Immortals review | Chloe

Director: Tarsem Singh; Starring: Henry Cavill, Mickey Rourke, William Hurt, Frieda Pinto

Hear that? Hear that sad, achey, groany creaking noise? Yeah, pretty sure that’s the sound of my taste in movies (reluctantly) maturing.

The movie that did it was Immortals. That’s not to say it pushed my mental boundaries or gave my intellect a good work-out, causing my taste in film to mature in the process. No – this film made me realize that, sometime fairly recently, rousing pre-battle speeches, lots of talking about ‘being a man’, sweaty sword fighting, one-dimensional romances and father-issues that involve actual Gods stopped floating my cinematic boat.

Immortals does have all of the above, but it’s not always a bad thing (exception: one-dimensional romance). Of course, rousing pre-battle speeches are something we’ve come to expect from this kind of movie, and this one definitely delivers its own – for about the first forty seconds. Beyond that, it gets a bit lengthy and, honestly, a bit embarrassing. However, the film’s star, Henry Cavill, playing a rugged and beautiful Theseus (unknowingly trained by Zeus in the human guise of William Hurt = epic skillz with a sword), is so good in the role that he’s really what makes the whole thing as watchable as it is. Heroic without being stupid, handsome without being smug, likeable, good guy, total mummy’s boy… and not difficult to watch leaping around shirtless.

Which brings us onto the sweaty sword fighting. Some of the choreography in Immortals is stunning – occasionally I wondered if anyone was actually killed during filming (quick Google – nope), because the stunts, specifically mid-battle, were jaw-on-the-floor epic. It’s the kind of movie that really inspires you to go to gym... But seriously, beyond any shadow of sexuality, athletic people in their physical peak look incredible in 3D. All the limbs and muscles and bones and sinew make the experience visceral.

Stephen Dorff, who I last saw starring in indie Somewhere as a lovable douchebag Hollywood actor, plays a lovable douchebag in Immortals too. In fact, come to think of it, I’ve only ever seen Stephen Dorff playing lovable douchebags… Anyway, here he’s a great counter-part to Cavill’s lovely but boring hero, spitting out one-liners and coming onto Frieda Pinto at every opportunity. Apart from some jarring, too-obviously-modern references, Dorff’s character gives the character line-up a little pizzazz and livens up the otherwise fairly standard-issue proceedings.

Speaking of Frieda Pinto. While no one can deny that she is ridiculously beautiful and I guess likeable as an actress, her character is just boring with zero actual storyline. Here she plays a high priestess whose most crucial possession is her virginity, because it leaves her uncorrupted and able to see her visions of the future. Pretty important, right? Well, what about if I said these visions had saved you and your friends more than twice in the space of a day? Would you just go giving it away? And so we come to one of the more awkward sex scenes ever filmed, with a laughably un-romantic morning-after. In fact, it was almost as if nothing at all had happened. To add to the stupidity of the tacked-on ‘romance’, Theseus and Frieda (did her character even have a name?) cross paths exactly once during the big battle, and only for him to say, “stay where you are.” Be still, my heart. 

One thing that genuinely shocked me about this movie was its incessant violence. And not just the usual shoot-a-few-guys-in-the-head stuff; really sinister, vicariously painful things too. Most of them thought up by/in service of the evil King Hyperion (Mickey Rourke)  – among them a human fry-up, a bit of face-disfigurement,  a confrontation involving part of the male anatomy, a couple of rape threats… One-dimensional baddies are fine because you don’t feel guilty for wanting them dead, but at least give all the other characters enough development so the audience cares whether or not they survive the tyranny.

All in all, not very nutritious brain fodder, nor anything that’ll keep you up at night pondering the intricacies of life or the universe; rather something that looks good enough to hold your attention and is loud enough to keep you awake. But you knew that already.

Verdict: ** ¼

Contagion Review | Frankie

Directed by: Steven Soderberg
Written by: Scott Z Burns
Starring: Matt Damon, Kate Winslet, Laurence Fishburne, Gywneth Paltrow, Jude Law and Marion Cotillard.


It’s been a while since we’ve seen an interesting apocalyptic film. In 2009 we were given 2012 (dir. Roland Emmerich), an action pact, CGI filled end-of-the-world drama. In 2004, the same director gave us The Day After Tomorrow, a drama centred on the global warming crisis. On the 21st October this year Contagion hit the cinemas, offering us a more realistic representation of a deadly pandemic.

The film follows the stories of different people across the world as an un-known and extremely lethal virus spreads rabidly across the global population. As a group of scientists and doctors at the Centre for Disease Control work around the clock to solve the problem before it takes over, husband and father Mitch Emhoff (Matt Damon) struggles to deal with the growing epidemic as it takes his family members and an obsessed blogger (Jude Law) continues to claims he has the solution.

As you might guess from the plot, this doesn’t exactly sound like your average apocalyptic film. And it really isn’t. What’s interesting about Contagion is that it constantly flirts with the idea of this epidemic-turned-pandemic becoming the end of the population as we know it, but rather the battle between intelligence, paranoia, fear and the virus.

The cast-list is truly outstanding with a collection of well-known actors from America, Europe and England. It’s rare to see so many well-known faces on the screen together; you would think that they might struggle to each get their deserved screen-time, (with the exception of Marion Cotillard whose story was the most-moving but least seen). Contagion is a character story, it’s about the personal struggles as much as it is about the growing pandemic, and at certain times even more so. However, I do wonder if this film would have generated as much interest or success without its cast-list.



Contagion offers us something completely different. It is subtly dramatic, quietly heart-breaking and will leave you leaping for your hand sanitizer every time you touch a door-knob. Whilst some may find the film too slow-paced for their liking and lacking a sense of real urgency, it will almost definitely leave you feeling rather insecure about the public transport in London, as well as the state of your student house and the state of hygiene of your various roommates.

Overall, for some Contagion may be too slow-paced and lack any action or real thrill, but the acting is nothing less than captivating, with a story that is unsettlingly realistic and will leave you forever attached to your hand wash.

Francesca’ Star-rating: 4*s

Melancholia review | Chloe

Directed by: Lars von Trier; starring: Kirsten Dunst, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Keifer Sutherland, Alexander Skarsgard

So, as you may or may not have heard, Melancholia is about the end of the world. Or is it?

I was lucky (again: or was I?) to catch what must be near enough one of the last London screenings of Melancholia at the Prince Charles cinema just off Leicester Square.

At the risk of sounding a bit melodramatic, I’ll say it was a movie-watching experience unlike any other I have ever had.

It begins with a slo-mo montage that is so slo-mo it’s almost no-mo at all, set to the loud (so loud) swelling strings of Wagner. Each little scene looks like an eerie painting, each foreshadowing a little bit of the movie. Then it’s onto ‘Part 1: Justine’, and we’re at the wedding of Justine (Dunst) and Michael (Skarsgard) - to which the couple themselves have arrived two hours late, to the irritation of Justine’s older, responsible, no-nonsense sister, Claire.

At first things seem okay – apart from the late arrival – but we soon learn that Justine suffers from a crippling depression. She wanders in and out of the carefully-planned proceedings whenever she feels like it, to either take a bath or have sex with someone who isn’t her husband on the golf course. The awful, horrible tension – between the sisters, between their cold mother and not-quite-all-there father, between the newlyweds, between Justine and her boss - builds and builds and culminates not with a bang, but with a quiet, agonising moment between the new husband and wife.

After the horror of the wedding, we move onto ‘Part 2: Claire’, which takes place a few months later. (It is around this time we first hear tell of another planet, named Melancholia, making its way closer and closer to earth.) Justine arrives by taxi at the home of Claire and her amateur astronomer husband (Sutherland) and their son, Leo. In the grip of a depression that is almost watch-between-your-fingers painful to witness, Justine can barely function, spends days in bed and can’t even summon the energy to climb in the bath. It is truly the best performance I have ever seen Kirsten Dunst give, and she’s one of those who, for me, can do no wrong.

When Melancholia begins to rise higher and brighter in the sky each night, Justine seems to return to herself a little more. Claire, on the other hand, gets more and more anxious in the face of the looming planet, and the most interesting facet of the movie becomes more tangible – the end of the world is bound to change people, even reverse their roles completely. Here, Justine seems to almost welcome the end of all things – what, after all, does she have to lose? To her, the earth is evil: “no one will miss it,” she declares. Her ambivalence equates to strength in their last days. But sensible Claire descends slowly into hysteria; who wouldn’t, knowing their child must join them at the end of the world?

I guess it’s up to each movie-goer to decide whether the whole thing is a metaphor or not. And if it is, what is it a metaphor for? Relationships? Marriage? Selfishness? Depression? The idea that, when the world does come to an end, everything but that simple fact will lose all significance?

To be honest, I didn’t really care about any of that when the film finished. All I knew was that I couldn’t shake the feeling that I’d just been punched repeatedly in the gut. At the same time as someone swirling my brain around inside my head. While a bright light was pointed right into my eyes. My friend felt vaguely ill.

Then I realised why: Melancholia is so hateful, so persistently bleak, doomful and downright freaky, that it kind of felt like watching someone tortured for two hours. Essentially, it’s not far from the truth – von Trier watchers know he often makes his actresses suffer for the sake of his movies (see genitalia-slicing Antichrist, which doesn’t even need a spoiler alert anymore).

Having said all that, I cannot stop thinking about it. First off, it was completely beautiful, visually; the light, the colour, the effects. Second, a movie hasn’t given me that gut-punched feeling in ages, and while at the time it was an unwelcome sensation, I later found myself pleased. Pleased that a film had been made that could affect me on a physical level, and managed to worm its way out of every ‘box’ I tried to put it in while I struggled to define it to myself for my own peace of mind.

There is nothing ‘easy’ about Melancholia, but I reckon it’s definitely worth the struggle – if only for the feeling, which is so foreign in this age of seat-filling, box-ticking films, of not quite knowing what to make of it.

Verdict: ****

This Is England '88 preview screening, BAFTA

Last Tuesday Frankie and I were lucky enough to snag a couple of tickets to a preview screening of the first episode of This Is England ’88 at Bafta HQ in Piccadilly.

I hadn’t thought about the possibility of another series since soon after ’86 ended, so to see this pop up on Bafta’s Facebook page (seriously, USE Facebook for stuff like this – you get cool stuff) heightened my excitement levels dangerously.

We were asked very nicely by the head of drama at Channel 4 and by Shane Meadows himself not to divulge any details of certain plot points, and I’m willing to stick to that. It’s just too good an opening episode for it to be spoiled at all.

But: as you will know if you’re an obsessive England watcher, last we saw Shaun, Woody, Lol and the gang things weren’t great (as per pretty much usual). So, surprisingly, this episode starts off mostly hilariously, with everyone waking up in their respective homes on December 23^rd, 1988, sometimes alone, sometimes not. And in the ‘sometimes not’ category, some new faces appear! In-TREEEEG-ing.

Like always, the best thing about watching something on a big screen is the collective reaction of the big audience. And as a cool (and surreal) bonus, the majority of the cast and some of the crew were there watching too, all pissing themselves at each other’s ridiculous costumes and hair (on the show, not in real life…). One of the most bizarre telly-viewings ever, but simultaneously awesome.

After the episode finished, to a lot of applause, there was a little Q&A with Shane Meadows (director/writer/creator) and Vicky McClure (Lol). As well as a few on-set stories and a glimpse into the surreal goings-on of his childhood that inspired Meadows to embark on the project, we also learnt a bit about the future of This is England.

This first episode of ’88 was nearly a stand-alone Christmas special - meant to portray the distinctly English Christmas that Meadows knew from childhood and recognises now. In his words: “an anti-climax, a bit nice, with some horrible shit mixed in”. Any familiar bells ringing? In part, that’s what makes the episode so good: the squirmy, awkward feeling that you’re being shown an uncomfortable collage of all the Christmases you’ve experienced over the years, with all the cringy Dad moments and strange around-the-table conversations.

We can also expect a This is England ’90 “in a year or two,” with maybe more after that, maybe not. A guy in the audience asked if Meadows would be interested in following in the footsteps of Mad Men’s creators, who claim they’d like to take Don Draper all the way to 2011 and his 84^th birthday. Meadows made it clear that he’d rather not “do an Only Fools and Horses” and reach his absolute peak, then churn out some not-as-good material afterwards. He described looking forward to exploring the explosion of rave culture and said he’d like to start ’90 with a shot of a pill dissolving on someone’s tongue. He did admit to not being able to see much after ’90, but he wasn’t making promises that his mind wouldn’t change.

If the awesome episode they treated us with is anything to go by, and the solid, compact format of three episodes a season carries on its successful way, I wouldn’t mind following This is England to its 84^th birthday, either.

Paranormal Activity 3-review

Directed by: Henry Joost and Ariel Schulman.
Written by: Christopher Landon.
Starring: Chloe Csengery, Jessica Tyler Brown, Christopher Nicholas Smith and Lauren Bittner.
Run time: 84 minutes.


I think it’s safe to say that you know exactly what to expect when you watch the third instalment of Paramount Pictures’ Paranormal Activity franchise. Don’t get me wrong, this isn’t a bad thing; as the old saying goes ‘if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it’… but if you’re not a fan of the first two films, there certainly isn’t anything new here to entice you.
The third film is a prequel that takes us back in time again to where it all began in 1988. Katie and Kristi are just young girls, played by the adorable Chloe Csengery and Jessica Tyler Brown, who learn that there is a mysterious entity living in their house. As before, a number of cameras are placed around the house to try and catch the being in the act.
Sounds familiar, doesn’t it, but the story does offer us a lot more in terms of explanation to what we have seen before. Indeed, the activity begins rather slowly with one event triggering suspicion and intrigue from Katie and Kristi’s stepdad Dennis (Christopher Nicholas Smith), who continues to study the video recordings to find out what might be going on. If it’s cheap thrills you’re after then this film certainly will not disappoint, as it offers everything that you expect, and more.
Saying this, I feel that the story could have been taken further than it was, particularly with the ending which felt rather abrupt and it seems that almost everything that you expect to see after watching the extended trailer is not to be found anywhere within the cinematic release, which I have to say left me feeling rather let-down.
Overall, using another prequel for the franchise works well with dozens of tense and jumpy moments to have by all, but if you’re after something new and different than this isn’t the film for you.

Francesca’ star-rating: 3*s.

THE HANGOVER PART II Review, by Frankie.

Director: Todd Phillips
Writers: Craig Mazin, Scot Armstrong and Tod Phillips; characters by Jon Lucas and Scott Moore.
Starring: Bradley Cooper, Ed Helms, Zac Galifianakis.

There was always going to be huge doubt over whether this sequel would match up to its expectations following The Hangover. The idea for the first film was so orginal it was inevitable that the sequel had to really pull something new out of the bag to wow the overly expectant audience and the truth is, it didn't. The film really struggled to escape the storyline of the first film, and why not? It's called The Hangover for a reason, and as the saying goes "if it ain't broke, don't fix it". However, I think this may be an issue for the majority of the audience who will be looking for something new and to be honest the only new addition to the film was the change in location, and swapping a baby for a monkey...The beginning of the film seemed to drag slightly and I felt like they could have jumped into the story a bit quicker to get the ball rolling, but putting that aside...

I still loved it!

The jokes were still funny and more insane than the first and I thought the antics of the three amigos in their quest to find their friend seemed even crazier than the first! The films characters have more of a story behind them, including more of their partners and families, the best of which comes from Galifianakas' lovable Alan, as we see him on his home turf with the parental unit wrapped around his short chubby finger. They are still the great characters we have grown to love; "The wolfpack is back".

3.5*s

The Hangover list- perfect viewing for the day after the night before...

It’s probably a bit obvious that I am writing this list because I am hung-over thanks an awesome Summer Ball last night.
So I'm sat here, at my laptop, still in my PJ's at 7pm, waiting for my pizza to arrive thinking 'what should I crack on or find online to help me in this vegetated state?'... These are my top choices.

1. The Hangover (2009), the obvious choice, for obvious reasons-no matter how hung-over you are, there is no way you could ever be THAT BAD. Plus it doesn't hurt to watch Bradley Cooper walking around looking all rugged and dirty (I have a bit of a soft spot for him).

2. Miss Congeniality (2000) When there's not much going on in the old hat-rack there's nothing better to watch than an old favourite, with great actors, easy laughs and a happy ending. Not to mention a few kick-ass moments.

3. Finding Nemo (2003) Another classic favourite, this awesome animated feature offers something similar to Miss Congeniality (a touching story, jokes, lovable characters) but with fish, not women in sparkly outfits.

4. Zombieland (2009)/ 5. Shaun of the Dead (2004) These two are very different from each other, but are also one of the same (the new genre of zom-com). These are brilliant films to watch when hung-over, not only because comedy is the best medicine, but also because I literally feel like a zombie (it's just good to know I don't actually look like one).

6. The Dark Knight (2008) Because it's awesome. And I love it.

7. Hot Fuzz (2007) Another Simon Pegg-Nick Frost combination. These two are like hangover doctors with their insane montages and ridiculous jokes. I've seen this film so much I practically know all of the words- that makes for easy viewing and excessive laughing.

8. Taking Woodstock (2009) It's totally laid-back and chilled-out mannnn.....

9. Transformers (2007) No matter how many times I've seen this film, it doesn't stop being any less awesome. It's just a shame about the sequel...

10. Thor (2011)/ Star Trek (2009)/ I am Number 4 (2010). These are very personal choices, chosen not only because I really love them (well 'love' is possibly a tad strong for the latter), but mostly because I'm very partial to very hunky attractive male actors...

So, you may have guessed that the majority of these films, if not all of them are in my personal DVD collection and you would be right.

PLEASE feel free to add you own personal hangover favourites, I would love to read them, especially with Summer around the corner ;-) Happy Viewing film geeks!