Four Lions (2010)

4 radicalised Asians with very low common sense, intelligence, and a high opinion of themselves plan a terror attack in the middle of London.

They might just get away with it no thanks to the equally incompetent cops.

Watch this if you feel you need to laugh at the absurdity of the post 9/11 world.

Read my full review at Fridae, first published on 31 August 2011.

The first grader (2010)

Inspirational. Based on a true story. A story of how one man overcame the odds.

Emotional manipulation, a predictable storyline, and a highly contrived plot manage to come together in The First Grader, thanks to its great script.

That and its nationalist telling of the Kenyan independence movement and critical assessment of post-colonial Kenya.

Read my full review at Fridae, first published on 31 August 2011.

The Smurfs (2011)

The Belgians would start a war over this movie if they had an army of soldiers instead of bureaucrats.

Peyo's communitarian, almost socialist blue critters are plucked out of their habitat to star in a very generic, lazily written fish out of water comedy.

Which has nothing to do with the clash of cultures between communitarianism and capitalism.

Read my full review at Fridae, first published on 31 August 2011.

Glee: The 3D concert movie (2011)

This film is an awkward, jarring mixture of prerecorded clips from the Glee concert tour, backstage footage with the cast being in character, and documentary-like footage of fans who went for the show.
This does not spell success as a concert movie, a documentary, or a film adaptation of the series.

Watch only if you're a fan.

Read my full review at Fridae, first published on 31 August 2011.

Take me home tonight (2011)

The John Hughes/Cameron Crowe high school comedy gets a modern update, with young adults instead of schoolkids.

As per genre conventions, expect our protagonist to learn to thumb his nose at authority, be his own man, and get the girl of his dreams - i.e. come of age all in the space of one night.

Nothing unexpected happens, though you might want to watch this for its 1980s soundtrack.

Read my full review at Fridae, first published on 17 August 2011.

Suckseed (ห่วยขั้นเทพ) (2011)

Scrappy highschool underdogs with no musical sense form rock band and struggle to succeed.

It's like That Thing You Do!, Beck: Mongolian Chop Squad, and This is Spinal Tap all rolled into one.

Suckseed is a typical Japanese band film executed in the bold and demented visual style of the Thai New Wave.

Read my full review at Fridae, first published on 17 August 2011.

Beginners (2010)

A sort of portmanteau film featuring the same characters at different time periods.

In the present day, a graphics designer gets over the death of his dad. Last decade, his dad came out of the closet after becoming a widow. In the 60s, a young child witnesses the love his parents have for each other.

Watch this film for how it uses wry observational humour to counter the sense of fate and tragedy inherent in the portmanteau film structure.

Read my full review at Fridae, first published on 17 August 2011.

Incendies (2010)

In the Citizen Kane of war movies, two recently-orphaned siblings travel from Canada to war-torn Lebanon to unravel a life-long mystery about their mother, a missing brother, and a father no one talks about.

Even though this is a largely non-preachy character-driven movie, the film does educate on the Lebanese Civil War, where the Christian faction was just as belligerent, murderous, and monstrous as the Islamists.

Read my full review at Fridae, first published on 17 August 2011.

Womb (2010)

A woman clones her best friend/dead husband, inseminates herself, and gives birth to him.

Understandably, things go downhill from there.

The problem is how this film feels like a Christian filmmaker's shrill, melodramatic allegory of cloning as gay marriage: the most important danger issues associated with human cloning are single parenthood, sexual grooming, incest, and the Oedipus complex.

Read my full review at Fridae, first published on 10 August 2011.

The Assault (L’assaut) (2010)

Think of The Assault as a French Hollywood-wannabe take on Die Hard and Flight 911.

Here, a plane hijacking leads to a hostage crisis and a swat team response.

It's a high budget paint by the numbers movie whose redeeming feature is its 80s action film sensibilities.

Read my full review at Fridae, first published on 3 August 2011.

Zookeeper (2011)

Perhaps the greatest disaster to happen to the romantic comedy was Adam Sandler.

He introduced the obnoxious, passive-aggressive, moronic to the point of retarded man-child to the ugly man/hot chick pairing. It doesn't work because no one buys the hot chick finding the man-child’s antics and company endearing.

In Zookeeper, the obnoxious, passive-aggressive, moronic to the point of retarded character is... the hot chick. I guess this is an improvement?


Read my full review at Fridae, first published on 3 August 2011.