The first two Night At The Museum films were noisy, juvenile but generally fun attempts at Spielberg-style special effects adventure comedies. There was little to distinguish the first instalment from the second and with number three, subtitled Secret of the Tomb, director Shawn Levey, who has helmed every film in the franchise, has stuck to the formula. Ben Stiller returns
Read moreLife Itself documents the life and career of film of possibly the world’s best known film critic, Roger Ebert. The film explores his early journalistic career, student activism, his film reviewing for the Chicago Sun Times, his ground-breaking film review TV show with Gene Siskell and his battle with cancer. The film is composed of readings from Ebert’s biography –
Read moreThis week on ‘Built For Speed’ we review two of the bigger new releases to hit cinemas, Taken 3 and the Russell Crowe-directed WW1 drama The Water Diviner. There’s also plenty of fine music from Australia and overseas including DM3, Urge Overkill and The Jesus and Mary Chain whose debut album ‘Psychocandy’ turns 30 this year. Don’t forget our regular preview
Read moreThe Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies is the final instalment in the ludicrously inflated Hobbit trilogy, a series that has vividly exposed many of director Peter Jackson’s filmmaking flaws particularly his long-winded story-telling and poor character development. The first Hobbit film, An Unexpected Journey was noisy, silly, featured too many embarrassing attempts at comedy and even had a
Read moreSt Vincent is a charming if flawed feel-good comedy drama that provides another showcase for Bill Murray’s amusing brand of misanthropy. Murray plays Vincent a familiar figure in American cinema, the rude, miserable, middle-aged grump neighbour who disdains anyone interfering with his self-contained, self-serving world. When his new neighbour, kindly single mum Maggie (Melissa McCarthy) is forced to work late,
Read moreThe Hunger Games: Mocking Jay Part 1 suffers the Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows curse where, in a final cash grab, the last instalment of a film franchise is split in two making the first half a mostly dull prelude to the actual finale. That’s not to say Mocking Jay Part 1 doesn’t have its attractions. Director Francis Lawrence
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