Second Act: DVD Review

Second Act: DVD Review

Presumably rejected by Hallmark and Lifetime for its utterly insane twist, Second Act is a film that is crippled by its storyline, which comes straight out of 1950s America.

J-Lo is Maria Vargas, a long-suffering assistant supermarket manager in downtown New York. On her birthday, Maria is trying to secure a promotion, having spent 15 years working as the manager's right hand and set in motion some changes that would benefit the business.

But rejected for promotion, and with her relationship with her toyboy baseball coach crumbling over her desire to not have kids, she finds herself offered a job at a major cosmetics company, thanks to her street-talking friend (Remini) faking her CV and getting her an interview.

It gets worse for Vargas when she gets the job and isn't sure how long to continue the lie - setting her on a collision course with the younger elements of the firm, including the firm's founder's daughter Zoe (Hudgens).

To explain why Second Act is such a bizarro trip into 1960s world where women can have anything they want, as long as men sanction it, is to reveal its twist. Which is to rob you of a genuine "Are you kidding me" moment that cinema so rarely offers. Suffice to say, that will not happen here.

But it's enough to say that despite Lopez's earnestness and innate likeability as the everyday woman who wants it all, the film's utter unswerving adherence to something that would have been part of a Twilight Zone episode of I Love Lucy is not to its credit.

Added to this the level of mansplaining going on as well throughout, this tale of so-called women's empowerment is lacking the balls (sorry) it needs to heartily succeed and carry past an insane twist that defies logic and belief.

Lopez does what she can with the material on offer, and maybe the credibility is stretched as far as it can - but giving its lead a power me moment to be crippled by a pratfall seems like something from decades ago, and is as weak as it is inexcusable.

In a fantasy world context, Second Act's continual stereotyping and conforming makes it almost unbelievable to behold, and its central message of You Can Have It All, Ladies seem like something from decades long since buried, and much deliberately maligned in a more woke 2018. It's even more of a crime how it fails to execute its own concept and collapses into a pile of sentimental mush than is barely worthy of a girls-night-out film. 

The Kid Who Would Be King: DVD Review

The Kid Who Would Be King: DVD Review

There's no hiding from British films as the stench of Brexit starts to creep in.

And in Attack The Block director Joe Cornish's latest, which he wrote as well, The Kid Who Would Be King reeks of both the problems of the current United Kingdom's plight (albeit at a surface level), but also global uncertainty. Along with the aimlessness of contemporary society, Cornish has his sights squarely set on making sure the kids don't feel lost in a present of our own making.

Throw in a message of empowering the kids against the problems of today for the future, amid the contemporary transposition of the Arthurian legends, and it's clear what The Kid Who Would Be King is trying to do.

Serkis is 12-year-old Alex, a non-consequential kid in a school in England. Mates with bullied Bedders (Chaumoo, who may leave you feeling like he's channelling Julian Dennison), Alex stands up for what's right - despite the right thing being to his detriment.

One day, while escaping the bullies, Alex discovers a sword in a stone slab at a construction site, and quicker than you can say Lady of the Lake, Excalibur or any of the Arthur lore, pulls it out.

But under the ground, Arthur's long-lost half sister Morgana (Ferguson, underused) is stirring, ready to take the world as her own, now it's in a fragile state.

Much like Attack The Block did, The Kid Who Would Be King bandies together an 80s style gang of kids (once again, multi-cultural) to save the world. This time though, they lack the killer charisma of the first, but in some ways, that's perhaps the point, as these are everyday kids, given a bit of the once-over-lightly treatment.

That flaw does slightly show in the quest portion of the film as Cornish reinvents the Arthurian legends to fit his own ends. And it does feel padded in parts as it heads toward its inexorable CGI denouement. But it helps that what transpires riffs nicely on the likes of Lord Of The Rings and Percy Jackson and even has its own baddies in the form of flaming sword carrying CGI creatures.

The Kid Who Would Be King: Film Review

Serkis makes a reasonable lead, doing the best with what he has to work with, and even getting some laughs out of lines like "I'm 12, I'm not even old enough to do a paper round" when Alex's told he is the future king. He also brings some heft to the fatherless storyline - though in truth Patrick Stewart (complete with Led Zeppelin T-Shirt) does a lot of that with his Merlin. There's a lot riding on the tales he learned as a child, and the tales he's told now by friends or by family - but Serkis translates that through the prism of an ordinary kid, trying to do the best he can.

Gently earnest, with an exhortation to listen to the kids of the present, because they are the leaders of our future, The Kid Who Would Be King wears its empowerment message with pride - but it never loses sight of the fact it's there to serve as escapist family entertainment - and does so admirably.

Shoplifters: DVD Review

Shoplifters: DVD Review

Shoplifters' tale of a Japanese family living in the slum downtrodden house is meant to shock from its beginning.

With the opening seeing a father and son stealing from a supermarket in a co-ordinated military style set of precision manoeuvres, we're thrown into the family world of the Shibatas.

Living in low income and scraping by, the family's world is changed when the father brings home a little girl he sees living outside a house with no apparent parents nearby. As the girl doesn't want to go home and shows signs of abuse, despite the strain on the family, they keep her within their walls, a family giving love to an unknown.

However, that decision could prove as fateful as it will fruitful.

Subtle and perhaps aiming to provoke empathy throughout, without ever being manipulative Kore-eda's social eye on the affliction of some Japanese families is also a salutation to uncompromising love.

With her big eyes, and cute haircut, the abused little girl is never anything more than a tool to win over the audience, and to cast light on the insidious ways of abuse, so redolent worldwide that it hurts.

While there's humour in this social tale, there's also an undercurrent of anger that Kore-eda provokes in you that this family have to go through so much to just get by. But presented under a sunnier outlook, Kore-eda manages to make proceedings warmer than they perhaps should be, a chance to push a message in ways that could otherwise not work.

The Palmes D'Or winner Kore-eda Hirokazu's Shoplifting is a story that may move you, but ultimately, its last reel reveal feels cheap and easy, a narrative rug-pull aimed to disorientate and reassess.

What it actually does is make you question why some of the characters you've invested in over the past two hours don't do the one thing you'd expect them to. It's a unsettling turn and leaves an after-taste which is hard to shift (and which is too spoilery to discuss here).

While Kore-eda Hirokazu may wish to be saluting love and family in all its forms, and present a world similar to one glimpsed in Sean Baker's The Florida Project by centring on the children, Shoplifters' strength lies in its interactions within the family.

Some threads may go undernourished, and while the reveals at the end may pull together some of the looser ends, there are similar themes of family that Kore-eda has pursued before. Granted, this latest may see a more broken family than previously, but the social realism captured within is nonetheless heartbreaking throughout. And certainly the burst of consciousness and guilt is never belaboured throughout.

A thoughtful piece, but a flawed masterpiece to some, Shoplifters' strength lies in its willingness to expose the double standards of Japanese society - and ultimately, the hypocrisies and selfishness of us all.  

Win a copy of Spider-Man: Into The Spider Verse

Win a copy of Spider-Man: Into The Spider Verse

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The out-of-this-world voice cast includes Shameik Moore as Miles Morales alongside Jake Johnson (“New Girl”) as Peter B. Parker, Hailee Steinfeld (Bumblebee) as Gwen Stacy/Spider-Gwen, Mahershala Ali (Green Book) as Miles’ Uncle Aaron, Brian Tyree Henry (“Atlanta”) as Jefferson Davis, Lily Tomlin (“Grace and Frankie”) as Aunt May, Luna Lauren Velez (“How To Get Away with Murder”) as Rio Morales, Zoë Kravitz (“Big Little Lies”) as Mary Jane, John Mulaney (“Big Mouth”) as Spider-Ham, with Nicholas Cage (The Croods) as Spider-Man Noir, Kathryn Hahn (Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation) as Doc Ock and Liev Schreiber (“Ray Donovan”) as the villain Kingpin.

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Aquaman: Blu Ray Review

Aquaman: Blu Ray Review

The litany of DC movies is scattered with almost-rans.

For every Marvel success, there’s been a thudding DC failure, a reminder that tone and story still triumph in the comic book medium.

So it’s pleasing to reveal that Aquaman goes some way to addressing prior failures, by telling a story early on that packs heart and heft, before the usual rote destructive CGI chaos steps in to clean up in the final act.

At its heart, in terms of plot, Aquaman is DC’s take on the political in-fighting last seen in Marvel's Black Panther.

Momoa is Aquaman, aka Arthur Curry, a half-human, half Atlantian, who's keeping the seas safe from the likes of marauding pirates, when he finds himself hauled into a political coup after red-haired Mera (Heard) emerges from the waters of his long-lost home world.

Warning him that the war that's unfolding at the hands of King Orm (Wilson) will affect his beloved surface dwellers, Aquaman's thrown into a battle over the rights to the underwater throne and a birth right he doesn't potentially want...

Aquaman offers a Tron-like spectacle with an underwater world that's vibrant with life and teeming with visual creativity and depth. Atlantis looks like it's a lived in world, a world that breathes as it floats below, and as various sea creatures float by, with CGI in overdrive to showcase its very best.

Sadly, the same can't exactly be said about the more human elements of the film which are overwhelmed by the script's over-stuffed nature.

Momoa treads a thin line between knowing cheesy dialogue and performing endless action sequences while revelling in the OTT nature; but he has the charisma for Curry (and performs enough hair flips through water to look like he's advertising premium shampoo), and lends Aquaman the kind of reverence - and occasionally irreverence - the DC material affords him.

The problem is some of what is populated around him.

With one-note characters like Mera offering mainly exposition (and a clumsy attempt at romance that should have been drastically re-worked at the script level before being committed to screen) and Orm proffering petulance and discord, the film's tonal shifts are seismic in their execution and occasionally jarring as it swims between cornball and seriousness.

Meshing the myth of Excalibur, Karate Kid training, Splash's inter-species love story with a pro-environmental message, and the politics of power and squabbling brothers that we've seen in Thor and Black Panther, Aquaman never really lays any claim to originality - nor would it expect to with some of its utter po-faced dialogue and frankly creepy digital de-ageing of stars like Morrison and Dafoe.

What Aquaman does deliver is spectacle, and radically changes the game for what's to be expected of DC films - it still has the pomposity of the dialogue of Batman Vs Superman and ends up in an utterly messy CGI fight as its denoumenent, but those troubles are inherent to all comic book films, not just the long derided DC Universe.

There's a lack of emotional investment in Aquaman's central character, but there's plenty on show early on in Morrison's heartfelt turn (some of his best work yet) and pre-credits love story with Kidman's Queen of the sea. It's a welcome touch, before the continual shock and awe of the action overwhelms everything and builds to a deafening crescendo.

In terms of cache, there is no denying this is a major step up.

But Aquaman's over-reliance on CGI spectacle, bombast and underwhelming quest a-to-b type story, coupled with a lack of depth on its hero and his glistening abs, means that Aquaman is more a film that delivers on its outlandish promise, rather than holding back a little and running with what sticks to the wall. 

Red Joan: Film Review

Red Joan: Film Review

Cast: Judi Dench, Sophie Cookson, Alfie Allen, Stephen Campbell Moore
Director: Trevor Nunn

Inspired by a true story it may be, but Red Joan's insistence on miring everything in flashback means sadly it squanders its best asset - Judi Dench - as nothing more than a bookend to proceedings, with glimpses throughout.

However, while this story begins in a leafy English suburb with Dench's Joan Stanley being arrested as a suspected informant who leaked top secret information, its flashbacks soon reveal another equally strong presence in the form of young Kingsman actress, Sophie Cookson.

Ripping back to Cambridge and exploring how Joan became affiliated with the disaffected communist movement, Red Joan seeks to keep questions in place about whether she is a willing participant in a crime or had been manipulated via love (fake or otherwise) in the past.

It's an interesting proposition, and while the relatively formulaic, almost TV-movie like telling of the story feels flat, the central performances are not. Its open-endedness is also its strength, with a final shot and simple facial smirk from Dench offering to throw everything up in the air that you've already seen in a kind of Keyser Soze-esque tribute.

But where Red Joan falters is in some of the film's innate ability to play it safe.

Period details are nicely rendered, and the sense of atmosphere is palpable, but what transpires lacks some of the edge that say a pulpy thriller may have helped you get to the edge-of-your-seat and leave you questioning throughout.

Likewise, the almost minimal use of Judi Dench feels criminal; even the briefest of scenes in the present day, with her son's suspicions swirling around her, hint at a frustrating promise that narratively had to take place.

However, as mentioned Cookson's turn as the young questioning intellect caught up in the cold war and its machinations gives the film a welcome human edge. Hers is a performance that anchors the film and almost makes you forget about the bookending of its sidelined mammoth talent.

All in all, Red Joan's commitment to the straight storytelling serves it fine, but with a little more flair and more uncertainty, the sense of panache in this wartime tale of love and betrayal, both personally and at a country-wide level, could have helped it into some truly sterling stuff.

Missing Link: Film Review

Missing Link: Film Review

Cast: Hugh Jackman, Zoe Saldana, Zach Galifianakis, Stephen Fry, Timothy Olyphant
Director: Chris Butler

Meshing a whole range of genres, Laika's latest sees them build on the work done with Kubo, Coraline and The Box Trolls to produce something that while it lacks as much heart as their previous work, it still raises the game in the animated front.

In a take on the new world versus the old world, Jackman plays Sir Lionel Frost, an explorer and monster hunter who longs to be accepted into the inner circle of explorers run by Stephen Fry's puffed up Lord Piggot-Dunceby.

When Frost receives a letter purportedly giving him the location of the Sasquatch, he sees this as his chance to cement his place and show the naysayers. But it turns out the Sasquatch is the one who got in touch with him to seek his help.

Dubbing his find Mr Link, Frost sets out to help...

Missing Link is a curious film.

It lacks the derring do of the kind of adventure films you'd potentially expect, eschewing that in favour of something that's old school in many ways.

There are elements of a western here as Frost rides into a deserted town with bar fights on the menu; and there are components of classic Laurel and Hardy as the Odd couple of Link and Frost go on their journey, thanks to Link's taking everything Frost says literally - and which delivers some of the biggest laughs of the film.

With his benign face and innocence, Galifianakis' softly spoken Link is a fragile character given a heart that's hard to deny. There's silliness at times, called for by the script, and it works nicely, thanks to Jackman's somewhat stiff delivery as the explorer who's lost his place in the world, in pursuit of what he feels matters to him. The duo make a good pair, and it's at the expense of Saldana, whose character feels a little shoehorned in and sadly sidelined.

While part of the problem with Missing Link is that the threats just tangibly disappear at times, Laika's animation does much to paper over those narrative cracks. It may not be the traditional stop motion, given it's run through a computer, but there are elements of Aardman Studios here and the kind of beauty that was part of Kubo and The Two Strings (one of the most underappreciated animations of past years).

Laika's commitment to indigenous faces also shines again in the latter part of the film, and subtle touches make this an animation fan's dream as the different cultures merge.

There may be moments when the younger kids will get restless, but Missing Link is not above a dismissive raspberry to punctuate proceedings, nor is it opposed to some silly wordplay and sight gags that will be adored and amuse.

All in all, Missing Link may at times feel like it has some links of its own missing, but the overall chain is tight and strong, proving that Laika's branching out into wider stories is only a good thing.