Reviews by SJMJ91

Being a huge fan of the classic TV show ever since childhood, I never really thought a feature film on the famous cat and mouse was a bad idea but despite that, I don't think it was as awful as people have made it out to be. I grew up with this but now even after the fact that there are so many flaws, it is something that at least tries to be something fun and that is all it is. There are some key moments in the feature film where you are taken back into the older generation such as some comic violence like there is in the TV show and the often on-and-off friendship and rivalry between Tom and Jerry. I think perhaps the best bit of hope we get from the original TV show is the ending scene which you will have to see for yourself.


However, there are quite a number of deep flaws such as the instant and most obvious one: Tom and Jerry who actually talk (even to the human characters) when they hardly said a single word at all in the TV show and that is what makes the TV show truly great because we don't need them to talk because their characters are developed enough. As for how they act in the film, mostly it doesn't feel like the same cat and mouse we saw in the past except that they both have the same features and same name. If they were going to make a Tom and Jerry feature film, I think that having the characters involve speak is perhaps the best and only way a feature film would work especially in this generation now that the silent era is now long gone. I guess I would understand if Tom and Jerry talked only to each other but the fact that only the little girl can hear and understand them and no other human character can, I just don't understand. One bit of credit I will give about the choice of Tom and Jerry talking is that Richard Kind (voice of Tom) and Dana Hill (voice of Jerry) were good choices because their voices provide almost exactly how I imagined Tom and Jerry would speak anyway. Also, the fact that in the old show, we almost hardly ever saw a human character's face or upper body features hence why one of (and perhaps the most famous) Tom's owner is known as Mammy-Two-Shoes. It would have been good to see her in this film or someone like her anyway, not some weird ginger, fat woman stalking and ''abusing'' a little girl.


The famous cat and mouse make their first appearance together in a feature film. When Tom's owner moves house, accidentally leaves Tom behind and the next morning the house is bulldozed to the ground, it means Tom and Jerry have to make their own living together and get used to the lifestyle on the streets. Because they are a cat and a mouse, that is a very difficult task. They come across Pugsy (a dog) and Frankie the flea and into a group of cat-thugs and sing a couple of songs but they together meet young orphan girl Robyn who has ran away from home from her evil Aunt Figg (well, really her guardian seeing as her father is supposedly dead and her mother died when she was a baby) who is really only after her father's money hence why she is looking after Robyn. She has her lawyer accomplice who tries to take it off her. So, Robyn, Tom and Jerry come across funny and exciting adventures and try to escape the evil clutches of Aunt Figg forever.


Admittedly, it is good fun listening and singing along to the songs but overall, I didn't really like how they made Tom And Jerry: The Movie like a musical such as the songs weren't amazingly written, a few of the songs were to close together such as ''Friends To The End'' and ''What Do We Care'' and because the story isn't all that great, the musical side just didn't match the pride or passion of the story. Throughout most of the time, Tom And Jerry: The Movie was flat but they perhaps tried to make this a success at least but it just didn't work. I only just liked this one so I think I might give Tom And Jerry: The Magic Ring a miss.


Overall, Tom And Jerry: The Movie is a deeply flawed guilty pleasure that I loved as a child and still do get some good fun watching from it seeing as this was a childhood favourite of mine and still love watching the old classic TV show now. No, this didn't really need to be made and probably shouldn't have been made but it definitely is a good one to recommend to little kids especially of this generation. If it stayed completely noble to the TV show, it would have been a great success! Tom And Jerry: The Movie really is the one film that many would describe it as ''so crap but so much fun'' and that is basically this film in a nutshell.

M was released in the early stages of cinema and after another German film Nosferatu, M became almost like the birth of the thriller genre so in terms of horror and suspense, the Germans were the ones that started those specific genres off! I really like silent films especially ones that are suspenseful and have a dark story but this one was a bit of both because there were moments of ordinary dialogue and actions but there were a lot of unexpected silent moments that were literally silent without any music at all. This didn't so much terrify me but it really kept me off the edge of my seat as I was watching it and I love the feeling when a film drives me to that. I also couldn't help but notice that the characters seemed to like saying the words ''bastard'' and ''swine'' a lot and I think this is the oldest film that I have watched that actually features swearing in it.


Child-murder is probably the one cinema theme where viewers don't and wouldn't feel comfortable with watching at all so it really isn't for the faint-hearted but I do love films with dark stories and creepy characters. Unfortunately, not everyone would watch this because it was made in the early 1930s, it was filmed in black and white and some are very fussy snobs who expect top quality Avatar-like effects every time. However, I am actually quite surprised that nobody has made a remake version of M yet. It's not like I'd want them to, just that Hollywood are so predictable and most classics have been remade or loosely remade but have turned out crap most of the time.


There have been a rash of child abductions and murders in a German town. The murderer lures the children into his confidence by candy and other such child friendly items. Everyone is on edge because the murderer has not been caught. The most substantial pieces of evidence the police have are hand written letters by the murderer which he sent to the newspaper for publication. Unknown even to himself, a blind beggar, who sold the murderer a balloon for one of the child victims, may have key information as to the murderer's identity. The murder squad's work is made even more difficult with the large number of tips they receive from the paranoid public, who are quick to accuse anyone of suspicious activity solely for their own piece of mind that someone - anyone - is apprehended for the heinous crimes. Conversely, many want to take the case into their own hands, including the town's leading criminals since the increased police presence has placed a strain on their ability to conduct criminal activity. Although they both have the same end goal of capturing the murderer, the police and the criminals seem to be working at cross purposes, which may provide an edge to the murderer in getting away.


Despite there are many characters involved in M, it was really only about one character: the murderer of the children in the city. Peter Lorre portrayed Hans Beckert and what an absolutely outstanding performance it was! It is unique, really, because before M, Lorre was in fact a comedic actor but his performance in this film goes to show that anybody can portray something really well that is totally different from what they have done previously in their careers. He wasn't only a terrifying villain in terms of what he was doing regarding the murder of the children but he was also damn terrifying to look at especially when the character was either scared or shocked about something that was going on. Apart from the obvious fictional characters back in the old days, the Hans Beckert was perhaps the darkest character to have ever been shown in a film and that child-murder is unfortunately something that happens on a regular basis. I don't understand how Lorre as well as the film in general weren't nominated for any Academy Awards at all! Otto Wernicke gave a great performance also as Inspector Karl Lohmann! M was also Wernicke's career breakthrough as well as Lorre's too so this became a breakthrough for those involved in the film as well as a breakthrough in cinema in general.


Fritz Lang is perhaps the most underrated filmmaker in the history of cinema. First he achieves the breakthrough classic Metropolis in the science fiction genre and now M in the horror-thriller genre. Despite the fact that both films are breakthroughs in cinema and both are fantastic, I did prefer M more because it was more powerful and I just happened to enjoy it more as entertainment than art like Metropolis is both of those too but the other way round. I really liked the twist at the end of the film also but I won't spoil that in the review. Anyway, I think that Fritz Lang truly expressed (even from a German in the 1930s on the brink of World War II) that there truly are some sick people in this world and some just don't deserve to live like child-murderers and paedophiles.


Overall, M is one fantastic classic that is a landmark in the thriller genre (and the birth of psychological thrillers) and is without a doubt one of the best foreign language films of all time and it is also unfortunately one of the most underrated films as well. Despite the fact it was made in the early 1930s, it is a lot darker than some of the thrillers we see nowadays. If you're one of those people who aren't too selective when it comes to classics and if you like Metropolis, you will absolutely love this one like I did.

I was intending to watch this at some point in the future but a relative was forcing me to watch it so I put him out of his misery and watched it. However, when I did watch it, I thought it was absolutely amazing and I loved it from the start to the end. I was tempted to watch a dubbed English version of the film but it really was a lot better watching it in original language Swedish despite it had subtitles. It feels a lot more real and, quite frankly, I understood the film a bit more too. Apart from films by the Americans, British and Australians (well, foreign language films), I have always thought that the Swedes make the best films but after this, Let The Right One In, The Seventh Seal and a few others, I really think they are simply the best. In the near future and when reading about Swedish (and maybe other Scandinavian films such as Danish, Norwegian or Finnish) films that have been done in the past (such as films by the late Ingmar Bergman), I'll definitely watch the supposed best ones of that country!


There were so many great qualities that this had but, personally there was one weakness that The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo had and that was that it wasn't completely as intense as comments suggested like on the DVD or in reviews that I have read. Or maybe they possibly found even the investigation scenes tense the most when there was one or two edge-of-seat scenarios in the film. There was some shocking moments in the film, though, especially when involved sexual violence and other references in similarity to it.


Forty years ago, Harriet Vanger disappeared from a family gathering on the island owned and inhabited by the powerful Vanger clan. Her body was never found, yet her uncle is convinced it was murder and that the killer is a member of his own tightly knit but dysfunctional family. He employs disgraced financial journalist Mikael Blomkvist and the tattooed, ruthless computer hacker Lisbeth Salander to investigate. When the pair link Harriet's disappearance to a number of grotesque murders from almost forty years ago, they begin to unravel a dark and appalling family history. But the Vangers are a secretive clan, and Blomkvist and Salander are about to find out just how far they are prepared to go to protect themselves.


Michael Nyqvist was great as Mikael Blomkvist (both his real name and character names are very similar, aren't they?)! Nyqvist showed us a kind of character that we have seen time and time again. What I mean by this is that we see this detective on a mission to solve a mystery of someone who has gone missing and has a deep but rather disturbing story behind it so that is a frequent dialogue in crime films. Noomi Rapace was simply outstanding in this film and she was simply robbed of an Academy Award nomination for Best Leading Actress! It would have probably been at the 84th Academy Awards for the films in 2010 despite The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo is really a 2009 film. Her character seems like one of those young women who does look quite a dodgy young woman when you first see her as well as incredibly sexy, she is a troubled young woman with a traumatic past and has a dark story behind it. I really don't know what to make of Daniel Craig and Rooney Mara (who appeared in another David Fincher film The Social Network and also the remake of A Nightmare On Elm Street) as these two leading roles in the Hollywood upcoming remake.


After only one film seen from him, Niels Arsen Oplev is a great director already and it is unfortunate that he only directed this one and not The Girl Who Played With Fire and The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet's Nest. He directed it a bit like David Fincher did in Zodiac, James Wan in Saw and Jonathan Demme in The Silence Of The Lambs with the very intense scenes and rather graphically violent and/or scary background settings. Unfortunately, The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo didn't receive recognition at the Oscars or Golden Globes but it did win Best Foreign Language Film at the BAFTA Awards and rightly so! Rapace was nominated Best Actress and was nominated for Best Adapted Screenplay. I sometimes hate how biased the American Academy really can be towards films that aren't in the English language because on occasions those films are better than some of the films that Hollywood release.


Overall, The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo is without a single doubt, one of the best films of 2009/2010, one of the most underrated films ever and is another great film that the Swedes can add to their successful films list. The sequels will have to do pretty damn hard to beat this one! It certainly is a fantastic start to a series and had a teasing ending like The Lord Of The Rings: The Fellowship Of The Ring did apart from the entire Millennium trilogy are all out on DVD now so that's good. Also, I am now looking forward to the Hollywood remake (or their own version) now which is directed by David Fincher (Fight Club, Seven, The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button, The Social Network) after this fantastic film!

Over the years, there have been quite a few film adaptations on the Pearl Harbor attack and despite I read about the very negative responses from the public and critics, I was expecting at least a few good things about it but apart from the effects, Pearl Harbor was an absolute disaster that deserved all the negative criticism it rightfully deserved. I mean, the film was a success as far as box office takings and it did become a blockbuster but where I am annoyed is that Michael Bay and co have robbed viewers of their money at the cinema and on DVD to watch something that is basically a lie! Before I watched it, I prepared myself for it and read the historical facts about what really happened but I don’t think there were very many that were correct at all!


Unfortunately, this is perhaps the best known version of the attack and I will admit that the effects were good as predicted but even so, they didn’t even save the film in the slightest. This was needlessly too long and it’s that simple! I will also confess that I didn’t watch the entire film. I stopped at 94 minutes and fast forwarded what was happening because I really wasn’t going to spend another 90+ minutes watching a film I was hating although I did catch the ending. I am normally a big fan of films based on true stories especially ones that are set in World War II and this is the one so-called “bio-pic” that has sunk the lowest and the makers and actors have spat in the faces of those who lost their lives and the relatives and friends of those lost ones during the attack. I think the fact that this is a Hollywood film also which makes it a weak film anyway.


Pearl Harbor is a classic tale of romance set during a war that complicates everything. It all starts when childhood friends Rafe and Danny become Army Air Corps pilots and meet Evelyn, a Navy nurse. Rafe falls head over heels and next thing you know Evelyn and Rafe are hooking up. Then Rafe volunteers to go fight in Britain and Evelyn and Danny get transferred to Pearl Harbor. While Rafe is off fighting everything gets completely whack and next thing you know everybody is in the middle of an air raid we now know as "Pearl Harbor."


Despite I still found it a tremendous disappointment to cinema and I am not a fan of Ben Affleck, Josh Hartnett or even Kate Beckinsale that much, I was at least expecting the acting to be decent but it seriously failed miserable especially from Ben Affleck! A guy who seduces a girl and then leaves her to become a pilot because “he’s always dreamed it”? I could literally laugh at how pathetic that is. And how pathetic it really was with the poxy friendship too. I mean, I hated how they used a love triangle that wasn’t even real and just kept dragging on and on and on and that completely took over the attack itself! All three characters might as well have a threesome and get the hell out of this film because it really could have done so much better without all of them. Ok, I’ll admit that James Cameron’s Titanic had that with a fictional love story but that was a strong story and they actually got the historical facts correct alongside the fictional love story. The only real fact we got out of Pearl Harbor was there were bombs at Pearl Harbor by the so-called “Empire Of Japan” but there seriously had hardly any specific facts.


I have seen a few films made by Michael Bay even before I saw Pearl Harbor and I think the lowest he has even gone is with Transformers: Revenge Of The Fallen and it wasn’t only until early March 2011 that he regretted the film and admitted it was crap! As for Pearl Harbor, he has officially sank down to the disaster level where Transformers: Revenge Of The Fallen is and I do really hope he regrets this one deeply! For God’s sake, the attack on Pearl Harbor may have been in 1941 but despite that, people still talk about it now and, Michael, if you’re going to make a film about a very crucial event that happened in the world especially towards Americans (ohh yeah… you’re American yourself!), you need to be in the right state of mind to get the facts right! Michael, face it, you are a failure! You always have been and you always will be for eternity. Ok, what the FUCK was with the script?! I think this is the first script in a long time that I have listened to where I have literally shaken my head, sighed with shame and laughed at while watching it and it almost became quite painful! I hope if there will be another film about the attack where a director like Steven Spielberg, Clint Eastwood or even one of the great directors of this generation like Chris Nolan, David Fincher, Danny Boyle or someone else makes it, I would most certainly be there to see it! In fact, I dream of when that day comes!


Overall, Pearl Harbor is one of the most disappointing films of all time and it is really that simple. It’s not really like I wasn’t expecting at least a little bit of disappointment anyway but there you go. As I said, only the effects were the quality of this film and that is it! Well, I guess that is the best quality of pretty much every Michael Bay film. The best way of putting it is “big budget with small brains”. The last thing I can say in this review is that Michael Bay, Randall Wallace (screenwriter) and the majority of the actors should have been the ones who died in the attack rather than those heroes in the war who did.

I first read about Rango just after Johnny Depp had completed Public Enemies and when I found out that Gore Verbinski would be directing it and after his great but slowly weak Pirates Of The Caribbean trilogy which Depp played the lead role, expectations became quite high. After seeing the trailer, it looked like it could be a good bit of fun but didn't look amazing. For the first time, there has been an animated western that became a success and western is a rather rare genre in the animated world. Anyway, when I saw it on the day it was released in the UK (in fact, the very first showing at my local cinema), I could see the fantastic side of the film but I couldn't help but notice one or two disappointing flaws.


Where I found this film rather flawed was that it began very slowly and took quite a while to get going and I kept thinking to myself when I was watching it "Ohh… come on! Get on with it!", I felt that the ending was rather rushed and also I barely found any comedy at all within the film. Well, I didn't literally laugh out loud anyway but apart from those weaknesses, I was rather impressed with the story and how they involved hard environmental issues for those animals who live in deserts all around the world so that was quite clever and it did teach a lesson or two about that. The effects were fantastic as predicted and I am both surprised and glad that Rango wasn't released in 3D. I mean, an animated CGI film not released in 3D in this generation after Avatar's release?! I never thought I would live to see the day(!) Rango is a perfect example of why 3D is now a money-grubbing system and shows how pointless most films released in 3D really are.


A pet chameleon who has lived his entire life in the confines of a cozy glass terrarium discovers adventure beyond his wildest imagination in this animated western adventure. When we first meet Rango, the imaginative pet chameleon is safe in his terrarium, and embarking on epic adventures through the power of imagination. Then, suddenly, his safe existence is irrevocably upended thanks to a bump in the road that sends him soaring out of a car window, and right onto the searing hot asphalt of a desert highway. On the advice of a wise armadillo who relays the story of the Spirit of the West, our conical-eyed hero sets out on search of a town called Dirt, narrowly escaping a hungry hawk and encountering a self-sufficient pioneer named Beans along the way. Upon arriving in the dusty desert town, Rango wanders into the local bar and convinces the locals that he's a notorious gunslinger with a lightning fast trigger-finger. When one of the locals challenges Rango to a showdown on Main Street, the hawk that menaced our hero on his way to town shows up looking for a rematch, and ends up beak down in the dirt. Now the townspeople are convinced that Rango is the real deal, and the Mayor decides to name the brave chameleon their new sheriff. But Rango's honeymoon in Dirt is short-lived when bandits steal the town's entire supply of water, and the newly christened sheriff forms a posse in order to get it back. Little do they realize they were all being manipulated by one greedy power-monger who's determined to keep the people of Dirt under his thumb with the help of a diabolical villain named Rattlesnake Jake whose Gatling gun tail makes Swiss cheese of all challengers. Now, if Rango can just locate the Spirit of the West and summon the courage to realize his true potential, perhaps he can finally free the people of Dirt from the tyranny that binds them, and discover his true destiny under the scorching desert sun.


Johnny Depp has only provided a voice-only acting performance twice in his career; once for this and in Tim Burton's Corpse Bride in 2005 so Johnny in an animated film is a rare occasion (and quite frankly is probably the main reason why most people decide to watch it). He provides different voices for every film he has made and he gives us mostly his Captain Jack Sparrow/Sweeney Todd voice so it is easily recognizable. I think one flaw where Johnny being cast in Rango is that people would perhaps only care about Johnny Depp being in it, not about the Rango character. I liked the Rango character anyway and he reminded me a lot of Captain Jack Sparrow due to his wittiness, trying to play a strong leader but is quite a fraud, can act rather cowardice towards his enemies and a few other reasons so I think that is what led to Johnny's role in Rango. Aside from Johnny, the cast was simply fantastic! I mean, I have noticed recently that it is mostly animated films or live-action CGI films that have the best ensemble casts (this cast doesn't quite beat the Gnomeo And Juliet but it certainly is a tough challenge against it). The rest of the cast features the likes of Isla Fisher, Abigail Breslin, Ned Beatty, Bill Nighy, Alfred Molina, Harry Dean Stanton, Timothy Olyphant and Ray Winstone. To be honest, Johnny Depp is one on his own and the rest of the cast are all there together just like Rango is one on his own and the rest of the characters in the town Dirt.


Gore Verbinski really has been in my good books ever since the start of his career with the hilarious family comedy Mouse Hunt, romantic-comedy The Mexican which I wasn't too fond of, the first Pirates Of The Caribbean film, the hilarious black comedy The Weather Man, the two Pirates Of The Caribbean sequels and now Rango which is perhaps his most different and extraordinary project to date. I normally prefer directors who try making films of different genres but some work and some don't. Verbinski and Rango does work pretty well but not as well as I have seen from directors in the past. He re-unites with Johnny Depp for the fourth consecutive time after the Pirates Of The Caribbean trilogy and their work on Rango is another success.


Overall, Rango is a visually stunning and extraordinary but a both slow-paced and fast-paced film that I did get good fun out of but I wouldn't class it as one of the best films of 2011 so far. Folks, don't see it just for Johnny Depp's voice! You'll find that it isn't just about him despite he is awesome! I think I would watch it again at some point in the future but it's not one I would urge to see again at the cinema or immediately get on blu-ray. It would look good on blu-ray, though. Anyway, the point is that Rango is good and you should check it out.

Just before I first saw Watchmen, expectations were very high and when I did see it for the first time at the cinema, I was incredibly disappointed by it due to its very confusing dialogue, it became quite flat throughout most of the film and I wasn’t very impressed with the acting either although I do admire the director. However, after that second viewing when it was on DVD, I actually really enjoyed it a lot more but I still notice some more of the flaws but not half as many this time. I think the reason for that being was because I understood the story a lot more this time than I did before.


It is something that does have its similarities with the Spider-Man trilogy but the main differences are that it is a team of superheroes and it has a very dark and a very adult friendly story. I was stunned at how great the effects were and also the art direction, costume design and cinematography. Why they weren't possible contenders or even nominated for Academy Awards in those categories, I have absolutely no idea! Understandable, I gather why people perhaps wouldn't like this because of its complex dialogue like I didn't previously why I saw it the first time but I have gathered in films that it sometimes, not always, makes a film more powerful and makes the makers more talented but that can be the case with films and having basic stories so it just depends on the specific film, really.


"Watchmen" is set in an alternate 1985 America in which costumed superheroes are part of the fabric of everyday society, and the "Doomsday Clock" - which charts the USA's tension with the Soviet Union - is permanently set at five minutes to midnight. When one of his former colleagues is murdered, the washed up but no less determined masked vigilante Rorschach sets out to uncover a plot to kill and discredit all past and present superheroes. As he reconnects with his former crime-fighting legion - a ragtag group of retired superheroes, only one of whom has true powers - Rorschach glimpses a wide-ranging and disturbing conspiracy with links to their shared past and catastrophic consequences for the future. Their mission is to watch over humanity... but who is watching the Watchmen?"


Watchmen has a great cast of actors who, in my mind, do give at least a satisfying job but I think for me the best performance will be either Billy Crudup as Jon Ostermon/Dr. Manhattan or Jeffrey Dean Morgan as Edward Blake/The Comedian. Malin Akerman was decent as Laurie Juspeczuk/Silk Spectre II. Malin may have been absolutely gorgeous in it but I don't think she quite bought the complete charm or emotion to the character as suggested in the graphic novel. I like Billy Crudup in general and I think his role in this film is another that I think was great from him. I like the character but I think that there were some moments where I was thinking ''Uhh.. ok'' and slightly lacked the believability of the character. Jackie Earle Haley was great as Walter Korvacs/Rorschach who reminded me a lot of Marv in Sin City who was portrayed by Mickey Rourke due to his unique and rather violent attitudes towards others because of a certain event or a series of events that have occurred in both their pasts. Patrick Wilson was pretty good as Daniel Drieberg/Nite Owl II. Wilson also starred alongside Haley previously in Little Children.Jeffrey Dean Morgan was great as Edward Blake/The Comedian. We only really see him in flashbacks seeing as he was murdered right at the very start of the film (don't worry, it isn't a plot twist, it was in the plot synopsis anyway).


Zack Snyder is a director more of eerie visual effects and very dark and adult stories so in many ways, it is typical that he decided to direct Watchmen seeing as he previously directed Frank Miller graphic novel 300. It is weird because I think where Snyder has his flaws as a director (a bit like Michael Bay but nowhere near as bad as him), is that he just tries too hard and thinks about the effects visually more than the dialogue of the story and the script and I feel that Snyder tries too hard with Watchmen by making it as successful as 300 (regarding box office performance but not completely critically) and I am predicting that he'll do the same with the upcoming film Sucker Punch. I am not saying that he is a bad director, he is just a director who tries too hard at doing almost the exact same thing. There was one thing about Watchmen where I think it has its main weakness is that it is unnecessarily too long. I mean, it is 162 minutes long including the credits and I think it could have been at least 120 minutes (2 hours).


Overall, Watchmen is a very enjoyable film that does have its weaknesses but has its great qualities also. If there are any sequels going to be planned in the future like how the film ended, I would be up for that. I think you really need to stick with the story to fully understand it and perhaps needs to be viewed twice for you to fully understand it especially if you didn't like it the first time you watched it. Great film to watch and I preferred it over Snyder's previous work 300 even though I didn't before.

After the giant success that was Fellowship Of The Ring and the ending of it that built up to the sequel, expectations were probably the highest I have ever felt about a film. I can remember watching all three films in the cinema and they all did blow me away but The Two Towers is perhaps the most different of the trilogy because we go on a journey where the One Ring isn't the main key focus of the story so we go to the other side of Middle-Earth although we do see the One Ring and Frodo and Sam on their quest a lot now seeing as the Fellowship has fallen apart and the stories have separated. The end of The Two Towers that lead to the build-up to Return Of The King was even more of a tease than the ending of Fellowship Of The Ring was.


Over the years there have been many sequels that have been disappointing failures especially when their predecessors have been great successful and I am glad to say that The Two Towers managed not to do that. Despite that it is a different story to what we saw in the first film, it felt so real like I was literally there with all of the characters and was epic all the way through and that is simply what I love the most about the entire trilogy. I loved every single action scene in this; especially the Helm's Deep battle and the fight in the field with the Isengard wolves.


The Fellowship has been broken, Frodo Baggins and Samwise Gamgee have gone to Mordor to destroy the One Ring, Merry and Pippin have been captured by the Uruk-Hai and Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli have made friends of the Rohan, a race of Men who are upon war, led by their aging king Théoden. The two towers between Mordor and Isengard, Barad-Dúr and Orthanc, have united in their lust for destruction. The corrupt wizard Saruman and his slimy assistant Gríma Wormtongue, under the power of the Dark Lord Sauron, have created a grand Uruk-Hai army bent on the destruction of Men and Middle-Earth. The rebellion against Sauron is building up and will be led by Gandalf the White, who was thought to be dead after he fell down that dark abyss in Moria thanks to the Balrog. One of the Ring's original bearers, Gollum, has tracked Frodo and Sam down in search of his 'precious', but we see a nicer side to Gollum when he becomes Sméagol (his old original self before he became Gollum) and is used as a guide to Frodo and Sam by getting to Mount Doom to free the people of Middle-Earth from Sauron once and for all.


I thought the ensemble cast in Fellowship Of The Ring was just fantastic and in The Two Towers we see even more actors who have joined in to make their careers even more worthwhile in this landmark trilogy such as Andy Serkis (who was voicing Gollum for one or two scenes but there was hardly any body motion capture like there was in the sequels and will be in The Hobbit films), Bernard Hill, Karl Urban, David Wenham and amongst others. As for the actors who were in the predecessor, pretty much all of them deliver fantastic performances although there was one or two that weren't all that great and could have been better in my opinion. For example, I wasn’t entirely impressed with Liv Tyler as Arwen or Miranda Otto as Éowyn so basically just the women in the films. Everybody else gave a great or at least satisfying performance. Elijah Wood was good as Frodo once again but not one of the best. I’ll tell you what his performance is like in comparison to another's, and that is it is rather similar performance to Mark Hamill as Luke Skywalker in the Star Wars original trilogy. Ian McKellen wasn't involved in The Two Towers as much as Fellowship Of The Ring or Return Of The King but that doesn't mean he gave a weaker performance! He is just perfect for the Gandalf character and he proves that in the sequel. Viggo Mortensen was pretty good too as Aragorn and so was Sean Astin as Samwise Gamgee (in my opinion, the most underrated performer in the trilogy). Orlando Bloom doesn't annoy me in Lord Of The Rings like he did in Pirates Of The Caribbean so that’s good and I really liked the funny chemistry between him and Dwarf Gimli. Andy Serkis was amazing as Gollum! He and McKellen are the best performers in the trilogy! Fact.



Peter Jackson, a director who most people had no knowledge of until Fellowship Of The Ring was released and he blew us all away with a film that really felt real. However, did he do it again with The Two Towers? Ohh… hell yeah! Unfortunately, Jackson didn't receive an Academy Award nomination for Best Director but he damn sure deserved to win the bloody award, let alone be nominated! Peter really is the only guy who could have made Lord Of The Rings as successful as it is now and he really is the only guy who can pull off The Hobbit too seeing as they came before Lord Of The Rings in the books but the films are prequels to the trilogy. Anyway, the way he handled making this film was literally flawless and it was spine chilling throughout every second of it. You might find this weird and be gob smacked at this but even the extended versions of the trilogy aren't even long enough despite that they are all at least 3 ½ to 4 hours long so yeah, that goes to show how much I love Lord Of The Rings and will love The Hobbit which are most likely to be at least 3 hours long (both films).


Overall, The Lord Of The Rings: The Two Towers is another fantastic film in the Lord Of The Rings trilogy and when it ended, it became the biggest build-up and most exciting film experience ever when it led to Return Of The King which is my favourite film of all time. No, this wasn’t completely about the Ring but it is still a masterpiece and a very serious, dark, gripping adventure where we visit another region of Middle-Earth. It also has its rightful place as one of the greatest sequels of all time.

Quite frankly, I was going to watch The Bounty Hunter for the same reason as I did for The Last Airbender and Vampires Suck: they are three of the 5 films that were nominated Worst Picture at the 31st Golden Raspberry Awards as well as Sex And The City 2 and The Twilight Saga: Eclipse and I normally love watching crap films because I just laugh at their awfulness and I take great pleasure in ripping them apart when I get round to reviewing them later. No, The Bounty Hunter isn't as painful to watch as the rest of the nominees were and I would possibly say that it is the best one but that doesn't mean it was a good, enjoyable film.


What really confused me about The Bounty Hunter was that I kept asking myself as I was watching it "Is this a romantic comedy? Is this an action-romance? Is this an action-comedy?" and, to be honest, I wouldn't really call it a comedy at all because it simply wasn't funny. I wouldn't even call it a romantic film because there is a huge difference between soppy chemistry between characters and serious love but in the case of The Bounty Hunter, it didn't even act serious enough or even try to for people to take it seriously and feel the bond between the two leading characters. Yes, I realise that there are romantic comedies that do involve similar cases like this but we truly feel the bond between the characters a lot more in some of those films than we do in this one. I couldn't help but feel the pretty damn obvious predictability of this film! I mean, after 5 minutes, I knew what was going to happen. Well, not every single second of speech but you know what I mean!


The gambler and former police officer Milo Boyd owes money to dangerous takers and works as bounty hunter. His ex-wife Nicole Hurley is a reporter investigating the mysterious death of a man that was reported by the police as suicide. Meanwhile Nicole is accused of running over and assaulting a police officer and is summoned to a hearing in the court. However, she has a lead for her case and she misses the audience with the judge. Milo is assigned to track down and arrest Nicole; in return, he would receive an award of US 5,000.00. Milo stays close to his ex-wife and they both revive the good moments they had in their marriage and Milo. But Nicole is pursued by the criminal that she is investigating.


Yes, we know why Jennifer Aniston and Gerard Butler were cast in this film together as lovers: because they were lovers in real-life during the time that The Bounty Hunter was being made and let's face it, a lot of the public would want them to star in a film together while they're dating in real life (like Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie in Mr. And Mrs. Smith). Jennifer Aniston is an overrated actress in my opinion and yes, she is hot but she really cannot act! I have liked her in roles such as Bruce Almighty and Along Came Polly but she was just awful in this film! I really wish that Milo Boyd had put her in jail after 5 minutes and just left her there because it would have done the film a favour! As for Gerard Butler, what the hell was he thinking?! Yeah, Gerard has that physique where he could be a badass character like he was in 300 but in some ways, Gerard in this made me think a lot of Dwayne Johnson aka The Rock in Tooth Fairy! Gerard did star in a similar kind of film as The Bounty Hunter last year: The Ugly Truth which does look just as awful and like the most predictable film on this Earth. I mean, the bond between them isn't love! It is just a pair of hopeless idiots, simple as. I mean, grown middle-aged adults asking for parents for advice on love?! A guy having to kidnap his ex-wife to go to "jail" and then they slowly fall for each other again?! Come on! Where are the brains of the screenwriter and director and even the actors who even decided to be part of this film anyway?


Andy Tennant is a director who's films have not been recognized hardly at all except for Hitch and he does seem to go for the same kinds of films over and over again but doesn't do very well with any of them, really, and I really think it will take a lot for him to be any worse than he already was at directing The Bounty Hunter. I don't even think some of the action scenes were brilliantly filmed because as the shots kept changing, there were so many bloopers. Actually, I guess that is the fault of the editor than the director's but the directing was still pretty bad. As for the way that The Bounty Hunter was written, it really was incredibly daft! I mean, one minute, it's soppy romance then the next its a runaway chase then its soppy romance again! It was a pretty damn chaotic film to watch on occasions!


Overall, The Bounty Hunter is easily one of the cheesiest films that I think I have ever watched. Not in terms of effects obviously but when it comes to characters, acting, script and pretty much everything else, it is very cheesy! If they're going to think of a soppy title, don't think of a badass title like ''The Bounty Hunter'' because only a badass action film with an actually decent storyline, strong characters and a solid script could pull that off. It is probably my favourite of the 5 2010 Razzie Worst Picture nominees but there is no denying that this is a really bad film that I think pretty much everybody hates.

This became perhaps the most anticipating film of 2009 for me even more than Avatar, Up and Inglourious Basterds because I was deeply touched by the tragic death of Heath Ledger and the fact he died half way through filming, I really needed to see this! When I did, I enjoyed it but it wasn't amazing seeing as it had a rather weak story but after a rewatch, I really disliked it! There are quite a few reasons for this but those will be spread out in my review but I think the main reason was that despite it is a fantasy story, it is perhaps one of the most complex if not the most complex story I have ever had to watch. I have watched it twice now and I didn't fully understand it.


Another fault (more of a weakness than a major flaw) was that although it isn't Heath's fault, people were sort of led away by Gilliam's work on the film as well as the rest of the actors involved because everyone wanted to see Heath and what will be his final scene and when the actors who took over replaced him. I will say that the effects, art direction, costume design and cinematography are all pretty impressive but I wasn't completely clicked with the world we are taken into and the modern world. Sometimes it works pretty well but in others, it really doesn't.


In London, the sideshow troupe of Doctor Parnassus promises the audience a journey to the "Imaginarium", an imaginary world commanded by the mind of Doctor Parnassus, where dreams come true. In the stories that Doctor Parnassus tells to his daughter Valentina, the midget Percy, and his assistant Anton, he claims to have lived for more than one thousand years; However, when he fell in love with a mortal woman, he made a deal with the devil (Mr. Nick), trading his immortality for youth. As part of the bargain, he promised his son or daughter to Mr. Nick on their sixteenth birthday. Valentina is now almost to the doomed age and Doctor Parnassus makes a new bet with Mr. Nick, whoever seduces five souls in the Imaginarium will have Valentina as a prize. Meanwhile the troupe rescues Tony, a young man that was hanged on a bridge by the Russians. Tony was chased until he finds and joins the group. Tony and Valentina fall in love with each other and the jealous Anton discovers that his competition may be a liar.


Heath Ledger was at the stage of his career where one is at the very top of the mountain so to speak especially after his mind-blowing performance as the Joker in The Dark Knight for which he received a posthumous Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor in 2009 and for his very heartfelt but solid performance in gay/bisexual western Brokeback Mountain which received him his first Academy Award nomination and, quite frankly, I was expecting another award possibility for Heath in this film but unfortunately, he wasn't half as good as I wanted him to be or as good as he can be. I wasn't even sure whether three actors replacing one actor in one role was a good idea at all whether they were all friends of Heath's or not. It just made Tony have an almost empty soul because we see four different actors play him! Why not just the one actor to replace Heath? Personally, I think it should have been just Johnny Depp, not only because he is a better actor than Jude Law and Colin Farrell but also because Johnny looks the most like Heath than the other two actors. I mean, even Johnny Depp's appearance disappointed me because he was in it for like 5 minutes then actor switches. Christopher Plummer was decent as Doctor Parnassus and I did like Verne Troyer (aka Mini-Me in Austin Powers trilogy) and Lily Cole too.


Terry Gilliam has never really been in my good books seeing as I have never really understood any of his films and haven't been entirely impressed with any of the films that he has ever done although he does seem to go for unorthodox stories. To be honest, I didn't find The Imaginarium Of Doctor Parnassus any different to any other film he has done. However, I will give credit to Gilliam to still manage to make the rest of the film and release it after Heath Ledger's sudden death. As first, I was rather intrigued with Gilliam's theory on dreams that are spoken about in the film's script but, quite frankly, after a second viewing it is a flat theory that is an absolute lie.


Overall, The Imaginarium Of Doctor Parnassus became a huge disappointment to me and I really wish Heath's career truly ended with a much better film! Perhaps one as fantastic as The Dark Knight! Unfortunately, this isn't a fault but it was just the attraction that the film received and it just became nothing more than a tribute and dedication that really didn't show great expectations and was just really flat. May you rest in peace, Heath Ledger, and you'll never be forgotten.

I had a deep desire to watch this film seeing as I love classic musicals as well as classics in general, it is my mother's all-time favourite film and I have been told previously by other relatives and friends that recommended it to me and… my God! Am I pleased or what?! The Sound Of Music is one of the single most perfect pieces of art and entertainment that I have ever laid my eyes on in my life. From the very start to the end, I was almost in an enchanting world that was a bit like the enchanting world of Disney. Actually, now thinking about it, The Sound Of Music would have made an awesome Disney film. Then again, if Disney did it, it might not turned out as awesome and successful as it has become.


The Sound Of Music really does take you into a world of pure beauty that doesn't seem like it is from this world. It seems more like from a world that nobody has ever been to and nobody ever will go to again after this film. Ever since watching it, I now have a dream goal to visit Salzburg, Austria and I think was the most perfect place for The Sound Of The Music to be filmed! Like most musicals, the songs within are just pure magic and give you goose-bumps and chills down your spine as you watch it especially in the songs "The Sound Of Music", "Maria", "My Favourite Things" and "Sixteen Going On Seventeen". I just cannot choose what my favourite song is from the film because they are all so brilliantly written, brilliantly performed and also brilliantly directed.


In 1930's Austria, a young woman named Maria is failing miserably in her attempts to become a nun. When the Navy captain Georg Von Trapp writes to the convent asking for a governess that can handle his seven mischievous children, Maria is given the job. The Captain's wife is dead, and he is often away, and runs the household as strictly as he does the ships he sails on. The children are unhappy and resentful of the governesses that their father keeps hiring, and have managed to run each of them off one by one. When Maria arrives, she is initially met with the same hostility, but her kindness, understanding, and sense of fun soon draws them to her and brings some much-needed joy into all their lives -- including the Captain's. Eventually he and Maria find themselves falling in love, even though Georg is already engaged to a Baroness and Maria is still a postulant. The romance makes them both start questioning the decisions they have made. Their personal conflicts soon become overshadowed, however, by world events. Austria is about to come under the control of Germany, and the Captain may soon find himself drafted into the German navy and forced to fight against his own country.


After Julie Andrews' outstanding performance as Mary Poppins in Mary Poppins, 1 year later she stars in the leading role in a musical once again but this time playing a slightly different kind of character. We see Maria as that very gentle and friendly young woman just like Mary Poppins but I think her performance as Maria in The Sound Of Music is simply the best performance that I think she has ever done and I think should have earned her a second Academy Award win (it would have been a back-to-back win if she really won Best Leading Actress. She was nominated, though, so that was good enough). The Sound Of Music proves that Julie really was back then and still is one of the greatest British actresses of all time. I felt like this all the way through but Maria really is one of those women who you just want to give a big hug to and would make the perfect wife so that is another reason why Julie's performance was so special. Christopher Plummer has been widely known for many films in the past but I think this has been his most famous role and I think this is the best role I have seen from him. He was simply robbed of that Academy Award nomination for Best Leading Actor because he damn sure deserved it. I loved how cold he was towards Maria and towards the children but when he softened up again like before, it really showed his character deep-down and moved the audience and shows that children really do need their parent(s) to act like that towards them. Out of the supporting actors and actresses in the film, I would say it is a tie between Peggy Wood as Mother Abbess and Eleanor Parker as Baroness Elsa Schraeder. Well, in shorter words, all of the actors involved were fantastic!


Robert Wise is quite possibly the one director who started off and became an influence to great directors such as Stanley Kubrick, Danny Boyle and Oliver Stone seeing as they are all directors who have made different films of different genres. Wise, who makes his second consecutive musical after Romeo and Juliet like musical West Side Story which won Best Picture and Best Director (but Wise shared that with Jerome Robbins) and makes a musical that melted the hearts of the people in the 1960s and still does now after over 45 years. It perhaps isn't a cinema landmark or like a breakthrough in cinema but in terms of directing and how beautiful it was filmed, it certainly does blow the minds of its viewers.


Overall, The Sound Of Music is quite possibly the best directed musical of all time if not the very best. If you are not moved by this or don't find this a beautifully crafted film, you simply are one empty, heartless creature! This is easily one of the best musicals of all time as well as one of my favourite musicals, one of the best of the 60s and it is on my favourite films ever list too. I can't see there ever being a more beautiful, enchanting and magical musical than The Sound Of Music.