Tagged Two Stars 2015

Malick poses questions about purpose and life whilst running on an empty tank. As expected, Emmanuel Lubezki (DP for Gravity and Birdman) achieves wonders for Malick, transforming urban landscapes and GoPro...

The best thing about Momentum, this year’s least anticipated political-gangster thriller, is its Stomp-style opening credit sequence. It gets a bit hammy after that. The camera lingers longest...

Mockingjay 2 rejoins Panem in a war of attrition, which soon grates the audience more than the enemy. Confusing Young Adult for Petulant Adolescent, the interchangeably unoriginal and illogical plot treats...

Despite doing nothing wrong formally, Je Suis un Soldat struggles to delve any deeper than the surface in terms of character, motivation and theme. Je Suis un Soldat's portrayal of black market dog-selling...

From the beginning, Poltergeist 2.0 has potential. Its premise was always a winner, and there's a strong core cast working to draw us in. Kenan creates a compelling and unique connection with his film and...

As if it wasn't jarring enough to see Sandler and Buscemi play understated with nary a slippery footed Kevin James in sight. Writer/director Thomas McCarthy has created an uneasy mess; shifting its tone from...

The first half of Return to Sender is a passable attempt at a sincere and sensitive look at the effects of sexual violence on a victim as she tries to reclaim her life and her home. The second half,...

A brave central performance from Hye-rim Moon goes a small way towards redeeming the broad feeling of frustration left by Su-won Shin’s Madonna. With shades of Almodóvar’s Talk to Her, an interesting...

With tensions between the USA and Russia on the rise again, this film is a timely reminder of how close the world came to nuclear apocalypse in 1983. The man in question is the conflicted Stanislav...

With an omniscient voiceover, supernatural premise and bland romance, The Age of Adaline could be a mash-up of Pushing Daisies and a Nicholas Sparks novel. After a whistle-stop tour of 20th century US...

Looking like a rather drab Meatloaf video (think candles and chambers) played on half-speed with a perma-frowned Clive Owen solemnly plodding about, Last Knights struggles to engage from the off. As its...

Life has a balance and if you break this equilibrium, bad things happen. In this case, the result is Hot Tub Time Machine 2. In the first outing, the balance between puerile humour and nostalgia was just...

Virtually plotless, Lost River is a lurid technicolour nightmare featuring a senseless mishmash of shot types, a warped Miss Havisham and a caricaturish Matt Smith. There’s no subtlety here; the sparse...

Jauja* would work much better as a short film. Framing the vivid Argentinian landscape in a 4:3 ratio is a provocative choice that pays off far better for Alonso than his bloody-minded insistence on static...

From their portacabin of death, all-American jocks get to blow shit up with only RSI to fear; the lady cries yet complies; Ethan Hawke has a moral crisis whilst remaining utterly immoral; Betty Draper makes an...