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Jackpot! is a strange beast. There's some good acting, some extremely good choreography and the concept and Director should have meant an above average comedy, but this is unfortunately not the case. Actually, it feels like Jackpot! has purposefully tried to be below average, and this is evidenced in the outtakes that roll during the credits, which are all funnier than what went into the movie itself. It's also a strange choice to show the audience that there were better jokes left on the cutting room floor and it makes me wonder if this was done on purpose, to highlight that some decision make or other ruined the movie for everyone involved. The out-takes show the people who made the movie are obviously funny people who had a good time making the movie and could have made a really fun little picture, but for whatever reason, whether it was an Editor without a sense of humour, or a studio executive that commanded Jackpot! aim for the lowest common denominator, what ended up in the movie was some of the least funny things that happened on set. I won't go on about the decline of comedy movies, and studios reluctance to shoot almost anything with any positivity, these days, but it does seem strange that what could have been a very entertaining film, made by good people, and that evidently had better jokes to tell, was purposefully gimped at the editing stage, for seemingly no good reason whatsoever.

Atlas is a solid 7. The story is one we've all seen before. It's a sci-fi spin on the buddy cop premise, with our star being forced to partner up with someone they think they'll hate, to take down the bad guy...... ....And that's okay. Sometimes it's fine to have a fun sci-fi movie that's simply a good eyeball ride with a familiar premise, for two hours. There's a couple of small technical flaws in the CGI, which are really only interesting for people who care about the rendering process, but other than that it's a really tight, well-paced, well-acted, well-written, solid 7 for sci-fi lovers. Explosions, robots, star ships and alien planets..... .....What more do you want on a Friday night?

As we know by now, if Netflix does a sci-fi or fantasy show or movie, better than anything Disney is capable of, then the critics will try to destroy it. This is again the case. Rebel Moon 2 is miles ahead of any of the Star Wars content Disney has produced, so the critics have obviously been briefed by Disney over what to say about it, whilst demonstrating not one of them has seen the movie. I'm sure the user reviews will yet again show the hypocrisy of professional reviewers who score without seeing the content.

The story is a re-tread of The Long Kiss Goodnight that is so strained under the weight of poor writing, it's a genuine chore to watch. Whilst TLKG is a slick, fast-paced movie, with tight casting, character-driven dialogue and a script that is minimal enough to let the action drive the plot, Argylle is the opposite. The cast is bloated and poorly chosen, with at least half the cast simply not being needed. The movie moves at a geological pace, to the extent that the movie could and should have been cut by and hour, and nobody would have noticed. The script is so stuffed full of exposition, it barely seems to remember that it's an action movie, between the narrative heavy "twists" and often cuts to Bryce Dallas Howard, reacting to on-screen action, rather than show it. A word on twists, just in general. A satisfying twist in a movie, is when a plot that is hinting at one thing, reveals another thread to the plot, which both makes the story make more sense, and makes the viewer think. Argylle's twists are not this. Argylle's idea of a twist, is contradicting what it just told the viewer. The person we told yo was good> Bad now! The American person? English, now! Spy? Not a spy. Not a spy? Spy. Bad person back to good.... .....And back again. It's not a twist. It's not clever. It isn't making anyone think. It's just childishly idiotic. I honestly wouldn't be in the least bit surprised to find out that most of the script was auto generated by Chat GPT, it's simply that horrible to sit through. Avoid at all costs. Punch anyone who tells you it's "fun".

Probably Snyders strongest piece of work yet, considering how badly Watchmen has aged. The movies core is Kurosawa's Seven Samurai, but beyond that there's some impressive world building of the larger narrative, setting the stage for the sequel in April, and for what I believe Netflix want to achieve with the universe as a whole. Visually arresting (although Snyders slo-mo overuse is evident here, as always) there's some absolutely stunning set-pieces and some of the production/set design for some of the smaller elements really add to the world-building here, which is something even good sci-fi of the past decade has really forgotten how to do. Overall I've enjoyed this more than any Marvel/Star Wars of the past decade, and I think hanging the larger story on the bones of a masterwork like Seven Samurai hasn't in the least detracted from what they've set out to do, it has set it free.

Easily the best DC movie, since the Nolan/Bale years. I understand some people are unable to separate what happens off screen, with the movie itself, so use their review as some sort of protest, however the movie is 9/10 and I defy anyone that has actually seen it to deny that. Yes there's some bad CGI. Obviously the studio didn't want to spend the money on a movie they weren't sure they should even release. Regardless of all that, this is amongst the best the superhero genre has produced in the past 30+ years and is better than anything Disney has yet achieved in the genre by some margin.

A couple of minutes in to the movie, the hero jumps out of a window, holding on to a large bird. As he falls, our hero shouts "fly you big bird!" A line which is strangely delivered with the cadence of a joke, without any of the actual content of a joke. This is the rule, rather than the exception, unfortunately. Like many a Disney/Marvel time-waster, the dialogue here is either exposition about the current MacGuffin hunt, trying to drive us toward the next scene, or "jokes" written by people who don't understand the concept of what a joke is. I imagine the movie will be wildly entertaining for anyone who enjoys the Disney/Marvel franchise or who laughs at and quotes the same three adverts, that they've laughed at and quoted for the past decade, that and children under seven. Anyone else will find this to be a trite, dull slog of a movie, which they'll have seen done better, before, repeatedly.

Whilst I don't really understand what the "woke" comments are actually referring to in the review section, the movie for me was weak because of how old-fashioned it actually felt. The dialogue was so poor, when it wasn't making trite, self-referential call-backs to the previous movies characters, locations and specialised flora and fauna, expecting the audience to remember who died, who lived, and what plants and animals names were in a movie from 14 years ago, it was being cringeworthy, with characters referring to eachother as "bro" every 30 seconds. I expected a screenplay to make those kind of basic mistake 20+ years ago(like Lord of the Rings did), but not now. These days a script should go through at least a dozen hands before it's filmed, let alone had a decades worth of CGI work on it, but apparently that's too much compromising of his pure artistic vision, for Cameron. Shame, because I think this will be the last Avatar, I watch. He's not moving movies forward, here. This has taken several steps back.

The first 20 minutes of the movie is dull and slow, and a more deft director could easily have compressed these opening, character establishing scenes, into less than half the space they take up. Fortunately, after the initial lull, the movie runs at a good pace, is light-hearted and packed with great little cameos. A "date night" movie, if ever there was one, which will be enjoyed by couples for what it is, and hated by teenage boys who mistakenly thought they were getting an effects-laden action movie. Judging from the review section, there's quite of few of them.

Not as good as the first movie, which fell like a breath of fresh air, in the genre. Not as interesting as Black Adam, which had far more to say than anything marvel has ever done. Fury of the Gods is stale, from the first minute, and feels exactly the same as a dozen or so Marvel movies. The story jumps from point to point, like a check-list, just as screen-time pays a minimum of establishing time to each of the characters in the over-stuffed cast. From the vastly overqualified actors, cast as villains, to the humour-free jokes, to the constant, inane MacGuffin exposition trying to weave together this complete lack of a film, Shazam might as well be a Disney/Marvel movie. That's probably considered high praise by the spread-sheet jockie's that forced this out the studio, whilst screaming "make me one of those". For me, this is about as low as a DC movie can get. Redacted a winning formula from the previous movie, just to turn it into a lesson in me-too-ism.

Absolutely no effort from anyone involved. The script has clearly been written in a few hours. The acting from Smith and Depp's daughters is single-take and the extras all put in better performances than the leads, because they clearly all thought they were going to be in a real Kevin Smith movie. This isn't a real Kevin Smith movie. It's a home movie, made to put something on the Smith/Depp daughters resume, and was doubtlessly put together within a week. Don't bother wasting your time, here...... They didn't.

Butchered. It's hard to think of a movie in recent times, from a big studio, that has so clearly destroyed a movie in the edit phase. There's strong performances from a sensational cast but the movie lurches erratically from scene to scene, like a drunken sailor. We jump back and forth in time, plot threads get lost from one scene to the next, character development is almost non-existent and huge chunks are just taken out of scenes with absolutely no regard for the audiences need for coherence in what they're seeing. I'd estimate there's probably close to an hour of missing footage here and it's frankly insulting to audiences that Sony thought putting the movie out like this was acceptable. Hopefully at some point the studio can put the movie back together properly because there's performances in there and a gorgeous, original visual style that feels like they could make a great movie, if only the people behind the scenes cared enough to make it happen as intended.

I honestly feel bad for the reviewers who couldn't appreciate Violent Night. Violent Night is, essentially, a beat for beat remake of Die Hard, with Santa as John McClane. It's that simple. It's that joyful, and it's been made with actors that are good enough to have fun with the concept whilst never cheapening the experience, and production and direction that keeps the movie firmly in the 'A' category, when the 'B' movie sensibilities could easily have dragged things down. In short, the movie is excellent. If you want to watch Die Hard at Christmas and someone says "it's not Christmassy enough" then this is your comeback. Ho ho ho, indeed!

It's so clear that many critics didn't even watch the movie, it's embarrassing. This is far more nuanced and poignant than anything Disney or Warner have made in the superhero genre up to this point, that for some critics to pretend they've watched it and call it bland is, quite honestly, an insult to professional reviewers who actually take their jobs seriously. Black Adam, as a movie, is driven by a commentary on the nature of prejudice, both global and personal. It uses the narrative to ask the viewer important questions about why they assume their moral judgement is above question and forces them to constantly change their perspective and adapt to new information rather than just lazily pick a side and insist they're "the good guys". Above all Black Adam asks Hollywood and the hero movie genre to take a long hard look at itself and ask if it really just wants to recycle the exact same one-sided stories, over and over again. Any critic calling this movie bland, shallow or by the numbers, should stop letting Disney's marketing department write their reviews for them, because they clearly didn't watch the movie themselves.

This is yet another good movie, from a studio that isn't Disney, but has a similar feel, so the review bots are here to downvote and the "professional" reviewers write scathing little reviews that read like they haven't even watched the movie. Every time a movie like this comes out, especially if it's from Netflix, you should mentally add an extra 3-4 points to the average. It's so sad what Disney has been doing to review sites the last few years. If only they'd put as much effort into making movies, they might start making something worth watching again.

A good vampire movie. A lot of suspicious, low-score, user reviews, that have clearly not watched the movie. This almost seems par for the course with good Netflix action movies, these days, with the bot army that Disney employ to downvote their rivals. The movie is a fun, 2 hours romp, that's fairly light but well acted and Jamie Foxx and Dave Franco carry the film from start to finish, without a dull moment. Stay until the end for a nice call back to Lost Boys. If you're in the mood for a fun vampire flick, this is well above the standard we've seen in recent years.

Another very good action movie, from Netflix, that is seemingly panned by the exact same critics that constantly give Marvel movies high ratings. Unlike most Marvel movies, there's never a dull moment in this Russo Brothers, high pace, action thriller, with just a hint of levity. The dialogue is a class above most in the genre, whilst the plot is of less importance, it stays just streamlined enough so as not to require lengthy exposition, and to move the film along at a fantastic pace, whilst never feeling like a trite excuse simply to connect action scenes. There's some excellent choreography, with a good mix of close and wide shot combat as well as an interesting use of smoke, dust, and other particle effects that give the movie an overall visual style and identity of its own, that's subtle but definitely sets it apart for those who are paying attention. Indeed, photography, alongside excellent production and set design, is way above standard for the genre and there are a handful of establishing shots, done with a mixture of drone and CG, at great speed, that are simply the best in class, that any genre has yet achieved. Jessica Henwick, Chris Evans, Ana de Armas and Ryan Gosling are all excellent, with the supporting cast all putting in extremely good performances, too. In short, the movie is excellent. If you go in expecting an exciting, two-hour action movie, then you'll almost certainly disagree with every single "professional" review out there and enjoy your time.

With so many bad reviews, I was kind of surprised how much I enjoyed the movie. The writing and the performances were really sharp from the entire cast and I laughed far more through the entire movie, than I have at anything that has come out of Hollywood for several years. Whilst most of the notes are quite close to a number of similar movies, not least Romancing the Stone (which is acknowledged in a couple of background nods) the movie holds the attention throughout and allows the stars and dialogue to hold the focus with charm and wit in abundance. The Lost City might not be award-worthy but it's certainly far more worthy of your time for a date night than plenty of higher scoring movies, if you just want to smile and laugh for two hours.

An interesting take on the Batman franchise, it sometimes leans a little too heavily on detective noir tropes. Whilst not as cinematic or inventive as the Keaton/Burton or Bale/Nolan interpretations, this version of The Batman does lean into "world's greatest detective" areas of the characters lore that are often ignored. This at once feels fresh and trite as the script often leans on established detective noir tropes, which, especially in the voice over sections can feel cringeworthy due to some poor delivery from Pattinson. Beyond these very short, seldom, poorly scripted moments however, the movie works very well. Whilst it may not have reached the very high heights of some Batman movies, it does feel authentic and compelling for the full 3 hour runtime and if nothing else it gives superhero movie fans something far more interesting to watch than the painfully dull, over sanitised Disney/Marvel, kids movies. Not perfect, by any means, but a great model to pursue for the future of the DC franchise.

At its heart, Resurrections is not "The Matrix 4", but a conversation between Lana Wachowski, the movie studio, and franchise fans about why the franchise doesn't need a fourth instalment. Whilst Keanu ostensibly reprises his role as Anderson/Neo, it would be more accurate to say that he's playing Lana Wachowski, as much of the movie is, essentially, Lana talking directly with the viewer, about what The Matrix means to people and why a fourth instalment in the franchise would be pointless and disappointing and why she simply won't make one. Towards this end there is an unenthusiastic continuation to the story, but just as it goes nowhere and feels empty, we're constantly being told by Keanu/Lana why a sequel is such a bad idea, even as it happens before us. I think it's pretty funny that a movie that so clearly states its intentions, over and over again, is so bashed by the exact same people that the movie tells us it's not going to try and placate. This isn't The Matrix 4; this is a two hour admonishment of the way movie studios and franchise fans, force artists to make garbage sequels. It's not subtle. The message is front and centre and delivered astonishingly effectively. Anyone not understanding that deserves to be unhappy that they didn't get The Matrix 4, because the joke is very clearly on them.

He never really felt like Bond, for me. Craig always seemed closer to the angry, grumpy action hero, that Dalton played, rather than the suave spy, played by Connery, Moore and Brosnan. It would be nice to return to that form of actor, by giving us a cool, smooth actor, like Chiwetel Ejiofor, rather than yet another action hero, like Idris Elba. If action heroes are your thing, you'll find another, overly long, Bond in name only, action movie, here. Like Skyfall, expect a big, middle act lull, before an unsatisfying climax. It's by the beats and doesn't differentiate itself from any of the other Craig Bond movies, or indeed most action movies, over the past 15 years. It plays it safe. Has some unfunny quips, some loudly telegraphed twists and on the whole will be easily forgotten. An easy watch, which will let you text, check your social media, chat to people, go to the bathroom, fix a drink, and pay 50% of your attention to, throughout, without demanding more from you.... ....And afterwards you can update your status, telling your followers what a triumph it was. Mission accomplished.

By far the worst Star Wars movie, and in many ways one of the worst pieces of entertainment, made by a big studio, for many decades. Obviously, Disney has some people in charge, who are simply not capable in their jobs. The basics of character-driven stories are something which need to be adhered to. Not understanding why, or even what they are, is something executives demonstrated when they green-lit The Last Jedi's script. The Rise of Skywalker is the result. Let this be a lesson to all studios and franchise custodians alike. Letting people who don't even understand the basic rules of storytelling, at a first year English student level, hold ultimate power over the story of the biggest and most valuable franchise, the world has ever created, will end badly. It did. Very badly.

You can be absolutely sure, by now, that if this was a Disney movie, critics would be giving it 8's and 9's. It has become beyond tiresome that critics award tired, bad dialogue, formula driven, Disney drivel, high scores, whilst giving anything worth watching on Netflix, not just a bad mark but also reviews which show the critic hasn't even watched what they're reviewing. Red Notice is fun, from start to finish. There's good dialogue and chemistry between the stars and the pacing is good. All of these things are something you can't say about anything from Disney in many, many years. Is it truly cheaper to bribe 90% of critics, than it is to produce good scripts? It seems so, because I think we can all see what's going on, by now, it's blatant and more than a little sad. It will end badly for Disney, as more and more people notice the emperor's lack of clothes. Netflix, however, will I'm sure, keep accumulating movies like this, which grow their catalogue and give people yet more reasons to subscribe to their service over Disney's.

The dialogue in Tenet is much like the positive reviews for the movie; So desperate to offer insight, and meaning, that they go on for twice as long as they should, only to find they have still said nothing worth hearing. Unfortunately, Tenet is mostly empty dialogue, from start to finish. There's a small, interesting idea here. 'Your perspective on time is just one, of many, here, let Nolan show you more.' It's not unlike, 'what if people could enter and alter your dream? Let Nolan show you more.' The major difference, here, between Tenet and Inception, is that Inception was a finished script, doubtlessly re-written many times, to ensure it's both legible and fun, all the way through. Tenet has not had even a first of second pass. It has not had a good writer come along and say "Hey, Chris, why are you telling instead of showing. This is boring. Let's start again, without all the exposition that goes nowhere and try and craft a more interesting story around your central concept." The entire movie feels like Nolan is stuck, writing page, after page, after page of exposition, to try and explain the story to an editor or producer, but they just got so bored, they turned around and said **** it, yeah, sounds great, Chris, do that, I trust you." The result is massively bad. Beyond bad, in fact, as it's the first unwatchable film Chris Nolan has made, which makes it disappointing, too. We can only blame ourselves. We thought he was incapable of making a bad movie, just as the studio clearly did, when they let him go ahead with such a poor screenplay. The truth, of course, is never that complicated. Sometimes people waffle and don't produce anything worth hearing, no matter who they are.

Whilst most of the beats of this movie are fairly pedestrian, in that it's a gritty, dark, apocalypse story, with no great intricacy to the plot, it has far more artistry to it than you might first assume. Whilst Harvey Keitel is as good as you would expect in his role as a, "preacher" predicting the coming doom, a big shock for many will be Hayden Christensen, in what is a career highlight, playing Kurt, a man who has been suffering from PTSD for nearly half of his life. The script has an often dreamlike quality to it and leans heavily against the great Allen Ginsberg work, Howl, which is a piece that both texturally informs the movie and Hayden's acting as it veers from the lucid to the imagined, in a way that leaves the viewer never entirely sure if what we're seeing through Kurt's eyes is real or not. The photography works very well with its predominantly low light scenes and whilst the budget is obviously fairly low, it is used well and the few sets/locations present don't make the film feel cheap. In short, I'd highly recommend checking The Last Man out, if for nothing else than simply to witness Hayden Christensen putting in his best performance yet.