The Addams Family (1991) ****

The Addams Family (1991) ****


Dir: Barry Sonnenfeld


Starring: Angelica Housten, Christopher Lloyd, Raul Julia


Synopsis: 25 years after Fester (Lloyd) ran away after a fight with his brother Gomez (Julia), a con artist lawyer and his loan shark send a Fester look-a-like to find out where the Addams' fortune is.


Verdict: The Addams Family is a film I remember so well from my childhood - watching again and again on video and, even now when I almost know it word for word, it still has me in stitches.

The gothic eccentricity, the dark humour and the kooky characterisation. It's what you would expect from the classic family and after 20 years it still holds its own.


Though he is known to be quite hit and miss with his films (take MIB and compare to Wild Wild West) Sonnenfeld shows in his directorial début that he has what it takes to make a good comedy, despite his hit and miss career since. 

It's difficult to decide upon which of the cast delivers the best performance. Housten and Julia are wonderful as the mother and father figures - the juxtaposing calm of Morticia to the grandiose and over the top Gomez who turn everything they say - or indeed is said to them - into sexual references. Lloyd's Fester is so similar to his Doc (Back to the Future) - with his eccentric behaviour and sense of haste, it's a combination that serves him well and creates a character the audience can really enjoy. 


Of the children, Christina Ricci's Wednesday is by far superior to Jimmmy Workman's Pugsley - she has that sinister look and line delivery that is believable and, while all we see of him is his hand, Christopher Hart's Thing is one of the most urgent and emphatic characters in the film - and all this from gesture alone is a definite nod back to the days of silent cinema.


Without all of the pomp and glitz of special effects, the comical appeal of the writers and the scripts delivery by the cast is what makes the film stand out. The humour is brilliantly off the wall, from the unpacking of Uncle Nick Nack and his various wardrobes, to the Addamses trying to settle into the 'normal' American way of life, it is daft to the fullest extent it can be.

This film is great fun to watch, with such an amount of hyperbole in its comedy and delivery that is difficult to resist enjoying it.

Goon (15) **

Goon (15) **

Dir:Michael Dowse

Starring:Sean William Scott, Jay Baruchel, Alison Pill

Synopsis:After his family reject him for being less intelligent than them, Doug Glatt uses his talent for taking and delivering abuse to take an underperforming hockey team up through the league.

Verdict:All at once, Goon is and isn’t a typical William Scott style film. Where we are used to seeing him playing a loud and obnoxious character, substitute this with the quiet, yet violent, Glatt - a bouncer turned hockey player. Well, hockey player is a loose term. He plays the player who exists primarily to get into fights in the surprisingly violent game of ice hockey.

The film is quite a good move for Scott, as it shows that he can indeed play something other than the Stifler-esque role he is known for. At times he can be quite sweet in his ‘simpleton’ way, especially in his courtship of Eva (Pill) and then he destroys that by taking beatings that should render him unconscious, and then beat seven shades out of the other guy.

The humour is typical of the genre, focusing on slapstick, sex jokes and blue language to get simple laughs. In some ways, it reminded me of Happy Gilmore with its humour and plot, just a bit less subtle. But that could just be me.

This said, the story moves quite slowly and, despite a good deliverance by William Scott, I didn’t find myself connecting with the character as well as I probably should. This, coupled the re-use of the same jokes from countless other comedies, means that the film didn’t quite get to my funny bone or touch me in the way it should have either.

Brick (2005) 15 - *****

Brick (2005) 15 - *****


Dir: Rian Johnson


Starring: Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Lukas Haas, Emilie de Ravin, Nora Zehetner


Synopsis: Brendan is a typical high school loner who ends up getting pulled into the underworld of his high school's social system to discover why his ex girlfriend came to him asking for help. He calls on his friend, and information go-to-guy, 'Brain' to help him infiltrate the criminal workings of the school and solve the mystery.


Verdict: At first, you get the feeling that this indie Noir-style thriller from writer/director Rian Johnson is a parody on the genre but, as you continue watching, it develops into a brilliant piece of cinema.

Vaguely reminiscent of Bugsy Malone (in terms of transplanting a well known genre into a younger cast of characters), Johnson got me wondering whether his film is a re-imagining of the American high school genre, or Noir re-imagined? It works as either and both and whichever you decide upon, it probably won't be the wrong answer.

Gordon-Levitt, well known for his role in Inception, plays the classic detective brilliantly, all the while keeping the character equally believable as a high school student. The character steals things to find out clues, makes people talk with violence, has Brain (Matt O'Leary) as his go to who knows information and even his dialogue - through language, sarcasm and how his sentences are structured - scream classic detective (the only thing missing is the alcoholism).

But all the focus cannot remain on him, the rest of the cast also deliver the goods, from Hass' The Pin to Richard Roundtree's Vice Principal (who plays the role of the police commissioner in the high school microcosm).

The story is brilliantly clever, partly in itself as it would surely work just as well within the typical Film Noir setting and characters, but to have it contained within the world of the teenager at school is genius - the underworld of drugs and crime juxtaposing with operation out of their (seemingly) oblivious parents' houses and the simplicity of going to their classes.

All in all, two genres you would never expect to meld together have produced a film that is thought provoking, intelligent and more simply, works as a whole.

Surf's Up (U) 2007 - ****

Surf's Up (U) 2007 - ****


Dir: Ash Brannon, Chris Buck


Starring: Shia LaBeouf, Jeff Bridges, Zooey Deschanel


Synopsis:  A documentary-style animation going behind the scenes at the yearly penguin surfing competition from Pen Gu Island, Surf's Up follows Cody Maverick (LaBeouf) as he tries to fulfil his life's dream of winning the contest.


Verdict: It tends to be the way with kids films that they appeal to adults as much, and this is definitely one of those heart warming films that puts a smile on your face.

Yes there are an abundance of clichés that fill up the plot, as you would expect from a film aimed at a younger audience, but these don't matter as they are expected and are part of what makes this genre of film so enjoyable.

The comedy is the sort of thing that appeals to children and grown-ups, from general slapstick that all enjoy, to some jokes that parents will understand more than the younger viewers. You know the jokes and you know what will happen so you don't really have to think too much.

The voice-acting talent is very well suited to the film. Jeff Bridges, commonly known as 'The Dude', fits the bill brilliantly for an ageing surfer, and LaBeouf's voice works as the young, cock-sure kid. Alongside the voicing is the soundtrack, which features some classic pop-rock, surf style and feel good music.

The other nice thing about this film is that it came out before the new fad for 3D came out, and the effects are focused on the animation - which shows. The CGI waves are the stand out feature of the animation, but the character and scenery animation is also very good, despite taking the back seat.

A good film to watch with the family on this long Bank Holiday weekend, or indeed at any old time on DVD.

Prometheus - 3D (15) ****

Prometheus (15) ****

Dir: Ridley Scott

Starring: Noomi Rapace, Logan Marshall-Green, Michael Fassbender

Synopsis: After discovering the same pictogram in several ancient civilisations, a team of explorers go to the planetary system that is described to discover the origins of the human race. There, they find a terrifying secret and must battle the past to save humanity's future.

Verdict: The fan-boy in me just wants to splurge his guts out about how much he enjoyed the film, but the more sensible side of me has managed to shut him up for a while so this review can be written (be warned that in person I will gush a bit).

The story is great: relatively easy to follow but with moments when it leaves you feeling a bit stuck. The main culprit for this would be the way that, yes, a lot of the questions that are raised in Alien are answered but it then raises new questions to be answered. Possibly an extra for the DVD release to fill in some of the plot holes?

This said, Scott really takes the film back to its roots in the sci-fi horror genre that made the first film stand out and makes a film that didn't disappoint me even after all of the hype. He has also, somehow, managed to (in a way) discredit the Alien vs. Predator (AVP) films from the timeline of the franchise (which isn't necessarily a bad thing). 

The mix of being able to scare the audience and action that was used in 1979 works again here, though the tactics are somewhat different - where the franchise started with the fear being what you can't see, we already know what the alien looks like and we know (sort of) about the space jockey, which leaves them to come up with new ways of scaring the viewer.

The special effects are brilliant; from the details in the alien structures that matches so well with what I remember from Alien, the CGI, all the gory details and the fantastic scenery on the planet, Prometheus doesn't disappoint when it comes to delivering visually and, at first, the 3D looked promising but, as always, there were moments when it delivered, and others when it failed to do so.

The acting talent really helps to bring the story together. Rapace is brilliant as the main character Dr Shaw becoming, in effect, a new Ripley for the 21st century. Fassbender shines as David, becoming quite like his Magneto in X-Men: First Class - someone who is both sinister villain and a friendly face in one package.

With its special effects and great story, this film will have you reaching for your Alien box set when you get home - even if it's only to feed the desire to carry on where this left off or to help you double check and make the connections of how everything fits together, this is definitely a film that lives up to its hype.