Don't Mess With The Zohan Review

I decided on watching this film primarily on the involvement from Judd Apatow, the comedy producer with the Midas touch...somehow everything he's involved with turns into absolute comedy gold.

This however, is a bit of a bum note, but I would put that down to the fact it is more of an Adam Sandler vehicle than an Apatow vehicle. Hopefully the case may change for this summers Funny People, in which Apatow directs.

Anyway, back to the film...It all starts off very silly and is quite enjoyable, however, bases most of its jokes on racial stereotypes. Once it gets into New York is where the laughs come, although not very often I might add, only here and there.

Now I could have still accepted this as a funny film, around the 7/10 mark. Butttt...and this is a big but. Sandler syndrome seems to strike the film in the final 10 minutes, where we get a monologue from a key character blabbering on about how its ok to be different, everyone should get along, be in love with everyone etc etc. It happens in every single Sandler film without fail, every Sandler film should come with an edited version where you don't have to watch the ending. Because of this i'm disappointed, again, I try and like Adam Sandler, but he just ends up disappointing me at the end of every film he's in.

5/10

Push Review

With not much choice at the cinema, we opted for the least bad seeming one. So, the hopes were simply average for this. About a group of 'special' people, as they like to put it, Push follows Chris Evans (not the ginger one) and Dakota Fanning as they try to search for things that are shown to Dakota in her future. She's a 'watcher' and he's a 'mover'...simple names for people with foresight and telekinesis.

The film starts out all well and good, apart from some people with the most ridiculous power...to scream really loud, this hurts peoples ears and smashes stuff. As you can imagine, it gets annoying after the...erm...first time.

Everything kind of slows down towards the middle and the bum starts to numb. Until the final third of the film where things pick up and then it starts to get a little complicated. It's all very good to watch though, the people with telekinesis are the best to watch, throwing limp bodies around etc.

The ending is probably the best part, after a few little twists and turns. The film could quite easily find itself a sequel. Perfectly finished. Apart from a few minor inconveniences, the film was enjoyable, but probably helped from the fact i didn't have much of a preconception of it.

6/10

Hitman Review

Well, I wasn't expecting anything special from this film. A videogame adaptation, therefore I was naturally sceptical.

As a fan of the game (I owned Hitman 2, and played it more or less non-stop for a good 2 weeks), i was hoping for the best and the film didn't disappoint...too much. I would drop it into the same category as the Doom adaptation, it was fun. It was a fun game, however, could easily have been made into a serious delve into an assassin's psyche. I'm personally happy it wasn't, it was an action film, and in my opinion a very good one. It wasn't an amazing one however.

The action and the dialogue could easily have been picked out of any other action film from the 90's. The Russians...the most stereotypical villains' possible.

In the mood I was in, it was perfect, pure escapism. It brought a big smile to my face seeing the character from the much loved game using his traditional baller pistols, his emotionless personality, disguises. Oh, and Olga Kurylenko isn't too bad either, she seems to be popping up in every recent game adaptation, with her featuring in Max Payne too.

Mindless fun, could have chosen a better leading actor, Timothy Olyphant definitely wasn't the man. He did an adequate job however.

7/10

On a side note, Mickey Rourke should have won Best Actor. Everything else spot on.

Choke Review

This is a film I didn't know much at all about, given it for free to review for the student mag. It was an intriguing film. We are introduced to Sam Rockwell going to his sex addicts meetings, ironically to get some sex. He goes to restaurants to try and get rich people to save him from choking and hopefully get some sort of financial sustinence from them. He spends the money on keeping his mother in a good care home, while she suffers from Alzheimers.

The film, although billed as a comedy, doesn't really throw up many opportunities for a laugh. Some instances are funny, but they never seem to feel okay to laugh at. The films funnier moments seem to be when we see Rockwell's character Victor breaking down. The scenes in the care home offer up a smile, until the realisation that it must actually be very hard for people who suffer from these illnesses.

The flashbacks to his childhood are an interesting insight into how he is in the present and show that there are some levels to his complete and utter disregard for most people he knows.

All in all, the film isn't one that will appeal to everyone due to its subject matter, but it was a good film nonetheless. Definitely different to most things I watch.

7 out of 10.

Notorious Review.

I went to see Notorious last night. A film which was good, although lacking something, not quite sure how to put my finger on it. Ray and Walk The Line were both long films but dragged you into the lives of the characters, both heavily oscar nominated. Notorious went with the unknown actors, maybe this was it, or maybe it just wasn't interesting enough.

The first quarter to a third of the film jumped around, taking only around 10 minutes or so to be a child and jumping to being 17. This happens quite often, however the jumps vary in age gaps, making it fairly difficult to grasp at times.

Eventually everything levels out more or less and we see a P Diddy/Puff Daddy/Puffy D who looks somewhat like R Kelly, but its not a lookalike contest, anyway, the history of BadBoy Records, and the East/West rivalry unfolds. With most biopics, we get the whole its going well, now its not, oh it's okay now. All in all, the film was enjoyable but theres no wonder that it didn't grab any nominations, something which i would imagine the production companies were hoping after every other biopics success. Maybe it's just the subject matter, but who knows.

5 out of 10.