Released 22nd December
Seen 23rd December
Directed by David Ayer
Written by Max Landis
Produced by Clubhouse Pictures, Overbrook Entertainment, Netflix
Starring Will Smith & Joel Edgerton
Ghost In The Shell
Released 30th March (Australia)
Seen 21st December
Directed by Rupert Sanders
Written by Jamie Moss, William Wheeler & Ehren Kruger
Produced by Paramount Pictures, DreamWorks Pictures, Reliance Entertainment, Shanghai Film Group, Huahua Media, Arad Productions, Steven Paul Production, Amblin Partners, Grosvenor Park Productions, Seaside Entertainment, Weying Galaxy Entertainment
Starring Scarlett Johansson, Michael Pitt, Pilou Asbaek & Juliette Binoche
The Book Of Henry
Released 23rd June
Seen 15th December
Directed by Colin Trevorrow
Written by Greg Hurwitz
Produced by 1978 Films, Imagenation Abu Dhabi FZ, Likely Story, Parkes+MacDonald Image Nation, Playtone, Route One Entertainment
Starring Naomi Watts, Jaeden Lieberher, Jacob Tremblay & Sarah Silverman
‘War For The Planet Of The Apes’ Review: Damn Dirty CGI Apes
Uploaded to MoviePilot on 28th July
This is in a style I attempted for MoviePilot briefly when I thought I could put reviews on there… they weren’t a review place, this was me being dumb. Also, this style isn’t one I like, but I’m keeping this for reference purposes. Oh, and yes this is why I didn’t review War For The Planet Of The Apes before now.
The modern-day Planet Of The Apes franchise has garnered a rather impressive reaction, especially when compared to the Tim Burton attempt at the franchise. Both Rise Of The Planet Of The Apes and Dawn Of The Planet Of The Apes got really high praise, something that many found stunning considering that a lot of us still were getting over that 2001 version. So, here we are, the third movie in the series and it has a lot to live up to.
How did it handle the high bar that the two previous films set? Let’s figure that out.
Continue reading “‘War For The Planet Of The Apes’ Review: Damn Dirty CGI Apes”
’31’ Review: Rob Zombie Let Loose
Uploaded to MoviePilot on 27th July
This is in a style I attempted for MoviePilot briefly when I thought I could put reviews on there… they weren’t a review place, this was me being dumb. Also, this style isn’t one I like, but I’m keeping this for reference purposes.
Rob Zombie has something of a reputation in the horror genre. Some love him, some hate him, some change their opinion about him from film to film. I’ve personally always been relatively indifferent to his work. I found House Of 1000 Corpses to be an interesting throwback picture and thought Devils Rejects was really good for the majority of the runtime, but everything else he’s made hasn’t really sat well with me. Especially his remakes of Halloween which, in my humble opinion, are possibly some of the worst of the horror remakes. So I had some trepidation going into his 2016 movie 31, a movie that he made using funding from his fans because it was apparently too extreme for the studios.
Let’s see if he used his chance to break free from the studio system to his advantage.
The Circle
Released 17th August (Australia)
Seen 11th December
Directed by James Ponsoldt
Written by James Ponsoldt & Dave Eggers
Produced by 1978 Films, Imagenation Abu Dhabi FZ, Likely Story, Parkes+MacDonald Image Nation, Playtone, Route One Entertainment
Starring Emma Watson, Tom Hanks, Patton Oswalt & Karen Gillian
WARNING: Mild spoilers for the end. No specifics will be mentioned but there’s a lot of hints, because that’s where most of the problems lie. I would cover those with a spoiler plugin but I don’t have those yet. I’ll speak in very general terms and not name characters or locations, but just warning you now.
The Great Wall
Released 16th February (Australia)
Seen 6th December
Directed by Yimou Zhang
Written by Carlo Bernard, Doug Miro, Tony Gilroy
Produced by Legendary East, Atlas Entertainment, China Film Group, Dentsu
Fuji Television Network, Kava Productions, Le Vision Pictures & Legendary Entertainment
Starring Matt Damon, Tian Jing, Willem Dafoe, Andy Lau & Pedro Pascal
Cult Of Chucky
Released 2nd November
Seen 16th November
Directed & Written by Don Mancini
Produced by Universal 1440 Entertainment
Starring Brad Dourif, Fiona Dourif, Alex Vincent & Jennifer Tilly
The Child’s Play series is one that’s gone through many variations. The original 3 movies were all focussed on Andy Barclay and had a serious tone to them despite the admittedly silly concept. Bride & Seed of Chucky took the series in a more comedic direction, which culminated in the underappreciated Seed (Which I once wrote about my love of). When Seed didn’t do quite as well as they expected at the box office the series went straight to DVD and straight to the darkest it’s ever been with Curse Of Chucky. Now we have Cult of Chucky, the culmination of decades of building and they’ve built up to something glorious.
Jigsaw
Released 2nd November (Australian release)
Seen 15th November
Directed by Michael Spierig & Peter Spierig
Written by Pete Goldfinger & Josh Stolberg
Produced by Serendipity Productions, Twisted Pictures & A Bigger Boat
Starring Matt Passmore, Tobin Bell, Callum Keith Rennie, Hannah Emily Anderson & Laura Vandervoort
In 2004 a couple of Aussies changed the world of horror cinema with nothing more than a handsaw, a bathroom and Westley from The Princess Bride. It went on to become one of the biggest horror series of all time raking in around half a billion dollars with its annual releases until the series came to an end with Saw 3D in 2010. The series was considered long dead until this year when Jigsaw revived the franchise and let the games begin again… sadly, much like when you play any game multiple times, you know all the moves by now and after a while, the game stops surprising you.
Sleepless
Released 16th February (Australia)
Seen 13th November
Directed by Baran bo Odar
Written by Andrea Berloff
Produced by FilmNation Entertainment, Open Road Films, Riverstone Pictures & Vertigo Entertainment
Starring Jamie Foxx, Michelle Monaghan, Scoot McNairy & Dermot Mulroney
In the 1990’s, the drug Ambien rose to prominence as a form of sleep aid. It was a branded version of the zolpidem class of drugs that would aid someone in going to sleep, even though it had adverse side effects such as causing people to sleepwalk and being a very addictive substance. I think I found a really good substitute for that drug that has no adverse side effects. I’ll take my Nobel prize in medicine now for discovering this brilliant alternative, thank you.
Movie Meister Reviews 