derekblake Reviews

Under the Skin (I) (2013)

Could Do Better

[1/10 · 30 July 2015]

I have to admit that I did not watch the whole movie, I could not stand it any longer and after twenty minutes we switched it off. Is this what they spend my money on from the national lottery? I'll be frank, I genuinely could have done a better job with my HD camcorder, it must have had a budget of Oh, say a couple of hundred Scottish pounds. A good half of what we watched was a blank black screen, and the rest was so dark no one could see what was going on, which was good because nothing was going on. If you want a cure for insomnia then watch this film, otherwise forget it.

I was bored.

Very bored

Not even the naked women in the eventual opening sequence (after watching a dot on a black screen for about five minutes, could eject life into this corpse of a movie.

Crystal Skulls (2014 TV Movie)

Physics? What Physics

[4/10 · 9 September 2014]

Well what can I say about this made for TV movie? The acting was not bad, although some of the support actors would have had trouble getting into am-dram productions. the story line was the same old 'quest' story, searching for that elusive artifact. One good point was a baddie that actually admits his mistake and works with the Indiana Jones type hero to save the world. However;... . . In my opinion there should be an international law (UN help please) that anyone other than script writers with a physics degree, should be banned from writing sci-fi scripts/teleplays. The worst thing about this movie was the total disregard for science. the continuity in the film is totally missing. In the first part of the film a cave collapses, seemingly covering the floor of the enormous cavern. Later the same cave appears again, but there is no sign of the cave-in and the nice path remains clear of rubble. Nice clean-up Sweden. Then there is the quick rescue when a helicopter crashes in Sweden and a team is sent out from Vienna (that's Austria, at least a thousand miles away) and the rescue team find them and get them back within the hour. That's some helicopter they have. No wonder most Americans don't have a clue about geography.

Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014)

Not the Best

[4/10 · 9 September 2014]

Personally I was not impressed with this movie, certainly not as good as the first movie, but then squeals that are as good or better than the original are rare. I found the storyline quite weak and the dialogue hard to hear over the too loud mood music, editors never seem to learn this fact. The SFX were OK but nothing breath-taking, and the acting was lack-lustre. In saying all this I enjoyed the movie and would recommend it as a easy-to-watch piece of entertainment, with a bucket of popcorn a cup of coke/coffee and your Kindle to read to stop you getting bored. Someone to wake you up for the exciting bits would also be an advantage.

21 Jump Street (2012)

Waste if Celluloid

[1/10 · 25 July 2014]

What trash! I do not even know why we sat through this film, other than I was using my computer during the entire length. The story line was puerile, one that I have seen many times, but with some innovation. It was billed as a comedy, but I have had more laughs in an operating theater. The language was terrible and totally gratuitous, not adding anything to the plot other than for those imbeciles who think swearing is comedy, which is a cheap shot. There was not one good gag in the whole film. When you watch films like this it does one thing; it explains why the present generation acts the way it does and has the low standards that it displays. Do yourself a favor, if you have any intelligence at all, DON'T watch it.

The Darkest Hour (2011)

Low Light=Lower-Budget

[3/10 · 31 December 2011]

Well what can I say, a good storyline ruined by budgetary constraints. It seems these days that the latest way of reducing the post-production expense is to shoot an invisible alien at night. The acting was just above amateur, in fact I have seen many amateur performances that would make this production look like a school project. The ending was such that it was either left open to pave the way for a sequel or because they totally ran out of money at one hour and twenty-five minutes. The film ends where the story really begins, such a same not to have realised the true potential of the screenplay. The concept of the aliens was unusual and I must say fairly original, however one has to suspend any knowledge of physics in order to make them believable. Aliens that seem to be of pure electrical energy explode with a shower of solid matter when killed, which makes no sense whatsoever. Please, someone with a real skill for production and direction do a remake, Stephen Spielberg are you listening?

In Time (2011)

Make Time for this Movie.

[1 November 2011]

A very unusual film screen-play, well written and shot, don't expect any CGI effects here, this is a very down to Earth sci-fi that bears more than a passing resemblance to our current problem with world banks. Surprisingly Justin Timberlake puts in a very professional performance, and not a song in sight, Timberlake carries the part with a very grounded performance being so laid back that he is almost horizontal. Amanda Seyfried submits a polished performance although her make-up makes her look like one of those Japanese animations of what a European looks like, complete with over-sized eyes. The film holds the attention from the first to the last frame and provokes some emotion from the viewer on several levels. Certainly worth a watch, not quite a Rolex, but much better than a Timex.

Watchmen (2009)

A Shot in the Dark

[1 November 2011]

Yes this is yet another movie that was shot during a power-outage, we watched it on TV and were quite bored with the whole thing. Not only were we visually deprived but the storyline is convoluted and difficult to follow and seems to take you around in circles. The acting was competent and professional from what I could see, but with such low lighting little expression is visible, so I may as well have been listening to the radio. Not the usual run-of-the-mill super-hero film and does not come into the same class a Green Lantern, or Captain America. However if you view this movie as a piece of art then perhaps it works, I guess the proof of this would be how many people were in the audience as opposed to the very long list of credits.

The Thing (I) (2011)

More Black-out Filming

[26 October 2011]

I Loved the original, and this remake was faithful to that concept. However, I just wish I could have seen what was happening on-screen as this was yet another movie that seems to have been shot during a power-outage. Why, oh why, do today's directors and producers think we, the audience, do not need to actually see what is going on, this is the whole point of movies. If I wanted to use my imagination then I would have read the book. On a positive note the CGI's were good and not overdone. I have one other gripe, which is general and applies to most monster type movies; can we reasonable believe that an alien race that is capable of interstellar travel, have the dexterity to design and build a sophisticated craft, turn into beasts as soon as they arrive on Earth? In The Thing we are asked to believe that large spider-like creatures piloted a space craft for another planet, not believable at all.

2012: Ice Age (2011 Video)

Worst ever

[18 September 2011]

What can I say about thin film? It was one of those movies where you can't wait for the end, not because you needed to see how everything turned out, but because you just want it to be over. The acting was agonising, with characters so wooden they would have done better bringing Gerry Anderson back as casting director. I say characters, but in reality there weren't any, it was as if the actors were reading the lines from an Autocue for the first time. However we did manage to get some fun out of the film, by spotting the continuity errors and the number of times they used the same shot for different scenes. One snow covered street with a nice clock tower was used for a street in Bangor Maine, Boston and finally New Jersey. I thought it was clever how the paper snow on the windscreen of the vehicle folded back each time the windscreen wiper hit it, in one scene. The special effects were straight out of the 1950's and over all you needed to suspend both belief and reality, the basic science was just silly with 200 MPH glaciers and fighter jets dropping atomic bombs on low level passes. The whole film was just one big mess, possibly the worst movie I have ever watched and not walked out on – I must be getting old. The movie was a waste of the film it was printed on (or blank DVD).

Conan the Barbarian (2011)

How to Make a Movie in the Dark

[2/10 · 20 August 2011]

I am struggling to actually review this movie, not because of its weak story-line or because of its total lack of imagination, or even because of its gratuitous violence (most of which is hidden), but because the one thing that was missing was a lighting engineer. Yes folks, this is an object lesson in how to make a low budget blockbuster movie, though how much money was actually saved by shooting seventy-five percent of the film in darkness I don't know. However the other cost saving was certainly well designed, a few decent cameramen who could actually keep the shot in focus would have spoiled the whole thing for me. Out of focus darkness was entertaining for the first ten minutes, after that it became irritating, the big fight scene in the last ten minutes of the film is lost completely but then that will have saved on the cost of giving the monster too much detail, rather than leaving it a a piece of wet hose pipe. What a waste of time and money, not the production companies, but mine, I can sit in the dark with some flickering lights at home for free. There was one decent fight scene in the film about half way through, but it was certainly not worth the ticket price. One of the worst and most irritating films I have seen for a long time.

Hulk (2003)

Most Confusing Film Award

[3/10 · 14 January 2011]

One of the worst Super Hero films I have seen in a long time. The opening scenes are confusing and difficult to watch because of the use of 'Picture-in-Picture' techniques, often using the same scene shot from different angles. The earlier storyline is fragmented but does come together later in the film, I really lost interest because of this but pushed on to the end. Too many scenes seem to have been shot in almost total darkness and it was impossible to see what was going on during these times (which were many) especially the fight with dogs, this was almost completely lost to me. The sound also was lacking and much of the dialog passed by as the actors growling at each other, this was especially true of Mr. Banner Senior whose voice was so low that a subsonic converter should have been used instead of a microphone. The CGI of the Hulk was poor and unconvincing. As you may have detected I really enjoyed the film.