I have fond memories of Twister (1996), starring Helen Hunt and Bill Paxton. Even though plot points may differ, I felt like I was getting a repeat dose in Twisters. This is a special effects movie, with romance thrown in for good measure. Perhaps it will resonate more strongly with those that haven’t seen the…
The Bad Boys action-comedy franchise dates back to 1995. Now the fourth film in the series – Bad Boys: Ride or Die – sees buddy cops Mike Lowrey and Marcus Burnett defending their former boss’s honour. Detective Lowrey (Will Smith) has married his physical therapist, Christine (Melanie Liburd). His partner, Burnett (Martin Lawrence), has had…
George Miller’s latest opus in the “extended Mad Max Universe [TM]” is Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga. The film delivers two things Australian audiences love: fast cars and, um… Greek mythology (?). Yep, Miller takes a page from the likes of Theo Angelopoulos (Ulysses’ Gaze) and the Coen Brothers (O Brother, Where Art Thou) by…
The romantic comedy The Fall Guy delivers plenty of action, hairy scenes and hijinks. Colt Seavers (Ryan Gosling) loves his job and his life. He’s a noted movie stuntman and body double for arrogant action star Tom Ryder (Aaron Taylor-Johnson). More than that, Seavers is head-over-heels for camera operator Jody Moreno (Emily Blunt), who aspires…
Dev Patel makes his directorial debut with Monkey Man, a gritty, graphically violent, and brutal revenge thriller. The film follows the adventures of an enigmatic and taciturn character known only as “Kid”, who fights against the corruption and social injustice rife in contemporary India. Patel also plays the anonymous antihero, a kid who grew up…
Imagine if you had the ability to see into the future and change the outcome. That idea is at the centre of Marvel’s latest superhero movie, which the studio would like to turn into a franchise. Brought up in foster homes, Cassandra Webb (Dakota Johnson) is a paramedic. All she knows is that her mother…
Japanese novelist Kotaro Isaka hit on a great formula with his last book, Bullet Train. That was a fast paced, violent and weird battle between a group of idiosyncratic assassins on a train. Bullet Train was influenced by more than a little manga, plenty of early Tarantino and a whole lot of swagger. And while…
The Beekeeper is a wild ride – ultra-violent, over-the-top nonsense. But – dare I admit it – also a guilty pleasure. Some of the dialogue is horrendous. The scene that gets the plot going is extremely wooden. Plausibility is never in question because it simply doesn’t exist. And yet the choreographed action, with one man…
Once seemingly a license to make money, the sheen seems to have worn off the superhero movie genre following a few disappointing films like The Marvels, Blue Beetle and the troubled The Flash. And now here comes what is, arguably, the nadir of the genre with this waterlogged sequel to 2018’s Aquaman. Aquaman and the…
Just who isn’t corrupt? That seems to be the question asked in the action-thriller The Bricklayer. The CIA is in the firing line, literally and figuratively. Someone is blackmailing the agency by assassinating foreign journalists and making it look like the CIA is responsible. That someone appears to be Radek (Clifton Collins Jr.), formerly on…
