Good Vibrations (2012) directed by Lisa Barros D’Sa and Glenn Leyburn, 18th March

Plot

A biopic of an unconventional record shop owner Terri Hooley who discovers a love for punk music and sets up his own label. In doing so he unwittingly becomes a godfather to the budding underground punk scene. Through punk music it allows the young to escape from the sectarianism. Against the back drop of North Ireland in the 1970s during the Troubles.

Review

The film opens with a young boy playing in a garden who has a love for music. Unlike other boys he comes from an unconventional socialist family and for this he is picked on. This does not stop him from being different and conforming with the rest. This is a bit difficult for anyone living in Northern Ireland.

As the Troubles start old friends take sides and old fiends become rivals. For Terri he chooses neither and becomes a pariah to both. For Terri he sees music as as a focus for people to coming together regardless of religious belief. With this he opens a music shop on the most bombed road in Belfast but he shows a canny insight in the problems and gets old friends now rivals to join him one more time in a pub and gives out albums to stop protection racketeering, destruction of his shop and death threats to him.

As a record store owner he discovers punk accidentally through a school boy who asks him for a punk record. He does not have it as he has a love of Country and Rock and Roll. So he orders the record and decides to see an underground punk gig. The gig blows his mind away and sets off a series of events which he cannot control but just goes with it. Setting up his own label, recording a band, pressing a record and touring Northern Ireland ( not an advisable thing to do). In the process he discovers the Undertones and believing in them goes to London to promote them. He is a man of passion and belief.

Terri Hooley is no saint and is also flawed showing not much of a great flare for business acumen. Though he is a canny man having an insight to other men and knowing what is good music before others do.

Richard Dormer gives a great turn as Terri Hooley playing him with passion and great belief. Jodie Whittaker who plays his long suffering wife is given a very limited role.

The look of the film also gives an authenticity to it. The sets and the costumes are great and really takes you back to that time of the 70s. Whilst the film is interspersed with archive footage and adds to the atmosphere of the film and emphasises that all these events did take place in reality. Occasionally we get Hank Williams references who only appears to Terri.

One surreal and effective scene is when Terri takes some drugs to calm himself before knocking on all the doors of record labels whilst plugging the Undertones.

This is a charming film showing that a love of music can get people together regardless of religious divide. The film is about the music and the passion that it can inspire in people against a difficult backdrop. Go see it and it also has a great sound track to boot too.

8/10

The Incredible Burt Wonderstone (2013) directed by Don Scardino, 14th March

Plot 

Burt Wonderstone an established old school magician splints from his longterm stage partner Anton Marvelton after a new street magician steals their thunder. Burt then spends time with his boyhood idol and rekindles his passion for magic and why he started it in the first place.

Review

Burt starts magic to get away from the school bullies as everyone loves a magician. So he teams up with Anton and together they form a partnership and more importantly a friendship over the next 30 years. After 30 years years of partnership the relationship starts to fall apart with Burt having become a self obsessed egotistical prima donna thinking he is gods gift to women and to entice them he has the largest....bed in town. He doesn't even speak to Anton at any other time than during the show. Especially after performing the same show for 10 years in Las Vegas. Enter the stage of the street magician Steve Gray played by Jim Carrey who is a different kind of magician. New school where it is not enough to trick but to endure in reality the trick.

Faced with being thrown out of their Las Vegas home, Burt and Anton try to reinvent themselves as Nu magicians by doing a daring box trick of sitting in a box for 7 days. Unfortunately Burt is old school and too pompous and arrogant to learn a new trick. The act does not go well and Burt and Anton fall out. Leaving the Brain rapist Steve Gray to move in on their patch.

The premise of old and new school magicians battling out should have made this a wonderful silly film with lots of opportunities of ridiculing the new school dour melodramatic seriousness with Steve Gray playing a David Blaine like character. Whilst the old school of being glitzy hammy and fake tan and big hair of Burt and Anton a la Siegfried and Roy like but without the tigers. The potential of an Anchorman like film of silliness was here. Unfortunately there are no real laugh out loud moments and all the humour is pleasant polite titter. There is no bang and pizazz. The film is all set in the real world and no surreal moments unless you count the cameo of David Copperfield.

Alan Arkin plays Rance Holloway. The person who inspired Burt to take up magic where Burt encounters Rance in an old peoples home. Alan Arkin steals the show and the best bit is when he makes himself disappear from a hospital bed. Olivia Wilde is not really given much to do and like all magicians assistant is there to look pretty and let the magician get on with deceiving the audience.
 Jim Carrey plays his character well with his mock sincerity of the new school magician with very little face contortion until his appropriate end. Steve Carell and Steve Buscemi give likeable performances. Whilst James Gandolfini give a James Gandolfini performance.

This is a safe pleasant film with no real gross out moments and a few laughs. It leaves the audience wanting more but you leave disappointed and wonder why the film was given top billing. There should have been a flash and a bang. All you get is a lighter and a fizz.

5/10

Welcome to the Punch (2013) directed by Eran Creevey, 12th March

Plot 

Three years after master robber Jake Sternwood escapes England he has to return to London to rescue his son who has been gunned down mysteriously, allowing  detective Max Lewinsky another chance to catch him and give him redemption.

Review

Over the last few years the recent slew of Brit crime films that have made it to the silver screen have been a little disappointing with either cliched cockney gangsters or marauding gangs of youths. So I did not have high expectations for this film even with the name of Ridley Scott attached to this film.

Jake Sternwood returns to London to rescue his son allowing Max an opportunity to arrest his nemesis but not is all as it seems. Max is double crossed and an unlikely partnership between Jake and Max is formed so they can work out what is going on around them.

The issue with this film is the story. Unfortunately the story is a little thin and there is not much character development so you don't feel emotionally attached to any of the main characters. There is a political angle as well which is hinted at the start but just does not really feel satisfactory and appears to be tagged on. The film does explain all and it does tie in all the threads in the final exposition when Max finally works out what is going on but it feels altogether rushed.

Mark Strong playing Jake Sternwood gives a mean and moody performance. Whilst James McAvoy is a fresh faced but tightly wound detective given a shot at redemption after failing to catch him once before which left him physically and mentally damaged.

It is quite a violent film but not graphic and allows the audience to use their imagination for the graphic and brutal nature of the act.

Dare I say the film could have been 20 minutes longer to allow for more character development and given a more satisfactory feel to the film but I fear that the pacing and tension may have been lost in doing so.

There is a light comedy moment with the Granny house scene to an otherwise unrelenting onslaught in pace to the film and slows it down too. The slow-mo shoot out also works here and adds to the film.

What really works for the film is the pacing which gives great tension and a tautness to it. The blue wash look to London quite suits the film too.

The film ends with an opportunity for a sequel.

This is a fast paced action cops and robbers thriller which lasts for 100 minutes. The suspense and tension is there and it is a roller coaster of a ride leaving you on the edge of the seat. Forget the thinness of the story enjoy the ride or the punch that the film gives.

8/10

Identity Thief (2013) directed by Seth Gordon, 5th March

Plot

Mild mannered conservative Sandy Bigelow Patterson based in Denver, Colorado has had his identity stolen by a lady in Miami, Florida. With his job threatened and the lack of Police action to catch the culprit, Sandy decides to apprehend the harmless looking lady and bring her back to Denver to clear his good name.

Review

Once Sandy has caught up with his doppelganger he realises he cannot fly back to Denver from Florida and must drive back. From here you know it is going to be a road cum buddy movie where initially there is huge animosity between the two but through the road journey they bond and understand each other.

With the premise of catching a harmless compulsive liar what on the surface should be quite straight forward. You know it is not going to be and it should lead to many crazy capers and hair brained situations.

The film should be a lot funnier but unfortunately it is not.The leads are great with Jason Bateman and Melissa McCarthy but unfortunately the script and screen play just lets them down. It is let down because it is bland. The film just feels very pedestrian and there is no roller coaster ride to the film.

Big Chuck (Eric Stonestreet) has a great moment with Melissa McCarthy on the dance floor and Motel scene but all the other actors in the cast don't really get a look in in this film.

There are one or two great scenes especially the Motel scene but apart from this there are no other real highlights.

There also seems to have been a real lost opportunity in the film  with the lack or light use of the Bounty Hunter (Robert Patrick) and the Gangster duo ( Genesis Rodriguez and T.I.) in chasing the two Sandy's across America. There was an opportunity for a Midnight Run like caper.

In the end you know how the film is going to end with the usual redemption story. Alas the film is just executed in a paint by numbers way so the redemption at the end altogether feels quite underwhelming.

This is not a bad film it's just very average. I just had higher expectations and wanted to like this film much more.

6/10