Viewer Reviews
Recent Reviews By PANDABAT
 | 127 Hours (Film)Not bad - pandabatTaking strong influences from similar tales (e.g. Touching the Void), Danny Boyle brings us 127 Hours, a largely one-man play featuring James Franco in the central role. When he gets trapped in the middle of nowhere by a rock that has trapped his right arm, he must use his wits and what's left of his ever decreasing sanity to try and survive. Couple of gory more ... |
 | True Grit (Film)Rollicking Wild West Ride - pandabatSuperb central characters and some great action set pieces interspersed with some very odd, typically Coen outer characters combine to make this a fairly hectic but utterly enjoyable romp through the wild west following a girl and two mercernaries trying to track down the man that killed the girls father. Very well shot, acted and directed the movie is only more ... |
 | The King's Speech (Film)Good but not great - pandabatGreat performances and interesting shots do make a this an enjoyable film and the dialogue elevates it again over most of the dross around now but, while all this sounds good, there's still something about this movie that reminds you of a Subway roll - there's just not much to get your teeth into. Still, you'll go away with a smile on your face and get more ... |
 | The Fighter (Film)Punching above its weight - pandabatWhile Bale, Adams and Wahlberg (along with the lesser known cast) provide performances that are above and beyond what's called for, "The Fighter" remains a very basic story. Competent in its telling it remains nonetheless a good show but should not be as highly rated as it is. The fight scenes are disappointingly ungraphic too for those more of the "Raging more ... |
 | The Rite (Film)An Exercise in Exorcism Movie-Making - pandabatAnthony Hopkins, Ciaran Hinds and Colm O'Donoughue star in this pretty standard take on the usual exorcism stories that we've seen before. Newcomer O'Donoughue plays a priest struggling with his faith after only enrolling in seminary school to get away from his home. When the head of the school sees something different in him, he is sent to Rome to do a more ... |
 | The Way Back (Film)Horrendously Disappointing - pandabatSadly after a strong opening set-up in escaping a Siberian Gulag, "The Way Back" descends into a mind-numbing picture show which ultimately just records a group of people walking through a landscapes. It might seems a trite thing to say but that's how it is. Good performances abound but the actors are alas doing the best they can with poorly drawn out more ... |
 | Julie and Julia (Film)Quite Enjoyable & Sweet - pandabatMike must have been on a downer the day he saw this. While it can be a film of two halfs, one half (the one from the past with Meryl Streep & Stanley Tucci) is outstanding - largely due to the actors playing out a tight little love story of people and of food. The modern-day element with Amy Adams is weaker but, while admittedly light, "Julie & more ... |
 | Inception (Film)Superbly crafted movie that stops short of genius ... for now - pandabatChristopher Nolan returns our screens with the dense if, at times, overly-convoluted film, "Inception", which takes the well-worn heist genre, adds a dose of surreallism and turns it completely on its head. Leonardo DiCaprio plays Dom Cobb, a man gifted in the arts of shared dreaming where many persons can inhabit a single individual's dream. He has made a more ... |
 | The Crazies (Film)One of the better ones of the genre - pandabatTimothy Olyphant and Radha Mitchell star in this slightly different take on the zombie movie. A very interesting and atmospheric opening shows us how people in a small town in middle-America are beginning to act strangely and commit rather gruesome acts. The local sherrif (Olyphant) and his deputy (Joe Anderson) begin to investigate but, before they can more ... |
 | Shutter Island (Film)Wait for DVD and even then ... well, meh! - pandabatLeonardo Di Caprio and Martin Scorsese reunite once more to bring the story of "Shutter Island". Di Caprio plays a troubled US Marshall assigned to investigate the apparent disappearance of a patient from a mental institution on the eponymous Shutter Island. Partnered with a new agent, Chuck (Mark Ruffalo), whom he does not fully trust, the investigation is more ... |
 | Up (Film)Very Enjoyable - pandabatOnly caught up on this one recently. Plot summary basically involves an old man, Carl Fredricksen, attaching a load of balloons to his house in order to bring it to Paradise Falls in South America where he and his late wife, Ellie, had planned to visit all their lives it having being the place where their childhood hero, Charles Munz, disappeared, along more ... |
 | Green Zone (Film)Above-average action-thriller but only just - pandabatMatt Damon id Chief Warrant Officer Miller, a man in charge of one of the teams tasked with finding WMDs in early post-invasion Iraq. When they continually find nothing but toilet factories, empty warehouses, piles of dust and such, his patience with the chain of command begins to fray. When overtly questioning the source of the intelligence upon which his more ... |
 | Up In The Air (Film)High Flyer - pandabatRyan Bingham (George Clooney) is the man you hire when you want to fire people within your company but something is stopping you from doing it yourself. As good with a comforting arm or a get-up-and-go inspirational kick up the ass as he is with a dead-eye stare, there is not a single face-to-face scenario that he cannot cope with in his cross-country, more ... |
 | The Wolfman (Film)Sheep in Wolf's Clothing - pandabatMy God! Even with such thespian stalwarts as Anthony Hopkins, Benicio Tel Toro and Hugo Weaving, "The Wolfman" has less of a howl than a whimper. The successful touring-actor, Lawrence Talbot (Del Toro), has returned to his father's (Hopkins) countryside manor after the mysteriously brutal death of his brother at the hands (or claws) of a man or beast. In more ... |
 | Daybreakers (Film)Different but ultimately not good enough - pandabatWelcome to the Vampire Nation - a world where vampires rule and humans are just a food source. Ethan Hawke plays a haemotologist working on an artificial repacement for blood to feed the growing masses in the midst of a dwindling human blood supply. This blood shortage is leading the evolution of a new sub-species of vampire which is erratic and violent. more ... |
 | The Princess And The Frog (Film)Classic Disney for Kids - pandabatUnconventional tale of the lady kissing the frog prince and turning into a frog herself. Set in New Orleans and the surrounding bayous, Disney takes it cue from the jazzy, southern, creole and cajun infuences of the region and blends the classic human/animal character interactions to great effect in song, dance, light and drama. A manelovant baddie with his more ... |
 | The Invention of Lying (Film)The Intention Of Trying - pandabatRicky Gervais' second outing as a leading man (the first being the amiable if unspectacular "Ghost Town") is the promisingly-titled "The Invention Of Lying". It begins with what sounds like a DVD-commentary and, after a briefly interesting opening in which the protagonists finds that he can tells lies in a place where people only tell (and expect) the more ... |
 | A Serious Man (Film)A tangled web of obscurity - pandabatI've been a fan of the Coen brothers for some time now and up until their previous outing, "Burn After Reading", have enjoyed their output. While "Burn After Reading" was poor (and one should expcet it to be so based upon the name), I thought there would be more to "A Serious Man" and, in a way, there is but it is far too much more than can ever be consumed more ... |
 | The King (Film)Watchable & Enjoyable in a Dark Way - pandabatElvis (Gael Garcia Bernal), newly released from the Navy, goes to seek out his father, Pastor David Sandow (William Hurt), whom he has never met. Sandow now has a family of his own and wishes to put his godless youth during which Elvis was conceived behind him. Sandow's daughter, Malerie (Pell James), unaware of her relation to him, unwittingly allows Elvis more ... |
 | The Goods: Live Hard Sell Hard (Film)Very OTT but sometimes works - pandabatHard to know what to think of this one. It's fairly poor in many ways but just when you start to give up on it, it throws an inspired piece of humour in your face and you forgive it all it's flaws. It's all about a crack team of salepeople (a bunch of misfits headed by Jeremy Piven) being called to a car showroom to save the day when the chips are down and more ... |
 | Avatar (Film)Visually Astounding - pandabatWhen has James Cameron not delivered a visually spectacular movie? I'm fairly sure that has never happened and "Avatar" is no exception. The plot can be pretty much ignored as any child with half an intellect will know what's going to happen from very early on - there are no surprises in that respect. Why 5 stars then? Well because Cameron has excelled more ... |
 | Sherlock Holmes (Film)Good Looking But Bloated, Plodding Plot - pandabatIn simple terms the story's about Holmes trying to solve how Lord Blackwood, a practitioner of black magic, has seemingly returned from the grave to terrorise London and trying to uncover Blackwood's true intentions. Robert Downey Jr., Mark Strong, Jude Law & Rachel McAdams; quite the cast and yet director, Guy Ritchie, fails to use them to their more ... |
 | Not enough meat in the sandwich - pandabatMichael Mann returns with a biopic on John Dillinger (Johnny Depp), the infamous, depression-era bank robber. Dillinger's making quite the name for himself and as his reputation grows so does the want of the FBI's director, J. Edgar Hoover (Billy Crudup), to catch him. Special Agent Melvin Purvis (Christian Bale) is assigned to lead a team to track down and more ... |
 | 2012 (Film)Another unnecessarily OTT disaster movie. - pandabatWhat is there to say about "2012" other than the fact the Roland Emmerich decided to remake "The Day After Tomorrow". The plot, in as much as it's relevant, centres around John Cusack's failed writer character and his family as they try to escape the destruction of the Earth as we know it due to solar energy heating the planets core up to the point where more ... |
 | Paranormal Activity (Film)Subnormal Creativity - pandabatRepetitive, Annoying & Boring: just 3 of the words that you'll have time to think about while the same scene plays out around 10 times on-screen in "Paranormal Activity". Inspired by films such "The Blair Witch Project" and, to a certain extent, "Cloverfield", it fails to reach the often unspectacular heights of those forebears. At least "Blair Witch" more ... |
 | Confessions of a Shopaholic (Film)Like Impulse Purchases - Shiny, Nice but Lacking in Substance - pandabatRebecca Bloomwood (Isla Fisher) is girly girl. She loves her high fashion, bright colours, fine clothing and anything else that's really nice and costs lots of money. Unfortunately she has not been so good at controlling her spending as she has been at increasing her bills and having lost her job. with a debt collector calling her at every available more ... |
 | 10,000 B.C. (Film)It's Certainly Primitive - pandabatBack in a land before time (well, twelve thousand years ago if the title's correct), D'Leh (Steven Strait) is a young man from a small village who has grown up without a father because the latter left on foot of an ominous prediction which was foretold with the arrival of a young girl, Evolet (Camille Belle). Now all grown up, D'Leh wins the right to choose more ... |
 | Moon (Film)Absorbing and different - pandabatSkirting somewhere between thriller and mystery drama with a sci-fi edge to it, "Moon" is a movie that shuns the high budget special effects and instead keeps things simple and on the story. Sam Bell (Sam Rockwell) is a company worker with a three year contract t be stationed at a mining operation faciility on the dark side of the moon. He is more ... |
 | Defiance (Film)Poor, derivative and clichéd - pandabatThe three Bielski brothers, Tuvia (Daniel Craig), Zus (Liev Schreiber) and Asael (jamie Bell) take to the Belorussian woods in order to escape the genocidal killings of Jews by Nazis and local, Nazi-aligned police which have already claimed the lives of the rest of their family. As word spreads of their camp, more and more people come to join them and their more ... |
 | Death Sentence (Film)Doing Hard Time - pandabatRather like Michael Caine, Kevin Bacon can't be said not to be prolific. The problem with that is that it can be difficult to do films of consistent quality and I'm afraid that is what has happened here. Here he plays a mild-mannered executive, Nick Hume, who has the perfect American family with his wife (Kristy Swanson) and two kids, the older of which is more ... |
 | Hard Candy (Film)Candy that's not so sweet - pandabatWhen 32-year-old Jeff (Patrick Wilson) arranges to meet his online chat partner, 14-year-old Hayley (Ellen Page), in real life, he could not have foreseen the consequences of his actions. Coming across as the shy and naive type, Hayley allows herself to be invited out to Jeff's home in the country where photographs of scantily clad teens adron the walls. A more ... |
 | He's Just Not That Into You (Video)Entertaining Look at Modern Love - pandabatThis being a story of intertwined plots, it would would probably be unwise to try and summarise here. Instead one can say that this is a (mostly) light-hearted look at the ups and downs of relationships from getting into them to getting out of them. The big name cast includes Jennifer Aniston, Bradley Cooper, Kevin Connolly, Scarlett Johannson, Ben Affleck, more ... |
 | Bruno (Film)On A Par With Borat - pandabatSasca Baron Cohen returns to our big screens with Bruno, the gay, Austrian fashion presenter, a character that he's been peddling since some early 2-minute slots on Paramount in the late 90s. Following much in the same vein as Borat, Bruno's latest instalment of adventures takes place in America where the people, their opinions, thier diversity and their more ... |
 | Rescue Dawn (Film)Better Than Average Survival Story - pandabatDieter Dengler (Christian Bale) is a German-born US citizen who joined the US Navy in order to learn to fly. It was a passion he'd had since seeing Allied fighter plane in Bavaria in his youth but, ironically, on his first mission he is shot down and captured by Laotian irregulars allied to the Viet Cong. In the POW camp, he meets, amongst others, fellow US more ... |
 | You Don't Mess With The Zohan (Film)Didn't live up to its potential - pandabatZohan (Adam Sandler) is a top-notch Israeli counter-terrorist agent who dreams of leaving the military, the hate and the violence behind and to start cutting hair and making it silky smooth. In order to achieve this goal, he fakes his own death and heads for New York where his ambition to become the best hair stylist is hampered by the realities of his new more ... |
 | Terminator: Salvation (Film)(T1 || T2) > T4 > T3 - pandabatWTF, you say? Well, it's a short (and a little nerdy) way of saying that this movie is better than Terminator 3 (which was just about ok) but not as great as either of the first two movies in the franchise. Aside from an opening sequence where death row in-mate, Marcus Wright (Sam Worthington), signs up for some scientific experiments that end up with him more ... |
 | Anything For Her (Film)Gripping Thriller That Could Have Been Even Better - pandabatLiving an apparently normal life, Lisa (Diane Kruger) & Lucien's (Vincent Lindon) peaceful existence is shattered when Lisa is arrested for the alleged killing of her boss. All the evidence points towards her and she is convicted of murder and sentenced. Three years later, when her final appeal fails, Lisa gives up hope and attempts suicide. She more ... |
 | Rudo and Cursi (Film)Not the laugh riot you might hope for - pandabatAhh, Gavin Burke. Often have I disagreed with his words and this is no exception. "Rudo Y Cursi" brings to us the story of Tato (Gael garcia Bernal) and Beto (Diego Luna), two poor guys who work on a banana plantation in rural Mexico. When a talent scout and agent, Batuta (Guillermo Francella), spots them at a local soccer match, he ends up more ... |
 | Star Trek (Film)Excellent Reboot - Mediocre Movie - pandabatWell, JJ Abrams' version of a Star Trek movie has finally arrived, just in time for the summer blockbuster season and how is it? Well, a little good and a little bad. While there's a marginal plot (which is effectively a sub-polt) involving Eric Bana's angry Romulan from the future, this is really an origins story for the Enterprise crew. As such, we are more ... |
 | London to Brighton (Film)A Little Over-rated - pandabatPicked this up on DVD after missing it in the movie houses and reading good things about it at the time of its release. Telling the story of Kelly and Joanna (the former a street walker, the latter a runaway) as they flee London and more specifically Kelly's pimp, Derek, after things go wrong with a criminally well-connected client whose son now wants more ... |
 | X-Men Origins: Wolverine (Film)Weak Effort Despite The Adamantium - pandabatSo the X-Men franchise has run its course for now and the studio wonder what to do next. Why not take a leaf out of Lost's book and tell the back story to a character? Why not indeed and which character is chosen? Only the coolest, toughest, hardest of them all: Wolverine. Hence we have "X-Men Origins: Wolverine" come to pass.The story starts way more ... |
 | Fast and Furious (Film)Ronseal-style Road Racing Action - pandabatThere is a loose plot in "Fast And Furious" but why waste time explaining something you could make up yourself in the next five minutes. The franchise has made its name from being big, brash, colourful, fast and loud with the bodies of the cars vying with the bodies of the actors to try and see who's hottest. The stunts are a mash up of more ... |
 | Let The Right One In (Film)Good core idea but awful pacing - pandabatSet in 1980s Sweden, "Let The Right One In" tells the story of Oskar, a quiet, bullied and slightly disturbed 12-year-old boy who fantasises about violent revenge on his tormentors, and his burgeoning relationship with his new next door neighbour, Eli, a strange girl whose windows are blocked off to sunlight, who doesn't feel the cold, only comes more ... |
 | The Wrestler (Film)Somewhere between good and very good but not outstanding - pandabatBringing the story an aging wrestler, Randy The Ram (Mickey Rourke), to the screen, "The Wrestler" adopts almost a fly-on-the-wall documentary approach to its storytelling. Following a heart attack after a fight, Randy tries to reassess his life and to rebuild his shattered relationship with his estranged daughter (Evan Rachel Wood) while more ... |
 | Watchmen (Video)Not bad but Probably Warrants 2 Viewings to Appreciate Properly - pandabat"Watchmen" is an ambitious movie based on a comic/graphic novel of which I have no idea or understanding but, based on a quick google for some spoiler-less primers on the internet, found easy enough to pick up on (I recommend this strategy actually as it stops you wondering about stupid details that you might question and find confusing but are in more ... |
 | The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (Film)Waste Of Time - pandabatBenjamin Button (Brad Pitt) is born as pint-sized old man and abandoned by his father at what happend to be a sort of old folks home after his mother dies in childbirth. Here he grows bigger and slightly younger and encounters some of the characters who come and go, including a young girl, Daisy (Cate Blanchett), with whom he immediately connects before more ... |
 | Gran Torino (Film)Heavy handed, sentimental trash - pandabatClint Eastwood's been slipping directorially of late. For me the "Flags Of Our Fathers"/"Letters From Iwo Jima" pairing and "Changeling" have not been of the same class as "Millionaire Baby", "A Perfect World" or the excellent "Mystic River". His latest effort, "Gran Torino", sees him more ... |
 | Valkyrie (Film)Essentially a Hollywood Remake - pandabatTom Cruise returns to our screens in an untypical role for him as the German Colonel Von Stauffenberg who, along with fellow German Officers, plotted to kill Hitler before Europe and Germany itself were torn apart in the distant but already evident defeat that was to come. The film follows the plot from its inception to (if you know anything at all about more ... |
 | Rachel Getting Married (Film)A way of getting harried - pandabatAnne Hathaway takes on the central role in this movie where she plays a junkie, Kym, let out on release for her sister Rachel's wedding. Even on the journey home to prepare for the event we can see that fractious family ties are going to come into play later in the movie. As we move toward that point, the film brings us along reasonably briskly with snappy more ... |
 | Yes Man (Film)Better Than Expected - pandabatJim Carrey's back with "Yes Man" in which he plays a man who, having spent his recent life saying no to anything outside his drab routine, suddenly finds himself compelled to say yes to everything after attending a self-improvement seminar. This of course leads to all manner of humourous scenarios and also leads to him meeting the love interest, more ... |
 | Slumdog Millionaire (Film)Another Over-Hyped Movie - pandabatWhilst aware that film viewing can be very subjective but I feel the gushing reports for "Slumdog Millionaire" are not wholly warranted. Telling the story of Jamal and how he came to know the answers to all the questions on a "Who Wants To Be A Millionaire" programme where he wins big, the movie adopts a flashback mechanism by where we more ... |
 | Role Models (Film)Another Semi-Funny Comedy - pandabatPaul Rudd & Sean William Scott, star in this comedy about two energy drink promotional employees who, following a automotive-related incident, are forced by court order to particpate in a "big brother" programme run by the almost-insane Jane Lynch. Rudd plays the crabby, bitter one while Scott is the happy-go-lucky ladies man. They are of more ... |
 | Kisses (Film)Mildly Diverting Appetiser Of a Movie - pandabatThis is almost ambient filmmaking. Not much of a plot to speak of and largely made up of drifting shots backed by accompanying music. As Irish movies go, it's not that bad but there's little to it. The young leads are good but most of the time there's not too far for them to stretch. 3/5 but nothing more. more ... |
 | Pride and Glory (Film)Solid Movie In The Old Tradition - pandabatThe plot of this one essentially boils downs to the following: corruption within the NYPD threatens to split a family of cops apart over the Christmas season. To say anything more about it is unnecessary and would take away from the one of the film's best points: it's strong character development. While there's a certain feeling when watching most of this more ... |
 | Quantum of Solace (Film)Boring & Disjointed - pandabatHaving enjoyed the thuggish Bond introduced in "Casino Royale" (well, up until the point where he fell in love with Vespa), I wasn't sure what I was going to think of the latest instalment, "The Quantum Of Solace". In this movie, the action picks up right where "Casino Royale" left off and extends the intrigue around the shady more ... |
 | Burn After Reading (Film)Middling Movie From Those That Are Capable Of So Much More - pandabatA confused and almost farcical plot surrounding the loss of the memoirs of a recently redundant CIA agent, Osbourne Cox, (John Malkovich) and the misguided attempt by two gym workers, Linda & Chad (Frances McDormand & Brad Pitt), to make money from finding them. Meanwhile Cox's wife, Katie (Tilda Swinton), is having an affair with a US Marshall, more ... |
 | Pineapple Express (Film)Fun in a so-so kinda way - pandabatA stoner, Dale Denton (Seth Rogen), goes on the run with his pot dealer Saul (James Franco) after Dale witnesses a cop (Rosie Perez) and a local crime lord, Ted Jones (Gary Cole), carry out a hit on an Asian gangster. Sometimes helped and sometimes hindered by Saul's dealer friend, Red (Danny R. McBride), Dale must analyse his relationship with hs more ... |
 | Tropic Thunder (Film)Jungle Feeble - pandabatAhhh, Hollywood! Take a great cast and put them together in a movie billed by some to be comedy of the year and what do you get? "Tropic Thunder" is what. Following the scrapes of a group of actors shooting a Vietnam movie who accidentally get caught up in real-life hosilities with a local drug militia, the movie begins with great laughs and great more ... |
 | The Wave (Film)OK but it's no tsunami - pandabatDrama chronicling the establishment of a movement within a German school called "The Wave" as part a classroom experiment into autocracy and which is based on a true-life instance of this happening in the UAS in the late 1960s. Despite thinking that Nazi-ism could never happen again in Germany, the pupils involved take to the movement with gusto more ... |
 | RocknRolla (Film)Middling BritGangsta Romp - pandabatGuy Ritchie returns to the plot pastures from whence he originally came with "Ricknrolla" which revolves around a London underground kingpin, his right-hand-man, his attractive accountant, two recently released convicts that need some money, a Russian gangster, a painting and the kingpin's rocknrollin' stepson. in typical Ritchie style, there are more ... |
 | The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas (Film)Poorly Conceived Trash - pandabatIt's not often that I'd agree wholeheartily with Mr. Gavin Burke of Entertainment.ie but on this occasion the man's review has certainly hit the nail on the head. The story has an interesting premise of approaching the holocaust from a human perspective with the innocent eyes of a child but the execution of this is absolutely awful. I have not read the book more ... |
 | Hellboy II: The Golden Army (Film)More Commercially Appealling Jaunt than First Movie - pandabatHellboy (Ron Perlman) returns to us only now he's facing more grown up problems as he tries to get to grips with his relationship with the fiery, in both senses of the word, Liz (Selma Blair). His sidekick Abe Sapien (Doug Jones, this time using his own and not David Hyde Pierce's voice) is back too along with a new superior officer in the bureau that they more ... |
 | Space Chimps (Film)What a pile of cack! - pandabatEither the previous two "viewers" did not see the movie or the quality of narcotics in this country has improved somewhat in the last few years (I never inhaled - honest!). Not since "Barnyard" have I seen an animated movie which delivers less. Aside from a David Bowie joke and small bit of slapstick which might get the really young more ... |
 | The Dark Knight (Film)New Improved Sequel but not perfect - pandabatThe Joker comes to Gotham and Batman must fight against the villian's anarchical, chaotic approach to crime and life which itself rubs off the city, on the hero's alter ego's life and the people around him. No more need to go any deeper into the plot of this dark but entertaining offering. Acting is pretty good all around with only Christian Bale's voice's more ... |
 | The X-Files: I Want To Believe (Film)I wanted to like this - pandabatGreat as it was to see Mulder and Scully back in action, this half-baked, half-thought out effort is little more than a mediocre episode stretched out to feature length. Despite it's length, random outbursts of anger and such from characters will make you feel like some scenes are missing. The acting's fine from the leading duo but the supporting cast, more ... |
 | WALL-E (Film)Adequate But Unimaginative - pandabatPixar's usual standards of animation feature in "Wall_E", a tale of the last remaining robot out of many who were left to clean up planet Earth while we humans went away on an epic space cruise to get away from our own filth. When a probe lands and dispatches another electronic being, EVE, a AI love story begins but what follows is predictable more ... |
 | Hancock (Film)Missed opportunity for something different - pandabatWill Smith's latest vehicle, "Hancock", asks the question: what would a superhero be like if he didn't know where he came from or where he was going? Answer: A drunk social misfit. What will save him a lifetime of being like this? A member of the public whose life he saves, played by Jason Bateman. Hancock rather reluctantly accepts his offer to more ... |
 | Kung Fu Panda (Film)Animated Tale That Will Pander To Many - pandabatPo, a panda adopted by a noodle-selling bird, drams of a life of kung-fu though his lack of focus and bountiful girth preclude him from following his dream. However, when he, almost by accident, is chosen as the Dragon Warrior, he must oversome the prejudices of those already there and find a way to bring out the kung-fu within in order to defeat the more ... |
 | The Incredible Hulk (Film)Fun But Incredible Hunk Of Junk - pandabatEd Norton stars along with Liv Tyler, Tim Roth and William Hurt in the latest Hulk movie. Taking it as read that everyone knows the basic HUlk story, this movie takes up things where Bruce Banner is in South America. He's been off the radar for a while but a trace of him pops up, leading to the US military attempting to catch him for further research. more ... |
 | The Forbidden Kingdom (Film)Kung-Fu Lite - pandabatBasically, a teenage boy with a penchant for kung-fu movies befalls afoul of the attentions of a local gang of bullies. During a confrontation with them, he finds himself magically whisked back to ancient China where he links up with some kung-fu master types (Jackie Chan, Jet Li) and helps defeat an evil warlord. A bit of action, a bit of humour, a bit of more ... |
 | Wanted (Film)Enjoyable Bubble Gum For The Mind - pandabatPlacing itself at a level of ridiculousness somewhere between the original Matrix move and its two sequels, "Wanted, starring Aneglina Jolie, James Mc Evoy and Morgan Freeman, sets its tale about a band of super-talented assassins who try to keep balance in the world as they kill targets designated to them by the "Loom of Fate". Yes, it is more ... |
 | The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian (Film)Chronic Tale From Narnia - pandabatThe Pevensie children return to Narnia one year after their original adventure only to find that a 1000 years have passed in their absence. The fantastical land of Narnia has been taken over by a swarthy bunch of men who are bent on their conquest and elimination of all things Narnian as well as their own power games. These take the form of King Miraz more ... |
 | Gone Baby Gone (Film)Engaging and Intruiging if slightly flawed - pandabatPartners in both their private detective business and in pleasure, Patrick Kenzie (Casey Affleck) and Angie Gennaro (Michelle Monaghan) are hired to investigate the case of a young girl going missing from her home in their Boston neighbourhood as it is thought that Patrick may be able to use his local expertise to get information from people who would not more ... |
 | In Search of a Midnight Kiss (Film)Love Comes Quirkily - pandabatStruggling with his bohemian existence in LA and single since his painful break-up with his previous girlfriend and his move out there , Wilson (Scoot McNairy), finds himself persuaded by his friend and flatmate, Jacob (Brian McGuire), to try a bit of Internet dating in order not to be alone for midnight on New Year's Eve. Through this medium he meets more ... |
 | Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (Film)Poor and unnecessary final outing for old Indy - pandabatOne of the most successful movie franchises of all time makes a long-speculated-upon return to the big screen with Harrison Ford reprising his role as Indiana Jones one last time. Rumours have abounded for years about a fourth Indiana Jones movie and numerous scripts have come and gone in the time since "The Last Crusade" all those years ago in more ... |
 | Iron Man (Film)A Movie Of Fine Mettle - pandabatThe latest in a long line of comic book adaptations, "Iron Man" comes to us with Robert Downey Jr. in the role of Tony Stark, aka Iron Man, a man who began life as a child prodigy and now heads up Stark Industries who chiefly concentrate on weapons manufacture. With nearly every mundane, day-to-day task taken care of by his assistant Pepper more ... |
 | Where in the World is Osama Bin Laden? (Film)Documentary-Lite from Spurlock - pandabatIf you've already seen "Supersize Me" then you'll already be familiar with Morgan Spurlock's man-on-the-street approach to documentary making. In "Where in the World is Osama Bin Laden?", prompted by his impending fatherhood and wondering what kind of world his child will be born into, Spurlock dispatches himself off on an odyssey more ... |
 | Doomsday (Film)Descent to Derivative Junk for Director Marshall - pandabatBeing a fan of director Neil Marshall's previous efforts ("Dog Soldiers", "The Descent"), I was happy to try out the latest offering, "Doomsday", despite some far from glowing reviews. The thin plot goes something along the lines of Scotland being isolated by a huge wall due to a virus outbreak but years later, when the same more ... |
 | In Bruges (Film)Non-conformist Debut With Promise For the Future - pandabatFollowing on from his 2004 success with the short, "Six Shooter", the director, Martin McDonagh, brings us his first feature length film. Based in Bruges, it follows two Irish criminals, Ray (Colin Farrell) and Ken (Brendan Gleeson), who are sent there to lie low after Ray's maiden hit goes badly wrong. With Ray being a pub-loving straight guy more ... |
 | The Orphanage (Film)Another Great Spanish Scare Story - pandabatHaving directed the superb "Pan's Labyrinth", Guillermo Del Toro takes a back seat and produces this Spanish-language psycological-drama-come-horror about a woman, Laura (Belén Rueda), who buys the orphanage where she grew up with a view to making it a modern-day home for disabled children. Moving there with her are her husband, Carlos more ... |
 | The Other Boleyn Girl (Film)Very Plain Period Piece - pandabatStuck in a marriage to Katherine of Aragon (Ana Torrent) who has failed to give him the male heir he so desires, King Henry VIII of England (Eric Bana) begins to look elsewhere for a solution to his legacy. On a hunting trip to the Boleyn household, despite a rather obvious play for his affections by one of the daughters of the house, Anne (Natalie more ... |
 | Son of Rambow (Film)Rambo Re-Shoots With Hits & Misses - pandabatWill Proudfoot (Bill Milner) comes from a religious family whose beliefs mean that he can't wacth telly and can't really mix with other boys his age. When he comes into contact with the school's one-man-disaster-zone, Lee Carter (Will Poulter), the two boys begin an unlike friendship which ends up centered around their reimagining of Rambo, "Son of more ... |
 | Funny Games U.S. (Film)Unbelievably and unmercifully bad! Really! - pandabatPeter and Paul (Brady Corbett & Michael Pitt) are two seemingly well-mannered youths who arrive at George & Ann's (Tim Roth & Naomi Watts) gated country retreat where they are staying with their son Georgie (Devon Gearhart). At first seeming innocuous, it transpires that the visitors are in fact psychotic and hold the family hostage in a bizarre more ... |
 | There Will Be Blood (Film)Snatches Defeat From The Jaws Of Victory - pandabatWhat can be said about this that has not already been said: very little one suspects but here's my two cents anyway. Charting the rise of Daniel Plainview (Daniel Day Lewis) from being a lowly labourer scrabbling for small oil strikes to being a rich and powerful oil magnet and documenting his ever decreasing humanity which is replaced with pure greed, more ... |
 | Lars and the Real Girl (Film)Could Be This Year's - pandabatLars (Ryan Gosling) is not really the full bob. Hampered by social handicaps, possibly stemming back to the death of his mother during his birth, he is nonetheless loved within the community, not least by his brother, Gus (Paul Schneider), and his pregnant wife, Karin (Emily Mortimer). Due to the impending arrival of Karin's baby, due to the the arrival of more ... |
 | Be Kind Rewind (Film)Offbeat and Funny But Too Uneven - pandabatMike works in a run down video rental shop which is owned by Mr. Fletcher (Danny Glover). His friend Jerry works at a gonzo car body shop down the road.When Mr. Fletcher goes away to research how to improve his store, Jerry accidentally wipes all the tapes in the store due to the fact that he's magnetised. In order to save the store, the duo must re-shoot more ... |
 | Sweeney Todd (Film)Flee, Run Away! - pandabatHaving being hit about the head by cohorts of a judge (Alan Rickman)that took a facy to his wife and having being sent away to god knows where Sweeney Todd (Johnny Depp), formerly the barber Benjamin Barker, returns to London 15 years later to find that his wife has poisoned herself and that his daughter is effectively held captive by the judge that wronged more ... |
 | U2 3D (Film)Nearly Better Than The Real Thing - pandabatTake one of the biggest bands in the world, add a crazy South American crowd, shoot it in digital 3d and you get quite a show. If you don;t like U2 then don't bother but if you do then you'll get plenty of live action thrills without the hassle of long walks to the venue, expensive beer, queues for the toilet and a 5 hour journey home. Almost got up and more ... |
 | Semi-Pro (Film)Airball That Goes Wide Of the Mark - pandabatRight, I'm done with long reviews entailing thought and effort. Will Ferrell is Jackie Moon, a one-hit-wonder merchant who used his money to by the Flint (Michigan) Tropics, an ABA team who are now facing extinction due to an upcoming merger with the NBA. Ferrell's movies can go well, like "Blades Of Glory", or badly, like "Talladega Nights - more ... |
 | The Diving Bell and the Butterfly (Film)Outstanding Cinema - pandabatJean-Dominique Bauby (Mathieu Amalric) is editor of Elle magazine in Paris, has a lovely family in the country and, typically, a little mistress in the city. He has everything going for him until, aged only 43, he suffers a stroke whilst out driving his son around in his new drop-top sports car. Suddenly everything has changed as he is completely paralysed more ... |
 | Juno (Film)Disappoints Compared to Hype - pandabatPoor old Juno (Ellen Page)! After a one night stand with her friend Paulie Bleeker (Michael Cera), she finds herself with child and she neither wishes to get rid of it nor raise it herself. After the initial shock of the situation, her father, the 'humourously'-named Mac Macguff (JK Simmons), and step-mother, Bren (Allison Janney), support her more ... |
 | Jumper (Film)Look Before You Leap - pandabatHype-magnet number one this week is a little movie called "Jumper". Apparently it's based on a book and so firstly I must give kudos to a the author that managed to get a story that stinks this much published. Starring Hayden Christensen, an actor that has found a way of being more wooden than Orlando Bloom, as David Rice, who has escaped his more ... |
 | All the Boys Love Mandy Lane (Film)Surprisingly Well-Made Teen-Slasher - pandabatMandy Lane (Amber Heard) is hot; so hot that at school she is the centre of attention from all angles. The film opens with a snapshot of how far guys will go for her and then jumps forward nine months to the latest attempt by one of her schoolmates to woo her by inviting her, along with some other class mates of both gender, out to his parents ranch for a more ... |
 | Enchanted (Film)Like A Soft-Drink: Sweet & Bubbly But Lacks A Kick - pandabatGiselle (Amy Adams) is a princess living in the far-away, fairytale-land of animated Andalasia, desperately waiting for the one day when her prince charming will come. When he eventually does, in the form of Prince Edward (James Marsden), they fall instantly and deeply for each other and are set to be wed almost immediately until the Prince's stepmother , more ... |
 | Cloverfield (Film)Monsters do exist. Hype is one of them! - pandabatThe Blair Witch Experiment Re-Hashed/Revisited/Reloaded (take your pick of dodgy Matrix sequels) crashes into Godzilla, only this time around showing you some vacuous members of the 'beautiful people' who panic their way into consistently stupid decisions for around 6 hours. One part of the original review I can agree with is that the less you know going more ... |
 | The Savages (Film)Observational Drama That's Observed From Too Far Away - pandabatIt being their surname, father, Lenny (Philip Bosco), daughter, Wendy (Laura Linney), and son, Jon (Philip Seymour Hoffman), are the eponymous Savages. When Lenny's longtime partner dies and he himself is showing the signs of the onset of dementia, Wendy and Jon are faced with making difficult decisions together on their father's future despite their lack more ... |
 | Definitely, Maybe (Film)An Oasis in the Desert Of Decent Chick-Flicks - pandabatThanks to Entertainment.ie I actually got to see a pre-release screening of this, the latest from the people that brought you "Notting Hill" and "Bridget Jones". Wait! Before you all rush off to find another movie review, please bear with me as this movie is a bit of a twist on the chick-flick genre in that it is a guy that is tellling more ... |
 | No Country For Old Men (Film)Will Still Be A Top Movie of 2008 At Years End - pandabatAdapting from a Cormac McCarthy novel set in the early 1980s, the Coen brothers return to triumphant form on-screen with "No Country For Old Men". Llewelyn Moss (Josh Brolin), a modern-day odd-job cowboy and Vietnam veteran, happens across a drug-deal gone wrong while hunting in the desert scrub of southern Texas. Finding a stack of drugs, arms, more ... |
 | Lust, Caution (Se, Jie) (Film)More Cautious of Haste than of Lust - pandabatSet in Japanese-occupied China, "Lust, Caution" is Ang Lee's latest film and tells the tale of Wong Chia Chi (Wei Tang), a new student in town with a crush on the head of the college's student drama group, a patriotic man who frustrated by his parents forbidding of hime to fight in the army as his bother has already been killed by the Japanese. more ... |
 | Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem (Film)Pulp Friction - pandabatBeings, be they alien or human, just can't seem to leave those tentacled, egg-implanting, suck-face aliens where they find them. When a ship carrying a group of the "Predator" aliens falls victim to a full-size alien moster and crash lands on Earth, a unch of the friendly little fellows escape and begin to turn a small town in the US into the more ... |
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