Thursday 20 August 2009

Movie-Con 2: Film Reviews

At Movie-Con we got full screenings of the following films;

DISTRICT 9 - Good idea here but didn't quite work for me. Starts off with documentary-style footage of a government agency in control of a refugee camp for aliens that have crash landed in South Africa but abandons this halfway through for your standard sci-fi action movie. Will have people talking about 'Prawns' in South African accents for ages though.

INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS - Tarantino returns to form with his own unique take on WWII. His trademark dialogue is beautifully handled with star-making performances for Christoph Waltz as Col Hans Landa and Michael Fassbender as Archie Hicox. At times brutally violent, tense and hilarious, it's everything a Saturday night at the movies should be. Might even get people watching subtitled movies in the future!

ADVENTURELAND - Wonderful semi-autobiographical coming-of-age tale by Greg Mottola, telling the story of a young man forced to work in an amusement park over the summer to pay for college. All the cliches are there: girl to fall in love with, geeky friends, getting high, talking about sex, etc. but he manages to create a truly heart warming film. Do not go expecting another Superbad however. The trailers will undoubtably try and market it as this but it has more in common with Garden State or Squid And The Whale.

FUNNY PEOPLE - A huge misfire from Judd Apatow. Torn between wanting to be a full on R-rated comedy and tender story about redemption, it fails on both counts. Some great jokes but 100 dick jokes don't make a great movie... they make a Kevin Smith movie.

HURT LOCKER - Incredibly tense movie about a bomb disposal squad in the Iraq war. A blistering series of set pieces that analyses the state of mind of soldiers, for whom war is way of fulfilling a thrill seeking addiction.

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