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Valentine’s day brings thoughts of romance and… Lego. Well, on the big screen at least. The films this week are The Lego Movie, The Monuments Men, Her and 50 Kisses.
The Lego Movie
An ordinary LEGO minifigure, mistakenly thought to be the extraordinary MasterBuilder, is recruited to join a quest to stop an evil LEGO tyrant from gluing the universe together.
Starring the voices of Will Arnett as Batman, Elizabeth Banks as Wyldstyle, plus Alison Brie, Charlie Day, Will Ferrell, Morgan Freeman, Jonah Hill and Anthony Daniels as the voice of C-3PO, this looks superb but isn’t a 3-minute trailer going to show us far too much?
Hit or Miss? Verdict: Hit!
The Monuments Men
Based on the true story of the greatest treasure hunt in history, The Monuments Men is an action drama focusing on an unlikely World War II platoon, tasked by FDR with going into Germany to rescue artistic masterpieces from Nazi thieves and returning them to their rightful owners.
It would be an impossible mission: with the art trapped behind enemy lines, and with the German army under orders to destroy everything as the Reich fell, how could these guys – seven museum directors, curators, and art historians, all more familiar with Michelangelo than the M-1 – possibly hope to succeed? But as the Monuments Men, as they were called, found themselves in a race against time to avoid the destruction of 1000 years of culture, they would risk their lives to protect and defend mankind’s greatest achievements.
Starring George Clooney, who also directs, plus Matt Damon, Bill Murray, Cate Blanchett, John Goodman, Jean Dujardin, Hugh Bonneville and Bob Balaban, I really like the look of this from the trailer, even though it hasn’t had a great set of reviews.
Hit or Miss? Verdict: Hit!
Her
Theodore is a lonely man in the final stages of his divorce. When he’s not working as a letter writer, his down time is spent playing video games and occasionally hanging out with friends. He decides to purchase the new OS1, which is advertised as the world’s first artificially intelligent operating system, “It’s not just an operating system, it’s a consciousness,” the ad states. Theodore quickly finds himself drawn in with Samantha, the voice behind his OS1.
As they start spending time together they grow closer and closer and eventually find themselves in love. Having fallen in love with his OS, Theodore finds himself dealing with feelings of both great joy and doubt. As an OS, Samantha has powerful intelligence that she uses to help Theodore in ways others hadn’t, but how does she help him deal with his inner conflict of being in love with an OS?
With Joaquin Phoenix in the lead role, and Scarlett Johansson as the voice of Samantha, plus many more including Rooney Mara, Kristen Wiig, Amy Adams and the director Spike Jonze, I’m fascinated by the concept for this film and I can’t wait to see it.
Hit or Miss? Verdict: Hit!
50 Kisses
Fifty Kisses is a crowd created feature film with multiple stories connected by one thing – a Valentines kiss. Irreverent, charming, ridiculous, moving and at times profound, 50 Kisses features everything from love struck zombies, androids, teddy bears to… fatigue-fighting lesbians! 50 Kisses is the world’s first crowd generated feature film; a multi-cultural and global reflection of pop culture’s vision of love in the 21st century.
Stefan Dennis is the only name in the cast that stood out for me. The rest include Natalia Tena, Alex Calloway, Kenneth Stahl and many more I’ve never heard of.
When it comes to the trailer, it tells us “2000 screenwriters. 150 filmmakers. One movie”. Yes, I know a lot of people submitted scripts, but this trailer does not make me want to go and see the finished product.
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.