Review #1,465: 'Bumblebee' (2018)

By the time Transformers: The Last Knight rolled around in 2017, even the most hardcore fans of Michael Bay's Transformers franchise were getting tired of it all. The Last Knight, which was the fifth entry into the series, marked ten years of Bay's butt-numbing, explosion-heavy epics, which substituted the charm of the original 80's television show and toy line for faceless CGI constructs bashing each other to pieces, lame comedy, and an increasingly creepy attitude towards its female actors. Bay teased his departure from the franchise after three movies, but went on to make another two, and it's always been clear that the problem lay with the director's inability to engage the audience on an emotional level and refusal to deliver anything but headache-inducing action and softcore pornography. Eyebrows were raised when Paramount announced that one of its few memorable characters, Bumblebee, would receive his own spin-off. Yet they were significantly relaxed when they learned that Travis Knight, director of the acclaimed Kubo and the Two Strings, would helm the project, and not Bay.

Opening with a battle between the Autobots and Decepticons on their home planet of Cybertron, it's immediately apparent that all this universe required was a fresh pair of eyes. Yes, this sequence isn't much more than a computer-generated smackdown between huge alien robots, but at least we can tell them apart. The Autobot leader Optimus Prime (voiced as ever by Peter Cullen) is leading a resistance against their oppressive foes, but seeing his side are losing badly, Prime sends scout B-127 (Dylan O'Brien) to Earth to set up base for their eventual rendezvous. Crashing down in 1987 California, the diminutive Autobot immediately encounters a unit of government soldiers, led by Agent Jack Burns (John Cena), on a routine training exercise, and is met with open hostility. Left grievously wounded after an attack by Decepticon Blitzwing (David Sobolov), B-127 transforms into a Volkswagen Beetle to lay low while awaiting rescue. Meanwhile, teenager and amateur mechanic Charlie Watson (Hailee Steinfeld), still grieving after the death of her father years ago, finds the rusty banger and decides to repair it as a pet project, hoping to impress junkyard owner Hank (Len Cariou) in the process. But when that final piece slips into place, Charlie finds way more in the piece of junk she names Bumblebee than she was expecting.

While Bay quickly forgot about the fans who loved the cartoons, toys and comic books growing up, Knight eagerly embraces them. Rewinding the timeline back to the 1980s, Knight mixes the inevitable action set-pieces with heartfelt drama, which stems not only from Charlie's relationship with the clumsy yet adorable yellow lunk, but also from her grief and anger that her mother has already moved on. As Bumblebee stumbles around the house trying his best not to break anything, you can't help but think of E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial. His prat-falls are made funnier because you have grown to love the character, and by evoking such an established 80's classic, Bumblebee engulfs you further in its pure nostalgia trip. Most importantly, there's a sense of fun and playfulness that was lost in the crotch-grabbing and flag-waving of Bay's cinematic haemorrhoids. Charlie and Bumblebee's bonding sessions are sweet and charming, and Steinfeld's performance is undoubtedly key to this. An endearing mix of awkward teenager and highly capable mechanic, Charlie wears vests and listens to The Smiths, and where Bay may have had her in hot pants leaning over a car, Charlie would much prefer to be underneath it. Her character helps paint an even clearer line between this semi-reboot and Bay's parasitic universe, and finally, I'm excited from the next Transformers film again.


Directed by: Travis Knight
Starring: Hailee Steinfeld, Jorge Lendeborg Jr., John Cena, John Ortiz, Jason Drucker, Dylan O'Brien, Angela Bassett, Justin Theroux, Peter Cullen
Country: USA/China

Rating: ****

Tom Gillespie

Review #1,423: 'Mission: Impossible - Fallout' (2018)

Over the course of twenty-odd years, Tom Cruise has clung to the side of an aeroplane as it soared into the sky, had a knife held millimetres away from his eyeball, and ran down the side of the world's tallest building, all for the sake of the Mission: Impossible series, a franchise that no-one would have dreamt would still be packing cinema screens two decades later when it began back in 1996. Cruise's enthusiasm for putting himself at genuine risk of death has seen these movies continuously trying to outdo each other, and the sixth in the series, Christopher McQuarrie's Fallout, is not only the most ambitious in scale and clinical in its execution, but may also just be one of the finest action pictures ever made. I never believed the sight of Cruise running across the outside of the 119th floor of Dubai's Burj Khalifa would ever be topped, but Fallout delivers not one but two superior set-pieces, and that's not even mentioning the rooftop-hopping that saw Cruise break his leg and carry on with the scene. 

Ethan Hunt and his Impossible Mission Force team are tasked this time with intercepting three plutonium cores in Berlin before they fall into the hands on an organisation called The Apostles, a terrorist group made up of survivors from The Syndicate. Joined by Luther (Ving Rhames) and Benji (Simon Pegg), the team fail in their mission when Hunt refuses to let one his own die. As the terrorists make off with the plutonium to sell to a mysterious buyer called John Lark, Hunt receives a dressing-down from CIA director Erika Sloane (Angela Bassett), who is furious at their failure to secure the weapons of mass destruction. She forces Hunt to take on CIA operative August Walker (Henry Cavill) as a shadow, and the odd couple head off to Paris to track down Alanna (Vanessa Kirby), an arms dealer they believe has connections to Lark. Double-crosses and high-speed chases ensue, as well as Tom Cruise's trademark run, as all paths start to lead back to Solomon Lane (Sean Harris), the formidable villain from last time.

Christopher McQuarrie is the only director to have returned for a second stab at the Mission: Impossible gig, and the choice seems odd given how lacklustre Rogue Nation proved to be. But whatever he failed to grasp last time around he confidently nails here. McQuarrie and Cruise pull out all the stops, executing everything from a terrifying night-time sky-dive to a helicopter chase that sees Cruise plummet from the chopper's rails to the cargo swinging 40 feet below like veteran masters of the genre. The sheer risk and danger of some of the stunts pulled off here is gobsmacking, and Cruise can now comfortably sit alongside the likes of Jackie Chan as one of the greatest action stars ever. Cruise isn't the only star of course: Cavill particularly impresses as the deadpan slugger with a moustache so impressive it manage to cock up Justice League's re-shoots. Rhames and Pegg, who are both given larger roles than usual, can now banter like colleagues who have worked with each other for four movies, and reliable support is given by the likes of Rebecca Ferguson, Alec Baldwin and Michelle Monaghan. At two and a half hours, it can be argued that there's at least one climax too many, but I doubt anyone will be checking their watches. 

Directed by: Christopher McQuarrie

Starring: Tom Cruise, Henry Cavill, Ving Rhames, Simon Pegg, Rebecca Ferguson, Sean Harris, Angela Bassett, Vanessa Kirby, Michelle Monaghan

Country: USA/China/France/Norway

Rating: ****

Tom Gillespie

Review #1,307: 'Black Panther' (2018)

When Marvel first announced they would finally be giving their most popular African-based superhero a most overdue solo outing, audiences and critics alike clocked straight away just how important the film would be, not only in the superhero genre, but for mainstream film-making as a whole. In recent years, social media has raised huge question marks over an industry that had been, and still is, failing to honour both women and ethnic minorities in movies, with last year's Wonder Woman being the first superhero movie of note to tackle the issue head-on, delivering astonishing results in the process. Black Panther is not the first black superhero lead - see the likes of Spawn, Blade and Catwoman - but it is the first to truly celebrate African culture and specifically focus on the 'Black Experience'. The results are, again, truly astonishing.

Marvel has unleashed a game-changer, and one that is well on its way to becoming one of the highest-grossing movies of all time. But this was never really in doubt when they announced that Ryan Coogler, the enormously talented director behind Fruitvale Station and Creed, would be behind the camera, and expectations then soared as soon as the jaw-dropping trailer hit, which was our first real look at the vibrant and fantastical fictional African country of Wakanda. With Chadwick Boseman's T'Challa aka the Black Panther introduced two years ago in Captain American: Civil War, Coogler has been spared the need for origin story mechanics and has free reign to explore this previously unseen world. The big joke is that the rest of the world think of Wakanda as a third-world country full of goats and farmers, when in fact their technological advancements put everyone else to shame. Yet they choose to keep their major discovery - a crashed meteor carrying mystical substance vibranium - a secret for generations. After a brief read of African history, you can understand why.

So their country is a dazzling, futuristic sight, yet the Wakandans still honour the traditions of their ancestors. With their former king T'Chaka (John Kani) dead at the hands of Daniel Bruhl's Zemo, his son T'Challa has returned to Wakanda to receive his crown. He wants his old flame and active spy Nakia (Lupita Nyong'o) there for his big day, and his sister Shuri (Letitia Wright), a science boffin who trumps the likes of Tony Stark and Bruce Banner in terms of intelligence and innovation, teases her older brother. Despite an initial reluctance, T'Challa is a willing and capable leader, both politically and physically, able to defend any challengers without the aid of the enhance powers of the Black Panther. While the lack of having to watch the protagonist wrestle with their feelings as they step up to a bigger responsibility is certainly refreshing, the lack of any real arc for T'Challa is one of the very problems with Black Panther. With a supporting cast so vast and impressive, T'Challa often gets drowned out of his own story.

Still, the supporting cast, which includes the likes of Danai Gurira, Martin Freeman, Angela Bassett, Forest Whitaker, Daniel Kaluuya, Andy Serkis and Winston Duke, certainly deliver. Wright near steals the film, and Duke, as rival tribe leader M'Baku, makes a big impression in a relatively short amount of time. But a Marvel film wouldn't be complete without a big bad, and Michael B. Jordan's Eric Killmonger is easily their most complex, imposing and sympathetic since Loki. To say more about his character would be giving away spoilers, but Coogler and co-writer Joe Robert Cole lay out his motivation and execution with real precision, and Jordan proves to be a thoroughly menacing presence. The cast, which is one of the best assembled in recent memory, help Cooger sculpt this fascinating world of progression and tradition, and even when the film can't help but indulge in a climax of CGI fisticuffs, you'll remain immersed because you'll care about the characters. Black Panther does something no other superhero has done before it - for me at least - and resonates long after the credits roll, proving timely in exploring the question of whether to build bridges or walls.


Directed by: Ryan Coogler
Starring: Chadwick Boseman, Lupita Nyong'o, Letitia Wright, Michael B. Jordan, Danai Gurira, Martin Freeman, Daniel Kaluuya, Winston Duke, Andy Serkis, Angela Bassett, Forest Whitaker
Country: USA

Rating: ****

Tom Gillespie

Review #1,114: 'Malcolm X' (1992)

Malcolm X, Spike Lee's epic portrayal of the street hustler turned spokesman for the Nation of Islam who was assassinated at the age of 39, is undoubtedly the director's most assured, complex and mature film, but it is a wonder that it was ever made at all. Controversy began long before production even started, with heavy criticism laid on the fact that Norman Jewison was lined up direct what many, including Lee, felt was a project a black director should handle. When Jewison gracefully bowed out and Lee took over, many still felt that the polarising activist's life would somehow be whitewashed, labelling Lee a 'Buppie' (middle-class African-American).

The irony of many of the statements thrown at the biopic before it was even made was highlighted, and the resulting film was a 3 hour 20 minute testament to Lee's persistence at getting his hands on a story he had dreamt about making since film school. The studio had thrown in a budget for and insisted on a 2 hour 15 minute running time, but Lee, understanding that the contradictions and evolution of Malcolm's teachings and the many events and influences that helped shape the man demanded a longer running time. When the budget was exhausted, Lee called in for donations from the African-American community, and many of them obliged. Somehow, it's still too short to really get to heart of Malcolm, but it's certainly a far better film than it would have been had Lee not been so insistent at bringing his vision to the screen.

Malcolm's life was crammed with incident, and Lee does a decent job getting almost everything in. Flashbacks to his childhood, when his mother and father were tormented by the Ku Klux Klan and his family lived under the constant threat of death, are juxtaposed with his early life as a sharp-suited, ambitious numbers runner in Harlem known as Red, working underneath gangster West Indian Archie (Delroy Lindo). His actions soon land him in prison, where he meets Baines (Albert Hall), a fellow inmate working for Elijah Muhammad (Al Freeman Jr.) and the Nation of Islam. Baines teaches Malcolm that the drugs and alcohol he enjoys so much are simply ways for the white man to keep the black man in their place, and that the white man is, without exception, the devil. Malcolm leaves prison as Malcolm X, ditching the 'slave name' given to him by his ancestor's owners, and is transformed into an extremely enigmatic and convincing spokesman for the Nation of Islam.

The rush of excitement and danger of the opening third soon gives way to a more serious tone, as Malcolm's radical views on segregation under the watchful eye of 'the honourable' Elijah Muhammad makes him an incredibly controversial figure; loved, hated and feared in equal measure. Malcolm's popularity soon causes rifts and jealousy within the ranks of the Nation, and he sees the man who once took him under his wing become a deadly nemesis. His wife Betty Shabazz (Angela Bassett) receives threatening phone calls, and the family's house is set ablaze. Lee's technical discipline throughout these moments, especially for a director who usually embraces visual flourishes, ensures that a steady, gloomy momentum builds up towards Malcolm's eye-opening pilgrimage to Mecca and eventual murder.

A film of such emotional weight also calls for a great performance, and Denzel Washington delivers in spades. Even when Malcolm is at his most questionable, Washington imbues the character with the same charm, wit and magnetism that no doubt saw him sore through the ranks of the Nation and become loved by many. When the pace sags, and it frequently does, Washington manages to draw you back in with his effortless screen presence. The film manages to paint a well-rounded picture of a man who underwent a few radical changes in his life, thanks both to Lee's thoughtful approach and Washington's incredible performance. Lee does go slightly overboard with his worship of the man at the climax, as Ossie Davis reads a eulogy over a montage of children declaring "I am Malcolm X!" and a speech from Nelson Mandela, but this doesn't do too much damage to what is engrossing, detailed and fearless biopic of an inspirational man.


Directed by: Spike Lee
Starring: Denzel Washington, Angela Bassett, Albert Hall, Al Freeman Jr., Delroy Lindo
Country: USA/Japan

Rating: ****

Tom Gillespie

Review #998: 'Critters 4' (1992)

It seems that there is an unwritten rule when it comes to horror franchises that are teetering dangerously on the edge of bargain-bin hell. When the basic premise has been stretched so far that it is well past the line of self-parody, just transport the action to space. The Hellraiser franchise did it, the Friday the 13th films came to an embarrassing end with Jason X (2001), and even the Leprechaun series tried it, all to no avail. With the charm of the crites, or 'critters', all but disappearing by the time Critters 2 (1988) came around, it was never going to be long until the red-eyed killer pillows found themselves drifting through the cosmos.

We were given a brief glimpse at the next instalment at the end of Critters 3 (1991), which was shot back-to-back with number 4, as the recurring, hapless bounty hunter Charlie (Don Keith Opper) found himself face-to-face with the last remaining crite eggs but halted from exterminating them by his alien friend Ug (Terrence Mann). It is against intergalactic law to cause a species' extinction and so Charlie is ordered to place the eggs in a preservation capsule but manages to stumble into it himself, and they are blasted off into space where they float around for 50 years. Luckily, or unluckily, for Charlie, he is found by a junk ship who are ordered by the Intergalactic Council to take their prize load to a nearby station to await further instruction.

It is here that the crew of archetypes spend the bulk of the film bickering amongst themselves, and the film takes its sweet time for douchebag captain Rick (Anders Hove) to finally lose the plot and open their cargo, unleashing the crites on the unsuspecting bunch. Wasting an impressive cast that includes Angela Bassett, Brad Dourif and Twin Peaks' Eric DaRe, Critters 4 is just plain boring for the most part. With the crites themselves barely registering until the climax, the film stumbles around looking for interesting sub-plots to distinguish its characters but ultimately, like most movies of its ilk, ends up just ripping-off Ridley Scott's Alien (1979). A whimpering end to the Critters franchise that arguably should have ended two movies ago, although I'm sure a Hollywood remake is inevitable.


Directed by: Rupert Harvey
Starring: Don Keith Opper, Terrence Mann, Paul Whitthorne, Angela Bassett, Brad Dourif, Anders Hove, Eric DaRe
Country: USA

Rating: *

Tom Gillespie

Review #254: 'Green Lantern' (2011)

Disgraced aircraft pilot Hal Jordan (Ryan Reynolds) is chosen by a green ring to be Earth's representative in the Green Lantern Corps - a police force that spans the galaxy that protects the universe from evil. The ring gives him the power to materialise his imagination into a green force powered by will. The ring was brought to Earth by a crash-landed alien, Abin Sur (Temuera Morrison) who had, in the past, defeated a deadly foe named Parallax (voiced by Clancy Brown), who after escaping from his prison, attacked Abin Sur and caused him to flee his planet. Meanwhile, scientist Hector Hammond (Peter Sargaard), son of Senator Robert Hammond (Tim Robbins), is brought in to perform the autopsy on Abin Sur. A part of Parallax that has lingered with his corpse latches on to Hector, causing him to develop telekinetic powers and a rather large forehead.

Green Lantern is one of those adaptation that has been thrown around Hollywood for years, with many writers, directors and stars named as possibilities and then dismissed as quickly as the idea came around. For some films, this proves a good thing. An example, Zack Snyder's Watchmen (2009), was a hell of a long time coming, with the likes of Arnold Schwarzenegger being banded round to star as Dr. Manhattan. But several writers and directors later, it came to someone who had a passion for the material, and he created something very good and loyal to the graphic novel. While it was by no means a perfect film, it was just about as good as one could hope from a movie adaptation of a very difficult novel. In the case of Green Lantern, perhaps the troublesome journey from comic book to screen was there for a reason, as the finished film is pretty poor.

As likeable as Ryan Reynolds usually is, he doesn't have the charisma or the loveable rogueishness that, say, Robert Downey Jr. has as Tony Stark in Iron Man (2008). Hal Jordan is generally unlikeable - he is cocky, reckless and selfish. Tony Stark's arrogance makes him stand out, and separates him from the mere mortals he swears to protect. Jordan is seen at the beginning of the film sacrificing his wing-man (or wing-woman - the sexy Blake Lively as Carol Ferris) in order to beat a rival company in a dog-fight. He is evidently an emotionally torn character - we see this in an extremely soppy flashback which shows us how Jordan witnessed his father blowing up in front of his eyes. Well boo fucking hoo. I couldn't ever warm to his character because he doesn't deserve his power. Perhaps if his back-story was served with a little less cheddar and a bit more originality then maybe I could root for him.

The premise that he can harness his imagination as his power is an interesting one, and certainly one ripe with limitless possibility. Yet director Martin Campbell (Casino Royale (2006), The Mask of Zorro (1998)) and the four different screenwriters seem to leave many gaping plot holes. Jordan is seen throwing up fast and imaginative defences when being trained by Green Lantern Corps combat trainer Kilowog (Michael Clarke Duncan), yet when being faced by the giant-headed Hammond, everything goes out the window. Hammond holds Carol as hostage when Jordan bursts in brandishing his ring (the one on his finger!) when Hammond makes him aware that Carol is being held telekinetically in mid-air with a syringe filled with what I can only imagine as poison floating near her neck. Jordan appears to be helpless. So why doesn't he imagine a steel wall around Carol, and a giant knife across Hammond's throat? Because that would be to easy and would require the writers to come with better ideas, of course.

The film really isn't quite as bad as the critics have made it out to be. It is sporadically fun, and features the ever-watchable Mark Strong as Green Lantern Corps leader Sinestro. But the film is just so annoyingly stupid that it made me question why someone so stupid would be chosen to wield such power. And the script is so bad that you can hear the desperation to try and forge some humour out of the thinly-written supporting characters (the 'comedy relief' best-friend is so bad the director just seems to cut him out of the movie half way through). Not exactly a Ghost Rider (2007) sized pile of steaming shit, but nothing to give Christopher Nolan sleepless nights. DC better book up their ideas, as Marvel seem to be running away with it (although Marvel have yet to make a film as good as The Dark Knight (2008)).


Directed by: Martin Campbell
Starring: Ryan Reynolds, Blake Lively, Peter Sarsgaard, Mark Strong, Tim Robbins, Angela Bassett, Geoffrey Rush, Michael Clarke Duncan
Country: USA

Rating: **

Tom Gillespie