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This week, there are NINE new films out for you to choose from: a horror thriller from Netflix with Nat Wolff and Willem Dafoe in Death Note, Tom Cruise ends up drug-running for Pablo Escobar in American Made, Daniel Craig and Channing Tatum lead a crime/comedy in Logan Lucky, there’s a battle for the city of Detroit, New York has turned into a police state in Bushwick, the little engine that could returns to the cinema in Thomas and Friends: Journey Beyond Sodor, Terminator 2 returns to the cinema – this time in 3D, there’s drama in Félicité, and Scarlett Johansson completely wastes her time in Rough Night.
Death Note centres around Light Turner (Nat Wolff), a bright student who stumbles across a mystical notebook that has the power to bump off any person whose name he writes in it. He decides to launch a secret crusade to rid the streets of criminals. Soon, the student-turned-vigilante finds himself pursued by a famous detective known only by the alias L (Keith Stanfield – Get Out).
Based on the famous Japanese manga, I haven’t seen that, but this looks to have tones of the Final Destination series, in that while Death chose who to pick off and in what order, this time, the choices fall in the hands of the protagonist.
Death Note is spelled out on Netflix tomorrow and I’ve been really looking forward to this, especially since Adam Wingard is directing, whose The Guest, starring Beauty and the Beast‘s Dan Stevens, is a must-see.
Hit or Miss? Verdict: I said read the review!
American Made makes me wonder how much Tom Cruise is still as he’s made, since I thought Luke Wilson was playing this role at first. Cruise must’ve had some work done to his face, even though he’s heavily made-up and has a wig.
Anyhoo, he plays pilot Barry Seal, who through improbable situations, ends up working for the CIA’s Monty Schafer (Domhnall Gleeson – Ex Machina) and as a drug runner in the south, to Pablo Escobar, during the 1980s.
The film is directed by Doug Liman, who Cruise worked with on Edge of Tomorrow, and his credits include Mr and Mrs Smith and The Bourne Identity.
Writer: Gary Spinelli
Also stars: Caleb Landry Jones, Jesse Plemons, Sarah Wright, Jayma Mays, Lola Kirke and Ozark‘s Kevin Johnson.
Hit or Miss? Verdict: Hit!
Logan Lucky is directed by Steven Soderbergh and looks to be one of the year’s best with a hilarious trailer that made me laugh a lot and a cast to die for.
The premise is simple, with two brothers – Jimmy Logan (Channing Tatum) and Clyde (Adam Driver) – looking to pull off a heist during a NASCAR race in North Carolina, but it’s the dumb behaviour of some of the charactres, the hick accents and a stirling dyed-blonde Daniel Craig as a jailbird, being sprung out of jail to commit the robbery.
Writer: Rebecca Blunt
Also stars: Katherine Waterston, Seth MacFarlane, Sebastian Stan, Riley Keough, Katie Holmes, Hilary Swank, David Denman, Dwight Yoakam, Brian Gleeson and Blue Ruin‘s Macon Blair.
Hit or Miss? Verdict: Hit!
Detroit is the name of the city in which this movie takes place, centered around a police raid in 1967, which results in one of the largest citizen uprisings in the United States’ history, and the film stars John Boyega (Star Wars Episode VIII: The Force Awakens).
Directed by Kathryn Bigelow, I loved her original Point Break in 1991, but was less impressed with the otherwise-critically-acclaimed The Hurt Locker and Zero Dark Thirty. However, this does look good from the trailer.
Detroit is released in the UK on August 25th, three weeks after the US date.
Screenplay: Mark Boal
Also stars: John Krasinski, Kaitlyn Dever, Will Poulter, Jack Reynor, Hannah Murray, Anthony Mackie
Hit or Miss? Verdict: Hit!
Bushwick is a town in New York, but one where lots of weird stuff has happened, as the place has turned into a police state, a la the videogame Homefront.
In full, when a Texas military force invades their Brooklyn neighborhood, 20-year-old Lucy (Brittany Snow) and war veteran Stupe (Guardians of the Galaxy‘s Dave Bautista) must depend on each other to survive.
Texas is trying to secede from the US, with this city being used as a negotiation tool. Lucy meets Stupe after coming up from the subway into the military invasion of Brooklyn. Together they decide to cross the treacherous five blocks of Bushwick – littered with looters, local militias, the invading forces, and one crazy cousin – in order to get home and be reunited with Lucy’s grandmother.
Bushwick is released in the UK this Friday, and then on Blu-ray and DVD on October 23rd, and I’m really looking forward to this.
Directors: Cary Murnion, Jonathan Milott
Writers: Nick Damici, Graham Reznick
Also stars: Christian Navarro, Arturo Castro, Jeremie Harris
Hit or Miss? Verdict: Hit!
Thomas and Friends: Journey Beyond Sodor
Join Thomas The Tank Engine and his friends in this exciting adventure to the mainland that shows us friendship is more important than being the favorite engine. Can Thomas and the new experimental engines save James and help bring him back to the Island of Sodor?
How can you say no? 😉
Director: David Stoten
Stars: Darren Boyd, Sophie Colquhoun, Jim Howick, Colin McFarlane, Lucy Montgomery, Rasmus Hardiker
Hit or Miss? Verdict: Hit!
Terminator 2 is one of my all-time favourite films, especially in the extended Special Edition, but James Cameron does NOT need to take another of his old 2D films (like Titanic) and pointlessly retrofit it for 3D. Plus, while this may be a 4K restoration, you won’t be seeing it in 4K. For a cinema to show a film in 3D, it shows two 2K images (one per eye), so you’re still seeing 2K resolution!
Note, that if you do see this, most cinemas are ONLY showing it next Tuesday, since August 29th is ‘Judgment Day’.
Just get the Blu-ray Special Edition instead! (okay, so the package also contains the 3D version, but both versions include the Special Edition)
Hit or Miss? Verdict…. in 3D? : Miss!
Félicité sings in a bar in Kinshasa. When her 14-year-old son has a motorcycle accident, she goes on a frantic search hrough the streets of Kinshasa, a world of music and dreams. And her path crosses that of Tabu.
I couldn’t get a handle on this film, however…
Director: Alain Gomis
Stars: Véro Tshanda Beya Mputu, Gaetan Claudia, Papi Mpaka
Hit or Miss? Verdict: Miss!
Rough Night is a series of rough ideas that should’ve been thrown in the toilet rather than turned into a movie.
On the plus side, it stars Zoë Kravitz (Mad Max: Fury Road), but on the downside… there’s everything else.
Scarlett Johansson tries her hand at alleged comedy, as a hen party results in a male stripper ending up brown bread. A nd they have to sort it out. Who cares?
Well, apparently director Lucia Aniello does, who co-wrote this with Paul W Downs, along with a cast including Colton Haynes, Demi Moore, Jillian Bell, Ilana Glazer, Ty Burrell and Kate McKinnon, from the godawful Ghostbusters reboot.
Rough Night was due out in the UK on June 16th, so it’s already been put back two months! That does NOT look good, and it’s pretty much flopped in the US.
Hit or Miss? Verdict: Miss!
Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.