Mother Mary (4 Stars)

I went to see this film in the cinema knowing nothing about it. I hadn't seen any trailers in the cinema prior to it being shown.

The film is about a pop singer returning to stage after a three year break caused by an accident on stage. In the film Anne Hathaway reminds me of Lady Gaga in her early years, but I've read that the director based Mother Mary primarily on Taylor Swift. Maybe; I hardly know Taylor Swift. Three days before the concert Mary arrives dishevelled and hardly recognisable at the house of her former costume designer and lover, Samantha, and asks her to design a dress for the concert. That's very short notice, but Samantha agrees.

The film is a talkie. For the first hour of the film the two women discuss their past, with flashbacks to concerts over the last 18 years. The film doesn't seem to be going anywhere. Then the women discover in their conversations that they've both been haunted by the same ghost. Yes, the film needs a whole hour to reach the supernatural part. This is strange, from the pacing, but the story is well told.

One small word of praise. All the songs in the film are sung by Anne Hathaway herself.

The Hustle (3½ Stars)

This is a remake of "Dirty Rotten Scoundrels" with the genders swapped. Having watched the original film less than a month ago I could see how closely it followed the old story. There was no suspense for me, I always knew what would happen next. That wasn't a problem for me. My intention in watching the film was to see a wild comedy romp starring Rebel Wilson. I wasn't disappointed. I got what I paid for, enough to satisfy my crush on Rebel Wilson.

Anne Hathaway is modelled on Michael Caine, just as Rebel Wilson is modelled on Steve Martin. Anne Hathaway is a perfect likeness of Michael Caine, smooth and refined, whereas Rebel Wilson is a caricature of Steve Martin, exaggerated and over-the-top.

The main problem for me in the gender reversal, something I saw coming from early on, was that a man would eventually win the upper hand. I regretted that. Nevertheless, it's a fun film.

P. S. Don't forget the after credits scene.

Colossal (4½ Stars)

Do you want to hear an amazing story?

If you don't, stop reading now.

Gloria is nothing special. She's just a mixed up woman in her late twenties who lives in New York. She doesn't have a job, but she has a boyfriend who pays the bills. He also finances her main hobby, which is drinking. She goes out in the evening, and sometimes she stays out all night. When she gets home in the morning she can't remembers where she's been. There's no time for an argument because her boyfriend has to go to work.

Not many men would put up with that for long. Gloria's boyfriend is no exception. One morning when she gets home she finds he's packed her bags, and she has to be gone by the time he returns from work.

Gloria is luckier than most other women in that position. She has a house in New Hampshire that she's inherited from her parents. It's been standing empty for years, and there's no furniture, but at least she has a roof over her head. She's fortunate enough to be offered a job by one of her childhood friends. The job is serving drinks in a bar; hardly the best career for someone with her problem.

By now you're probably wondering what's so amazing about the story. It sounds like something that could happen to any small town girl who moves to New York. The big city can eat you up and spit you out, and we shouldn't be too quick to judge those who fall by the wayside.

But Gloria isn't just any small town girl. When she returns to her home town she finds that she has the power to destroy Seoul. She also has the power to save Seoul. It's her choice. At first she doesn't realise what she's doing and she kills a few hundred people in the city centre. Gloria apologises and promises not to do it again, writing her apology on the ground where she's demolished buildings.

The Koreans think she's a monster. The army and air force are mobilised to stop her. She's no monster, she's just a mixed up young woman. Her apology was sincere. She really doesn't want to hurt anyone else. There's a sinister force preparing to wreak havoc in the Seoul city centre, and she's the only one that can stop it. She's even prepared to give up drinking. They have to trust her.

I told you it was an amazing story.

Success Rate:  - 3.3

	Order from Amazon.com
	Order from Amazon.co.uk
	Order from Amazon.de

Ocean's 8 (4 Stars)

Debbie Ocean, the younger sister of Danny Ocean from the Ocean's Trilogy, is released after spending five years in prison for art fraud. She's spent this time meticulously planning an extravagant jewel robbery in her head. All she needs to do is find a team to help her. She assembles a team of six women with different skills around herself. It's only women, because she doesn't trust men. It was a man who snitched on her and got her thrown into prison. The eighth woman is added late in the film.

The target is a diamong necklace worth $150 million that's been locked in a vault at Cartier in New York for 50 years. They manipulate the host of the yearly Met Gala event into borrowing the necklace to wear at the event. She's accompanied at all times by two armed security guards, but Debbie has everything planned.

This is a very good film about suave and manipulative women who manage to keep their cool while fighting against overwhelming odds. The film takes time to introduce all the characters, and by the middle of the film we're rooting for them and hoping they'll be successful. Sandra Bullock is excellent as the criminal mastermind who doesn't actually take part in the robbery; she just stands back and watches as her team do their jobs.

Colossal (4½ Stars)

This is the 30th film in the Stuttgart Fantasy Film Festival.

Yesterday I complained about the ridiculous story told by "Radius". The premise of the "Colossal" is just as unbelievable, but I can accept it for one simple reason: it's a comedy. That excuses any illogical storylines.

In Seoul a large monster is terrorising the city every night. Gloria (Anne Hathaway), who lives in a small town in the eastern USA, realises that the monster only appears if she walks across a playground near her house at 8.05 am, her time. The monster mimics her movements, as if she is controlling it.

Ridiculous? Yes. But the film is hilarious. I enjoyed it a lot.

Interstellar (3 Stars)

This is Christopher Nolan's most ambitious film to date, exceeding even "Inception" in its scale. It's his first attempt to create a film that can be called an epic, depending on your definition of the word. It's also his biggest failure. In his attempt to write a film that stretches across billions of miles and dozens of years he's produced a piece of work that is painfully slow.

The film begins in the near future when the human race is in danger of extinction. Dust clouds are killing almost all the crops, leading to mass starvation. The film's hero, Cooper, is recruited to fly a mission through a wormhole to find habitable planets to relocate the human race.

The twists and turns in the plot, which I won't further discuss here, rely on a huge bootstrap paradox. Human beings from the far future are sending back information needed to save the human race. They don't seem to be very good at it. Rather than send barely comprehensible messages, couldn't they have phoned up the Earth's top scientists and told them what to do? Or better still, couldn't they have sent a big rescue pod back in time to whisk everyone away to a new home? The film doesn't make sense.

The contrast between the lazy farming community and the space exploration is deliberate, but I found the farm scenes too boring. The talks about ghosts annoyed me, and I only tolerated them because it was obvious that it would be relevant later in the film.

Stanley Kubrick left a legacy with "2001: A Space Odyssey". This is clearly what Christopher Nolan intended. Whereas Stanley Kubrick's film is a classic of cinema that will never be forgotten, Christopher Nolan's Space Odyssey fizzles out before it even starts.

The Intern (4 Stars)

Ben Whittaker (Robert De Niro) worked for 40 years in a company that printed phone books, for many years as a chief executive. At 65 he retired, shortly after the death of his wife. He is trying to remain active, keeping a regular daily schedule, getting up at the same time every day and doing Tai Chi in the park, but he feels something is missing. He needs a purpose in his life.

He replies to an advertisement for an internship at an e-commerce company, About A Fit, that sells clothing online. He's assigned as the personal assistant to the company's owner/founder, Jules Ostin (Anne Hathaway). The film's humour comes from the contrast between the two characters. Jules is a highly focused executive who has neglected her family to build a company up from nothing to 220 employees in 18 months. Her unorthodox leadership methods (which seem to be a parody of other successful company founders like Steve Jobs) clash with Ben's efficient common-sense style. Ben's lack of knowledge of the Internet age is presented humorously, especially in the opening sequences, contrasted with his younger colleagues' lack of knowledge of the pre-Internet age. For instance, Ben has to explain why people needed phone books. "Can't you just use Google?" It's a clash of two worlds.

The film has a very simple story, which has been criticised by other reviewers, but I consider that to be the film's strength. The film is character driven. It would have failed with lesser actors than Robert De Niro and Anne Hathaway. They're so charming, both individually and in their interaction with one another, that we can't help but take them into our hearts. The same can be said of the minor characters, such as the other interns and Jules' secretary. The masterful directing by Nancy Meyers introduces the characters to us one by one, giving us enough details to know who they are, so that none of them are blanks. The only person I dislike in the film is Jules' husband Matt, who comes across as a creepy, over-polite character from the first time he appears on screen. Jules could do better than that!

The film has a multitude of sub-plots going on, which I won't describe in detail here. Spoilers! I'm not sure whether that's an advantage or a disadvantage. On the one hand they distract from the main story, but it's these very sub-plots that describe the minor characters to us. Ben's romance with the company's massage therapist seems unnecessary, but I understand why it was added. Without this romance the viewer might have suspected a romantic attachment between Ben and Jules, which the director wanted to avoid at all costs.

This is a charming feel-good movie. It's not a chick flick, it's a film for everyone. It's definitely a film that I want to watch again and ponder in more detail.

Les Misérables (4 Stars)

I'm reviewing the 2012 version of the musical starring Hugh Jackman as Jean Valjean. The original story stems from a novel written by Victor Hugo in 1862. Unlike other French novels the original title has been retained for the English version, since it is difficult to translate accurately. A musical based on the novel was first performed in 1980, in French. In 1985 an English language version was first performed in London. The original novel spends a lot of time discussing moral issues, but this is kept to a minimum in the musical. Nevertheless, the lessons are there to be learnt.

The story begins in 1815 when Jean Valjean is released from prison after serving 19 years hard labour for stealing a loaf of bread. Officially he is still on parole, so he has to report to the authorities once a month for the rest of his life. He is given food and refuge in a church, but he is tempted by the riches he sees. He steals the silver plates and flees. The police capture him and bring him back, but the church's priest says that he had given Jean the plates as a gift, and chides him for having forgotten the most valuable items, the silver candlesticks. This act of kindness changes Jean's life, but he also decides that he will never report for his parole.

In 1823 Jean is living under a false name in Montreuil-sur-Mer as a factory owner and the town's mayor. One of his employees, Fantine, is fired because she has an illegitimate daughter. Destitute, she is badly beaten and Jean finds her shortly before she dies. Since he feels guilty for her fate he promises to take care of her daughter, Cosette, as if she were his own child. But Inspector Javert, a policeman who knew Jean as a prisoner, recognises him. Jean flees to Paris and takes on another new identity.

Cosette living in poverty

The story continues in 1832. A revolution is being planned. Inspector Javert is sent to Paris, where he recognises Jean. The revolutionaries capture Javert and deliver him to Jean, but Jean releases him. He says that he bears Javert no ill will because he was only doing his duty. Javert gives no thanks, saying that he will return to arrest Javert after the revolution has been crushed.

There are many more details to the story, but I've only described what's necessary to understand the moral issues. Jean started out as a petty thief, only stealing out of desperation, but his time of imprisonment hardened him. When he was released he had become an immoral person, willing to steal even from some someone who was helping him, but the priest's act of forgiveness made him want to help others. It's wrong to say that Javert was a bad man. In one scene he is speaking to God, and we see that he honestly thought he was doing God's work in pursuing Jean. Javert's mistake was not seeing that a person can change. "Once a thief, always a thief". This is a mistake made by many today, Christians and others. Repentance can be a reality, but others who have "always been good" don't want to accept it and assume the change is only being pretended.

Jean, in the face of persecution, continues to do good. He lives to serve others, especially his adopted daughter Cosette. He even saves Javert's life when he has the chance, by letting the revolutionaries think he is already dead. A man who is truly good doesn't do good in order to gain a reward -- in this case a pardon from Javert -- he does good for its own sake. "Les Misérables" has a lot of lessons to teach us.

The Dark Knight Rises (4½ Stars)

This is the final film in Christopher Nolan's Batman trilogy. Rachel Dawes was killed in the second part, so she doesn't need to appear in this film. That's just as well. Christopher Nolan might have chosen Whoopi Goldberg to play her this time.

The Dark Knight Rises (4½ Stars)

Thank you, Cineworld, for having "catch up" presentations in your cinemas. I missed this film when it was shown in the cinemas last year, so I jumped at the chance to see it on its one day only showing today. Films like this deserve to be seen on the big screen.

This film wraps up Christopher Nolan's Batman trilogy, or maybe I should call it his Dark Knight Trilogy. It's far removed from the campy Batman films of the 1980's, and even further from the 1960's television series. Batman's enemy this time is Bane. He's not identical to the Bane that we know from the 1990's DC comics, but at least he's not the mentally backward character who appeared as Poisin Ivy's henchman in "Batman & Robin". The back breaking scene was accurately copied from the comics.

At the beginning of the film Batman has retired. He returns to action after he finds out that Bane has devised a plan to bring Gotham City under his personal control. But it's even worse than this. The city will not just be controlled by him, it will be completely destroyed.

The film's imagery is spectacular, and the action is breathtaking. In itself the film deserves 5 stars, but I have to deduct half a star because Catwoman doesn't carry a whip. Sorry, that's the rules, blunders like that have to be punished. I admit that Anne Hathaway looks sexy in her costume, but the gun is so out of place. Unless I'm mistaken, she has never carried a gun in the comics. What is it with film directors and guns? They even gave Captain America a gun in his solo film.