Review : Focus

FOCUS : Starring Will Smith and Margot Robbie - Two big names in a comedy, crime, drama about how a veteran con man's latest scheme goes tits up when a woman from his past, who is now a accomplished femme fatale show up and throws his plan up in the air.

There are many films out there like this like 21, Now You See Me, Catch Me If You Can, Casino and various others similar to this, I think what makes Focus an interesting film to watch is that it is forever compelling from start to finish, its so clean cut and carefully executed so you don't miss a trick, your drawn in but not given too much away. I think it does what it says on the tin and carries it's purposes out quite well throughout.

On the other hand, the competition with films such as this is enormous. My issue is that if you are one of these people who doesn't pay much attention when watching films, then don't watch this film. It's one of these things where if you take your eye off the ball, you miss a trick and its so quick and precise to the limit that you need to have full attention on it.

What's confusing is that it couldn't just stay about thing, it had to be about something else, it had to be controversial in order to keep it flowing when in actual fact, it was doing well 20 minutes in. I do feel it is a bit of a rush rush type film, and not one which is about being bang on the timing, you need to tone it down allowing the audience to absorb what they have just watched and then draw them back in again. It's the issue of balance that gets to it in the end which is a shame.

6/10 for me.

Review : Spooks - The Greater Good

Spooks - The Greater Good is a continuation of the story which is established on the BBC's 'Spooks', in which the head of MI5 and his assailant must prevent a terrorist attack happening in London.

It seems like a deeply thrilling topic when you think about it, considering that London is one of the most iconic cities in the world and there have been many attempts to provoke a terrorist attack in London so much to the extent, you've got police officers on the street with machine guns as protection from hostile forces. The country is very aware that these sorts of things can and could happen, so to do a film about it at this time and base it off a hugely successful TV series just adds something more special to the cinematic value of this film's background.

I really enjoyed this a lot, there was a lot of fast passed, action sequences, the plot wasn't too complicated, things seemed to have the right amount of depth to it so it wouldn't get too farcical in action and would boar the viewer, interesting cinematography captured throughout and the music score as well added great depth to the background of a scene which of course is always a bonus.

Performance wise, there wasn't really a bad member of the cast in it. The acting wasn't anything amazing where I went 'Oh my god Kit Harrington is Amazing in this' for example, it's just above par, on average, serves the purpose from what you could expect from that particular cast. I do approve of the diversity of people and background but you do wonder with any film if it was the cast you'd visualise, if you could swap that actor for this one and have them in it instead, would it work quite so well and most of the time - 87% of the time. It doesn't because you got to have the right balance there and sometimes people's strengths or weakness's can not really do anything for the other members of the cast, which demonstrates why cast is so important.

Going into the story a little bit, telling you what it's about : It starts with a terrorist escaping custody during a routine hand over, Will Holloway (Kit Harrington) teams up with a disgraced MI5 Intelligence Chief Harry Pearce (Peter Firth) to track the terrorist down and get him back before he commits a terrorist attack on London.

It's a race against time the story, and its one of these summer films in which you can sit back relax, enjoy and have a good time and this film in perticular is good to see in the cinema because it adds a sense of cultural anxiety and thrill rush which you don't get say in the comfort of your own home. On the big screen the quality of it is quite spectacular in a way and I think people will get good thrill cultural changes from it in a good way, in moments of peril and dramatic tension there are wonderful shock moments which viewers don't anticipate and therefore makes it surprising and triggers off a shock factor about, that what makes good crime films interesting viewing.

I'm going to give it a 7/10. Very good indeed.

Review : Avengers - Age of Ultron

AVENGERS : AGE OF ULTRON When Tony Stark and Bruce Banner try to jump start a dormant peacekeeping program called Ultron, things go horribly wrong and it's up to Earth's Mightiest Heroes to stop the villainous Ultron from enacting his terrible plans.

This is the kind of make believe action film which allows you to escape from the real world and re enter marvel world once again. If you liked Avengers Assemble then that chances are you'll enjoy Age of Ultron as well. 

The great works of Marvel Films do it yet again, producing yet another truly excellent production, it looks good, it sounds terrific, mind blowing special effects - especially if you experience them in 3D. 

The storyline for Ultron is Tony Stark tries to jumpstart a dormant peacekeeping program, things go a bit pear shaped and Earth's Mightiest Heroes, including Iron Man, Captain America, Thor, the Incredible Hulk, Black Widow and Hawkeye, are put together again as the fate of the planet hangs in the balance. As the villainous Ultron emerges, it is up to the Avengers to stop him from enacting his terrible plans, and soon uneasy alliances and unexpected action pave the way for a global adventure.

Just a quick word of warning, I should point out I am not a huge marvel fan, my opinions are not relevant, however I shall have my opinions but if they're are any marvel fans reading this, please don't be disheartened in what I say. This blog, I talk about films and I sometimes divide opinion and I shall have my opinions.

Coming up with the story for me with this, it lies in the diversity of the story telling and if you can pull that off well you got the foundations of a good film, in the case of Ultron is about your threat in the heart of the story and building up a problem around that and the marvel heroes coming together again after Assemble to join forces and beat the villain in the end. 

The problem is (and I will probably get crucified for this) there are far too many characters in this story. That's the main problem, just too many people. I know the basic principal of an avengers film is to have all the marvel heroes come together and it does work in comic book land, the trouble with it not working so well this time around is that the characters dynamics are very different in terms of the way they see things in approaching the problem at hand, this could have been slightly more condensed as say an Iron Man story for example and not have all the other characters in, getting in the way.

It does seem to be a bit of an exaggerated plot, more so than what it turns out to be. I think the action was over pitched and the balance of action and drama in this wasn't quite right. too much concentration of watching things get blown up and 'epic' battles between the good guys vs the bad guys it all seemed to me a little to over the top and though this adds value to the whole comic to screen thing - everything is supposed to be like that. Personally I felt the story could work as well with a little less of the crashing and bashing and the whole wham bam thank you mam routine. 

On a contrast visual perspective the effects are stunning and the film is really well edited, there is no doubt about that in my mind. I just feel that graphically stunning visual effects and green screening and massive explosions and impressive sound effects are more important to people then going into depth of the story and in terms of the way I view things I like to overview the film as a whole and have a good balance of visual stuff within the story, and it was the other way round it was a story within the visual effects. It's not a bad thing necessarily I just find it a bit strange.

Therefore overall 6/10 for me.