andylev-40916 Reviews

Operation Fortune: Ruse de Guerre (2023)

Enjoyable and tongue in cheek

[7/10 · 16 April 2023]

I personally don't think Jason can do wrong and he played, for my money, a spoof spy in a spoof spy film. Jason played Jason.

Surely noone can take it seriously? It was an enjoyable comedy, a spoof, I mean an action film star playing himself in an action film!

Proper baddies, proper action, really quite tame killing, some good effects, tongue in cheek acting, clearly fun to make.

A slapstick take on a Bond movie. A comedy.

And why not?

It's far from perfect, it's devoid of deep meaning and welcome relief from all the current doom and gloom. Enjoy a daft fun movie for a while and forget your troubles.

Obviously I recommend it.

A Spy Among Friends (2022)

Might be good if you can actually see it

[1/10 · 2 April 2023]

I give up! I think that's it's a fascinating part of UK history that I have heard about and thought that I can get to understand more. I also thought my wife, NON-UK, might gain a little insight into UK history and the role of MI5, KGB, spies etc.

Sadly it seems to require pre-reading or maybe a history course.

Some attempts were made to give it context but it really didn't help the utter appalling LIGHTING!!

If we could at least SEE what was going on then, yes, we would be actually seeing a good drama. Given the quantity of scenes that were just reflections of my living room it's not that engaging.

Yes, London was dreary and yes, posh twits are grey, but not ALL the time.

Do the directors think Beirut was also grey and dull???

My takeaway from episode one and the little of episode 2 was that sticking doors are an essential part of de-briefing a potential security risk.

I refuse to persevere with "gritty realism" achieved through filming with low low low lighting.

Murder Mystery 2 (2023)

Inoffensive but not funny

[3/10 · 1 April 2023]

Firstly it proves that Netflix will commission anything. Secondly I still don't get WHY SHOUTING A LOT is considered as comedy. Apparently yes in USA.

The film has lots of gags, lots of action, lots of slapstick but nothing that provides actual laughs.

I guess it assumes that the viewer likes the 2 "stars" ie found Friends funny. Which it isn't.

If you like stereotypes and bland humour of an 8 year old then it doesn't offend. Hay yo. I guess older actors eventually run out of money.

The mystery? There isn't any. The murder? Dunno. Make up your own jokes they can only be funnier than Murder mystery 2.

The Whale (2022)

A study in how mental illness is ignored.

[3/10 · 12 March 2023]

It was sort of vouyerism, fat-porn, how yukky! A disgusting disabled person. A stereotype.

The set, the open front door, the characters coming and going all screams stage play adapted for film.

I'm still baffled how at the start was the guy with massive mental health issues was being a valued contribution to society through teaching and not just a yuk-fest. Very dubious how the nurse, the sister of his dead boyfriend, her brother, was the carer to the whale. Surely she wanted to allow him to die. He leaves his wife because he fell in love with one his students. So what. He discovered he is gay. He divorced. Why become estranged from his daughter?

His lover starves himself to death, he eats himself to death out of grief.

I agree with Lindy West. Why labour an essay written by the daughter. So who is Moby Dick?

The fake missionary from a cult hated by the carer, the moody society hating teen daughter are, no doubt, comments on society but they do nothing for society's view of people with mental health issues. "Let them die" is that the message?

I was left feeling meh, nothing much really.

Detective Knight: Redemption (2022)

Terribly sad

[3/10 · 25 January 2023]

How absolutely terribly sad to see Bruce reduced to this. So much of the time, it seems, he really didn't know what he was doing. Clearly not the man we once knew reduced to short lines of incredibly awkward script and stillted movement. Aside from Bruce's health limitations it is a dreadful film devoid of plot, a weird mismatch of flashbacks and seemingly random scenes with an awful synth music score. I tackled the pain through to the end and still non the wiser! Apparently a jailbreak, which was the easiest on film, with prisoners somehow getting out of prison and into New York unapposed, then able to all to obviously break in to a bank aided by the Mayor, why? I guess there was a backstory I missed regarding the escapee who was the single maskless robber. Not sure why.

I get the odd editing to make allowances for Bruce with the only "action" scene conviniently in the dark but it was still an uncomfortable watch.

I guess the dominance of mask wearing hid Bruce's stunt double in the end scene.

A final gripe. With all the chaos how come no police or national guard on streets, why police spent so much time in the office?

It's time to stop making films as vehicles for very age'd actors.

Hold Tight (2022)

Another dreary durge from Harlam

[1/10 · 15 January 2023]

Indescribable garbage. You need to watch to appreciate the laughable dubbing,terrible synth muzak, hilarious acting and a bad plot. It sounds like each character is dubbed in separate rooms using different echos. No character is worth caring about. The fact they get murdered? Meh! This is the sort of cheap to produce tat using a known name used as a hook, that Netflix pads out its dross with.

One other standout laugh is the school full of 30 year old students.

On a positive note it's nice to see other cities and unfamiliar architecture but it doesn't make me care that whoever gets murdered for whatever reason. As said by other reviews. Who cares about moody, horney teenagers?

Nanny (2022)

Not a horror and a boring drama

[3/10 · 24 December 2022]

Not for me. Gave up after 30 minutes because I couldn't wait for anything mildly exciting. The plot? Was there a plot? No scares, no tension. Bad dreams, some ghosts?

The acting is good. The actors are great. I love the context, American immigrants, different cultures and the issues associated. However it got boring quickly while waiting for some point or climax. Some scenes were creepy, some where just a dream. Really? Sex scene completely unnecessary. If it was a commentary on social issues for a single mum in Africa and working as an immigrant in the USA then it would be a good movie.

Don't waste your time.

1899 (2022)

I barely got through 30 minutes

[3/10 · 23 November 2022]

I gave up after 30 minutes of episode 1. Is it dubbed? Why--all--d-i-a-l-o-g-u-e so stilted? Is it trying to make it mysterious or just tedious? Is the whole series spoken in ye olde days speak? It's as stupid as pronouning Ye Olde as Ye OldE when Ye is just The and Olde is just Old! Just talk like people talk and pick up the pace. Long tiresome gaps between each characters lines don't make a conversation?

I gather that everyone has a dark secret and there is a missing ship and the oh-so scandalous women doctor has a missing brother and is mad or something and is a hero.. I don't care. At the bit after saving the pregnancy in the shameful lower decks when hero doc meets alcoholic captain I gave up.

I mean, what? Upper class travelers don't know there are lower decks?

I admit that I'm judging 8 hours based on 30 minutes but so far it's a 'trying to be creepy', 'trying to be clever' wet Downton Abbey minus the acting.

Yet more Netflix padding. I bet 90 minutes could tell the entire story minus the guff and painful acting.

Goodnight Mommy (2022)

Not scarry, not a thriller

[1/10 · 22 November 2022]

I have not seen the original but right from the start there were too many clues in the dumb script.

Inexplicably mummy wore a guaze mask to suggest what? Plastic surgery? A injury? Without mummy explaining any reasonable scenario immediately indicated a dumb attempt at throwing suspicion on her. It simply indicates that the problem is the boy. AKA I see dead people, the attempt at never actually referring to the imaginary twin and an event in the barn just gives the game away. Mummy never ever touches Luke nor talks to him.

It comes across as a made for TV daytime drama.

Why is every American "horror" not a horror? This one included. I watched to the end out of curiosity. The overriding question is who the hell uses an oil lamp at night in a hay barn in 2022 and who has hay bales in a barn in a non-working farm?

I guess it's worth watching to play spot the times they give away that Lukes not real.

Shattered (II) (2022)

Hey Malkovich, what's the going rate...

[1/10 · 20 November 2022]

... for lending your name to a B movie? JM is in 3 scenes, maybe 4 The rest of the crummy movie is soft porn, hammy lines from the porn star Sky and a dull obvious plot. I got the sense that the actors were acting in the straight jacket script and story line. The film seemed to be a patchwork of unnecessary scenes. The soft porn could be cut, the murdered girlfriend, the police, the reporters, John malkovich. Cut.

Right from the start, "oh help me choose a bottle of wine while I'm soaking wet in a school girl outfit Mr Singleman.." I mean, spot the honey trap, idiot rich man. Good lord. With such a terrible start nothing was a surprise. Nothing.

It was so incredibly painfully blatent it became quite fun to watch.

You could play,"Guess what happens next" . Maybe play spot the dumb plot holes ( like having the bad guys strip the house but leave a Picasso for Malkovich to use during his one scene) . Another completely unnecessary scene of course. I guess they did have to allow him to act, a bit, and then die.

Oh and by the way you have to believe the only way out of a tech geeks house is a single phone app. Yes of course, because in an emergency you don't need a second means of escape or god forbid, a knob.

Before you watch it please pay attention to the child using the air vent to escape a storage room that inexplicably doesn't open from the inside. Where does she go that leads to the front driveway and the front door? No matter, of course the nine year old shot the badgirl in the back (end film). Good shot kid. PTSD counselling for a child for its entire life then. God bless the USA!

Chronofilm (2020– )

Gave up after 10 minutes

[1/10 · 19 October 2022]

It starts with an interesting propersition but the wheels falls off when the time travel machine arrives. It screams budget. The sound is unbelievable. In one scene of 2 people, one sounds like his in a drain and the other sounds like they are in a sound proof box.

Cue the very annoying backing muzak, more cheap. The final nail in its coffin is the patchy dialogue. It's banial. It begs the question if the observers are interacting with the people in the past then they are changing history.

It quickly becomes a confusion of flash back images, the past while in the present, the past, the future, the what?? Also how are the people in the past being introduced to future tech?

Basically it is garbage.

The Dark Red (2018)

Slow burner

[3/10 · 19 October 2022]

Tedious long drawn out beginning followed by tiny bit of horror (?) then a minute of miraculous arms and fitness scene with a predictable revenge ending.

The premise of breeding telepaths requires hard stares and not special effects clearly fits into the low budget "horror". It is not a horror. It's a low budget thriller (ish) revenge flick.

The birth in a subterranean operating theatre, the eating of the placenta, the theft of the baby falls to bits by leaving an unbound woman free to escape using a broken tile. Quite how a woman escapes bare foot having just given birth who can barely stand.

It's just about OK and fits the quality portfolio one comes to expect from Netflix.

Lou (I) (2022)

Lou or Loo?

[3/10 · 24 September 2022]

The spoiler is great but the film is more Netflix drivel. Predictable, dull, poor dialogue, bad acting, not exciting, engaging nor entertaining.

Don't bother carrying on with watching it in the hope that it gets better. It doesn't.

An old CIA agents who wants to die? Why? Allowed her son to be kidnapped? I think? So he is mad and mad at mum? Failed marriage, one kid, left them but wants to kill granny, his ex and the kid.

Everything is predictable.

The kidnap, the tracking, the rope bridge, the lighthouse bomb, every fight.

Mum and son die die, killed by the CIA, cos it's a cover-up! Really? Who would've guessed?

Everyone is happy after the 2 funerals, obviously but, wait, who owns that hat? It's Lou.

It ticks the boxes ie mixed race child, female lead, female actor of colour, older actor who can fight etc. But sitting on the Loo is more entertaining.

La Brea (2021–2024)

Not unpleasant but it's bland

[3/10 · 16 August 2022]

Rip in time at bottom of big hole or rip in sky depending on the perspective.

I gave up over 2 points. 1. "Let me dig here to prove my visions are real." "oh I give up" "no wait. A ring 12000 years old but in mint condition" 2. "oh darn the drone didn't survive flying through the rip in time. I know let's try a million $ full size aircraft" IT'S A MASSIVE DRONE!!

Pause... Long silent stare into the middle distance

Miracle antibiotics.

Home made lumber puncture.

Mysterious characters Dark secrets Conflicts.

GCI animals.

Running.

More running. I'm routing for the animals.

Boring dialogue.

Boring characters.

Please let them all perish.

The Leftovers got it right. LA Brea. Gets it wrong.

BTW who outside the US relates to "LA Brea" ? What is it??

Office Invasion (2022)

Straight to VHS & the Blockbusters 99p bin

[1/10 · 14 August 2022]

Office invasion. When? Oh! At the very very end after the ever so hilarious antics at AMI. The mining factor where all the old clichés were dug up and made in to a "comedy". Ooh. His jacket got caught in the taxi ha, ha ooh there's a man weeing all over the toilet floor. Omg the bosses are soo mean. And so it drags on and on until the new bosses arrive with their funny accents. They actually are aliens that want the Madeupium or whatever. Who cares.

The film is dumb. Film student dumb. It's maybe 80s funny when funny films weren't funny. Or well made.

Apart from not being funny, it's boring, the overwhelming feeling is "just get a move on". Are the actors bad or is the script terrible? Was there not a budget. Rubber aliens? Really in 2022?

It didn't offend, scare nor entertain. Apparently good enough for Netflix but isn't everything?

From the beautiful country full of beautiful talented actors that gave us District 9, what was Office Invasion?

Moonfall (2022)

Moonfool

[4/10 · 11 August 2022]

Take Iron Sky add Space 1999 plus Thunderbirds add lots of clichés and you have moonfall, y'know cos the moon is falling. Falling. In space. Where stuff doesn't fall. The moon is an alien spacecraft powered by a star under attack by AI that became conscious a billion years ago. Odd that the super brilliant aliens can create AI and star driven hollow moon things but couldn't invent an EMP device to destroy the AI? What?

Nevermind that. Was this a comedy? How come a janitor knows more than NASA? How do you launch a spare space shuttle that you happen to have where exactly? Also it can be flown by pulling some valve levers? Eh?

Yet another CGI-fest, stuffed with big named actors, a cheesy script for 1 dimensional characters. Yet another the beautiful genius, the fool and the washed out hero save the world. A world wrecked by the moon and killing billions but nevermind sort of movie, yawn.

The greatest discovery in the history of mankind is why was this so dull. This action, scify, comedy, CGI failed to launch. Clearly the genre has run out of tarmac. Moonfail.

Dark Blue (2002)

Dull and impossible to follow

[6 August 2022]

I know I'm old but what the hell are they saying? Actually not saying but mumbling over a 1970s generic soundtrack Please point out which part wasn't a generic bad cop movie?

I'm confused, probably because I only caught a quarter of what was said, why did this rate so high? The acting wasn't terrible, bad but not terrible. Shouty cop flicks are great if you like Shouty cop flicks played out using generic characters. You would be forgiven for confusing this film with Naked Gun.

If you don't agree with me watch "Dragged over concrete" I could care nor be bothered to suffer Dark Blue to the predictable end. Rubbish. Avoid.

Keep Breathing (2022)

Confirmed that it's rubbish...

[2/10 · 30 July 2022]

Got bored half way through the first episode. Made-for-morning TV. It's pap. The story, the acting, the flash-backs amount to a bland dull story.

Yet another Netflix flop (YANF?) Many other reviews confirm my thoughts.

Netflix may have the most content but quantity /quality!?

The Gray Man (2022)

Utter rubbish but enjoyable

[5/10 · 23 July 2022]

As others have said it doesn't redefine the genre of the unbreakable anti hero. The entire premise being, because you murdered your father we think you'll make a great invisible assassin. The second premise is, erm, what? An SD card of encrypted potentially ruiness data. "If you copy it, it becomes doubly encrypted" what? No it doesn't. That's not a fact. Ok. Nevermind.

Call the ludicrous other villain to blow up a city to get the disk. While the other villian tries to rescue the kidnapped girl with a trackable pacemaker. You create a child character with a heart condition just to make her trackable. Sorry? What? She pings satellites?

The beyond credible action continues which entails blowing stuff up while one man defeats dozens and dozens of poorly trained soldiers, police and mercinaries.

The gray man only stayed gray for about 10 minutes.

"I'm 6 because 007" was taken. Great line and sets the bar beautifully. Unlike 11 in Strangers Things.

No. It wants to be Bond, Wick, et al but it isn't. The script is too flimsy, the characters too shallow. I didn't care about any of them. If everyone is essentially bad then who am I rooting for? Noone.

How was it resolved? It wasn't. All the bad people who weren't dead got away with whatever bad they were doing. The moral. Be bad but make sure you can get away with it.

It was entertaining if you just switch off the brain and enjoy the 100 round hand guns, ludicrous fight scenes and the CGI. Can someone please explain if you can hitch a ride with a parachute jumper who you kill on the way done so become just a dead weight? No?

The Terminal List (2022– )

Fun, as American gun obsessed fodder

[3/10 · 23 July 2022]

Good story. Script, actors and PHOTOGRAPHY? So very dark. Why film in darkness. Revenge thrillers are nothing new but this is not bad. Fairly obvious who did it but that doesn't matter. It is enjoyable. Bittersweet ending where there are no winners.

The hero is something between en immortal and rambo 🙂. Lots of action, high body count and weapons with infinite bullet. Just don't look for deep hidden meanings. You killed my brothers, I will kill you. A poorly conceived conspiracy with tons of flashbacks that don't progress the story. If his daughters picture is so precious why scribble on the back of it. Still not sure what the suicidal bird means.

For a culture obsessed with guns it fetishises killing. No wonder the mentally ill can seems themselves as Rambo/Terminator exacting revenge on society.

Underworld: Rise of the Lycans (2009)

Boring with gross overacting

[2/10 · 5 July 2022]

Shout, stare... ouch my contact lenses are killing me. A dull film with a terrible script. Hardly any actual story with stilted acting. Gci is OK but not when it shores up a dreadfull film. One to avoid.

Choose or Die (2022)

Choose this or die Netflix

[1/10 · 16 April 2022]

Was that the pitch? Choose to fund this sh>t or Die?

A video game horror! Ooh how original. The 1980s game seemed to inspire some 1980s Blockbusters straight to video crud. I'm sure that actors including Eddie Marsan went to drama school. So why the terrible acting? Terrible script, plot, location, set, effects.

Even the end when the story explains itself it made no sense.

In summary. Don't choose this awful film.

Brazen (2022)

Daytime, teatime TV cr4p

[2/10 · 14 January 2022]

I don't know the actress but blackfacing is deeply offensive and she is a bland actor.

The soap style made for DVD, TV banal bland "film" is offensive in its own way.

It's a pile of you-know-what.

It has no suspense, it's obvious, it's predictable, it's badly acted. The characters are 1 dimensional cardboard cut-outs that you don't care about.

It's the sort of drivel used in throwaway paperbacks of old.

Just to spoil it. The weird student son of the senator did it.

Elves (2021)

Should come with an 'elf warning

[2/10 · 11 January 2022]

Annoying family take a vacation to an island with there annoying daughter. It makes sense up until this point.

They run over an baby elf muppet thing. The pain of a teenager goes to 'rescue' baby elf. She uses her misguided "rescue baby animals from their family" thing and here's where it might of got interesting.

The elves take revenge on a local.

The idiot child causes the deaths of 5 locals, risking the entire island with her love of baby animals.

Thank goodness she survives with her family. What a shame.

The series is about 8 episodes too long. Mostly nothing happens. The puppets are not scary. No tension ever builds. Endless scenes of to-and-fro from village to electric elf-proof fencing.

I can't understand why an ok story could not have been a 90 minute horror instead we get a made for daytime TV series.

Apart from some decent acting and lovely scenery the muppet puppet elves actually look like fabric in close-up. This seems to explain the lack of close-ups of small hand puppets and large men in elf suits effects. Consequently the action is minimal and low budget. If the creature reveal is so near the beginning then one expects better effects further in to the series.

Cosmos (I) (2019)

Hand me the cable Mike and unplug this

[3/10 · 10 December 2021]

More cheese anyone? Maybe some ham?

How can recordings to hard drive fail? How did the radio astrology ever managed to develop software?

How can 3 superbright science guys not just use a portable generator?

I get it. All for dramatic tension and the usual need to make computer tech not dull.

3 guys in a volvo. One gazing at his pet project, a satellite, his buddy doing, erm? Well, nothing really apart from pounding a laptop and shouting coordinates?? Why shout? Its just an estate vehicle.

The hero of the piece listens to the galaxy worrying about losing funding for software that visualises in real time from audio signals in the back seat of a car while not recording significant events. Just try rendering anything on less than a server farm.

All the closeups of whizzing hard drives and pointless frienzed keyboard action to make the audio to image stuff identify some binary from space took an hour!! A few clicks of the telescopic control laptop, a shift to ultraviolet and, oh look, a spaceship. Guess the shape?

There was some sexual tension between 2 characters, get a room guys, lots of lingering looks, some bad temper, some Astro bants from the Astro-nuts, clever eh? See what they did there, Astronauts, astronuts. Obvious I know but everything must be over-explained???

Please. Tell me who in the Volvo didn't know everything this is to know about astrostuff, space, telescopes etc.

I know our collective attention span is less than goldfish, we believe Facebook and vote for Trump, Boris Johnson and the like but please, try writing dialogue that doesn't spend the majority of time explaining what a thing is.

Anyhow, clearly if you make the most important discovery of human history (what? All of history??) what you need to do is run around the woods collecting equipment.

What exactly was audio boy desperate to record to the apparently hot-swappable hard drives. If it was a signal then where was it? I can understand all the desperation if he only had one chance of recording a live signal but the receiver was packed away for the last minute car speeding thingy. "dave, meet me in car park C" Apparently although Dave works there he didn't know car park C?

Apparently Dave was jealous and didn't want them to be the first to have a file of a recording that they already had???

It was a nice idea well made with good actors but I still can't accept the tedious overuse of the over-explain. We stop that in the 70s when every Sci-fi used the word Space to preface everything apart from the cringeworthy "five of your Earth-minutes" in the early Star Treks leaving the harmonious tolerant Earth where all fat people had been culled.

I, like the film Cosmos, digress and meander just to add padding and bloat to something that boils down to Don't bother with this film or reading this review.

Who says we can't create a film like First Contact?

However, the rousing music score was a pleasant way to be distracted from the general feeling nothing happening.