The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies (December 2014)

Official Australian release date: 26/12/14. Viewed: 26/12/14.

Director: Peter Jackson

Actors: Ian McKellen, Richard Armitage, Martin Freeman, Luke Evans

Genre: Adventure / Fantasy

Rating: M

The third – and final – Hobbit film is a valiant attempt to recapture the ‘Lord of the Rings’ magic of Middle Earth, but too often feels tired and repetitive, especially in the sixth film in the franchise. It’s by no means bad, it’s just – as with the first two Hobbit films – unnecessarily padded, with lots of flashbacks and scenes of staring into the distance. I’m still not convinced the three Hobbit films couldn’t have worked as one cohesive 3 & a bit hour film…

Even though the second film featured his name in the title, Smaug (Cumberbatch) is quickly dealt with and the plot hastily progresses to be about the humans – led by Bard (Evans) – tying to move into the Mountain with the Dwarves – led by Thorin (Armitage) & a mostly redundant cameo from Dain (Connolly). To complicate things, the Elves – led by Legolas (Bloom)’s dad – show up too and then the Orcs arrive. By my count, that’s four armies. The fifth army never really eventuates… Gandalf (McKellen) & Bilbo (Freeman) are left stuck in the middle of all this.

There’s some quick appearances from Elrond (Weaving), Galadriel (Blanchett) & Saruman (Lee), which are unnecessary and don’t add to the plot. There’s some good battle scenes, but nothing to top ‘The Two Towers’ or ‘The Return of the King’. Some mild humour thrown in, but a lot of the film feels bogged down and aware it’s “the defining chapter” or “the final farewell” as it’s been billed.

Plenty of frustrating moments – Tauriel (Lilly)’s “romance” with Kili (Turner), Thorin’s “dragon sickness”, the get-out-of-jail-card that the Eagles pose. Despite these, the score is still great, with the use of the familiar motifs still effective and the cinematography beautiful.

Overall: Too much going on, but an adequate resolution to this trilogy.

Gav's Rating: 3.5 stars. 

Nightcrawler (December 2014)

Official Australian release date: 27/11/14. Viewed: 23/12/14.

Director: Dan Gilroy

Actors: Jake Gyllenhaal, Riz Ahmed, Rene Russo, Bill Paxton

Genre: Drama

Rating: MA

‘Nightcrawler’ is unfortunately not a standalone film of the X-Men’s cheeky elf character, but rather a dark exposition of modern news and the public’s (apparent) bloodlust. The film has a simple premise – Bloom (Gyllenhaal) and his partner, Rick (Ahmed) listen to the police scanner and try to show up at accidents to film the gory aftermath before the cops can stop them or before they’re beaten to the scene by other competitors. They’re literally trawling the night for news-worthy footage. That this ‘needs’ to be “bloody”, as Bloom clarifies with Nina (Russo) at the news station is either an indictment on TV news stations/shows, or the public in general – or possibly a bit of both.

Gyllenhaal is very captivating as the main star, being in basically every scene and using his huge eyes – and gross mini-ponytail – to creep you out. You don’t hate him, but start to fully comprehend what a psychopath he is as the film progresses. Sure, he doesn’t kill anyone himself, but he certainly does some despicable things and has no remorse and you start to truly despise him – which proves how good he’s acting!

Ahmed, Russo & Paxton are good in small, but significant roles. The soundtrack is solid and the cinematography of Los Angeles make sit actually look hospitable and attractive for a change – not as gritty as I would’ve expected in a movie of this tone. Good ending to the film, if a disappointing one to watch.

Overall: A good, dramatic film, even if not entirely enjoyable to watch.

Gav's Rating: 3.5 stars. 

This Is Where I Leave You (November 2014)

Official Australian release date: 23/10/14. Viewed: 12/11/14.

Director: Shawn Levy

Actors: Jason Bateman, Tina Fey, Adam Driver, Jane Fonda, Rose Byrne

Genre: Comedy / Drama

Rating: M

‘This Is Where I Leave You’ is a good mix of funny moments and dramatic moments of reflection. It’s basically the story of four siblings – Judd (Bateman), Wendy (Fey), Phillip (Driver) & Paul (Stoll) – and how they, along with their mum (Fonda), deal with their father’s death. There’s lots of squabbling and jibes, but also some nice scenes with some emotional depth.

This film is slightly better than ‘Date Night’, Levy’s similar film from a few years ago with Fey. It’s not too long, is quite well paced and has a good soundtrack. My main gripe is that – since I can relate! – there wasn’t a more fleshed-out character for Paul, the big brother. I think Phillip comes off being the most interesting, but it’s enjoyable seeing how they all interact with each other & their sibling’s partners. No real conclusion, but there is a few unnecessary spanners thrown in the works at the end.

The best bits are when they all deal with the loss with some levity, especially aided by “Boner” the Rabbi (Schwartz), some of Fey’s quips and the toilet-training kid. Byrne’s good as Bateman’s love interest, but since there’s so many cast members, doesn’t get enough screen time, along with Fonda.

Overall: Solid family-based comedy/drama.

Gav's Rating: 3.5 stars. 

Interstellar (November 2014)

Official Australian release date: 6/11/14. Viewed: 6/11/14.
Director: Christopher Nolan
Actors: Matthew McConaughey, Anne Hathaway, David Gyasi, Jessica Chastain, Matt Damon
Genre: Sci-Fi / Drama / Action
Rating: M

‘Interstellar’ was a film I’d been waiting to see all year, and it certainly is a huge sci-fi film – $165 million budget – from one of the best filmmakers going round. Basically, we spend 40min on Earth in the not-too-distant-future, where all the crops are failing and Homo sapiens are about to be wiped from the planet. Cooper (McConaughey), Romilly (Gyasi) & Dr Brand (Hathaway) are then sent to another galaxy – via a wormhole – as a last grasp attempt to find another habitable planet.

The film does really well of asking those big picture themes – what’s more important, family of the entire species, love or exploration, why do we matter? However, as a sci-fi/action film, it sometimes lets itself down – the characters aren’t that well developed, beside Cooper & his two kids (Chastain & Affleck when they’re older) and there’s too much maths/physics/relativity and not enough excitement and wonder.

Sure, the special effects you do get to see of the black hole and the planets they visit are great, but there’s just not enough of them – it’s a lot of them in a space suit/ship with an overbearing Hans Zimmer’s score making it hard to hear actual dialogue. It’s probably slightly longer than necessary also – 2 hours 50min, with the last 30min being a less-than-ideal conclusion to the film. Hopefully Damon playing an astronaut prepares him for next year’s ‘The Martian’, which should be more exciting than ‘Interstellar’.

Nolan – who will arguably one day go down as a directorial legend like Kubrick – owes a lot to ‘2001: A Space Odyssey’ and essentially ‘Interstellar’ doesn’t do anything better than that film 46 years ago. But it’s not all bad – I think my expectations were too high, especially after ‘Gravity’ last year – with Caine & Lithgow being solid on Earth and the robots, TARS & CASE (very similar voices/roles to HAL in ‘2001’ & GERTY in ‘Moon’) providing some humour (and a very unique form/function!).

Overall: A good sci-fi drama, but needed more action and adventure!

Gav's Rating: 3.5 stars.

Pride (November 2014)

Official Australian release date: 30/10/14. Viewed: 5/11/14.

Director: Matthew Warchus

Actors: Ben Schnetzer, George McKay, Paddy Considine, Imelda Staunton, Bill Nighy

Genre: Drama / Comedy

Rating: M

‘Pride’ is a simple British film that manages to be about lots of things all at once, all while being charming and quaint, as only the Poms can do! It’s set in London (and Wales) in 1984 and follows a small group of gay & lesbian activists who decide to do stand up to the Thatcher government – not for gay rights, but for the rights of the striking miners! It’s all handled quite well and doesn’t become a full on drama, or a full on comedy – or even a full on “political” or “gay” movie.

Sure, there’s definitely lots of political messages being explored – and you would like to think the world, in general, is a more tolerant place 30 years later – but the film’s really about this group of six friends banding together and supporting another put-upon group, a small mining community in Wales. This is where a lot of the humour comes from – the old Welsh ladies having fun with “their gays” and “their lesbians”!

The cast is superb – even though Nighy is probably under-utilised – with Mark (Schnetzer) & Joe (McKay) particularly captivating. The soundtrack/score is also great, although there’s obviously some disco! Well-paced and with a great ending, this is a very enjoyable film.

Overall: Fun, moving true story.

Gav's Rating: 4 stars. 

Fury (October 2014)

Official Australian release date: 23/10/14. Viewed: 20/10/14.

Director: David Ayer

Actors: Brad Pitt, Logan Lerman, Shia LeBeouf, Michael Peña, Jon Berhthal

Genre: Action / War / Drama

Rating: MA

‘Fury’ is set right at the end of World War II, with the American’s slowly forcing the Nazis back towards Berlin. This is different to lots of WWII films, since it’s not D-Day, or the Western front, or Pearl Harbour – it’s just five guys in a tank, driving across Germany, fighting Nazis when they appear. And that’s the film’s strong point – it’s very realistic. There’s death, mud, weary soldiers, fleeing civilians and prisoners everywhere.

Sure, it wasn’t filmed in Germany (England instead), but the costumes and sets look believable. There’s really only three battle scenes, with the reality of war (lots of waiting around) being illustrated to full effect. And while probably accurate, the drawn out interludes of no action make the film longer than necessary – I think this would have made an excellent 1 hour 45 min film, rather than 2 hours 15 min.

Don (Pitt) is not actually the main character – it’s really about new recruit Noman (Lerman) and how he fits in with this tight Sherman tank crew, and more importantly, how he deals with the horrors of war and killing other humans. The tracer fire looks great on the screen, but there’s not enough action or incentive to care for the characters and their mission to make this a classic war film. See ‘Patton’ if you haven’t!

Overall: Solid, realistic war film, if unspectacular.

Gav's Rating: 3.5 stars. 

Tusk (October 2014)

Official Australian release date: 9/10/14. Viewed: 9/10/14.

Director: Kevin Smith

Actors: Justin Long, Michael Parks, Johnny Depp, Genesis Rodriguez, Haley Joel Osment

Genre: Drama / Horror / Comedy

Rating: MA

What. The. Hell? That pretty much sums up ‘Tusk’. It’s basically a “trapped with someone evil” horror movie, with some Kevin Smith humour thrown in here and there. Sure, there’s some laughs, but they’re mostly incredulous. Now, I’m a pretty big fan of Smith’s and I used to listen to SModCast (but haven’t heard the one this was based on) and I’ve seen all his films and stand-up DVDs. But even still, this has to be the worst thing he’s done. I admire him for taking a risk and doing something unexpected, but ‘Red State’ was at least new, exciting and inventive. ‘Tusk’, not so much.

Before this turns into a total bagging, let me point out some of the pros – the score is great, the use of Fleetwood Mac’s ‘Tusk’ (“don’t say that you love me!”) is pretty great and fitting in its scene and some of the language and nuances that Parks uses are fantastic. Depp is also pretty funny as the unrecognisable (thanks to a fake nose and, I think, contacts) detective.

But it’s just hard to ignore the total and complete nonsensicalness. Why is it set in Winnipeg, Canada, but filmed in North Carolina, USA? Why would Parks leave the phone lying around for Long to find? How is Parks supposed to be 90+ when he’s only 74? Why do we need to see Joel Osment & Rodriguez pretty much talking to the camera when Long’s not there, adding nothing to the story? Why does Parks do what he does? There’s no real motivation there. Why does none of the plot make sense? Why do we need over half of the movie being exposition before anything happens? All I’ll say is, see it if you’re curious, but be prepared to be grossed out and simultaneously underwhelmed.

Overall: Odd, grotesque, unnecessary weirdness.

Gav's Rating: 1.5 stars.