The Avengers: Age Of Ultron – Movie Review

This being a film that I wasn’t very interested in seeing, I found it to be moderately interesting. That’s not to say though, that if I was interested in seeing it, that I would have found it to be any different. The film itself I was just able to bear. The CGI was done well on the majority of the film too. The characters were the same old, same old. There was a particularly strange love interest in there, that seemed almost like they just put it there to entice audiences into watching it. That being said, they did well to convey a sense of love between the two. The plotline, however, was something that anyone would have guessed and everyone probably did. I know I did.
The usual plotline for a superhero film is that the good guys are having a good time, living life. The bad guys are shown plotting something. The good guys aren’t any the wiser and then the bad guys show up, causing mayhem. There’s a love interest somewhere, which subsequently gets messed with by the bad guys in some way or another. The good guys and bad guys fight in some big battle and the good guys struggle to survive the attack. After almost all hope is lost, the good guys miraculously manage to save the day. They all live happily ever after.
There… that about sums up the usual comic book film, and to be fair, the majority of almost any film with a hero and a villain.
I never understood the fascination of films that are so similar, like comic book films. They’re great for entertainment purposes, but that’s about it. I’m not saying it was a terrible film, because it wasn’t. It just wasn’t that great… especially with all the hype that surrounded the film.
A big flaw I found with the CGI in this film however, was at the very start when they’re all racing through the snowy forest. A few of the soldiers are being thrown about and it all looks incredibly fake. The CGI just looked bad. They spent money and effort making the rest of the film look superb, which paid off, but it’s just that scene that is a let down for me. Even some of the Avengers aren’t terribly well done.
As for the acting, among others, James Spader as Ultron was great and so was Paul Bettany as Jarvis.
If you’re a Marvel fan, or love comic book/superhero movies, or even if you just want some entertainment for a few hours, then this a good film to go and watch.
One of my favourite posters of the film is below

The Age Of Adaline – Movie Review

(SPOILER ALERT!)

Absolutely beautiful. Everything about this movie is just perfect. The casting is especially phenomenal. Not only because Adaline is played superbly by Blake Lively and Ellis is played amazingly by Michiel Huisman, but also because of the spot-on casting of Anthony Ingruber as a young William Jones, who has an uncanny resemblance to Harrison Ford… who plays the older William Jones. Ford is superb as William Jones, showing emotion that I haven’t seen from him in a long time.

Adaline is a young woman, who never ages a day more than where fate stepped in and caused a terrible accident, which saw her car veer off the road in a snowstorm and end up in water. The narrating throughout the film, especially in this scene, is a beautiful addition to the film and goes hand in hand with the cinematography on screen. After Adaline’s heart stops, lightning strikes her car, acting as a defibrillator. The lightning also did something else. It caused her to live forever, to always remain 29 years old.

We first meet Adaline in modern day, at which point she has a her own fluffy King Charles Spaniel. We get glimpses at the rest of her life throughout the film. First, we start looking at smaller moments in her life and then at larger and more detailed moments. The relationship between Adaline and William is a particular and very large portion of the film’s flashbacks. As Adaline’s daughter grows older, it becomes apparent that Adaline isn’t ageing, and we find out how Adaline was able to deal with this. We also see love blossom and grow between Adaline and a new man in her life, Ellis. Playing hard to get, Adaline doesn’t allow Ellis into her life at first, before her daughter (who’s looks physically older than her) convinces her to say yes to starting a relationship with Ellis. This relationship flows throughout the film, blooming and romantic, until one day, she meets his parents. This in itself is difficult, but then Adaline has the added problem that one of his parents is someone from her past.

I thoroughly enjoyed this film. I did notice, however, that in one particular scene, the film slightly differs to the trailer. That’s the only bad thing that I thought I would mention. Other than that, the film is absolutely perfect!

The Imitation Game – Movie Review

I have to admit that going into this film, I had no idea what it was going to be about.
From the start of the film, I was enthralled with the acting abilities of Benedict Cumberbatch. I knew he was an incredible actor, but his portrayal of Alan Turing was phenomenal.
The film is about how Alan Turing discovered a way to crack the Enigma code, which was a code language devised by the german army, in order to encrypt their messages to each other.
It also shows the struggle that gay men had around the time of World War II.
Through love and loss, the times that hurt, the good and the bad times, this movie shows us what it was like for Alan Turing during those years. Cracking the Enigma code is just the very start of Turing’s story, as he has also never stopped loving someone, he was quite lonely and he struggled to find people that understood him.
It’s quite a strange connection between Cumberbatch’s Turing and Keira Knightley’s Joan, as they get on well and like a lot of things that each other likes, but yet there’s the aspect that Turing would never be in a fully loving relationship with her, due to his sexuality.
Once we see Turing start to build his answer to cracking the Enigma code, things start to get increasingly tense between the team of code breakers, as Turing is no longer helping them work on the code, but is off in his own little world, creating his masterpiece.
It’s all worth it in the end, as his friends finally come around to liking him fully again and are grateful for the easier and quicker way of cracking the code.
The only other thing that I am going to say is that the film’s ending is emotional.
Overall, the film is incredible and a must watch!

The Equalizer – Movie Review

A man on a crusade to rid the world of evil. That’s the line that I’m going to use to best describe this fantastic film. I loved how they played on the fact that he kept an eye on time throughout the movie, checking his watch and timing himself with various things.

The movie starts out with a man that is going about his every day life, doing the same sorts of things…until one day, he gets bored of reading at home, so heads out. He sits in a diner, reads his book, meets a girl, becoming friends. After seeing her a few times at the diner, he finds out that she is a working girl, with a boss that no-one wants to mess with. Well…apart from Robert McCall (Denzel Washington).

Well paced with never a moments dullness, this movie showed incredible performances from both Denzel Washington and his fellow actors.

A definite must-see!

LUCY – Movie Review

Having been a squeamish person for most of my life, I tend to find that sometimes it gets the better of me, especially when watching something gory. “LUCY” was no exception. From the outset, there is multiple scenes of blood and gore. This started to wean about mid-way through the film though. When I wasn’t feeling uncomfortable, I loved the movie! It wasn’t entirely what I was expecting, but I was in awe with the end scenes. They were very impressively executed and really shaped what the film had been about. For most of the movie, it had felt like there wasn’t really an objective or “mission”…even though ‘Lucy’ kept repeating that she was on a mission. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not putting this movie down, it was exceptional and I would probably buy it on DVD…I just think that the movie would have been better with less graphical ‘bloody’ scenes.
Despite everything that I’ve mentioned, the movie also explored all forms of nature, giving the film a factual element which really brought it to life. The earlier scenes with Morgan Freeman really teach you something about science and human nature, and nature in general. It informed you, at the same time as the special effects leaving you stunned. There’s one scene in the latter half of the movie, where ‘Lucy’ uses her abilities to ‘travel’…that’s all I’m saying… it’s a beautifully thought out work of art. They also did a great job at depicting what the scenery would have looked like.
I also loved how they compared human behaviour to animalistic behaviour, interspersing shots of the wild into tension packed scenes.
Would I recommend this movie? Yes! A massive yes, in fact. Just be warned though, if you are squeamish, this movie will most likely affect you.
This is 100% a must-see!

Non-Stop – Movie Review

A man who has seemingly hijacked a flight. A little cliché, but it works really well.

Liam Neeson plays a Federal Air Marshall who boards a flight which is going to be hijacked. Neeson is getting framed for the hijacking, and to stop it from happening, he needs to find the person who keeps texting him and killing passengers before time runs out. To make matters worse, the killer is picking off the passengers one by one, every twenty minutes.

With a plot that is seemingly like other ‘flight-murder-mystery’ movies, it still stands out from the crowd, entertaining the audience with twists in the plot and some epic jumpy parts. The acting on Neeson’s behalf is superb, and so is the cinematography. The only bad thing I have to say about this movie, is that the script was very predictable in places. Either that or I have watched far too many crime dramas!

A brilliant movie, which keeps you gripped to your seat and guessing throughout!

About Time – Movie Review

Starting out as a movie that captured me from the first moment I saw the trailer, About Time moved me more than any film has ever done.
The story of a young man, Tim, who finds out on his 21st birthday that the men in his family can travel in time, to change what happens and what has happened in his life.
After his Dad delivers the news of time travel, his Dad asks him what big thing he will do with the ability. The big thing? Find a girlfriend. Probably the simplest of things to do it may seem, but it’s not. Finding that ‘one’ person is difficult and then keeping up the happy relationship perfectly, as Tim wants to, proves to be even harder.
It all turns upside down though, when Tim’s sister has a car crash, caused by alcohol abuse. Tim realises he needs to change his sisters life, and the only way to do that would be to stop her from ever meeting her boyfriend, who’s a bad influence. In doing this though, he changes the gender of his child and realises that he won’t be able to fix his sisters problem and that the best way is to change it is in present time.
Perfect from beginning to end on every aspect if this movie, it serves also as a wake-up call to people who don’t spend enough time with their loved ones and who don’t live life moment to moment, to the fullest extent.

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The Bourne Legacy – Movie Review

SPOILER ALERT!

We all know Bourne as Matt Damon. That changes in this movie. This movie takes place around the same time as the Bourne Ultimatum and it’s not entirely clear as to whether this was the original intention for the series of movies, or whether it has been altered in this movie and we are supposed to take it that it has been happening all along. In some ways it is a great way to go with the storyline, but on the other hand it’s almost like they were trying to think of a way that they could make another Bourne film without Damon.

In The Bourne Legacy, Aaron Cross (Jeremy Renner) is a member of Operation Outcome, just like Jason Bourne was, which is one of the Department of Defense’s black ops programs. They provide their agents with green pills that enhance physical abilities and blue pills that enhance mental abilities. In the movie these are known as ‘chems’. We learn that Cross has been genetically modified by a tailored virus to retain the physical benefits without needing to take the green chems anymore. He finds out that this has been done to him, by a female doctor, Dr. Marta Shearing (Rachel Weisz), who was saved by Cross when the CIA tried to kill her. She starts telling him about what she has done to him and he immediately wants her to modify the virus so that it can lock the blue chems in, resulting in him not having to take them any more.

The movie plot is that he has to get to Manila to get the virus, along with Shearing, so they can modify it, before the CIA catch up with them, in their attempt to kill the last remaining members of Operation Outcome and anyone that knows anything about it.

Overall the movie was great. It had an entertaining plot and kept the viewer’s attention throughout it all, with a few ‘jumpy’ moments thrown in for good measure. One of those times being when Cross and another member of Operation Outcome, hear something whilst stranded in the middle of the snowy mountains. It turns out to a radio controlled plane, with a missile heading straight for them. The jump is as the missile ‘near-misses- Cross and obliterates the cabin he was just in, along with the other Operation Outcome member.

Apart from a good plot and some great ‘jumpy’ moments, the movie seemed to lack something. It may have been the lack of Matt Damon’s Jason Bourne, but Renner definitely makes up for it with his Bond like personality. One thing that did seem to let the movie down was the ending, with it climaxing with a motorbike chase, coming to a crashing stop at a man and son’s feet, who they hitch a ride with, losing their identities into the sunset. It almost felt like they didn’t know how to end it, so they cut out scenes that explained how the movie wrapped up and then cut to the final scene of them escaping into the setting sun.

This movie is definitely a must-see, even if it is for you to take what you have just read and find out for yourself.

Here is the trailer to the movie:

The Bourne Legacy is now available to buy on DVD and BluRay.

Did You Know These 6 Movie Facts?

1. In “The Godfather”, before anyone is killed, an orange is always seen somewhere

2. About 40% of “Schindlers List” was shot on a handheld camera

3. Humphrey Bogart had to wear platform shoes to play alongside Ingrid Bergman in Casablanca

4. Clint Eastwood wore the same poncho through all three “Man With No Name” movies without replacement or cleaning

5. The most popular topic of sport for a film is boxing

6. “Fight Club” stars – Brad Pitt and Helena Bonham Carter spent three days recording orgasmic sounds for their unseen sex scenes