Figment Reviews

Thursday, 21 February 2019

Destroyer (2018) - Film Review

Review:

*Originally written February 21st, 2019*

Well, looks like I'm in for another year where my favourite films of the year don't play anywhere near me in theatres. Meaning I either need to wait for a watchable torrent or a Blu-ray/4K release down the line. This is the state of cinema in the UK outside of huge cities at the moment. Unless it's Star Wars, Marvel or award contending Oscar-bait, I do not get to see the film at the cinema. Leaving me to wonder why I even bother any more.

Destroyer is already one of those, and it's only February (It was released here in January, but like I said, showed nowhere near me. Despite being heavily advertised at the Guildford Odeon. Honestly, the month leading up to its release, any film rated 12A or above showed the trailer for this. Then its release date came and nothing).

I'm amazed how overlooked this has been this awards season. Nicole Kidman is absolutely on fire here, in her most volatile, heartbreaking and ferocious turn I've ever seen from her. There's obvious comparisons to Charlize Theron in Monster, where they "Ugly" themselves up to look barely recognisable. It works here incredibly well, making for not just the best performance of Kidman's career, but one of the best of 2018. It is a travesty this was overlooked at this years Oscar's in favour of more baitey performances.

Outside of Kidman's performance, this is still an incredibly effective and uncomfortable corrupt police thriller that spans multiple time periods. Karyn Kusama balances everything with such care, delivering some powerful storytelling with bleak and brutal violence, leading to a surprisingly poignant ending (Although I'm not sure about that final shot).

I was instantly reminded of some of Taylor Sheridan's works throughout. Being a coldly told and bleak story featuring gorgeous cinematography and bursts of harsh violence. I'm amazed this came from the director of films like Jennifer's Body and the atrocious Aeon Flux, it's rare that a director can move on from films like that to create something far more meaningful and worth watching. I'm very impressed and once again she's shockingly overlooked along with several other female director's who failed to be nominated at this years Oscars.

We've seen corrupt police dramas told many times before, perhaps peaking in FX's series 'The Shield", but I really have a soft spot for films about these broken people who use their abuse of power in order to earn some kind of redemption down the line. While Kidman's Erin Bell is definitely not one of the most evil of corrupt cops we've seen in media, she is definitely one of the more interesting. Her handling of guilt after the events decades before the film begins which we learn through flashbacks throughout makes for some genuinely compelling viewing, leading to how she ends up the way she is.

Then there's the lengths she'll go to cover up her crimes and how that effects the relationships with the people around her. The relationship with her daughter is a little cliched, but Kidman's sincere performance certainly makes something we've seen before work, especially with help of the excellent script.

I'm really surprised this was completely slept on. I know I have a soft spot for these sorts of films, but it really is something special that really deserves seeking out. Kidman's performances carries a film that is excellent in all other aspects of its own right. A tight, compelling, beautifully shot piece of harrowing police drama that will most certainly be in my top 10 of 2019.

10/10 Dans

Destroyer is out May 27th, 2019 on Blu-ray and DVD in the UK
Watch the trailer below:

Sunday, 10 February 2019

The Expendables 2 (2012) - 4K UHD Review

Review:

*Originally written February 10th, 2019*

While the first Expendables film truly is bad, I'd always been a fan of the second, a film the first should of been. Having way more fun with the premise of bringing these faded action stars together to give us some over-the-top, violent and explosive action. Expendables 2 doubles down on everything the first gave us and improves on it at the same times.

Where the first was a self-serious mess of a film, this has a much more playful take on the concept, filled with self-aware humour (That doesn't always hit), but it works more than taking any of these '80s action cliches seriously. And this sequel is rife with fantastic cliches and terrible puns that add to a much more entertaining experience. Jason Statham's Lee Christmas proclaiming "I now pronounce you husband and knife" being a particular stand out.

What surprised me is how Stallone managed to direct the first one so poorly, despite being an extremely competent and great director, releasing Rambo just a couple of years before the first Expendables. That said, it was definitely best Simon West took over the reigns for the sequel and makes the great choice to film all the action during the day and not at night where you can barely make out what was happening. It is a shame that a film that cost $100 million looks so ugly though, the CGI is frequently poor and the emphasise over CGI blood instead of blood squibs is a gross oversight considering these are meant to be '80s throwback films.

There is some suitably brutal and gory violence as the team of mercenaries turn countless faceless henchmen into chunky pieces of red meat throughout, while delivering on some extremely entertaining set-pieces the original lacked. The finale at the airport was probably my favourite of the several action scenes. Plus it was great to see Bruce Willis and Arnold Schwarzenegger return and actually get involved with the action this time and play off each other, which they sadly did not get to do in the first.

I suppose what's most disappointing about these films are just how bland the characters are. The team are more their actors than their characters, while I know it is hard to juggle this huge cast, I barely care about any of them and it's more just fun to see the actors on screen rather than any sort of care for their characters. I honestly could not tell you a single thing about these people despite they seem to be a mismash of previous characters they've played in their careers.

Who really shines out the cast though is Jean-Claude Van Damme who is perfectly cast in the playful role as the wonderful camp villain "Jean Vilain", he seems to be having the time of his life in the role and it's the sort of silly nonsense these films need to have a sense of personality and once again, a huge step up from the first. I really don't remember who the villain even was in the first.

The only real thing the first had over the second isn't even to do with film itself. This is a massively disappointing 4K disc, not helped by how the film was shot. There are some moments that boast impressive detail and colour, but a lot of the time the films looks soft and carries a massively inconsistent amount of grain, some of it natural, some of it intrusive. While I was we got a better transfer this is still the best the film has ever looked.

The Expendables 2 massively improves on the first in every way. Competent and fun action, a self-aware tone and an insane cast. It's fun throwaway fodder that doesn't live up to the potential of its cast, but hell, it's still a blast.

7/10 Dans

The Expendables 2 is out now on 4K UHD, Blu-ray and DVD in the UK
Watch the trailer below:

The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part (2019) - Cinema Review

Review:

*Originally written February 10th, 2019*

I honestly wasn't sure how this would turn out. I've been a pretty big fan of these surprisingly good Lego Movies so far, which seemed to have come out of nowhere. Who thought something as cynical as a film about Lego could spawn a franchise of excellent kids films? With that said, I was massively underwhelmed by the trailers for this, but thankfully, the film itself turned out to be a worthy and possibly better effort than the first.

With all the meta aspects of the original sort of making a sequel hard to do, they fully commit to it with ideas that build upon the first and takes the story into some surprising and interesting places. It takes place 5 years after the first as Emmet and his friends have to take on an invasion of Lego DUPLOs as they try and fight to save their world.

Off the bat, it is so great to see Mad Max: Fury Road get to the point where it's even being massively homaged in a big budget kids film, as the opening act takes place in a dystopian destroyed version of the city as most of citizens have embraced the new status quo and have their own Fury Road style vehicles. This all quickly becomes a sci-fi adventure though as Emmett's friends are kidnapped and forced into an alien wedding ceremony as he has to learn to grow up, mature and save them.

Once again, the story and jokes seemed to resonate far more with adults than it did with children. Most the kids in my screening didn't really seem to laugh a lot at some of the jokes, but there was a lot of subtle stuff there for people my age to enjoy. Including a fantastic cameo from an '80s action star. It was also relieving to see this one didn't rely too heavily on gratuitous cameos from licensed characters, like the first did. Sure, there's still lots of characters, but they're mostly returns from the original, which was fine.

I was also massively impressed by how creative the animation is with this. I remember being a little put off by the look of these films before they were released, but they really are some of the most creative animated kids films going today. There is always so much going on with every scene, making for some excellent rewatchability. From it's gorgeous, vibrant and colourful pallet to the detail on display, this really was a feast for the eyes.

As gorgeous as the animation is, thankfully there really is a great story to go along with it. Emmett's journey is far more interesting than the one he went on previously and introduces us to a a new character also voiced by Chris Pratt as a bad ass action hero style character clearly inspired by his films. Emmett is just so immensely likeable, although his naivety can get on your nerves at times, but it was great to see a lot of the film dedicated to his journey of self-discovery, leading to some genuinely emotional and touching beats towards the end.

The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part brings the Lego Movie franchise 4 for 4 in terms of quality now. Another incredibly animated, funny and sweet journey packed with heart. I really hope they continue this streak and I can't wait to see where the series goes next.

8/10 Dans

The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part is out now in cinemas in the UK
Watch the trailer below:

Hitman: Agent 47 (2015) - 4K UHD Review

Review:

*Originally written February 10th, 2019*

Wow, I'd not planned on revisiting this since its release in 2015, but thanks to my compulsive problem of buying whatever film comes my way and out of morbid curiosity to rewatch it, I ended up buying this on 4K against my better judgement, and to no surprise, it is just awful.

How do they keep getting the Hitman license so wrong? I'm not sure if this is a sequel to the 2007 Timothy Olyphant film at all, or just a straight up reboot? Not that it matters, as the actors are changed and I cannot think of a single reference to the previous film. I spent a lot of this just wishing I was just watching the 2007 film again. That film wasn't great, but compared to this, it seems like a damn masterpiece.

Everything going on here is just not what the Hitman games are about. The games are a series of missions where you have to creatively use your environments to take out your targets as stealthily as possible with a loosely connected narrative sending you to the next mission. There is not a single hit of this in Agent 47. It's a mindless display of awful CGI action, that is poorly shot and lacks any sort of impact.

Every single bit of action is completely overblown, ugly and utterly stupid. People want to see Agent 47 carefully planning a mission and executing it flawlessly, not getting into gunfights in the middle of streets and purposely getting himself arrested, giving his name to the police and getting caught on camera. It's like the makers of this film have never even played the games.

God knows what they were thinking bringing back Skip Woods to write this mess. A man I'm convinced doesn't exist and is just a pseudonym used by studios to attach a name to a script that a 12 year old submitted. Honestly, look at this "Man's" history of films. A Good Day to Die Hard, Hitman, X-Men: Origins and Sabotage. Oof, this guy is just awful and I don't know who he is blowing to keep getting work in Hollywood.

The story here is just nonsense. Like I said, the Hitman games are rarely known for their stories, but at least they keep it simple and straight-forward. This is just an insane level of clones, cyborgs and conspiracy that I was pretty checked out by towards the end. I did laugh at just how bat-shit insane some of this crap got, but it's also so barbarically stupid and annoying.

The only bright spot here is Rupert Friend, who does a commendable job as Agent 47, but everything they do with his character is just wrong. I've always felt to do a Hitman film they should have Agent 47 as the antagonist, a Terminator like figure throughout the film, rather than the clear-cut good guy they make him out to be here. Which is another problem translating the character to film. He's just not an interesting lead, he's a cold, calculated killer that doesn't say much, making for a very uninteresting lead.

I know this franchise is being rebooted as a streaming platform show, which hopefully work a hell of a lot better than these awful films that are only good for a cheap laugh. When will we ever get truly great video-game movies? The nicest thing I can say about this is it least has an excellent 4K release, this should be expected from a film this glossy and new. And part of me sickly wants the 2007 film to get a 4K release at some point too....

3/10 Dans

Hitman: Agent 47 is out now on 4K UHD, Blu-ray and DVD in the UK
Watch the trailer below:

Monday, 4 February 2019

How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World (2019) - Cinema Review

Review:

*Originally written February 4th, 2019*

I was very late to the game with the How to Train Your Dragon franchise, I'd initially dismissed the films as more generic kiddie crap, but when I actually watched them, I was surprised to learn these were some of the best animated films of the decade, rivalling even Disney and Pixar. I'll admit it took me a little while to warm to those first one, but I was instantly won over by the sequel.

What's surprised me is how long this final entry in the trilogy and franchise (For now) took to make. It has been five years since HTTYD2 came out, which is a shockingly long time for most sequels to get churned out. So I really appreciate they took their time and effort to perfect this finale and it really shows. It might go places you'd expect, but this is an extremely effective and emotional end to Toothless and Hiccups story.

We're once again given some of the most beautiful animation in recent history. Bursting with such insane attention to detail, creative and incredible creature and location designs. I absolutely loved every bit of animation on display here. Every scene just popped and sparkled to a degree I did not expect. I really can't wait to see this bad boy on 4K in the future.

The focus here is once again on Toothless and Hiccup as they search for a hidden world where the dragons can live in piece without the threat of humans hunting them, while at the same time they are hunted by a deranged hunter obsessed with killing Toothless (The last of his kind) and Toothless finds himself a love interest.

The way Toothless is brought to life on screen is so easy to make you love him and care about his relationship with Hiccup, he's just so damn adorable. Plus it's great to see how much Hiccup has changed throughout the series, I'd recently rewatched both the previous films in preparation for this and the character really has grown and matured. Turning from the embarrassing child obsessed with killing a dragon to a man trying to bring peace to his late father's land and live up to his legacy.

The real only gripe I have with this whole thing is the villain, who is just pretty bland and uninspired. He's just another bad guy evil for the sake of being evil and having very little in the way of motivation. There is at least some cool stuff in the form of him having a few controlled and evil dragons, leading to some insanely fun set-pieces that live up to some of the best this series has seen.

I'd also seen a lot of people calling this easily the worst of the trilogy, which is fair enough, but for me I found it easily the most engaging, emotional and fun to watch out the three. It might help that this is the only one of the trilogy I've actually seen in theatres, but this all popped for me. The final scene is pretty up there in terms of endings for kids films. You're probably a monster or dead inside if you felt nothing at the end of this.

How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World is a triumph in animated film making. A beautiful, insanely creative and touching, heartfelt end to the story of Toothless and Hiccup that we've been following for nearly a decade. I really hope they just let this series lie and stop here though. This was something special that I didn't see coming. It's only February and animated films have had a seriously high bar set for 2019.

9/10 Dans

How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World is out now in cinemas in the UK
Watch the trailer below:

Tuesday, 22 January 2019

Glass (2019) - Cinema Review

Review:

*Originally written January 22nd, 2019*

After nearly a decade of complete trash, then making a huge comeback with both The Visit and Split, M. Night Shyamalan seemed to have finally got his groove back as a director. Sadly, this belated follow-up to Split and Unbreakable is nothing but a soaring disappointed of mishandled ideas, outrageous plot-twists and inane use of established characters.

Following on from the events of Split, Glass finds David Dunn (Bruce Willis) on the trail of Kevin Crumb "The Horde" (James McAvoy) as he's back on the path of kidnapping and eating college girls. The two quickly find themselves locked up in a psychiatric hospital that also contains Elijah Price (Samuel L Jackson) as they're all treated by Dr. Ellie Staple (Sarah Paulson), who specialises in cases of grand delusion involving people who believe themselves to be superheroes.

There is so little of this that works that it blows my mind this managed to get made. Shyamalan completely shits the bed with these characters we've seen grow since the series inception with 2000's Unbreakable. Everything feels like something out of a rough first draft, the dialogue is clunky and the execution of the twists are barbarically stupid and nonsensical.

The most intriguing aspect of this follow up is how things have changed for both David Dunn and Elijah Price since the events of Unbreakable, and it turns out its not much. Dunn is still donning his rain poncho and has become a local legend in the form of a vigilante in Philadelphia with the help of his son as he fights crime by night and runs a security store by day. While Price spends the first half of the film sedated and not saying a word.

A big question mark around this was Bruce Willis. This is a man who has not put effort into a role since Looper all the way back 2012, his career has pretty much involved him sleepwalking through straight-to-DVD action films since, with the exception of a Death Wish remake that somehow got a theatrical release last year. Annoyingly, Willis still seems to be in sleepwalking mode here, just spouting out his lines like he really doesn't want to be here. He just looks tired and fed up of life, but it's just such a shame he couldn't put effort into finishing off the story of one of his most acclaimed cult roles.

Then there's Samuel L Jackson, who does finally spring to life in the latter half of the film, essentially playing a campy comic-book villain who has lost all the nuance and weight of the Price we knew from Unbreakable. This is mostly due to the annoying script that constantly has Price mostly just talking about being in a comic-book and how what's happening in the story relates to where we would be in a comic-book. The whole things gets played out very fast and just keeps going until the film ends.

What's most frustrating about this whole experience is the flashes of potential brilliance that Shyamalan teases us with that ultimately goes nowhere. There's a smart, interesting dissection of the superhero genre buried in here somewhere, it's just a revised script and some better editing away. His visual style is all over the place too, some of the shots and colour design look fantastic, but when it comes to action, Shyamalan creates some deeply uninvolving action that lacks any sort of impact.

There is at least some bright spots involving James McAvoy, who is clearly having far more fun with his role than anyone else here. He effortlessly channels an insane amount of characters with his gonzo physical performance that is just pure joy to watch, despite the context being utter nonsense. While he is billed as one of the three main characters, he certainly takes up most of the screen time as Jackson doesn't even make an appearance until about 40 minutes in and Willis pretty much disappears for the entire middle of the film.

Anya Taylor-Joy's Casey is also a welcome addition, returning to her role from Split after being the only survivor from her encounter with The Horde. Then they just go and derail the whole thing by making her the only person who seems to calm Crumb down, and making her feel sympathy and a connection with Crumb, despite nearly being murdered by him and suffering days of abuse and psychological torture. It's just such a bizarre and misguided direction to take the character and it doesn't work in the slightest.

In the more shallow end of criticisms, it starts off entertaining enough, but grinds to a halt as we spend so much time in the asylum with these characters as they're treated for their delusions in increasingly frustrating and pointless scenes as we all know where it's all going and we know for a fact these characters are what they say they are, so spending so much time having a character try and convince them they're just normal people with mental health issues is just a chore.

Then it all comes crashing down such an anticlimactic showdown that brings all the characters to such shockingly unsatisfying conclusions that pretty much undo all the good work the previous two films have down and makes you wonder what the hell was the point of all this. Maybe expectations were too high, but also it was just Shyamalan becoming a borderline parody of himself as he delivers such hilarious awful plot-twist one after the other in the last 20 minutes or so.

I won't spoil anything, but one of the twists is something that many people had pointed out just after Split had been release and something I thought had already been confirmed, so seeing it played out as a huge twist just felt weird to me, especially as it was something I thought was pretty well known for nearly 2 years now. Then the last 3 main twists are so stupidly left-field and derailed a film I was already very on the fence about to begin with.

2019 has got its first huge disappointment and it's only January. This is not boding well. Glass is a huge mess on all fronts, barely saved by James McAvoy's scene stealing performance, but derailed by pretty much every other aspect of the film. Such a shame to see this series come to a bitterly insulting conclusion. Wack.

4/10 Dans

Glass is out now in cinemas in the UK
Watch the trailer below:

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Friday, 18 January 2019

Unbreakable (2000) - Blu-ray Review

Review:

*Originally written January 18th, 2019*

With Glass releasing this week it seemed like a safe bet to revisit M. Night Shyamalan's Unbreakable, his subdued superhero drama that is unlike any superhero film we get today. There's no lame humour aimed at 8 year olds, it's not bright and colourful and it doesn't wrap itself up with a boring CGI battle where a city is destroyed.

It's just a refreshing change of pace after becoming frequently disillusioned and bored by most comic-book films these days. In the past year we've had at least 5, with mixed results and I am dangerously bored by them. It might just be my increasing frustration of seeing every single new big release that I mostly have little interest in, but will give a chance anyway. I'd be fine with this is my local cinema actually showed the smaller films I do want to see, but it's a rarity, and it's frustrating.

Anyway, like I said, Unbreakable is just a breath of fresh air in 2019 and it really gets better with every watch, a character piece with vague brushes of comic-book vibes. I've always been one of those people who found The Sixth Sense a tad overrated and was always more impressed by Unbreakable, a film I found pretty boring as a kid, but being in my 20s, it's far more interesting than I'd remembered.

2000's Bruce Willis who actually tries to act is pretty excellent as David Dunn, a security guard who survives a train-crash that leaves every other passenger dead, while catching the attention of Samuel L Jackson's Elijah Price, a comic-book obsessed art gallery owner who spends his life in a wheelchair due to his rare disease that leaves his bones brittle.

As much as I love Unbreakable and I've seen it a few times now, I tend to always forget a lot of what happens. I obviously remember the big reveal at the end that leads to a barbarically abrupt close where I feel an epilogue or another 10 minutes were planned, but maybe they run out of budget?

But the mystery at the core of Unbreakable is still fascinating. Seeing Dunn slowly release he's not normal as he does more and more actions that normal human could not do, and I just love how restrained this all is. It's about the characters journey, not some boring end of the world plot. The closest we get to superhero action is a short scene towards the end where Dunn attempts to stop a home invasion which itself is cold, and surprisingly brutal scene. This feels much more like superheroes in the real world, something that has been done many times before, but never this effective.

I do love Samuel L Jackson's Elijah Price too, a tragic figure who is the polar opposite of Dunn, a man so obsessed with comic books, that he'll do anything in the vein hope that a character like the ones he reads about could be real. It's also just nice to see Jackson in a film where he doesn't get to drop the F bomb and a treat to prove he can give a good performance that actually has gravitas and isn't just fun because "It's Samuel L Jackson"

This was always planned as a trilogy in Shyamalan's head, which we know wouldn't end up happening till 2019 after the clunky reveal that Split was a secret sequel to Unbreakable. As much as the reviews are mixed for Glass, I really am looking forward to it, much more than any of the other Marvel or DC films coming out this year. It might be a mess and not as entertaining as those films, but god, I'm sure it'll at least be more interesting and different.

Unbreakable is a perfect refresher that superhero films can be truly great pieces of art in themselves. They don't need loud, obnoxious set-pieces or cringey jokes, just a grounded story that actually explores its characters rather than having to blow up some giant beam that shoots into the sky.

9/10 Dans

Unbreakable is out now on Blu-ray and DVD in the UK
Watch the trailer below: