Movie Reviews

Sherlock Holmes – A Game of Shadows Movie Review 0 838

Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows is an example of how to do a sequel right. It takes the good aspects of the first film – in this case the witty banter, the cool fight sequences, the formidable villain etc – and intensify them to make for an altogether more enjoyable and less problematic movie.

We catch up with Sherlock (Robert Downey. Jr) and his faithful Dr. Watson (Jude Law) some time after the events of the last film, and this time they have to try and stop the genius criminal that is Professor James Moriarty (Jared Harris) from bringing about “the collapse of Western civilisation.”

Easily the most enjoyable aspect of this current Sherlock Holmes incarnation is the exchanged dialogue between Holmes and Watson. The ingeniously cast Robert Downey Jr. once again brings his incomparable wit and charm to the role, and Jude Law is once more a great straight-man counter-balance to the titular detective’s unpredictable antics. The two actors clearly have a lot of chemistry together and their ability to deliver laughs while at the same time being believable – if unorthodox – heroes is better than it was last time round.

Everyone else is on solid form, too, including the likes of Noomi Rapace – aka the original Girl With the Dragon Tattoo – as the new female lead (Rachel MacAdams is virtually shoved aside to make way for the new blood), Jared Harris, brilliantly cast as Professor Moriarty, and Stephen Fry as Sherlock’s older, lazier brother Mycroft. They inhabit a Holmes universe which continues to feel fresh while still harking very much back to the classic stories originally written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle over a century ago.

At the helm of the film once again is Guy Ritchie, a director more known for smart talking gangster films (Snatch and Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels) than big budget blockbusters. But he continues to prove himself very competent in this type of filmmaking, improving on what he did with the last movie while still maintaining the style through and through.

However, as enjoyable as A Game of Shadows is (don’t worry the title makes sense once you see the movie), it still suffers from some of the plot issues of the first one. Namely these are the various conveniences and contrivances peppered throughout that are completely ignored in aid of moving the plot onto the next stage. It might not matter when you’re caught up in the exciting action at hand but ponder it during the quieter moments and you’ll begin to realise some of it either doesn’t make any sense or at least requires some big logic leaps that are explained away frivolously later on. The nature of the character is to be able to solve things that others wouldn’t (portrayed as Holmes’ inner monologue during crucial moments) but there has to be a point where it makes more solid sense. The issues are, however, far less prevalent than they were the first time around.

Overall Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows is clear improvement in just about every way, with more fun banter, bigger and better action set-pieces, a superior villain and a brisker pace. Perhaps the inevitable second sequel can improve on matters even more.

This review was previously published at Blog Critics.

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I'm a freelance film reviewer and blogger with over 10 years of experience writing for various different reputable online and print publications. In addition to my running, editing and writing for Thoughts On Film, I am also the film critic for The National, the newspaper that supports an independent Scotland, covering the weekly film releases, film festivals and film-related features. I have a passion for all types of cinema, and have a particular love for foreign language film, especially South Korean and Japanese cinema. Favourite films include The Big Lebowski, Pulp Fiction and 2001: A Space Odyssey.

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Movie Review: Aquaman 0 1880

The rocky road of DCEU films has traversed highs and lows, from the zeitgeist-capturing Wonder Woman to the absolute mess of Justice League. It’s a Marvel-rivalling gambit that, at its worst, is morosely serious in how it goes about presenting its outlandish superhero world without the depth to back it up.

The latest instalment seems to recognise and avoid that danger by being utterly, eternally ludicrous and over-the-top. But most importantly, where it counts anyway, it’s crucially self-aware of that fact and has a fun time plunging us into the depths and carrying us to great heights of entertainingly ridiculous spectacle.

We first met Arthur Curry AKA the Aquaman (Jason Momoa) teaming up with the Justice League. But how did he come to be imbued with the powers of the ocean? The film sets up his origin story quite well as we discover in the film’s opening minutes that his mother was Atlanna (Nicole Kidman), Queen of the ancient underwater Kingdom of Atlantis, who washed up on the “surface world” and met and fell in love with lighthouse keeper Thomas (Temeura Morrison).

Together they had a child that, to her mind, bridges the divide between the underwater and surface worlds, proving they can be one. However, it’s a view not greatly shared by many of her own people; when she wilfully returns to Atlantis for the sake of her son’s survival, they carry out a swift sentence of justice that would affect her husband and son’s destiny forever.

In the present day, Aquaman is approached by Mera (Amber Heard), a warrior princess of Nereus (Dolph Lundgren), who tries to convince him that he must claim his rightful place as King of Atlantis. This is in order to thwart his ruthless and cunning half-brother Orm (Patrick Wilson) from seizing power as Ocean Master that would lead to a full-scale attack on the surface world, someone who considers Aquaman to be a “half-breed” not worthy of the throne.

Credit must go to director James Wan (a filmmaker who has gone from horror franchises like Saw, Insidious and The Conjuring to blockbusters like Fast & Furious 7) for really going for it by delivering an eye-popping, bonkers visual style that seems to make every effort to be the opposite of drab.

It’s fuelled by a marriage between the comic book page and Greek mythology; sometimes that gets the better of it in the shape of characters going on extended monologues that explain legends in the finest detail, though at others that feeds into the idea of stories retold through the ages.

The film is a treat to behold whenever it dives into the ocean as Wan embraces the absurdity at every turn (look out for the giant neon-lit octopus playing the drums), wearing the inherent goofiness as a badge of honour rather than anything to shy away from. And,perhaps most importantly, the cast seems completely on-board for having as much fun with those OTT concepts as they want the audience to have.

Momoa brings alight-hearted charisma, which carries the film whenever it leans too heavy into one-liner humour that doesn’t always land as hoped, while bringing a welcome sense of bruising physicality to the action scenes that are otherwise so reliant on CGI.

An impressive cast of more seasoned actors all lend as much weight to it as possible, from Kidman’s caring, strong-willed portrayal of Aquaman’s mother to Willem Dafoe as his Atlantean trainer Vulko and particularly Wilson, who lends formidable threat to the potentially bland villain Orm.

For a film that had the potential to get so tangled up in both its place within an overall comic book movie universe and the mythology that sets the foundation of its tale, it’s surprisingly streamlined and enjoyably accessible. It’s a refreshingly carefree,unchallenging romp that invites you to let the tidal wave of rambunctious comic book movie sensibilities wash over you.

6.5 out of 10

Movie Review: Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse 0 1752

After so many sequels and reboots of the Spider-Man character on the big-screen, from Sam Raimi’s trilogy to the character being integrated into the Marvel Cinematic Universe, it’s hard to see what else they can give us that’s going to surprise. But along comes an animated Spider-Man to do just that.

Miles Morales (Shameik Moore) is a normal teenager living in New York with his parents; loving but fairly easy-going mother Rio (Luna Lauren) and loving but tough police officer father Jefferson (Brian Tyree Henry) – the film has a surprising emotional through-line in how it depicts the father-son relationship.

One day while doing some secretive spray painting with his chummy uncle Aaron (Mahershala Ali), he is bitten by a mysterious spider that gives him special powers from web slinging to a tingling Spidey Sense.

This leads him to eventually crossing paths with Peter Parker (Jake Johnson) who, due to the villainous Kingpin (Liev Schreiber) meddling with a dimension-altering weapon, has inadvertently been sent over from a parallel universe and who eventually teaches Miles how to be Spider-Man.

But it doesn’t stop there;many other diverse versions appear, from Gwen Stacy AKA Spider-Woman (Hailee Steinfeld) to Spider-Man Noir (Nicolas Cage). Sony’s dazzling animation is as fun because it takes that idea and just runs with it.

Anyone can wear the mask seems to be its mantra, conjuring the everyman wonder that drives much of comic book fandom. For all its eye-popping, modern visual aesthetics, it has a refreshingly old-fashioned spirit. The old and the new meet in the film’s beguiling combination of traditional hand-drawn animation and contemporary bells and whistles computer rendering. It’s about as close as a film has come to feeling like a comic book come to life.

Inventive direction by trio Bob Persichetti, Peter Ramsey and Rodney Rothman works in lovely harmony with the eclectic, knowing style of scriptwriter Phil Lord (The Lego Movie, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs) to find quite a miraculous way of breathing new life into the overflowing comic book genre.

From its sharply-written dialogue to its very animation style itself, the film is beautifully self-aware of its own station within the overall comic book movie catalogue, cleverly lampooning yet dotingly celebrating the attributes that have become such a part of pop culture. And yet it feels like it puts its own fiercely original stamp on that most famous of heroes.

This is a visually stunning, innovative incarnation of the character; propulsive in its energetic action, engagingly voiced, tightly written as a heroic narrative arc, reverential yet forward-thinking in its ethos and with a real sense of heart and soul at its core. It’s a particular treat for fans and a welcoming,imaginative embrace for everyone.

8.8 out of 10