In The Cinema This Week
The Heat
Sandra Bullock and Melissa McCarthy may seem like an odd pairing, but The Heat is a surprisingly funny film. Mismatched buddy cop comedies are ten a penny but rarely have they delivered quite as much laughs as this one. The respective stars of Miss Congeniality and Bridesmaids turn out to be sublime comedic foil: the banter between them is infectiously funny, even if the situations are nothing new. Ignore the horrendously photoshopped posters and check this movie out!
Grown-Ups 2
Adam Sandler continues his quest to destroy cinema as we know it with Grown-Ups 2, an egregiously boring slideshow of poo, fart and pee jokes. While his movies are seldom deeper than a puddle, Grown-Ups 2 is a shallow movie even by his standards. There’s no script; it feels offensively lazy, like everybody just showed up and started filming. You know your movie sucks when Taylor Lautner turns out to be its comical zenith.
The Wolverine
Hugh Jackman is back, and this time he’s not singing! Playing Wolverine is something he can do in his sleep at this stage, having played him six times by now. Based on a popular miniseries from the 80’s where Logan goes to Japan, The Wolverine features ninjas, ‘love hotels’ and a thrilling fight sequence atop a bullet train. The first superhero movie in ages that isn’t about the end of the world, the lower stakes make it feel like a regular action movie, with bonus cool mutant stuff thrown in. An almighty improvement on 2009’s unfortunate X-Men Origins: Wolverine.
From Up On Poppy Hill
Any new Studio Ghibli movie deserves attention. The Japanese animation studio responsible for classics like Howl’s Moving Castle and Spirited Away returns with From Up On Poppy Hill, a film set in 1960’s Japan. In the build-up to the 1964 Tokyo Olympics, two kids strive to save their school clubhouse from planned demolition. Firmly grounded on Earth – there are no cat buses, fish spirits or microscopic thieves – From Up On Poppy Hill still retains that creative magic that makes Studio Ghibli movies so memorable. Catch it dubbed or with subtitles at the Light House Cinema.
RED 2
Did you see the original RED? Chances are you didn’t, because the movie only made a relatively tiny amount of cash. Well, Bruce Willis, Helen Mirren and John Malkovich are back, but unfortunately RED 2 has lost much of the cheeky, happy-go-lucky spirit the original embodied so well. While the goofy plot is still entertaining, and watching Mirren shoot lots of people is as surreal as it was last time, the stilted performances and notable lack of laughs make this feel like Willis, Malkovich and the rest only showed up for the paycheques.
The Conjuring
“From the makers of SAW and INSIDIOUS” the advertisements bellow, but make no mistake; The Conjuring is nothing like either of those films. Neither gratuitously gory like Saw nor as screechy and obnoxious as Insidious, this movie does a great job of laying on the tension slowly but surely throughout. Director James Wan also made the near-unheard of decision in horror movies to hire really talented actors, who help make the whole experience convincingly scary. This is what more horror films should be like... Absolutely terrifying.
Only God Forgives
Ryan Gosling is back, although one could say he hasn’t returned to acting yet. Only God Forgives reunites the star, director and composer of Drive, and the result is a confusing art film with loony acting and ugly wallpaper. This is the third or fourth movie in a row where Gosling plays a brooding, ‘oh look at me, I’m so odd’-type character who rarely speaks, and it’s approaching crisis point at this stage. Fans of arthouse cinema will be miffed by its lack of direction, while Gosling's legions of devotees probably won't appreciate his performance. A sub-par David Lynch knock-off.