Thor 2

I gotta be honest... I wasn't a big fan of the first Thor.. It all seemed a bit far fetched (duh!?) But after his turn in The Avengers and a welcome injection of humour, I enjoyed it a lot more than I should have.. 

It starts where the Avengers ends.. Thor and Loki return to Asgard.  Loki's locked away in cell (with no visible toilet facilities I noticed.. ) I missed the initial 5 minutes so didn't catch Christopher Eccleston's entrance, but needless to say he reappears and chaos follows. It was Tom Hiddleston

who stole the show though in my opinion..

The action and CGi are both excellent, as to be expected in a film of this budget and overall I enjoyed..

Rating ****

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Captain Phillips

Here's another one I saw with Graham, he was more keen than I was.
Turns out it was another excellent addition to the Autumnal cannon.
Tom Hanks plays Captain Philips, who's container ship is highjacked  

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Enders Game

Here's another book adaptation hoping to set off another franchise.  This has been described as a cross between Star Wars and Harry Potter and I can see where they're coming from.

The basic premise goes something like this.. After earth is attacked by an alien race Harrison Fords general sets about creating an army to defend the planet from an inevitable future attack. Asa Butterfield plays Harry Potter, sorry Ender, an odd, outcast who is enlisted and subsequently selected to be 'the one' to lead the said army to attack the aliens where they live..

It's an interesting film. I'm a fan of both Star Wars and Harry Potter. Plus it's a big budget Scifi so it ticks all the boxes.. The ending had an interesting and dark twist too.

The special effects are the usual and all the actors put in solid performances.. But as with most films this year I wasn't blown away..

Another solid ***.
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Escape Plan

This is the first film where Arnold and Sylvester have played staring roles together apparently.. And at 66 and 67 (respectively) they're getting on a bit now (bless 'em). Long gone are the hey days of the 80's where my chums and I would settle down to watch Arnie and Sly mowing down bad guy after bad guy with heavy weaponry, cleverly constructed dangerous undergrowth and assorted garden utensils..
Unfortunately this film lacks the energy of their previous outings, which is to be expected at their age. It had humour and it was aware of its own ridiculousness... Sam Neil turns up in a small role as a conscientious prison doctor. Vinny Jones also appears playing a blind cripple who struggles with his inner demons having been imprisoned for inadvertently killing a bus load of orphans... Only joking, he plays a Prison thug who beats people up a lot and generally looks grizzled..
If you've seen any prison escape film you know the basic premise and that's fine. Graham found it a little tedious, too much plot and talking..
I on the other hand, enjoyed it for what it was.. ***

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Cloudy With A Chance Of Cloudy Meatballs 2

I loved the first one.. I'd go as far to say it's my favourite animated film of all time.
This time Flint Lockwood and his chums have to head back to Swallow Falls where it all started and retrieve the FLNSTFER, his machine he invented which has now taken to producing living food!
This film started of well. It had a lot of the same humour and charm of the first one and I was relieved more than anything. There was also a lot of activity going on in the background as in the first one.. The film started to fail a bit when the food started communicating and it all got a bit sentimental, but in the end it was entertaining.. Plus I have to keep reminding myself it's a U certificate and aimed mainly at kids, so you have to make allowances. Overall it was enjoyable. Not as good as the first one (are they ever?) ***
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The Fifth Estate

I hadn't heard much about this one.. Actually I hadn't heard anything about this one. Only that Julian Assange had denounced it and uploaded the script online.. I'd also seen a teaser trailer which gave nothing away.. But that's it..

What can I say about it? Well, it's the story of the website Wikileaks and it's creator Julian Assange. Benedict Cumberbatch does an uncanny impression of said Assange and Daniel Brule (Rush) as his partner in crime (so to speak). It covers the inception of Wikileaks in 2007 right up to its disclosure of the US governments secrets in 2010/11..

Hummmm.. To be honest it was an odd one. It didn't really get going for me until the 'Collateral Murder' video episode (I remember seeing that, and it was shocking then too). 

All the actors put in excellent performances but there's only so much excitement you can generate with footage of people on computers... I liked the way they dropped in the 'selling off the post office' reference at the Guardian and also bought the film right up to date with Julian denouncing it in an interview at the end..!?

Overall though it was fairly boring.. **1/2..

Blue Jasmine

Half Marathon day today so I wasn't really expecting to see a film.  After Liz and Sam had finished there was a few hours left so I figured why not? Unfortunately the times for  "How I Live Now" and "Filth" weren't any good so I ended up watching this, my first Woody Allen film. 

It was an odd film... Cate Blanchett plays Jasmine, posh New York bird who, after her marriage fails moves in with her sister in San Francisco. There's a series of flashbacks where we see Jasmine living the high life with her husband, Alex Baldwins Hal. The performances are oscar worthy, particularly Cate Blanchett and it is funny in places. The ending was a bit strange.. It kind of ran out of steam... 

Overall another "meh.." film.

***..

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