Alien: Covenant ***
Covenant does inject new blood and purpose into the Alien series with the focus on character rather than effect. It’s still just a nail biting.
Tag: Ridley Scott
Ben-Hur (3D) **
Still consumable – if you haven’t seen the 1959 powerhouse version – as the two leads try their damnedest to command a real screen presence. However, the film itself lacks spirit. Bekmambetov’s subdued cinematography does make the whole affair feel rather ‘televised’, rather than like an old-school, silver-screen epic
The Martian ****
Nothing, it seems, human or inanimate, goes to waste here, making The Martian a very satisfying watch and a return to the Scott glory days.
The Counsellor ***
It’s hard to fathom the big picture of the anticipated Ridley Scott-Cormac McCarthy collaboration, The Counsellor, apart from the obvious that greed is bad news, as is being embroiled in the drugs trade at any level. As a thriller, it’s stuffed with well-intentioned but wordy statements uttered by a crowd-pulling cast looking rather grand, including …
Welcome To The Punch ***
Stylish Brit crime thrillers seem two a penny, and it takes a very different perspective to produce one that stands out from the crowd in this day and age. Shifty Director Eran Creevy’s gritty and sassy London-based drama Welcome To The Punch echoes recent Brit flicks like The Sweeney in design, showing an alluring but …
Prometheus (3D) ***
Director Ridley Scott was quoted as saying that Prometheus was a film that would ‘stand on its own’, apart from the Alien series. It’s fair to say that the sweeping, opening 3D vistas and alien mutation on the IMAX screen are truly spectacular to watch, so there is a lot of genuine expectation from the …