Film Reviews by AER

This 1994 adaptation of Anna Sewell's Black Beauty is very much a product of UK filmmaking in the 90s. The horse's narration (by Alan Cumming) is awkward to begin with but then the persuasive tone of the film develops and gets better as it proceeds. Support from Alun Armstrong, and David Thewlis (In particular) give the story extra depth and meaning. It's sad that all the kids in the film are a bunch of wooden planks. Why are kids in big-budget UK films always sooooo terrible? Worth the journey as the source material is so strong you'd be an idiot of a filmmaker to mess this up.

5.5. out of 10

It's finally happened - this series has run out of petrol. Tired stunts, the word family said 800 times, a string of cameos/lame callbacks, two very crap baddies (Jason Momoa & Alan Ritchson), and you never believe for a second anybody stays dead for long. It's become a parody of its parts. Finally Super Fast has the sequel it's been waiting for.

3 out of 10 - MOT failure - Worst in the cycle by a long way

Following a blistering opening with an electric Elias Koteas as a serial killer, this supernatural police procedural heads down hill pretty sharpish. There are some great set-pieces in this too as Denzel Washington's cop is tormented by an ancient evil spirit that can embody anyone through touch. It's novel to have an unseen threat and two or three sequences use this device well... however, there's a lot of corny cr*p to wade through first. Not Denzel's finest hout.... Watch for Elias Koteas but he's only in the first 5 mins :)

This the best film adaptation we could have ever hoped for. Based on George Orwell's classic novel of the same title, this distills all the landmark moments from the book and it's gripping, sad and ultimately crushing. Perfectly cast, the principal trio, John Hurt, Suzanna Hamilton (who ended up in TV's Casualty!!) and in his last role, Richard Burton, all put in note perfect performances. It's a spooky, sad, and upsetting film. The futility of everything permeates everything. CLASSIC>

Charmless comedy from Australia that borrows stylistics from Wes Anderson and the likes of Napoleon Dynamite without the wit or an ounce of originality. Largely excruciating. Sorry.

Good performances aid an overwrought melodramatic plot - however there are convincing, heartfelt passages that really resonated... It's an unruly customer like many of the pupils depicted in the film. The ending is particularly affecting as the school is seen in ruins and the narrator reads the Fall of The House of Usher to a full/then derelict classroom. Thoughtful but very flawed but at least it was interesting.

we could all learn al lot from this animated adaptation of Ted Hughe's The Iron Man....which probably inspired ET. Lively, actionpacked with a great voice cast, I;m only sad that I never caught thi sone when I was much younger. Recommended for young adults - it's a blast.

Sadly the acting talents of Lin Shaye and Tobin Bell (who appear in extended cameos despite the top billing) cannot save this plodding, badly edited, and ultimately very boring horror film. It has a great concept which is thoroughly squandered and for the most part the script and outcome of the plot is dire. Don't pick up the phone.

Book of Blood is a very poorly scripted horror flick based on two Clive Barker stories. The drama is plodding and the performances stilted. Some of the supposedly sxty dialogue is hilarious! This makes some of the later Hellraiser sequels look like masterpieces. Look out for Doug Bradley in a very short cameo supposedly to validate the Barker connection further. Shoddy SFX put the final nail in the coffin. I think I'd sooner be a Cenobite than watch dreck like this ever again. 0.5 out of 10.

Usually I am drawn to films like this but I felt locked out of this one. It was well-crafted but it bypassed me.

Huge editing mistake forgiven that renders some of the story slightly nonsensical, Louis Malle's (almost) last film is the type of British film you don't see anymore. Jeremy Irons played a lot of these types of sexually virile lunatics in high-powered jobs back then and this was one of his most pathetic. His Tory MP has an affair with his own son's mysterious (quiet) girlfriend played by Juliette Binoche. They have a lot of athletic sex and then disaster strikes but not as melodramatically as you may think... we're British godammit (HOLD THE LINE on those tears and emotions).... I saw this on release in early 1993 and unlikely many films from that time it still works and does the job. It sketches emotionally blocked characters deftly but not deeply. Louis Malle gives this a light touch andI'm glad I revisited it.

Look out for David Thewlis and Peter Stormare in very early small roles.

Documentaries don't come more gripping than this chronicle of the rescue of a junior football team and their coach from a cave system in Chang Mai, N Thailand. Rising torrents of rain filled the tunnels cutting the boys off from safety leaving them stranded for over 2 weeks. The efforts that went in to saving them were astonishing. Watch this before you see Ron Howard's Hollywood dramatisation. I've not seen that one (yet) but it will be hard pushed to be better... Crucial watching.

The plot has been detailed in other reviews so I'll skip to the chase.

OK I found Colossal to be mean-spirited because some of the main characters were unbelievably nasty but were only ciphers. It was hard to believe that these regular alcoholic types woudl have no problem with laying a city to waste and killing hundreds of people in a faraway city with their careless actions. This is where the unconvincing part comes in - these alcoholics were thin caricatures that looked really good considering how hammered they got every single day. Jason Sudeikis' character is wildly unconvincing as he toggles between nice guy, mad guy and very evil guy.

On the plus side, the film is well made and the Kaiju look great. It's just the human drama is a bad fit for this and it left me cold because it seemed half-hearted and in Anne Hathaway's case - miscast. She's usually great but here, she looks out of place and a bit confused or embarrassed.

2 out of 5 - Well made but asked us to invest in thin, stupid and unrealistic characters. (OK, it is a fantasy who needs realism? but the makers seem to be strving for a mix of this and it doesn't work - sorry). A Colossal miss.

It's hard to know where the depiction of rich white kids aping hip hop gangstas starts and where the actors playing the former begin... The whole film is infected with the naffness of the rich kids. Sadly I think there may really be people like this in real-life - lost moneyed up kids who have appropriated the culture of poor hustlers that have been deified in movies and music. It doesn't make for a very good movie though - I found it cringe-worthy especially Joseph Gordon-Levitt's 'wigga' - he's awful. See if you can spot Channing Tatum in a very early role, and Tuco (Raymond Cruz) from Breaking Bad. This sh*t was wack and fake.

Despite attempts by Jack Lowden to breathe air and life into Terence Davies' film Benediction, this is dead/ No heartbeat can be detected in the string of long scenes marred by stilted acting and a plodding narrative structure. A good start only highlights that there isn't all that much to say about Siegfried Sassoon's life beyond his WW1 period as a thwarted conscientious objector. Now we know why the usually fantastic Peter Capaldi only usually plays Scotsmen - he can't do accents. Very disappointing.