Film Reviews by Champ

I had very high hopes for 1923. We saw episode one as a teaser that Paramount+ put out on a terrestrial channel, and were then annoyed to find that the rest was subscription/streaming only, so jumped on it when found that LoveFilm carried it. Every frame looks fantastic, with production values up with the best of feature film making.

Through episodes 2 onwards, we remained engaged, anticipating the resolution for the various story arcs....but they never came!

1923 is an object lesson in the perils of giving a storyteller an open-ended remit, with no requirement for an ending. On top of that, the three separate threads have almost zero connection with each other. The story line of native American Teonna Rainwater's struggles against her appalling treatment in government 'catholic' school is worth a movie in itself. Even better is the romance between Spencer Dutton and Alexandra, which has some beautiful writing and great performances. Conversely, while Helen Mirren and Harrison Ford ooze star quality whenever they're on screen, I never really cared about what happened to them. When the story is in Montana, I was always wondering what was happening in Africa with Spencer and Alex.

The last episode of the 8 was a complete anti-climax, and soured everything that had gone before. It's put me off these long-form dramas. Next time, guys, tell one story at a time, and make sure each one has a beginning, middle, and crucially, and end

This is simply one of the loveliest, happiest, most uplifting films I have seen in a very long time. I loved it so much I watched it a second time a couple of days later, this time with my mum (who is in her 80s), as I knew she'd love it too (and I was right, she did). I cry quite easily at films, but this one was definitely a three tissue movie! But they were happy tears, not sad.

Lesley Manville is in almost every scene, and completely carries the film. She really should have won some awards for this performance. But the rest of the cast are uniformly excellent.

I loved this! I won't recap the plot (not sure why people do that in their reviews here), but I found the story incredibly interesting, and it made me want to know more about it, and to read the original book. The structure, with each event in the story shown from the perspective of each of the 3 protagonists, was very powerful.

All the actors were at the top of their game, and I was particularly impressed with Adam Driver. But Ridley Scott should get huge credit for making a historic costume drama come so alive, and have such modern relevance.

I didn't quite hate this film, but my partner did - after 30 minutes she left, saying it was just constant gratuitous violence. And she has a point.

I stayed for the atmosphere, which is very well done. But a movie needs more than that, and the story and characters were so simplistic and two-dimensional that the film never engaged me. And having the actors speak in cod-Viking accents was just silly, and often difficult to understand. It would have been better to use the modern Norwegian language (or some old version) and have sub-titles.

If you like dirty half-clothed men fighting and screaming at each other, you might like this. I didn't

Emma Thompson is wonderful in just about everything, but in this she's even more wonderful than usual. Daryl McCormack is new to me, but he more than rose to the standard set by Thompson. The film is an intimate two-handed, with great dialogue and interplay between the characters. It manages to both be very funny, and very intimate, at the same time.

The final scene is slightly breathtaking, and shows Thompson's complete commitment to the story.

I find free climbers absolutely fascinating, and loved Free Solo. That movie gave something of an insight as to how the mind can manage risk at that extreme.

This film is equally mind-blowing, with the added twist that the subject, Marc-André Leclerc, is not at all motivated by fame or fortune, and really just wants to climb. But the real difference between this and Free Solo is that Alex Honnold is still alive, but Marc-André Leclerc died on the mountain (ironically, in an avalanche, while climbing with someone i.e. not doing an extreme solo route alone). The section after we learn of Marc's death is naturally downbeat, and utterly brings home the nature of the risk that he accepted.

I love these films because they take most people's assumptions about risk, and what's important when living your life, and turn them completely upside down. And, of course, this film, like Free Solo, looks incredible, showing the awesome mountain environment in all its glory, and how tiny humans are within it

I found this fantastically engaging, and Huppert, who is in almost every scene, is incredible. But while nominally a thriller, it is so much deeper and more nuanced than what Hollywood would have made of this story. And the sexual psychology underlying much of it is quintessentially French

I came late to this film, after it had received a lot of critical acclaim. And, y'know what - it deserves it.

As an alternative to superheroes blowing stuff up, this is a real film about real people living real lives. It's remarkable how many of the people on screen are not professional actors, just playing themselves, and the director (and, it must be said, Frances Mcdormand), makes them all completely natural and believable.

It also says a lot about modern America, without for a moment feeling preachy.

I devoured all the extras on the DVD once I'd watched the film, wanting to know more, and will now seek put the book it's based on

If #MeToo has led to movies like this, then bravo. This film takes standard genre tropes and twists them enough to draw you in, and keep you guessing. No one is let off the hook, either - if you're not part of the solution, then you're definitely part of the problem.

Admittedly I don't usually watch super-hero movies, but this one had good reviews, and I hoped it might feature a bit more than "super people smashing stuff up".

But sadly not. Not a single character was interesting, relatable, or even more than one-dimensional. The pre-amble with Diana as a little girl whetted my appetite, but thereafter, the adult Diana was nothing but dull. Very very pretty, but very dull too. But she was as nothing to the other characters, which were beyond unbelievable. It's like someone had tried to deliberately parody super-villains. By the 2nd half, I was just watching to see how bad it could get. When Kristen Wigg morphed into some kind of demonic snow leopard, that just about put the tim lid on it.

I know, I know - I just shouldn't watch superhero movies. I've learnt my lesson - although Black Panther has just dropped through the letter box!

I really, really loved this film. It's about nostalgia, and the sense that everyone has of growing up and older, and how to recognise it and acknowledge it. The characters are beautifully written and played, and completely believeable.

The writing is brilliant, but not in a "clever clever" way - when someone says something insightful, it really feels like they've only just thought of it themselves.

Much of the dialogue here is unintelligible. After a while you realise that this is ok, because it's not a Aaron Sorkin script, and what matters is not so much what the characters are saying, more how they say it. It's all about mood, as is the whole film, really - it doesn't really go anywhere, and there's no plot to speak of.

So why did I give it 3 stars? Because it left me with a good feeling. It reminded me a lot of The Florida Project, and gives a similar sense of people at the bottom of the pile still managing to find meaning in their lives.

This film covers events that happened in my lifetime, and yet I was still shocked to be reminded how the world used to be. We really have come a long way, baby! This film brilliantly brings to life one event near the start of that journey, and engages you and makes you invest in the characters and what they are doing.

And, as with the best dramas based on real events, the final shots of the real protagonists, as the are now, with a short potted history of what they went on to do, warmed my heart even more.

The loved the first "How to Tame your Dragon" film beyond words, partly because it was so funny, kind, beautiful and charming, and partly because when it came out my step-daughter was the perfect age for it, and she loved it too, so we watched it many times together on the sofa.

Now she's about to go to university, but the third and (very obviously) last film of the three brought back everything that was special about the first one, and brought all those memories of shared enjoyment watching on the sofa flooding back. Consequently, the emotional content of this film, which is significant, chimed in with my personal emotional life, to the degree that I've never been moved as much by an animated feature.

This film is beautifully realised, beautifully scripted, beautifully played by the voice actors, and is just altogether wonderful. I cannot recommend it highly enough. Now pass me another tissue, please :-)

This film completely took my breath away. It had me hooked in the first 5 minutes, and then as the story unfolded I got drawn further and further into it. It engages you in a way that only a genuine true-life story can - if this was a drama, you'd dismiss it as much too far-fetched.

The openess and honesty from the protagonists is amazing, and (as the director says in the DVD extras) is what really makes the film something special.

I'm not going to give away any of the content - you need to watch it. This is the documentary of the decade.