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southafricanrob
Reviews
Ninja Assassin (2009)
makes Crank High Voltage and Kill Bills offspring look like a Bambi in the jungle sequel
In some respects low budget, in other respects huge budget - either way this is more one for the boys....buckets of blood, some awesome fight scenes and just enough storyline to carry it through to the end but let you forget what happened by the beginning of next week. It starts off a little thin but once the basic plot is established and the action kicks into overdrive it settles down into a decent over the top action flick. Just like the late noughties saw vampires make a comeback to cool - ninja movies deserve a return to the big screen. Imagine nun-chuck wielding pyjama warriors in 3D - lets hope Ninja Assassin does more for ninja's comeback than Twilight did for vamps!!
A Dog's Breakfast (2007)
To the back of the shelf where it belongs...
With no disrespect to the filmmakers - this was crap. I own a DVD rental store and I review all the movies I buy online - my staff then review them as they come in. This is the classic example of trusting your gut!! I read quite a few good reviews in IMDb, noticed that there was an unnatural amount of 10/10 votes (700!!) and all in all something smelt very fishy about this movie - despite this i bought multiple copies. What a flop....all of us agreed - awful. To me it can be defined as a low budget attempt at British style farcical humor - a la 'death at a funeral' and fails badly as expected. Unfortunately one of our local distributors picked it up and marketed it as a smash hit....only thing redeeming it from a 1 vote is it appears to be a v small budget flick, written, directed and acted by the same person...something akin to a 2nd year film school project I'd say.
To the back of the shelf where it belongs...
How to Lose Friends & Alienate People (2008)
Unremarkable - Perfect example of how big names can produce shite and still make money!!
This movie started quite well but after the first 40 minutes dropped off a couple of notches. Pretty much what you'd be expecting before watching, it follows the usual clichés and predictable story lines. Simon Pegg sticks perfectly to character playing the just likable bumbling idiot, the rest of the cast including Kirsten Dunst don't really offer noteworthy performances with the exception of Jeff Bridges who has flashes of big lebowskiish flare.
Ultimately though, although the movie entertains mildly as it should, it seems to be the perfect example of how a couple of big names with a decent budget behind them can produce something that is entirely unremarkable and still succeed in turning millions...I was happy to waste a couple of hours with the DVD late at night but would have been narked if I had paid to see it at the cinema.
Big Nothing (2006)
Very Bad Things meets Guy Ritchie
from a plus side a good story, not overly predictable nor overly complex - a viable watch after a long day. Comparable to 'Very bad things' or 'Edmond' in its darkly comedic tragedy Big Nothing seems to be split down the middle for me...on one hand it is great as the darkly comic disaster with a fun yet uncertain plot reminding me of lock stock yet it is wrongly cast for this comparison. Imagine a younger cockier skank in the lead female role and something like of Colin Farrel's 'in bruges' character as one of the lead males resulting in an edgier take on big nothing. Not to say the comedic side of Schwimmer/Pegg (who where okay but definitely not great in Run Fatboy Run) don't work well here - they do nicely but it creates a slightly out of place lighter edge to the movie......overall i'm glad i watched it - it was worthy of me writing my first IMDb review.... enjoy