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Strike Back: Vengeance

July 27, 2016
TV
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Strike Back Vengeance Season 3 Trio Philip Winchester, Sullivan Stapleton, Rhashan Stone, Liam Garrigan, Rhona Mitra, Charles Dance, Vincent Regan, Natalie Becker, Shane Taylor, Stephanie Vogt

Strike Back: Vengeance (Season 3) – when a billionaire acquires four nuclear triggers in order to re-shape Africa, only section 20 can stop him. Continuing with the UK/US collaboration, this takes everything that worked about ‘Project Dawn’ and made it all bigger/louder/better. Every episode is wall to wall action; with dozens of set pieces, hundreds of deaths, and a load of whiz-bang sex scenes. The entire season is 100mph, and it’s simply great fun. The characters feel more rounded, the leads’ chemistry is fantastic, and it’s very professionally made – but things like ‘character development’, ‘plot’, and ‘direction‘ are background noise to the explosions, gunfights, stunt driving, and spec ops that march the show forward. It’s hard to believe that such a ridiculously intense level of action (huge set pieces every 10 mins or so) can be done on a TV budget – the 10 episodes are paired off into FIVE 90-minute long mini missions that run together. In a world of toned down and heavily edited 12-rated action films, the swearing, sex, and sensational action makes this feel like something from ‘the good old days’. Completely knowing, and aimed directly at young male action fans, Strike Back Vengeance is a show that only really does one thing (infinite ammo, high-octane action turned up to 11), but does it brilliantly – making it a truly unmissable show for action fans

Score: 8.5/10

Strike Back Vengeance Season 3 Sniping Philip Winchester, Sullivan Stapleton, Rhashan Stone, Liam Garrigan, Rhona Mitra, Charles Dance, Vincent Regan, Natalie Becker, Shane Taylor, Stephanie Vogt

Southpaw

January 2, 2016
Film Reviews
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Southpaw Training Regime Ripped Jake Gyllenhaal, Forest Whitaker, Naomie Harris, Victor Ortiz, Rachel McAdams, Curtis 50 Cent Jackson, Miguel Gomez, Oona Laurence, Rita Ora, Antoine Fuqua

Southpaw [minor plot spoilers]: a boxer’s life crumbles when his wife is killed, and he loses everything else he cares about. For a standard beat-down/comeback sports story arc, it feels overly ripe and melodramatic – the ‘Fall’ section of the story takes forever and just gets worse and worse, to the point where it’s becomes borderline comical: losing wife, then fighting licence, then money, then child, then house, then gets a shit job… Because this bit and the token training montages take so long the short-but-more-upbeat ending doesn’t really counterbalance the emotional front end. For a boxing movie we don’t actually get much fighting either; as the focus is on 1-dimensional characters (slimy agent, has-been trainer…) and a well-worn story arc. Although his character’s a simple short-tempered meat-head Gyllenhaal puts in another sterling shift (talk about a hot streak); the rest of the cast are definitely supporting roles. You’ve seen everything in Southpaw before, but with a bit of emotion and some strong storytelling Fuqua and The Weinsteins deliver a solid – if unremarkable – boxing picture.

Score: 7/10

Southpaw Knockout KO Uppercut Southpaw Jake Gyllenhaal, Forest Whitaker, Naomie Harris, Victor Ortiz, Rachel McAdams, Curtis 50 Cent Jackson, Miguel Gomez, Oona Laurence, Rita Ora, Antoine Fuqua

Out of the Furnace

December 17, 2015
Film Reviews
2 Comments

Out of the Furnace - Christian Bale, Woody Harrelson, Casey Affleck, Forest Whitaker, Willem Dafoe, Tom Bower, Zoë Saldana, Sam Shepard

Out of the Furnace: when his kid brother disappears after getting involved in redneck bare-knuckle boxing, his stoic brother takes the law into his own hands. The acting is nothing short of stupendous; everyone is in full on beast mode; although Casey Affleck does his trademark mumbling incoherency shtick – which is becoming pretty tiresome / irksome. Despite the array of colossal performances topped by Bale and Harrelson, the film is completely marred by a time-bendingly-slow pace, which makes it seem like a 4-hour affair. It’d be like watching Aryton Senna do a Formula 1 circuit in on a mobility scooter. When you’re filling an already lengthy movie with unnecessarily long aerial takes of a car driving through woods, and a time-consuming barely relevant sub-plots (like drink driving) – your editor needs to take a running jump. As the buildup to the finale is so agonisingly drawn out, the end – although satisfying – is ultimately underwhelming. Despite being a more grim version of the boxing sub-plot from Snatch, this it’s a gritty portrayal of a broken American steeltown community in decline. A very Eastwoodian sleeper, but only because it makes you want to sleep…

Score: 5/10