Film Review: Hobbs and Shaw

"I’m Dealing With The Future Of The Planet. I’m The Necessary Shock To The System. I Am Human Evolutionary Change..."

After a rather petulant, if supposed, high-profile, on-set fall out, the hotly reported, rather extended and overly silly "feud" between the muscle-headed duo of both Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson and Vin Diesel results in the release of Hobbs and Shaw this week, a similarly stupid, bloated and mind-numbingly dull spin-off from the jaw-droppingly successful Fast and Furious franchise, a blockbuster series which staggeringly continues to make shed loads of money even when the quality chops and changes more often than the leader of the Conservative party. Whilst the Furious franchise has become less about fast cars and more about fuel-injected explosions over the course of nearly two decades, Hobbs and Shaw is the first to overtly discount any notion of similarity from the set up of the series' first couple of movies and fall more into the bracket of full-on, high-octane, science fiction oriented action, one which sees The Rock and Jason Statham pretty much play themselves as they happily accept bundles of cash in order to reprise the titular roles of Luke Hobbs and Deckard Shaw respectively in order to prevent a catastrophic, world-ending, overly cliched bad thing from occurring. Whilst I am all for silly, hot-headed nonsense from time to time, Hobbs and Shaw is the type of action movie which is so painfully sterile and cheap, you long for the craftsmanship of 1990's era Michael Bay to come in and at least churn out a decent level of enjoyment, but with excess for the sake of excess and an annoying scent of self-congratulating sprayed upon it, the Furious franchise's first spin-off makes you long for the return of Vin Diesel. 

Let's start with the stars of the movie themselves. Take The Rock for instance, a dramatically effective action superstar with enormous physicality to boot who when placed in semi-decent, B-movie esque action romps in the ilk of Skyscraper can be thoroughly enjoyable to observe, but for too long now seems to be continually placed in simply awful works of cinema including the likes of San Andreas, Rampage and Jumanji, all of which unsurprisingly then proceed to take millions upon millions of dollars resulting in the cycle of bang-average movies continuing forevermore. In the case of Hobbs and Shaw, the addition of the always likeable Statham and Idris Elba should indeed be a trio made in heaven, but thanks to a quite awful screenplay, one full of genre-literate cliches and dodgy accents, eclectic editing which literally made me cheer inside once a shot held still for more than thirty seconds, and digital effects which take you completely out of the action due to their sheer cheap and tacky sensibility, Hobbs and Shaw is a real cause for concern regarding the way in which summer blockbusters seem to be heading, particularly when you look at the other examples this year alone in the ilk of Godzilla and Men in Black, but with the movie guaranteed to be a box office marvel as it provides certain types of audiences with enough to keep them coming, I for one can only speak the truth, and in the case of Hobbs and Shaw, it really is quite crap. 

Overall Score: 3/10

Film Review: Welcome to Marwen

"I Was Beaten Up Because I Was Different, So I've Built A Place Where I Can Heal..."

Inspired by the life and artistic works of Mark Hogancamp, who in Kingston, New York on April 2000 was left with severe life changing injuries and little memory of his previous life after being the victim of a vicious and brutal hate crime, Welcome to Marwen takes inspiration from the 2010 documentary, Marwencol, from independent filmmaker, Jeff Malmberg, which focused on the titular 1/6 scale World War II-era model town embodied by a collection of handcrafted dolls all designed with an uncanny resemblance to Hogancamp himself, his close friends and his now incarcerated attackers. Directed by Robert Zemeckis, (Back to the Future, Forrest Gump) whose recent cinematic output has been somewhat rather patchy, with the likes of Allied and The Walk by no means reaching the lofty filmic heights the American is best known for, Welcome to Marwen blends a soppy, emotional drama with oddball digital effects for a movie which cannot decide whatsoever what it wants to be, resulting in a final picture that on the one hand does feel considerably admirable considering the heartbreaking true story sitting at the heart of the drama, yet on the other, does feel entirely misguided and just way too experimental for a picture that due to having Zemeckis' name stamped all over it, will arrive with certain high expectations from critics and audiences alike. 

Perhaps the best way to review Welcome to Marwen is to critique the movie in the two separate halves the film plays out against, with one half the grounded, real-life drama focusing on the life of Steve Carrell's (The Big Short) Hogancamp set during the aftermath of his vicious assault, and the second half whereby Zemeckis returns to his well-known knack for digital effects with a particular narrative which sees the Hogancamp crafted dolls come to life and play out WWII style fantasies, all with on-the-nose modes of symbolism which mirror the horrors and fears of Hogancamp's scarred mind. Whilst the approach is bold and the digital effects are impressive, blending a mix of Anomalisa inspired visual imagery with weird, off-beat action set pieces which seem to have fallen right out of the Team America textbook, Welcome to Marwen still fails to really have the desired impact the filmmakers were obviously intending, with the sensibility of the movie falling too heavy on the schmaltzy in regards to the true-life drama, even with yet another rather impressive dramatic lead performance from Carrell, whilst becoming more and more alienating and irritating each time we are dragged back to the world of the digital dolls, which even after the second time when the point becomes abundantly clear, just feels repetitive and come the end of it, rather quite pointless. With an over-exaggerated runtime, some sloppy and misjudged casting choices, with the awfully accented Gwendoline Christie (Star Wars: The Last Jedi) the prime example, and an overarching stench of sticky sentimentality, Welcome to Marwen is unfortunately the first ripe dud of the year. We expect better Zemeckis!  

Overall Score: 4/10

Film Review: Baby Driver

"The Moment You Catch Feelings Is The Moment You Catch A Bullet..."

Of all the rare successful exports of sunny, sunny Dorset, director Edgar Wright is undeniably up there with the best the South West has had to offer within the 20th century, and whilst his humble beginnings with the likes of the Simon Pegg starring Spaced gave Wright the opportunity to begin his venture into stardom through the medium of televised entertainment, his crowning jewel is indeed the triage of movies within the so-called "Cornetto Trilogy", a series of successful movies which began all the way back with Shaun of the Dead in 2004 and continued with Hot Fuzz and The World's End in 2007 and 2013 respectively. Emerging once again into the cinematic spotlight, Wright returns with Baby Driver, a star-studded action comedy led by the likes of  Ansel Elgort, Kevin Spacey and Jamie Foxx, and a movie which overtly revels in a superbly crafted jukebox soundtrack, a collection of musical accompaniments which acts as the cornerstone for both the narrative and the development of the film's titular leading character, resulting in a blockbustingly entertaining thrill ride which features all the tricks and twists you expect from an Edgar Wright film, albeit one which is slightly lacking in a similar level of charm which has encompassed his earlier work. 

With an opening set piece which sets the standard for the rest of the action ahead, the audience is swiftly introduced to the life of Baby (Ansel Elgort), an ultra-skilled, high-speed driver who alongside suffering from a hard case of tinnitus, is caught under the thumb of Kevin Spacey's crime boss, Doc, a softly spoken, calculating Joe Cabot figure who forces him to carry out heist after heist in order to pay off a substantial debt. Using music as both a blockade to its' leading character's ailment alongside acting as a bedrock of carrying out the film's narrative, Baby Driver is undeniably an audience pleasing joy-fest, one which wins on a surreal number of levels through its' constant supply of rib-tickling humour, brilliantly measured OTT acting and action set pieces which prioritise practicality and stunt work over the CGI overkill which tends to encompass many so-called contemporary blockbusters. I mean really, who can beat a high-speed car and foot chase played out to the backdrop of Hocus Pocus by Focus? Whilst the ending set piece does seem a little too far-fetched and overlong, one which makes the final shootout of Hot Fuzz look like the lowest key fight scene ever, Wright has managed to bag himself another cinematic success, using his love of cinema and sound to create a film which will no doubt be as big a hit with audiences as it has been with critics, a rare combination to say the least.

Overall Score: 8/10