The Nut Job (2014) 63/100

Posted on August 11, 2014 by The Red Dragon

Rating : 63/100 85 Min

Not sure if ‘The Nut Job’ is really a suitable title for a kids film, but nonetheless it refers to the antics of various squirrels and woodland creatures living in a park in the middle of fictional Oakton City as they try to secure winter food for themselves by stealing nuts from a nearby shop, the owners of which are themselves using this as a cover whilst they try to dig a tunnel under the bank across the street. The animation is essentially quite good and the voice acting from the likes of Will Arnett, Brendan Fraser, Katherine Heigl and Liam Neeson is fine, with the film playing out rather like an extended version of an episode of ‘Tom and Jerry’ as the story is primarily delivered via an endless series of chase sequences. There is a slightly questionable good guy/bad guy set up as the hero, Surly (Arnett), is mainly concerned with gathering food for himself and ultimately he is vindicated in this (although he of course ends up helping everyone else and realising the errors of his selfish ways), as the powers that be, the evil Raccoon (Neeson) and his ‘angry bird’ clone henchman, turn out to be hoarding food to control the masses rather than to make sure they are all well fed. Should entertain children, but might struggle to ever become a family favourite.

Planes : Fire & Rescue (2014) 70/100

Posted on August 11, 2014 by The Red Dragon

Rating : 70/100 83 Min

Following up on the financial, if not critical, success of Planes, the Disney machine have realised they have a new potential franchise on their hands and have put more effort into this one – resulting in a much better story than before, though it’s still released by DisneyToon Studios who are relatively new at producing theatrical films and not straight to DVD sequels. Again aimed at a young family audience, parents might nevertheless find it quite enjoyable, despite being lighter on the occasional subterfuge of adult comedy compared to most of Disney’s output. The graphics are top notch as one would expect, but probably its biggest boon is the introduction of some solid voice acting from the likes of Ed Harris and Wes Studi, and a screenplay that deviates, thankfully, from regurgitating another race related contrivance and instead sees primary hero Dusty Crophopper (Dane Cook) effectively disabled at the beginning, forcing him to consider a change of career.

The somewhat antiquated fire department at his local airport provides him with the inspiration he needs to come to terms with his injury (his gearbox can’t handle really high speeds and conks out) as the popular terminal faces being shut down unless they can upgrade it, and thus he enlists for fire and rescue training (crop dusters were actually some of the first planes modified and used for fire fighting in the 1950s) introducing a raft of new characters, predominantly more interesting ones than in the original, and a new primary location. It’s a polished and morally strong animation for kids, with occasional moments of unexpected class, like the rescue team talking about how thunder and lightning can start forest fires as they are summoned to put one out, and then AC/DC’s ‘Thunderstruck’ playing as we watch them do just that, slightly à la ‘Iron Man 2’ (10) – although Marvel are actually owned by Disney, and indeed what is alluded to right at the end of ‘Guardians of the Galaxy‘ also manages to sneak its way into a scene here ….

Step Up 5 Million : All In (2014) 47/100

Posted on August 1, 2014 by The Red Dragon

Rating : 47/100 112 Min

Ok, so this is Step Up 5 (aka Step Up : All In) not five million, but really it’s so formulaic and derivative of its predecessors that they could rinse and repeat and get up to that number without any real effort. It has been billed as the film reuniting cast members from the other films, but what they really mean is that Moose (Adam Sevani) and Andie (Briana Evigan) are back in it – there is no Channing Tatum, for example, and although a few other semi familiar faces appear they, just as before, receive so little character development and so few lines that they might as well be new blood for all anyone is likely to care. The acting is terrible, and the screenwriting is offensive to writers everywhere, with possibly the worst element being lead male character Sean (Ryan Guzman), who does return from the previous film but who seems to have retained none of the life lessons he bored us with last time, managing to be both an indistinguishable carbon copy of all the leading male characters in the franchise as well as the least likeable of the lot.

The dancing, at least, is for the most part very good and has been well choreographed, but even the biggest fans of the series are going to struggle sitting through the garbage comprising eighty percent of the film to get to it. The story is the usual ‘some crew will try to bond in order to win a dance competition against the bad guys and the hot leads will fall for one another, even though one of these leads did the same thing a few films ago and that didn’t seem to work out too well for her and the other one would clearly rather make love to himself’ – eighty percent dancing with twenty percent story would have been far better. Evigan is by literal leaps and bounds the best thing about the film – and indeed it wasn’t until I sat and tried to remember the other four films that I realised her shaking her ass in ‘Step Up 2 : The Streets’ (08) is pretty much the only thing I remember about any of them. Bring on ‘Step Up 6 : All Out’, when Andie tires of male dancers breaking her heart and must now seduce the hottest girl in town through erotic, sweaty street dance – the girl is tempted, but what will her Republican Senator daddy who’s about to fund the state ballet have to say ..?? Only Moose knows …

Guardians of the Galaxy (2014) 70/100

Posted on July 31, 2014 by The Red Dragon

Rating : 70/100 121 Min

An odd film, in that the entire first half is completely flat but the second is the polar opposite – ultimately transforming itself into a reasonably soulful and entertaining sci-fi adventure. Certainly, if you’re going to tell a tale of two halves then that is the right order to do it in. Guardians is the latest from Marvel Studios and the first outing on the big screen for some of their lesser known superheroes, namely ‘Star-Lord’ (Chris Pratt), Gamora (Zoe Saldana), Rocket (Bradley Cooper), Drax (Dave Bautista) and Root (Vin Diesel), lesser known, perhaps, because their escapades are set in our current time frame but in another galaxy, allowing access to previous story threads in the Marvel film universe involving Thanos and Benicio Del Toro’s ‘The Collector’, both seen in post credit sequences at the end of ‘Avengers Assemble’ (12) and ‘Thor : The Dark World‘ respectively.

Star-Lord (Peter Quill is his somewhat less egotistical name) was abducted from Earth when he was a kid in the eighties, and he still religiously listens to the mixed tape he had with him at the time whilst conducting his present occupation of scavenging rare goods and then flogging them. One day, he is sent to collect an orb which will see a bounty put on his head and Gamora, daughter of Thanos, sent to retrieve the item from him by force, just as bounty hunters Rocket (a raccoon genetically modified to be really sarcastic) and Root (a tree) also come across their prey, all resulting in them being lumped together by the authorities in prison where they can begin to bond with one another and meet the final cog in their increasingly unlikely ass kicking outfit – Drax, who interprets everything literally and is built like the proverbial brick shit house.

This protracted and other worldly backstory is the film’s major setback, and a lot of it fails initially. It’s not really until they form a group and meet The Collector, also linking everything to what fans of the previous films will be familiar with, that it starts to cohere together and become more interesting. Thankfully, this still leaves a lot of time for things to pick up, as the action becomes more lively, the jokes funnier, and the characters more, ahem, root worthy, with a suitably dramatic finale and wonderfully villainous performances from Lee Pace and the demoniacally sultry Karen Gillan (who committed to having all of her hair shaved off for the role).

It’s directed by James Gunn (see the wonderful ‘Super’ 2010), who also co-wrote the screenplay alongside Nicole Perlman and, all in all, it is a worthy addition to the Marvel canon, but for a while it looked like it was heading for disaster. As usual, there are two new post credit scenes, but unusually the last one has a reference that most of the audience didn’t appreciate – it relates to a certain old superhero film that was so badly received it ended the careers of many of the people involved with it, Tim Robbins being one of the few to rise from its ashes (The Red Dragon, incidentally, passed him on the street in Edinburgh a few months ago – he didn’t recognise me), although I kind of remember it as funny, maybe for the wrong reasons, but I would love it if Gunn were to integrate it into the sequel to this, which has already been greenlit by the studios with him to take on the reins once more …

The House of Magic (2013) 65/100

Posted on July 27, 2014 by The Red Dragon

Rating : 65/100 85 Min

Animated adventure aimed at younger children and featuring an abandoned ginger cat, later nicknamed ‘Thunder’ for no especially good reason, who ends up taking refuse within a spooky old magician’s house. Once inside, the magician turns out to be able to do real magic, not just conjuring, and has a small devoted retinue of animated trinkets dotted around the house, all de facto led by the performing mouse and rabbit who do not take kindly to the arrival of the newest member of their troupe, the former primarily concerned she is about to become a tasty snack at any moment. Thunder is put upon to prove his worth to the rest of them and try to find a place for himself within this new family, and although it would have been most amusing if he had achieved this and then turned around and ate the mouse anyway, before turning his attentions toward the rabbit, this is not the direction the film goes in.

The primary villain is the magician’s nephew – who once loved magic but has since become a real estate agent and is now only interested in money, tsk tsk, eyeing up the old manor with dollar signs in his eyes. The animation is a little basic and rudimentary, but it is quite likeable, and similarly the automatons in the house initially seem garish and liable to scare little ones but they are quickly humanised and presented as friendly creatures, greatly ameliorating their image. Not a huge deal of magic is performed as the owner of the house ends up spending most of the film in the hospital, leaving the other occupants to fend off the nephew, and although there is nothing in here for adult viewers it should prove to be a pretty decent film for the intended audience. A conspicuously large number of famous names provide small voiceover parts – including Emily Blunt, Ewan McGregor, Kiefer Sutherland, Ron Perlman and William Shatner.

The Rundown / Welcome to the Jungle (2003) 67/100

Posted on July 26, 2014 by The Red Dragon

Rating : 67/100 104 Min

A surprisingly fun action film with equally surprising audacity when it comes to the set pieces. Dwayne Johnson (or, ‘The Rock’ as he was billed as back then, before a transitory period of Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson, and now just Dwayne Johnson) stars as a debt collector for a local personage who you do not want to get involved with, but he wants to get out of the racket. No problem, but he has to do one last job – go get his employer’s son, currently faffing around in the Amazon jungle (played by Seann William Scott) and drag him back home. Upon arrival he’ll meet the local hottie (Rosario Dawson), the gringo exploiting the land and its people (Christopher Walken) and realise that the son in question is actually looking for a rare, and thought to be lost forever, treasure, whereupon things get more complicated.

The fight scenes are good fun to watch, as pretty much everyone wants a piece of Johnson but he stoically refuses to use any firearms, instead relying on being awesome together with a little bit of wire fu. Some parts are just plain silly, and the editing is often borderline woeful – especially in the opening fight (which is immediately preceded by a cameo from Schwarzenegger just before he entered the world of politics, in an almost ‘passing of the baton’ moment with his real life friend Johnson) situated in a nightclub which has the worst excessive use of strobe lighting I’ve seen … well, ever I think, but armed with low expectations this can still be a little known, entertaining action frolic in the Brazilian rainforest.

The Purge : Anarchy (2014) 56/100

Posted on July 26, 2014 by The Red Dragon

Rating : 56/100 103 Min

The sequel to last year’s ‘The Purge‘ from Blumhouse productions (with James DeMonaco writing and directing again) who don’t waste any time in getting the next installment in their franchises out. It retains the good basic story from the first one – that at some point in the very near future the U.S. Government sanction one day of violence and wanton destruction when people can ‘purge’ themselves of their baser inclinations and not face any recriminations (until the next Purge possibly), thereby theoretically creating a society largely free of crime for the rest of the year. Here, the concept is advanced a little and more politics come into it, which was a good idea and works quite well, but its critical sin is that four of the five main characters are terribly written and just as terribly acted.

Frank Grillo (‘The Winter Soldier‘, ‘End of Watch‘) plays one man on a mysterious mission – driving around on purge night in a bullet proofed car with a small arsenal with him for company, but focused on his goal rather than engaging in the bedlam around him. The character is the strongest element of the movie. Unfortunately, he stops to help out some strangers and ends up with a small entourage of completely hopeless gibberlings that shackle him for most of the film. I mean, you really feel sorry for this guy, as the others waltz around in plain sight, scream and shriek at every possible opportunity, talk when they shouldn’t, tell him killing is wrong but ask him to kill everyone around them so they can survive, just generally break his balls and cover constantly. It picks up dramatically for the last twenty or thirty minutes, and if the rest had been like this then it would have been possibly better than the original, but as it is the very people we’re supposed to empathise with effectively destroy the entire core of the film.

Hercules (2014) 68/100

Posted on July 25, 2014 by The Red Dragon

Rating : 68/100 98 Min

Dwayne Johnson stars as the titular hero of Greek mythology (it should be entitled Heracles though, Hercules being the romanised version of the demigod) and he was pretty much the perfect choice for the role. He’s come a long way since the days of ‘The Scorpion King’ (02), delivering a slew of entertaining performances to become a dependable leading man and command one of the highest fees in Hollywood (Forbes currently places him in second place overall) and here his onscreen presence serves the character perfectly, as he stands on two tree trunk legs, each wider than the nearest warrior behind him, wielding his giant olive-wood club and adorned with the skin of the Nemean lion.

Rather than following in the footsteps of the likes of ‘Clash of the Titans’ (10) and ‘Immortals’ (11), this is more concerned with Hercules the man and how the myth is wrapped around him, and it is essentially a battle film with pretty decent set pieces and costumes – there’s nothing outstanding or brilliant about the movie but it is pretty good overall, notwithstanding the cheesy dialogue and historical inaccuracies (Athens is shown to have a king, for example, when at this time, circa 350 BC {which is actually way too late for Heracles’ era anyway}, her democracy was flourishing and kings had been done away with, and indeed they are using the misplaced king, Eurystheus, of variously Argos or Tiryns depending on which source you read) that we expect to find anyway. It’s based on a graphic novel and it has that kind of feel to it – similar as well to ‘King Arthur’ (04) in that we follow Hercules and his friends as they are hired to help defend the kingdom of Thrace from an usurper (Hercules is a mercenary, one tormented by a brutal personal event in his recent past), and we don’t get to know them in any great depth – but well enough to like them and care if they get cut to pieces or not.

There’s a host of good supporting actors – some of them regulars of the genre such as Rufus Sewell, John Hurt and Ian McShane, but also Peter Mullan, Aksel Hennie, Reece Ritchie, Joseph Fiennes and Ingrid Bolsø Berdal – playing the Amazonian Atalanta and looking very much like a young and super fit Nicole Kidman. It’s good fun with some nice locations and sets and it’s a lot better than the likes of the Conan reboot and the aforementioned ‘Immortals’ (truly, an episode of ‘Total Spies’ is more worthwhile than that film), and although it is lacking any kind of spark to really ignite it, enough has been done to merit a sequel and it probably won’t disappoint if you’re in the mood for a weekend action film.

Oddly, Johnson’s real life buddy Arnold Schwarzenegger had his first movie role playing the same part in ‘Hercules in New York’ back in 1969 (one of Schwarzenegger’s inspirations, Steve Reeves, also played the Grecian hero on two occasions). The two friends managed to share a brief onscreen moment together in ‘The Rundown‘ 03, which is also worth a watch incidentally.

Earth to Echo (2014) 57/100

Posted on July 25, 2014 by The Red Dragon

Rating : 57/100 91 Min

The handheld genre finds its way into the family film market here, with very similar results to previous experiments with it: contrivances to always have multiple cameras on the go (bizarrely including a hidden camera in one of the kid’s specs, which seems like a particularly nifty bit of kit for them to have access to) and fairly irritating central performances as they constantly try to sound excited, telling us we should be too. The plot has us following three young boys (played by Teo Halm, Reese Hartwig and X-Factor contestant Brian ‘Astro’ Bradley) around on their bikes as they trace a mysterious map that has appeared on their phones – a map which leads to the discovery of a small alien, Echo, that they will try to help collect the fragmented bits of his spacecraft so he (or she I suppose, its sexual organs are not noticeably examined) can go home before some evil ADULTS find it, play football with it and dismember it.

Echo has no real personality, it essentially looks really cute and can beep once for yes and twice for no, and that’s it, so the focus is on the adventure of the kids with at least an attempt to explore the strength of the bond between them, but mainly just watching them track down things and trying to avoid capture, with the very typical fantasy of the hot uptight girl from school (Ella Wahlestedt) somehow getting involved and coming along with them . For kids around the age of the main characters (fourteen?) it might be quite good, but for anyone else it’s a far cry from E.T. (82). One of them learns to drive a car in, literally, ten seconds. That’s the sort of level of production and believability you’re looking at here.

Senna (2010) 81/100

Posted on July 24, 2014 by The Red Dragon

Rating : 81/100 106 Min

An absolutely seminal moment in documentary filmmaking and indeed easily one of the best films of 2010. This masterful film follows the rise to fame of Brazilian Formula One driver Ayrton Senna, focusing on his time with the sport and, unusually, it only uses footage from the time rather than filming interviews now and cutting back and forth, feeling much more like an unfolding drama than a conventional documentary. Personally, I’m not in the least bit interested in F1, so the fact I loved this already speaks volumes. The story it tells has all of the best ingredients that true legends are made from, with high drama that you couldn’t artificially create and a very, very human element at its heart.

In essence the film asks two questions, what to do when you find yourself in a corrupt environment (as Senna does with the FI setup), whether that be a social group or a place of work, and what does it take to be happy, something which is hammered home by Senna telling us he enjoyed himself the most when he was racing for pleasure, with no money or politics attached to it, and we see him constantly chasing the next title never really seeming completely fulfilled – something which is common in many walks of life, certainly to the average person winning even one world title is enough to be pretty satisfied with and yet the reality for the individual can be quite different. Similarly, we watch him fight against the system, but it invites discussion about how to do that effectively without perhaps it getting to you more than you it – is it better simply to leave and walk away?

Not knowing the details of the story makes this all the more compelling so I won’t say anything more, other than give it a go and let its significance play out for yourself …

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