• Home
  • Movie News
  • Movie Trailers
  • Reviews
    • Cinema Reviews
    • Home Entertainment Reviews
      • Blu-ray Review
      • DVD Review
  • Competitions
  • Features
    • Interview

Movie Muser

Have your say about cinema

WIN! The Legend Of Hercules On Blu-ray! – The hero gets an origin story

4th August 2014 By Tim Isaac

The Legend Of Hercules is out on 3D Blu-ray and DVD on the 4th August 2014 courtesy of Lionsgate, and we’ve teamed up with them to give away two copies of the Blu-ray in this comp!

Kellan Lutz (The Expendables 3) stars as the mythical Greek hero, Hercules, in this epic origin story. The son of Zeus is betrayed by his stepfather, a tyrant King (Scott Adkins; The Expendables 2) and sold into slavery. Hercules must then embark on a legendary odyssey using his extraordinary strength to overthrow the king and restore peace to the land.

The Legend Of Hercules is an epic action adventure with mind-blowing thrills and an all-star supporting cast including Liam McIntyre (Spartacus: War of the Damned), Roxanne Mckee (Game of Thrones) and Gaia Weiss (Vikings).

If you’d like to try and win one of the two copies of The Legend Of Hercules on Blu-ray that we’ve got to give away, sign in to the site below (or click here to register) and answer the multiple choice question (see below for more details on how to enter). The competition closes on August 17th, 2014, so get answering and good luck!

HOW TO ENTER: This competition is open to all registered Movie Muser members who live in the UK. It’s free to register and obligation free, and once you’ve signed up to the site, you’ll be able to enter any other competitions we run, plus post comments, join in on the forum or even have your own film blog. CLICK HERE TO REGISTER. If you’re already a member, sign in below and answer the multiple choice question in the grey box, click enter, and you’re done!

This competition closes at 11.59pm on August 17th, 2014. Competition open to UK residents aged 15 or over. (For general competition terms and conditions, privacy policy and site T&Cs, CLICK HERE)

The Prize Finder – UK Competitions

CHECK OUT THESE RELATED ARCHIVES:

Starred Up (DVD) – Trying to find a way through prison life

3rd August 2014 By Tim Isaac


Eric (Jack O’Connell) is transferred from a young offenders institution to adult prison, and while he feels as if he can be a king in this new place, it soon becomes clear that he’s been thrust somewhere far more brutal and dangerous than he’s used to. The young man knows that his father, Neville (Ben Mendelsohn) is in the prison, and is hoping for a reunion.

It’s an awkward reunion though, as while Nev is keen to protect his boy, he is a violent, dangerous man and the two have very little common ground, especially due to the anger Eric barely seems to realise he harbours against his father.

The prison regime seems to have already given up on Eric, with officers already talking about the need to simply ‘warehouse’ the unpredictable boy for the rest of his life. However Oliver (Rupert Friend) sees hope and wants him in his prison rehabilitation group. Some of the officers see Oliver’s attempt to help the prisoners as a dangerous threat to the status quo, and are planning ways to ensure it fails. However it may be Eric’s only hope to turn his life around, not just so that one day he could become a productive member of society, but simply so that he can survive prison, where the threat doesn’t just come from other prisoners but from the guards too.

Starred Up was released in UK cinemas this year to almost universal acclaim, and there is indeed a lot to praise. The performances from O’Connell and Mendelsohn are absolutely belters. Both of them completely inhabit their desperate and dangerous characters, sucking you into their world so that even though they are both definitely wrong’uns, you feel involved with their lives and hope they can change things.

Likewise as a piece of drama it’s tense and dramatic. There’s never a point where you aren’t engrossed in this brutal, grim and endlessly volatile world. It is an excellent piece of filmmaking that will keep your heart in your mouth and make you question the mentality of incarceration.

It also has a thankfully undramatic take on prison homosexuality. There’s a tendency in films to treat anything gay in prison as being evidence of the degradation of being incarcerated, as if two men having sexual contact intrinsically demeans at least one of them. However Starred Up realises it can simply be about human connection, even amongst those who on the outside would be straight. It may be a surprise when it’s discovered, but the film certainly doesn’t judge it.

My only gripe is with one of the things that was most vaunted on its cinema release – its realism. I had the same reaction as I do with the endless stream of British movies set on council estates, where people live grim lives, are constantly miserable and if they go outside there’s a 75% chance someone will try and murder them. In those cases there seems to be a presumption that if it’s powerful and miserable, it must be realistic, even though just a little thought makes you realised you’re getting an incredibly heightened version of reality, where the problem are brought into the sort of didactic relief you’d never find in real life.

I had a similar feeling with Starred Up. Now I’m not saying it’s completely fake – far from it fact, as it’s written by a man who, like Oliver, used to run groups for prisoners where he tried to challenge their behaviour and improve their lives. However it is undoubtedly a heightened, condensed version of this world. After all, if real prisons were places where nobody could finish a single conversation without trying to murder somebody, it simply couldn’t function.

The film does look at real problems and real issues, but I think to call it realism actually does it disservice. There’s a tendency that this phrase allows middle class people with no idea what that kind of life is really like to sit safely on the sidelines while feeling like they’re being educated. However it can be a way to let themselves off the hook – because they’ve mistaken being immersed with seeing something ‘real’, they don’t actually properly engage with what they’re watching.

That would be a shame, as Starred Up is a very good film with a lot of interesting things to say, but just don’t excuse yourself by praising its ‘realism’ and not dig into what the point of its heightened prison universe actually is.

Overall Verdict: Superb performances and buckets of tension mean Starred Up is an incredibly engrossing watch. I may have an issue with what people perceive as its realism, but that doesn’t mean it’s not vital.

Special Features:
‘Making Of…’ Featurette
Interview With Jack O’Connell & Director David McKenzie
Behind The Scenes Footage

Reviewer: Tim Isaac

CHECK OUT THESE RELATED ARCHIVES:

The Legend Of Hercules (DVD) – Kellan Lutz goes Greek mythological (sort of)

3rd August 2014 By Tim Isaac


The Legend Of Hercules is less a movie than a collection of other films and TV series that have been dissected and then stitched back together to make something new (sort of). Fans of Greek mythology probably won’t be that impressed either, as while it takes little bits of the legends it creates its own story to turn it into a kind of superhero origin story.

The tyrannical King Amphitryon (Scott Adkins) is renowned as the most fearsome warrior around, who no one can beat in battle. His wife, Alcmene (Roxanne McKee), is told by a messenger of Hera that she will have a son by Zeus –who will be called Hercules – and whose destiny is to restore peace to the land. Amphitryon isn’t impressed by this new addition to the family, who he decides will be called Alcides, and is never shy about telling him he’s not as good as older brother Iphicles (Liam Garrigan).

Once grown Alcides (Kellan Lutz) falls for the beautiful Princess Of Crete (Gaia Weiss), which turns out to be a bad idea as she’s been promised to Iphicles. With Amphitryon feeling Alcides’ dalliance has shamed the family, he sends him off into battle where he expects him to die. Before Alcides goes, his mother tells him his father is Zeus and he’s really called Hercules, something the young man doesn’t believe is true.

Instead of dying in battle as he’s supposed to, Alcides is sold into slavery. He must then come to terms with his supernatural birthright if he is going to win his freedom and free the kingdom.

The Legend Of Hercules is not a great film. It seems to hope that nicking bits of 300 (particularly the idea of slowing down and speeding up the action during battle), Gladiator, Spartacus (both the 1960 film and the recent TV series – even to the point of casting Liam McIntyre as Hercules’ friend Soltiris), along with modern superhero films, will make it worth watching in its own right. That could have been okay if it didn’t have a script that feels like it is trying to be Shakespeare written by an amateur, and acted like it’s a high school play.

Add in some almost astounding preposterousness and the fact the bad guys have less depth than panto villains, and a lot of it is almost impossibly stupid.

There are some positives. The action scenes are pretty good even if they are a little over the top, and if you’re a fan of men with big muscles, there are plenty of those on display. In fact after the incredibly stupid first 40 minutes, it gets pretty watchable in an so-bad-it’s-good way, so that its stunning silliness starts to bring a smile to your face rather than a grimace

The Legend Of Hercules never genuinely gets good, and you’re certainly not going to want to watch it on repeat, but it could have been worse.

Overall Verdict: A spectacularly silly and messy amalgam of 100 other films and TV series, which has its moments but will generally leave you wondering how they thought a lot of it was a good idea.

Special Features:
Audio Commentary
‘The Making of The Legend of Hercules’ Featurette

Reviewer: Tim Isaac

CHECK OUT THESE RELATED ARCHIVES:

The Double (Blu-ray) – Into Richard Ayoade’s idiosyncratic world

3rd August 2014 By Tim Isaac


Richard Ayoade impressed many with his directorial debut, Submarine, and now he’s back with something a little more ambitious – an unusual, highly stylised movie based on a story by Fyodor Dostoyevsky.

Jesse Eisenberg is Simon, who lives in a David Lynch by way of Terry Gillian self-contained world. He works as clerk for a government agency, where no matter what great ideas he comes up with, nobody seems to notice him. That includes the woman of his dreams (Mia Wasikowska), who works in the copy room but barely seems to remember him, despite the fact he’s close to being her stalker.

Then James turns up, who is Simon’s exact physical double, although they have very different personalities, to the point of almost being exact opposites. Immediately James becomes the toast of the office, with the managers thinking everything he does is brilliant (even though he’s largely just stealing the more timid Simon’s ideas and work). Simon is perplexed, especially as nobody else seems to notice the resemblance between them.

The Double is certainly an idiosyncratic creation – it’s a movie that’s at once perplexing, beautiful, surreal, bleak, beautifully realised, often funny and sometimes utterly inspired. However even it can’t seem to decide what it’s for or why – or to be more accurate, it knows what it wants to be all about, but then keeps getting sidetracked and losing focus. For most films that would be disastrous, but The Double is so much in its own world and the sidetracks are often incredibly creative and clever – even if they do distract from the central spine of the movie – that it pulls through.

For instance, many people have commented on the absolutely brilliant sci-fi TV show, The Replicator (starring Paddy Considine), within The Double, which pops up every now and then. However the film often seems so enamoured with this show that it forgets why it’s there and it becomes a distraction to the overall film, no matter how brilliant it is as an idea in its own right. (That said, those who do want to see more of this wonderful slice of 70s-style sci-fi will be pleased to hear there are extended sequences from it in the special features).

There are moments in The Double where it feels like it may simply become a jumble of allusions to its inspirations, from Kafka and Kurowsawa to Brazil (the movie) and The Red Balloon, rather than something complete and fulfilling in its own right. As with Simon’s life, many things are clear thematically, but there are always things that don’t fit, or are left unexplained. It’s strange and sometimes a little frustrating, but it never stops being interesting and incredibly stimulating, even when it’s being annoying.

It’s certainly a singular vision (no matter how much in interviews Ayoade likes to suggest he merely stands there saying ‘yes’ and ‘no’ and then points a camera at the actors) and often a fascinating one – if nothing else the creation of its own miniature, self-contained universe (almost like a world in a bottle) is brilliant – but I couldn’t help feeling a little more focus could have turned this from a good film into a miniature masterpiece. If you’re like me you’ll come away from The Double feeling you’ve seen something special, but annoyed that even it seems unclear about what’s special about it.

Overall Verdict: As frustrating and peripatetic as it is beautiful and smart. The Double is an odd beast that’s certainly never dull and is often inspired, even if its tendency to get sidetracked detracts from its moment of brilliance.

Special Features:
Making Of
Deleted scenes
Extended scenes
Trailers

Reviewer: Tim Isaac

CHECK OUT THESE RELATED ARCHIVES:

Masters Of Sex – Season 1 (DVD) – What’s the best way to learn about sex?

3rd August 2014 By Tim Isaac


Masters Of Sex is certainly a provocative title, and one that could promise a lot but deliver little. Thankfully though that’s far from the case with this excellent series, which takes a fictionalised look at the real-life Dr. Williams Master (Martin Sheen) and Virginia Johnson (Lizzy Caplan), who revolutionised our understanding of sex by looking at it scientifically.

It’s amazing to think that in the 1950s we’d split the atom, begun to understand quantum physics, built skyscrapers that reached over 1,000 feet into the sky, and yet we knew remarkably little about something as fundamental as sex, largely due to prurience.

As presented here, Masters is a wunderkind doctor and he knows it. He’s arrogant and convinced of his own genius – but he wants to do something he knows could risk his career and get him fired. He wants to study human sexuality scientifically and to do it in person.

This presents all manner of problems – such as who would agree to be watched having sex and can Masters get anyone to agree to fund his research? And that’s not to mention what his wife may think. He hires free-spirited divorcee Virginia Master to be his assistant. While he initially thinks she’ll just be a pretty woman who’ll write things up and book appointments, he quickly realises that despite her lack of training she’s incredibly smart and more worldly wise that he is, and so becomes an increasingly vital part of his research – perhaps too close when he starts to wonder whether they should have sex with one another, purely for science of course.

Normally when series are set in the past, there are numerous issues about that era they pretty much ignore, simply because it’s too much to handle. However here the fact it’s about sex and sexuality means it has to take on all sorts of difficult subjects – not just sex itself, but things such as gender politics and homosexuality.

The show doesn’t shy away from the fact that back then men were often total dicks (of course they are absolutely perfect nowadays, as we all know), not because they were innately more evil, but because they’d been raised to look at women as less than men and that females ought to be exactly as men want them to be. As a result it causes all sorts of issues when they’re confronted with women with their own thoughts, aspirations, feelings and sexuality.

It also takes on the hypocrisy over homosexuality, such as Masters thinking he’s being very scientific by including gay prostitutes in his study and treating the subject seriously. However he’s not above blackmailing one of his superiors over his sexuality when his research is threatened. And both gender politics and sexuality come together with a character who’s married with a teenage daughter, but is secretly gay. He believes he’s a good husband and has no idea how what he’s doing has emotionally destroyed his wife (played by the always brilliant Allison Janney).

The show does have a few issues, but they’re exactly the sort of problems a good drama should have. For example it tries to do so much and deal with so many ideas, attitudes and situations that it occasionally gets a little confused and feels like it’s trying to cram in too much. It’s also not afraid of its characters’ flaws, to the point where there are moments when many people in Masters Of Sex do things that threaten to make them totally irredeemable, but it always manages to pull things back.

However perhaps the series masterstroke was the casting of the leads. Michael Sheen is perfect as a man who in many ways is a bit of a monster, but the actor always ensures Masters is still interesting and that no matter what seemingly awful thing he does, you never stop caring about him. Lizzy Caplan meanwhile is just phenomenal as Virginia Johnson, a woman who is determined to be her own person despite the strictures placed around her by society.

The four disc set includes all 12 episodes on four DVDs, although unfortunately there are no special features.

Overall Verdict: A great show that goes far beyond simple titillation, exploring gender and sexuality decades ago, but which reflects on our attitudes now.

Special Features:
None

Reviewer: Tim Isaac

CHECK OUT THESE RELATED ARCHIVES:

Mood Indigo – Suitably surreal for Michel Gondry, but is that all?

2nd August 2014 By Tim Isaac


I bow to no-one in my love for all things French and quirky, particularly Audrey Tatou, but can I be the first to call time on the Romain Duris-Tatou love-in? After Pot Luck, Russian Dolls and Chinese Puzzle comes yet another romantic drama set in Paris, which looks gorgeous, is fun, flirty and flighty – and yet, five minutes after leaving the cinema, leaves not a single trace. Charm will get you a long way in movies, and Tatou and Duris have it in spades, but eventually it wears thin without a decent script or meaty idea behind it.

The blame has to lie with Michel Gondry (Eternal Sunshine), who has the word ‘surreal’ nailed behind him as a default setting for every film writer in the world. Yes, his films all look lovely, and this one is especially sumptuous, with ravishing shots of an Amelie-style Paris and his good-looking leads to point his camera at. But here’s the problem, we now take that for granted. What’s needed is more wit, grit and a decent story. Gondry seems to have been locked into a room full of DVDs of Terry Gilliam and Jean-Pierre Jeunet, with MicMacs and Amelie stuck on repeat, with even a bit of Ratatouille thrown in – there’s an annoying mouse character and an obsession with ravishing food and wine.

Doorbells turn into beetles as they ring – a touch of Frank Kafka here – food wriggles on its plate, eels come out of the tap, and Duris and his chef/best pal Sy live in what appears to be a railway carriage suspended above Paris. Duris has even invented a piano that mixes cocktails depending on what chords the player presses.

Duris is a young inventor with plenty of cash who’s living a great life in a semi-fictional Paris, with Sy providing him with a seemingly never-ending display of outrageous dishes and accompanying drinks. His clothes seem to choose themselves, even his shoes move around so he can slip into them easily. There is only one problem. His pal Elmaleh has snapped up Sy’s niece as his girlfriend, and poor old Duris is single. They all go to a party where he meets Tatou, and they begin to date. Their first encounter is a day in a flying cloud – oh, very Gondry – which hovers above the city, a Paris which still has the building site which is currently Les Halles, weirdly.

They go ice skating, get serious and eventually marry, and reality suddenly steps in. Elmaleh has spent all of his money – and most of Duris’ – on buying second-hand books by his favourite author, and then tragedy strikes. A single snowflake enters her lung on honeymoon, and her coughing gets worse until eventually an x-Ray finds the problem – she has a flower growing in her lung. The treatment seems to work, but it is expensive.

The ‘flower’ is clearly a metaphor for cancer or serious illness, but there are two problems here. Firstly we don’t know enough about the central couple to really care about them – yes, they’re good-looking and they both like ice-skating, but that’s about it. Secondly the visual trickery, with amazing animation, dazzling shots and colour-co-ordinations, sits uneasily with the serious mood change the film attempts. When Tatou gets seriously ill, suddenly we get a screen full of ice blues, replacing the warm yellows and browns of the previous 90 minutes – it seems a little clumsy at best, distasteful at worst. Alice In Wonderland-style rodents scurrying around and a deep look at cancer are uneasy bedfellows.

Overall verdict: Paper-thin, self-consciously ‘quirky’ romantic drama which wears its charm like a badge of honour. Whether you go with it or not depends entirely on mood, but it is certainly a test of patience.

Reviewer: Mike Martin

CHECK OUT THESE RELATED ARCHIVES:
« Previous Page
Next Page »

Search this site…

Get Social

RSSTwitterFacebook

Get new posts by e-mail

Get the latest in our daily e-mail

Latest Cinema & Home Ent. Reviews

Mortal Engines (Cinema Review)

Anna and the Apocalypse (Cinema Review)

Suspiria (Cinema Review)

Overlord (Cinema Review)

King of Thieves (Cinema Review)

Isle of Dogs (DVD Review)

Mission: Impossible – Fallout (Cinema Review)

Tomb Raider (Blu-ray Review)

The Bridge 4 (DVD Review)

My Friend Dahmer (Cinema Review)

Latest News & Trailers

Detective Pikachu Trailer – Pokemon is going live action with Ryan Reynolds

Toy Story 4 Teaser Trailer – Woody & the gang are coming back once more

Aladdin Teaser Trailer – Guy Ritchie directs Disney’s latest live-action adaptation

New Glass Trailer – The worlds of Unbreakable and Split meet

Aquaman Extended Trailer – Jason Momoa goes to war under the seas against Patrick Wilson

New Overlord Trailer – Soldiers take on Nazi-created zombies in the JJ Abrams produced movie

The Mule Trailer – Clint Eastwood is an octogenarian drug runner opposite Bradley Cooper

Vice Trailer – Christian Bale transforms into former Vice President Dick Cheney

Mary Queen of Scots Trailer – Saoirse Ronan & Margot Robbie get Elizabethan

New Mortal Engines Trailer – London is literally on the move in the steampunk fantasy

Handpicked MediaHandpicked MediaCopyright © 2025 Muser Media · Powered by WordPress & Genesis Framework · Log in
Movie Muser is a member of The Handpicked Media network

This website uses cookies to improve your experience. We'll assume you're ok with this, but you can opt-out if you wish.Accept Read More
Privacy & Cookies Policy

Privacy Overview

This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may affect your browsing experience.
Necessary
Always Enabled
Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. This category only includes cookies that ensures basic functionalities and security features of the website. These cookies do not store any personal information.
Non-necessary
Any cookies that may not be particularly necessary for the website to function and is used specifically to collect user personal data via analytics, ads, other embedded contents are termed as non-necessary cookies. It is mandatory to procure user consent prior to running these cookies on your website.
SAVE & ACCEPT
 

Loading Comments...
 

You must be logged in to post a comment.