It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!
^ Back to Top
The MI6 Community is unofficial and in no way associated or linked with EON Productions, MGM, Sony Pictures, Activision or Ian Fleming Publications. Any views expressed on this website are of the individual members and do not necessarily reflect those of the Community owners. Any video or images displayed in topics on MI6 Community are embedded by users from third party sites and as such MI6 Community and its owners take no responsibility for this material.
James Bond News • James Bond Articles • James Bond Magazine
Comments
Agreed.
A few months back I revisited some of the Rocky films and loved them. I still need to see CREED and re-watch V, which I haven't seen since around 1990.
My favorite is probably still the first, but ROCKY BALBOA comes close.
III and IV very much play like action movies, and hit the spot when I'm in the mood for them.
Very much looking forward to the new one but plan on watching CREED first.
When The Curse of the Black Pearl was released, I had no idea what to expect. A modern swashbuckler from Disney studios based on a theme park ride? You're joking! But all the ingredients were delivered in excellent balance and the story wasn't half bad. Keira Knightley has one of the most beautiful faces in the world. Johnny Depp's Jack Sparrow struck like lightning in a bottle. Orlando Bloom counters Depp's maniacal performance with the easily digestible charisma of a one-dimensional good guy. Geoffrey Rush makes for a delicious villain. The visuals are stunning and Badelt's score sets the proper tone. Though simple in concept, the final film is a sweet cocktail of good comedy, old-fashioned eerieness and great spectacle. Gore Verbinski delivered a fine adventure indeed.
8,5/10
The obligatory sequels, Dead Man's Chest and At World's End, pulled a Matrix Reloaded/Revolutions on the series. Suddenly, many more characters come sailing in, not in the least the stiff British bad guy Cutler Beckett played with elegance by Tom Hollander. Naomi Harris and Stellan Skarsgaard add weight to the cast too. But the presence I find most captivating is Bill Nighy's Cthulhu-like Davy Jones, an outstanding creation. Adding more mystery to the Caribbean and providing us with two amazing climaxes--the Kraken is a delight and that vortex sea battle pushes my adrenaline levels to unseen heights--these two sequels are, indeed, bigger and, for me at least, also better. Zimmer's scores are powerful and full of loud bombast. I find myself truly caring for Will and Elisabeth. If one manages to suspend disbelief, these sequels are absolute stunners.
9/10
9.5/10
But when On Stranger Tides was released, I had very little faith. Rob Marshall is a competent director and at least a few familiars are back, most of all Jack Sparrow (and his dad), but there's also much that isn't back. The main problem is that I neither care about the new additions, including Ian McShane's Blackbears and Penelope Cruz' Angelica, nor about the Ponce de León plot. From the opening scenes of the film, which thrive on very cheap and childish comedy, to the disappointingly unglamorous conclusion, not a lot in On Stranger Tides keeps me engaged. A preacher and a mermaid drip into the plot somewhere too, but while the latter is stunningly beautiful, they can't substitute for Will and Elisabeth. Depp's Jack Sparrow furthermore isn't what he used to be. His strangeness has lost its charm and it almost feels as if the actor is sleepwalking through the film. The script relies heavily on us worshipping Sparrow, but too much spice can be poisonous. Geoffrey Rush, who's hardly in this film, is one of the few things about it I actually like. How this film managed to be the most profitable of the entire series, is beyond me.
6,5/10
Dead Men Tell No Tales had one chance of winning me back and, in fact, has won me back. Though it's one of the least successful films in the series, I am rather a fan of it. We're back in Will and Elisabeth territory, though not quite as much as I'd have liked. But we're slowly getting there and the after-credits scene certainly has gotten me excited. Salazar, played by Javier Bardem, is what Barbossa was in the first film, but he gets away with it. The spectacle is an improvement over the previous film, and so are the latest additions to the cast list, especially Kaya Scodelario. My only beef with the film is the score, this time not composed by Zimmer but by one of his minions, Geoff Zanelli. The problem is not that it isn't good or suitable music, but rather that it almost randomly splashes a greatest hits of the Pirates scores all over the movie. Imagine Barry whipping out the Bond Theme during Bond's gulf game against Goldfinger; well, that's the kind of logic Zanelli and/or the music supervisor applied here. But other than that, it's a serviceable comeback movie and one which I hope will do for this series what Fast And Furious (4) did for that series: bring the old crew back together and get even better than ever before. So please, more Will, Elisabeth and Davy Jones next time.
8/10
All that I wish for in a summer blockbuster are in this latest Dwayne Johnson action flick - non stop action, lots of humour, a very charismatic lead performance from The Rock himself, basically just a highly thrilling & entertaining film from start to finish (around 1 hour & 40 minutes of runtime). There are some very brutal fist fights in the film, especially the first one as the attack on the big Die Hard-esque skyscraper begins. All the high-altitude stunts are obviously in front of greenscreen, but Hong-Kong at night is a very beautiful sight to behold (even if digitally added behind Johnson) and of course all the fist-fights & shootouts are done without CGI, and gives Dwayne Johnson another opportunity to rack-up the bodycounts. As with the earlier Rampage, I can't wait to add this to my Blu Ray collection.
Next week: unto Ant-Man and the Wasp and Fleuve Noir (the latest French crime/thriller with Vincent Cassel).
Bit of a guilty pleasure, this one. I approve of any film featuring an ageing bad ass, even if it is a 67 year old John Wayne (who I don't particularly care for normally), hauling ass across Seattle in sweet looking Pontiac Trans-Am. The car chase is underrated too. I wouldn't put it in my top 10 chases, but definitely an honourable mention.
I admit back in my Hollywood Video employee days, I took that one home, but couldn’t finish. Perhaps it’s time to try that one again
It's worth it for the car chase finale. Really well staged by director John Sturges. The rest of the film is a bit meh!
That's the one. Realising his mistake, he went and made McQ.
Thinking about checking out this one, as it's available quite cheap on iTunes. Worth the purchase?
Brannigan (1975) is also available on iTunes, I see. Another 70's John Wayne film.
Worth a watch if you haven't seen it. There's no getting away from the fact it's a cash in on Dirty Harry, with a little French Connection thrown in for good measure, and not a patch on either.
Found it while looking for a review of 1982's Othello, the Black Commando, with Tony Curtis.
I've seen this film so many times and it still brings tears to my eyes. If it wasn't for the whiplash-inducing end titles, I'd consider this Kubrick's finest work (behind 2001 of course).
I'm also impressed by Kubrick's image composition, by how he works with powerful visual contrasts to his story for example. Magnificent! Everything on the French side is glorious and symmetrical, yet that's where the horror reaches its peaks. The generals discuss matters while literally standing on a chess board patterned floor; to them, this war is a game and the soldiers are nothing but pawns. People with power move from the left to the right whereas the soldiers move from the right to the left, something that emphasises that the conflict in this film isn't between the French and the Germans, but between the French leaders and their sacrificial lambs.
Kirk Douglas gives an amazing performance, but I'm particularly fond of Timothy Carey. I loved him in THE KILLING, but I find him to be even more compelling here. And Kubrick's third wife, the singing girl at the end of the film, is absolutely gorgeous!
Why, sir, why? Ninety minutes of cinematic perfection!
I'll make a point of taking the dvd to work with me tomorrow to watch, I have a large collection of films I have neglected to watch though when I finally do watch them and they are good I feel like I have discovered something.
It was very well made and suspenseful. But it's one of those movies you never watch again. I kind of wish I didn't buy it because now it'll sit there forever! Maybe wait for Netflix or something if you still haven't seen it.
It was hyped big time
Disaster movies are a dime a dozen and most of them are the same when you boil it down. Road trip across the country (or world) to see all the devastation caused by the s**t hitting the fan.
On that level, How It Ends, released on Netflix today (Friday the 13th), is no different. We follow Theo James' Will and Forest Whitaker's Tom as they go from Chicago to Seattle after an event that causes mass death and destruction as well as a nationwide power outage. Tom is the father of Will's pregnant girlfriend, Sam (played by Kat Graham, but she's very underused) and he and Will don't get along thanks to the differences in their upbringing. When all the planes from O'Hare are canceled, the two of them get in a car and head out on the road.
This is where I feel How It Ends is different than most disaster movies. The movie focuses almost exclusively on these two men, how they're so very different and yet how getting to Sam and finding out if she's okay drives them both. They're both capable of shoving their animosity to the side in order to save the one they both love.
Another key difference is how this disaster is treated. We never see the initial cause, we never see the destruction in the big cities (save one short sequence near the end). We see glimpses here or there on the back roads, but the majority of the damage done by this disaster is to society. Looters block off bridges, criminals steal cop cars, you name it, the people that Tom and Will come across are doing it.
You don't learn much about the cause of the disaster or even the state of most of the world (early on there's a news ticker that mentions a heatwave in Europe), but I feel it works greatly in the movie's favor. Too many answers would have ruined the tone of the movie, because at its core, How It Ends was not a disaster movie. It was a movie about Will and Tom and their love for Sam.
If you've got two hours, How It Ends is well worth them.
8.9/10
Brilliant film. One of the best anti-war films ever made. The ending is incredibly moving.
Have never been over fond of this film, but watching it again after many years it's not half bad.
It will never reach the heights of its predecessors but it's an engrossing film nevertheless.
The plot has a few contrivances, (why would Don Altobello believe that Vincent would change sides just like that and divulge his intentions) and silliness ( the murder by spectacles is ridiculous) but mostly its a strong story with some great moments.
Acting is all top notch and even the unfairly vilified Sofia Coppola does pretty well under the circumstances.
The climax is incredibly powerful and well acted, but the epilogue is such a needless and clumsy coda and it ends the film on a dismal note. Would have liked an epilogue featuring Vincent in his new Don role.
Currently watching Around the World in 80 Days Mini Series I have not come across this version before from 1989. It's a bit of a Bond love in with Jill St. John, Christopher Lee, Patrick Macnee, Gabriele Ferzetti joining Pierce. The cast over all is very impressive.
I love this mini series. Pierce is great. I used to have a copy, I'll have to track one down.
Just bought the dvd for a few pounds on Amazon, great story this version has excellent reviews. Noticed only half of the series is being aired on TV plus I am at work, so I'll watch it on dvd from the start when it arrives.
Sorry to say this Jackie Chan / Pierce Brosnan film left me disappointed. I thought an action film with these stars and directed by none other than Martin Campbell would be a better film.
It was far from terrible, but it lacked story that would've made it better. We never really know how Jackie Chans character manages to do the things he does, other than a little bit of back story.
The action was decent, though the usual Chan style and nothing new.
I did wonder why Jackie walked around like he'd soiled himself. Was this a character trait to show, you need to be mindful of the old Asian man.
The other thing I found unusual was Pierce Brosnan's accent!
Despite being Irish himself, Pierce sounded like an American, trying to do an Irish accent. It was weird. Though neither Chan or Brosnan were terrible.
Based on this, I don't think I'd want too see a future Campbell Bond film. It's unlikely now anyway, but I don't think he's got that spark in him he once did.
Watchable but forgettable.