of shadowy organisations gunning down their own populace seems to draw on one of Mockingjay's darkest scenes, Ball handles it all with gusto, if storyboarding it unremarkably to generic execution.

Essentially an extended jail break movie, The Maze Runner: The Death Cure's break-in-to-break-out ethos gives the Gladers the chance to be on the front foot throughout, rather than looking like victims and lab-rats.

O'Brien's solid if lacking a little charisma and it's left to Brodie-Sangster and the ever dependable Poulter to deliver some of the heart and humour that's sorely needed.

Much of Maze Runner: The Death Cure's MO is the unspoken love affair between Brodie-Sangster's Newt and O'Brien's Thomas, and certainly the betrayal by Thomas' ex Teresa never quite reaches the emotional peak and fruition you'd hope for and expect with involvement.

In terms of villains, Gillen's smirking Janson's on hand to provide conflict, but the conflict never quite builds on the promise of previous films, and feels rote at best.

Parts of the film are narratively convenient, and the use of the zombie-like Kranks feels more shoehorned in to allow parts of the story to progress, even if logic and behaviour never follow through and develop consistency within their own world.

However, that's been problematic of the series, one that's content to use characters to propel the action, rather than to engage with - and certainly the ethos of the lab rats / children conundrum is never anything but skin deep.

And with the scale of an apocalypse building, you'd expect Maze Runner: The Death Cure to have higher stakes, but by concentrating on the Gladers' insular world, and falling back only on the outside world when it needs to punctuate moments, Ball's Maze Runner conclusion feels more like it's slightly fumbled the scope of what it wants to achieve - and certainly its conclusion feels lacking in a wider resolution.

In the wash, Maze Runner: The Death Cure is a solid and just about watchable, if overlong, action film that never quite achieves the emotional highs of its mysterious first outing. 

Downsizing: Blu Ray Review

Downsizing: Blu Ray Review

With an eye on the insignificant and how small can mak a big difference, director Alexander (Sideways) Payne's Downsizing, starring Matt Damon and Kristen Wiig (briefly) clearly has lofty ambitions.

Juggling genres from sci-fi to hippy utopia to humanitarian issues, Payne's film is such a mish-mash of anything that it slightly struggles to garner its own identity.

Set in a world where over-population is a real issue and where scientists have discovered there's a way to shrink people and their possessions down and relocate them to gated communities, Payne's film centres on Paul and his wife, the average middle American.

A terribly bland Damon plays Paul, an occupational therapist and middle American, who's stuck in the humdrum way of his life - unable to get into a new home with his wife (Wiig, who's in the film far too briefly), they decide to downsize.

Enticed by the idea of becoming millionaires and having everything they always dreamed of as part of the process (wealth and property are multiplied in value under the irreversible scheme), the pair decide to undergo the process.

However, while Paul completes the procedure, his wife panics and leaves him before beginning - meaning that Paul is destined to find his place alone in LeisureLand, the community set up for smaller people.

Soon discovering the problems of the outside world still exist in Leisureland (crummy jobs, bad neighbours), Paul's dream of Utopia ends up more like a not for U-topia and he seeks his place in the world.

Toying with ideas of insignificance, a microcosm of a society that's less than idyllic, and a satire that has little to no bite, Downsizing aims for profundity but misses with a distinct thud.

It's helped little by Damon playing as bland as the script demands, time jumps that are less than crucial and add little to the drama.

Payne seems lost to know what to do with the little people, even throwing in some apparently timely talk of little people's rights - all the elements are in place in Downsizing, but frustratingly, the jigsaw is so messily assembled, it feels too much of a jumble to care about.

There's also the disturbing edges of Paul the white man American saviour in parts of the film, as the sadsack Damon tackles European attitudes, and Payne rolls out a thinly veiled Asian stereotype in Thai dissident and one-legged cleaner Ngoc Lan Tran, played by Hong Chau.

It's uncomfortable in the extreme and while the excuse script calls for it may be generous at best, it certainly doesn't sit right as the back half of the film meanders to a Lilluptian conclusion.

Ultimately, the fact that Downsizing has had its dramatic teeth shrunk down narratively does it no favours.

There's a kernel of a great idea here, and a doomsday-preppers style story which could have been smartly and cleverly executed. But the clever premise of Downsizing is squandered in an indulgent script and story which shrinks and shrivels as much as its titular characters.

The only way to perhaps enjoy Downsizing is to massively shrink any expectations you have before going in.

Win a double pass to see TULLY

Win a double pass to see TULLY

Synopsis: A new comedy from Academy Award®-nominated director Jason Reitman (“Up in the Air”) and Academy Award®-winning screenwriter Diablo Cody (“Juno”). 

Marlo (Academy Award® winner Charlize Theron), a mother of three including a newborn, is gifted a night nanny by her brother (Mark Duplass). 

Hesitant to the extravagance at first, Marlo comes to form a unique bond with the thoughtful, surprising, and sometimes challenging young nanny named Tully (Mackenzie Davis).

Tully hits cinemas May 10

No Ordinary Sheila: DVD Review

No Ordinary Sheila: DVD Review

The name Sheila Natusch will be familiar to anyone who loves nature and anyone who's from the lower reaches of the South Island.

Director Hugh MacDonald's gentle film biography takes in the life of Sheila Natusch, with better access than most given he's part of her family.

Starting off in Stewart Island where Natusch was born (nee Trail), MacDonald uses a Kim Hill Radio New Zealand interview with Natusch herself to help paint a lot of the scene, as well as Sheila's own writings. From growing up with a fascination for the wildlife and a strict father to Natusch's friendship with Janet Frame after they bonded at teacher's college, the depth on display here is fairly exhaustive, even if MacDonald knows which bits are best excised.

Using some stunning wildlife footage and shots from around Stewart Island itself, (a nice quick cut montage manages to show the range of what the island has to offer), the scene's set for Sheila's interests to be awakened.

Essentially a social document of growing up and life in the south from when she was born in 1926 on Rakiura, this telling of a life story is amiable stuff. It helps that it's centred so laconically by Sheila herself , a fairly upbeat sort of a character, whose enthusiasm is never in question throughout.

Very occasionally, there are some sadnesses on display, giving Natusch a more rounded edge. Be it the lack of children or the rejection of her Animals in New Zealand book by a publisher written off when one error was clocked, the more human frailties are brought to the fore by MacDonald's use of footage and other's questions.

But with an ethos of "If I'm going to look back, that's what I want to see", the toothy Sheila is a tough old bird, with an attitude which many could learn from - but sadly, most of the audience for this piece won't unfortunately be the youngsters they're looking to try and inspire, with a feeling that perhaps an older generation or a clutch of people from the South will benefit better from this gentle portrait.

It could occasionally do with an edit, and it's not always entirely convincing chopping and changing from different interviewers to tell the story of her life with soundbites or interview moments, but when the spotlight shines on Sheila, there's evidence of the spirit and the inspiration which shine through.

Quite a handy social document as well as salutation to one of New Zealand's pioneering naturalists, No Ordinary Sheila is genial fare, which is fortunate to be blessed with the cunning dry wit and warmth of its quintessentially Kiwi subject.