Fantastic Four (2015)

(M) ★★½

Director: Josh Trank.

Cast: Miles Teller, Kate Mara, Michael B Jordan, Jamie Bell, Toby Kebbell, Reg E. Cathey, Tim Blake Nelson.

"I sure hope that's not our careers getting sucked into that skyhole."

TWENTIETH Century Fox has big plans for the Fantastic Four.

Marvel Comics’ so-called “first family” (they’ve been a cornerstone of the company since Stan Lee and Jack Kirby created them in 1961) is already lined up for a sequel scheduled to be released on June 9, 2017, and the actors have all signed multi-film deals.

There are also talks of the characters teaming up with Fox’s other Marvel-made heroes, the X-Men.

Of course, none of that is going to matter if this first film isn’t any good.

The short answer to that unspoken question is “not really”. It’s certainly better than the corny, groan-worthy Fantastic Four movies made in the ‘00s but in an oversaturated market where even Ant-Man is gleefully making the most of his moment in the sun, this origin story doesn’t take its opportunity to step out of the shadows.

The quartet in question is brainiac Reed Richards (Teller), his long-time friend Ben Grimm (Bell), a hot-headed mechanic named Johnny Storm (Jordan) and his adopted sister/also brainiac Sue (Mara).

Richards’ experiments in teleportation attract the attention of Johnny and Sue’s dad Franklin (Cathey), who recruits Richards to work with his children on a similar project backed by the government.

Along with fellow bright spark Victor Von Doom, the group succeeds in opening a pathway to a parallel dimension, but an accident leaves them with a bizarre array of superpowers.

Unfortunately, this origin story is all origin, no story. The long build-up wouldn’t be so bad if it built up to something worthwhile, but it takes so long to set up its heroes and their transformations that it forgets to give them something to fight against, leaving the final (and only) battle of the film to be squeezed into five minutes at the end.

In place of a story we get a mildly interesting bunch of characters, hanging out and doing science, with little in the way of actual conflict, dramatic or physical.

Fantastic Four seemingly wilfully ignores the superhero movies that have gone before and instead buries itself in science montages, grand speeches (all made by Cathey’s Franklin Storm), and minor character interactions, rather than laying on the wow factor of spectacle, excitement, and strange people using strange new talents. Again this would be okay if the speeches and interactions led to deeper themes and stronger characters with intriguing arcs, but they don’t, and we’re left  shortchanged in the spectacle departments.

Unlike other movies starring Marvel characters, Fantastic Four (or “Fantfourstic” according to the poster title) takes the gritty and serious route, making it closer in tone to comic book rivals DC and their recent Superman reboot Man Of Steel than anything in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

That’s not a criticism necessarily, although the tone does sit uneasily when they try to work in some humour (most of which falls flat) and there is no deeper theme to give all the gravitas a purpose. In some ways, Fantastic Four is admirable in its different-ness, but it’s sadly unmemorable and unsurprising.

The big shame here is that the casting is spot-on – it’s the script that's off. Teller is perfect as Reed Richards, while Mara, Jordan and Bell all fit their roles nicely. Kebbell underplays Doom pretty well until it all goes down the insane drain at the film’s end.

For the superfans, most of the requisite boxes are ticked. Ben says “it’s clobberin’ time”, Johnny says “flame on”, and someone says the name “Fantastic Four”, although it all feels so lacklustre. The use of the origin story from the Ultimate Fantastic Four comic book series works nicely, making all the characters younger and dispensing with the “we got our powers from a cloud in space” origin, which is good.

But Dr Doom looks weird. Really, really weird. And not in a good way.

There are some good moments in here – it’s not all a total waste – and for fans of the genre it offers something different. There’s certainly some novelty value in seeing the direction the film takes when compared to the 2005 iteration.

But cynics might be right in suggesting this movie was only made to ensure Fox retained the rights to the Fantastic Four, preventing the characters from reverting back to Marvel.

After this, we may see the rights going back to their comic book home sooner rather than later.

Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation

(M) ★★★½

Director: Christopher McQuarrie.

Cast: Tom Cruise, Jeremy Renner, Simon Pegg, Rebecca Ferguson, Ving Rhames, Sean Harris, Alec Baldwin, Simon McBurney.

Buying tickets is for chumps.

In case you missed it, the Mission: Impossible film series is America's answer to James Bond.

The gadgets, the action, the women; these things are part of the likeness, but perhaps the biggest similarity is in how we remember the films – we tend to remember the Bond and M:I movies not by their plots, but by their stunts and/or villains.

In the case of the first Mission: Impossible, we remember the now legendary roof drop sequence. The second one had the mountain climbing opening. The third one had Philip Seymour Hoffman. The fourth one had the impressive Burj Khalifa stunt and the dust storm chase.

Continuing this theme, Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation (the fifth in the series) will be remembered for Tom Cruise hanging off the side of a plane as it takes off and doing a heart-stopping free dive into a water-cooled computer chamber, and Sean Harris’ Solomon Lane, who looks like an evil cross between Tintin and Dobby the House Elf.

Everything in between is the usual blur of encrypted files and crosses and double crosses you’ll struggle to remember in years to come when trying to discern the difference between the films.

The actual plot involves the Impossible Mission Force (IMF) being shut down (which seems to happen in every M:I movie) and Tom Cruise’s Ethan Hunt going rogue to track down The Syndicate – a group that Simon Pegg’s agent Benji Dunn helpfully describes as “an anti-IMF”.

It’s one of those plots where you shouldn’t think too hard about the fact it relies on chance or particular characters doing exactly what it was hoped they’d do, but it’s a serviceable plot all the same.

The film is front-loaded with its best stuff so the finale feels strangely low-key, yet somehow the whole is still satisfying.

That probably comes down to Cruise. His off-screen eccentricities are hard to ignore, and it's been at least a decade since his last truly great performance, but he still churns out highly watchable fare on a regular basis thanks to having a likeable on-screen persona.

But what we really forget is he is a seriously impressive old-school action star in an age where CG trickery has largely made that role somewhat redundant. Sure, there are digitally erased safety lines when he's hanging from a plane and digitally added cars when he's riding a motorbike flat out, but that's really Cruise, putting himself out there and in danger, and it's still seriously impressive.

The most welcome addition to M:I5 is an increased amount of Simon Pegg. He’s mostly just comic relief (although he does get one brief fight scene) but it’s good comic relief.

Ferguson is also a welcome addition, providing solid support as a kind of female Ethan Hunt, while Rhames and Renner are reduced to sidemen, which seems to be their lot in life. Harris also gives good villain.

Overall M:I5 is enjoyable, occasionally impressive, deftly paced, and smarter than most actioners, but not beyond the odd moment of idiocy. Lalo Schifrin's memorable theme gets a good workout – almost as much as Cruise’s 53-year-old body.

In other words, it’s everything you’d expect from a Mission: Impossible, if you choose to accept it.

Ant-Man

(M) ★★★½

Director: Peyton Reed.

Cast: Paul Rudd, Evangeline Lilly, Michael Douglas, Corey Stoll, Bobby Cannavale, Michael Peña.

The latest Psycho remake was weird.

MARVEL is getting cocky with its cinematic universe these days.

While comic book rivals DC are throwing all their big guns – Batman, Superman, Wonder Woman and Aquaman – into one film in a desperate attempt to catch-up, Marvel are doing whatever the hell they feel like.

Case in point is Ant-Man, the debut appearance of a character who, despite being one of the original comic book Avengers, is laughably named, oddly talented (he can control ants!) and weirdly antiquated in this day and age.

But Marvel are going to have their cake and eat it too, which is part of what makes this film so fun. They know it’s ridiculous so they make jokes about its ridiculousness. The script is acutely aware of how absurd the entire premise is but enthusiastically embraces the absurdity.

Dr Hank Pym (Douglas) is a brilliant professor and the original 1960s Ant-Man – a secret government weapon whose super-powered suit allowed him to shrink to the size of a bug and marshal an army of ants.

But when his former student Darren Cross (Stoll) gets close to cracking the secret of the Ant-Man costume and threatens to sell it to the bad guys, the long-retired Pym goes in search of a new hero to take up the miniature mantle and stop the villains.

Enter Scott Lang (Rudd), fresh out of prison and boasting a particular set of skills that Pym needs to save the day.

What’s different about this origin tale is that it comes in halfway through the telling – Ant-Man has already saved the world and hung up his helmet by the time our new protagonist Lang comes on the scene. It’s as if this is Ant-Man: The Next Generation, but in a practical sense it adds to the rich history in the increasingly complicated tapestry that is the Marvel Cinematic Universe (or MCU as the fanboys and fangirls call it).

Thematically, it’s covering some old Marvel ground. It’s about being worthy of what is presented to you (Thor), that technology is not inherently bad or good (Iron Man, Avengers: Age Of Ultron), the need for redemption and second chances (Iron Man again and anything with Black Widow in it), and the importance of family (Guardians Of The Galaxy).

But the strength lies in its fleshed-out characters. Lang is a little bit straight-up-and-down, but Pym, his daughter Hope (Lilly), and Cross are all well nuanced. Pym in particular is an interestingly flawed protagonist, with Douglas’ gravitas giving the science-babble weight and delivering the emotional needs of the story with aplomb.

What’s surprising is the film is not quite as funny or off-the-wall as anticipated. There are still plenty of laughs and Rudd is solid but he is largely restrained, which is confounding for someone with a reputation as a comedic actor. Also you can’t help but feel that writer and ex-director Edgar Wright was pushing for this to be funnier and even more off-the-wall, but that the version we’re seeing is Marvel’s dialed-down take.

If that’s the case, it’s a little bit of a shame. The best moments are the humourous ones and Ant-Man really excels when it’s taking the mickey out of itself and its pint-sized action, which is fleshed out with some novel-looking and wonderfully executed special effects. A fight between Ant-Man and an Avenger is a highlight, as is the climatic showdown which takes place primarily in a child’s bedroom.

While this is not quite on the MCU top shelf alongside Iron Man, Guardians Of The Galaxy, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, and The Avengers, it’s not far below them. It’s also further proof of Marvel’s self-confidence and ability to make sure each film works yet bears a distinct feel (this is basically a heist film) and look.

With its small-scale action and tongue-in-cheek irreverence, Ant-Man is a welcome relief from the large-scale destruction and save-the-universe shenanigans of recent superhero movies.

Magic Mike XXL

(MA15+) ★★★

Director: Gregory Jacobs.

Cast: Channing Tatum, Joe Manganiello, Matt Bomer, Kevin Nash, Adam Rodríguez, Gabriel Iglesias, Andie MacDowell, Amber Heard, Donald Glover, Jada Pinkett Smith, Elizabeth Banks.

The film's budget did not extend to shirts.

ON the surface, Magic Mike was billed as a ladies-only adventure that was all about Channing Tatum’s abs and Matthew McConaughey’s butt cheeks.

The surprising thing is that it was something more. Yes, it was predictable and a little thin and packed with men tearing off their clothes, but it was also funny, wonderfully shot, and featured a collection of interesting characters, with Tatum and McConaughey turning in career-best performances (which they have since surpassed).

Second time around, the story is even thinner – it’s barely an L, let alone an XXL. Dallas and The Kid have taken up a business offer in Macau (an excuse to write McConaughey and Alex Pettyfer out because they didn’t want to do a sequel), leaving the remainder of The Kings Of Tampa strippers high and dry.

Mike (Tatum), who has been out of the stripping game for a few years, reconnects with the Kings and decides to join them on one last road trip to a strippers’ convention before they all hang up their leopard-print g-strings for good.

Despite the slightness of story, Magic Mike XXL works as a fun road-trip movie because the characters are good value and the naturalistic dialogue carries plenty of laughs.

The film recaptures the upbeat vibe of the previous one’s best bits, dispensing with the “drugs are bad, stripping is bad” moralising that darkened it and focusing on keeping it light – no punches are packed, and no messages are driven home.

Each of the characters has their moment and their issues, mostly based around what to do with their lives after stripping, but it’s never heavy and just ensures the film is engaging. Without characters to empathise and laugh with (and at), Magic Mike XXL would be a total waste of time.

It’s the laughs that are key though. The finale routines are pretty funny, and Manganiello’s Richie gets a larger role, which helps fill the void left by McConaughey’s absence. A sequence where he attempts to get a service station attendant to smile is a hilarious highlight.

The choreography is excellent once again, and the addition of Donald Glover aka Childish Gambino is welcome, plus Tatum’s chemistry with Amber Heard is a million times better than what he shared with Cody Horn in the first film.

The biggest flaw lies in the length – maybe Magic Mike XL would have sufficed. A detour through a club Mike used to dance in drags on and on, packing in a lot of “male entertainment” routines and slowing proceedings down considerably.

Matched with the general thinness of the story, such delays are frustrating. The road trip’s goal of reaching a stripper’s convention of Myrtle Beach seems to take forever and then is dealt with fleetingly.

Fans of the original will come for the stripping, but stay for the laughs in this solid sequel.

Terminator Genisys

(M) ★½

Director: Alan Taylor.

Cast: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Emilia Clarke, Jai Courtney, Jason Clarke, Lee Byung-hun, J. K. Simmons.

"Alas, poor T-200, I knew him well."

WHEN Arnie uttered the immortal line “I’ll be back” in T2: Judgment Day, it felt like a promise to fans – the promise of more action, more awesomeness and more groundbreaking cinema.

In hindsight it was a threat – the threat of an increasingly Frankensteined corpse of a franchise, regularly re-animated to the point that it looks less and less like the thing it started out as.

The Terminator and T2 are classics for a reason, but they kickstarted something that just won’t die (and I don't mean the T-1000).

T3: Rise Of The Machines was passable (but forgettable) and T4: Salvation was kinda cool (but equally forgettable), but now we've reached T5: Genisys - a film as bad as its spelling and easily the worst Terminator movie to date.

It’s plot itself is a warning about the dangers of time travel – mess with the space-time continuum too much and you’ll end up with a bizarre mish-mash that ruins everything ... just like this screenplay.

Initially it sets out to retell the story of the first film from the perspective of Kyle Reese (Aussie Jai Courtney inhabiting Michael Biehn’s old role) instead of Sarah Connor (Emilia Clarke instead of Linda Hamilton).

Except that when Reese arrives in 1984 to protect Sarah from futuristic killer robots, he finds the first film’s Terminator (Schwarzenegger) is already a good guy and has been in the past protecting and training Sarah for about a decade.

As a result, Sarah is no longer the scared waitress needing Reese’s aid – she’s now a gun-toting war machine ready for battle, which is convenient because more Terminators are on their way to 1984 to kill Sarah and re-write the future.

From there the plot gets more convoluted and annoying, with some big questions left unanswered, but that’s just one faulty cog in this busted machine.

Emilia Clarke’s performance is terrible. You don’t need a time machine to foresee a Razzie nomination in her future. When you’re getting out-acted by Arnold Schwarzenegger playing a robot, you know you're in trouble.

It’s not entirely her fault. The lame characterisations don’t help the situation, leaving the Aussie duo of Courtney and Jason Clarke struggling to make us care about Kyle Reese and John Connor. Even a brattish teenaged Edward Furlong made us care about John Connor.

In fact, the best defined character is Arnie’s T-800. Just let that sink in for a moment – a robot with no emotions elicits the most empathy and has the best character arc. That’s how bad this movie is.

The attempts at humour regularly bomb and the action sequences are largely forgettable. The only set piece that doesn’t just wash over you comes early in the film and features a battle between two T-800s. I’d like to say that fight alone is worth the price of admission alone, but it’s not.

Director Alan Taylor (Thor: The Dark World) does a decent job trying to capture the look and feel of the original Terminator in the 1984 scenes, but the rest of the movie feels toneless and interchangeable with so many contemporary CG-heavy actioners.

There are few things to recommend in this hot mess of dumb repetitive action and idiocy. You just know they’re already planning more ways to revive the franchise, but you’ll leave the cinema wishing they would turn off the life-support and walk away.

Ted 2

(MA15+) ★★½

Director: Seth MacFarlane.

Cast: Mark Wahlberg, Seth MacFarlane, Amanda Seyfried, Jessica Barth, Morgan Freeman, Giovanni Ribisi.

"It says here you have to insert your penis into my vagina... yeah, this isn't gonna work."

HAS there ever been a comedy sequel that matches the original?

None come to mind, and Ted 2 certainly isn’t the exception that proves the rule.

It’s probably funnier than a lot of comedies, but its hit-miss ratio still skews to the miss side and certainly doesn’t have the high number of LOLs its predecessor had.

This sequel picks up where the last one left off, opening with the anthropomorphic teddy bear of the title (voiced by writer/director MacFarlane) getting married to his beloved white-trash girlfriend Tami-Lynn (Barth).

The wedded bliss doesn’t last long, leading Ted and Tami-Lynn to try for a baby to get their marriage back on track.

But their quest for a child raises red flags with the government regarding the legal status of a toy brought to life by a child's wish - is Ted a person or a piece of property?

The meandering plot dabbles with themes of civil rights, touching on race issues and gay marriage and adding a nice level of depth to a film that is otherwise pre-occupied with profanity, pot and porn.

It's those three Ps that provide the laughs again, and though the schtick wears thinner this time around, the CG teddy bear and his 'thunderbuddy' John (Wahlberg) are still a funny pairing.

Wahlberg's under-utilised comedic talents are again a highlight, as is newcomer Seyfried as Sam, Ted's bong-smoking lawyer and John's new love interest.

As with the original, this is strictly for fans of MacFarlane's brand of humour, which he honed with his show Family Guy.

That cartoon's success and the surprise box office domination of Ted have given MacFarlane carte blanche to do what he likes, as evidenced by his misfiring anachronistic western A Million Ways To Die In The West and the excesses on show in Ted 2.

The best examples of the latter are a Busby Berkeley-style opening credits sequence and a musical interlude of Seyfried singing Mean Ol' Moon, both of which add little to the film and nothing to the plot and seem to be there because MacFarlane wants them there. Ditto for his drawn-out pop culture references, such as riffs on Revenge Of The Nerds and Jurassic Park, and a few other gag sequences that don't work and just slow things down in an already overlong movie.

MacFarlane is a talent, no doubt, but his best may be yet to come. Ted was up there, but Ted 2 suffers from comedy sequelitis (if there is such a thing).

For the few jokes that work and the team-up of Ted, Wahlberg and Seyfried, this follow-up is worth a look but only if you loved the original.

Inside Out

(PG) ★★★★★

Director: Pete Docter.

Cast: (voices of) Amy Poehler, Phyllis Smith, Bill Hader, Lewis Black, Mindy Kaling, Kaitlyn Dias, Diane Lane, Kyle MacLachlan, Richard Kind.

"They elected who as president?"

INSIDE Out is proof positive that when the Pixar brains trust puts its collective mind to an idea, they can do anything.

The thought of doing a film largely set within the head of an 11-year-old girl and where the principle characters are her emotions would send every other animation studio reaching for the metaphorical paracetamol before immediately turning its attention to another Madagascar/Ice Age/Shrek/Despicable Me sequel/spin off.

Not Pixar. Having already pushed the boundaries by using a grumpy elderly widower as a hero, making a largely wordless enviro-centric sci-fi flick, and celebrating the joys of food with a cast of rats, the concept at the heart of Inside Out is a bold yet natural progression for this game-changing institution.

But the fact that they pull off this hair-brained idea so brilliantly and beautifully is enough to make you want to stand up and applaud.

The 11-year-old girl in question is Riley (voiced by Dias) and the emotions in charge of the control room that is her mind are Joy (Poehler), Fear (Hader), Disgust (Kaling), Anger (Black), and Sadness (Smith). All are tested when Riley and her folks (Lane and MacLachlan) sell up their Minnesota home and relocate to San Francisco, triggering something of an emotional breakdown for the girl and her anthropomorphic feelings.

Director Docter (Up, Monsters Inc), the screenwriters, and Pixar's brain trust reportedly spent three and a half years getting the story of Inside Out exactly right, and it shows.

The script sets up Riley's internal world with an ease that belies the amount of thought, research and sweat that must have gone into it - in the charmingly simple opening, we're introduced to the emotions, their roles, and the creative way the film demonstrates such intangible concepts as making and storing memories and the things that are important to Riley in her own mind.

At its simplest it's a journey story - two of the characters are trying to get from one place to another - but that journey takes us through some fascinating locations we've never seen in a family film before. Abstract thought, the subconscious, the imagination, "the dream factory", long-term memory - these are all shown in inventive ways, as are the critters that populate these areas.

But this is so much more than just a journey. There is a level of depth, heart, reality, beauty, honesty and, of course, emotion in this film that is astounding for any type of movie, let alone something that's largely marketed to kids.

At the lowest age bracket, which is lower primary school-age children, there is enough light and movement to keep them interested, plus they're bound to have a basic enough grasp of different emotions to keep track of things.

At the "tween" level (and for early teens), the subject matter is bound to resonate, as they've just gone through these kind of pre-pubescent mental shifts or are just about to go through them. It's dealt with so simply and truthfully that it has to hit the mark.

Realistically though, this is a movie for the parents. This film is a grown-up wolf in kid's clothing, or mutton dressed as lamb, to labour the sheep analogies.

It's bright colours and cartoonish characters may make it look like its targeted at the young'uns, however the beautifully nuanced ideas such as the loss of innocence and the importance of sadness reveal this as the mature think-piece it really is. It's a movie about kids trying to understand who they are, and as a result, it's about and for parents trying to understand their kids.

Inside Out is also laugh-at-loud funny, cry-out-loud moving, and genuinely thrilling, exciting and fascinating.

Picking the greatest Pixar movie was already difficult, but the arrival of their latest effort just made it all the harder.