FILM: San Andreas 3D (dir: Brad Peyton, 2015)

"Give it all you got!"

Starting with a literal cliffhanger, as you might have guessed, San Andreas is a good old-fashioned disaster movie: dopey soapy family melodrama, awful dialogue, massive casual carnage and a cringe-worthy patriotic tub-thump at the end.  Where this film scores over similar recent efforts such as 2012 and The Day After Tomorrow is the sheer insane scale and detail of the special effects that are brought up close and personal, instead of relying on cartoony wide shots, and the relentless devastation caused by actual earthquakes rather than aftershocks.  Dwayne Johnson is so reliably sincere in a role that suits him perfectly, and the rest of the cast is acceptable, even down to an unexpected pop princess acting cameo.  The orchestral score is thunderously over-the-top.  Some moments are undone by being pure disaster-movie cliché (such as the daughter trapped in a crunched car in an underground car park), some are quite distressing (the parallels with real-world tsunamis and 9/11 dust-clouds provide added punch), but there is a real effort here to provide huge, terrible spectacle.  Surprisingly, 3D does not add much most of the time, but occasionally it works very well with the sheer sense of scale on offer, such as the remarkable boat-vs-giant-wave sequence that echoes The Perfect Storm but takes off into an entirely unexpected peril.  San Andreas is a big dumb disaster movie with all the accompanying faults that entails, but with more bravado (visually and emotionally) than most in the genre.

FILM: Tomorrowland - A World Beyond IMAX (dir: Brad Bird, 2015)

"Does it work?"
"Ummmm, sure, yeah.....mostly....."

Whilst the deliberate mystery surrounding the promotional campaign makes for a refreshingly untainted and intriguing viewing experience, and an original concept in the remake/reboot/franchise marketplace as well, Tomorrowland is a classic Disney family adventure movie at heart, with a teenager thrown into a fantastic journey and ends up saving the day.  Clooney is great fun as the curmudgeonly scientist, and Britt Robertson is enthusiastic as the 'chosen' teen.  There is some fantastic CGI world-building on display, and the time-shift element is interesting (courtesy of Damon Lindelof) including a bizarre tween twist on The Terminator idea.  However, the film is saddled with a very simplistic and preachy message to the extent that you almost expect the assembled child-cast to break into a chorus of We Are The World at the film's finale.  This is an ambitious, lively and thoughtful adventure romp that rises above being classed as another expensive Disney folly and entertains as well as holds interest over a couple of hours.

FILM: Poltergeist 3D (dir: Gil Kenan, 2015)

 "There's nothing to be scared of.  There's nothing to be scared of."

And so it is Poltergeist's turn through the remake machine, and this version is a relatively disappointingly vapid re-run of the original's main beats, competently made for the Insidious generation and sadly lacking real emotion or, crucially, scares.  Even reliable performances from Sam Rockwell and Rosemarie DeWitt as the world-weary parents and some acceptable child acting fails to create the sense of the ordinary family in peril sticking together that drove the original - in fact, the little girl's disappearance over to the other side comes across as more like a bothersome inconvenience.  There is some good camerawork, but the oddly awkward music score often feels misplaced, and the use of 3D rarely springs to life.  This one had real potential, but yet again the end result feels like a compromise for a broad audience.

FILM: Mad Max Fury Road IMAX 3D (dir: George Miller, 2015)

"What a lovely day!"

Mad Max: Fury Road is an extraordinary action movie.  Essentially a relentless chase movie, it is gloriously, rivetingly insane, a true retooling of The Road Warrior for the 21st Century.   There are many moments which are simply so jawdroppingly incredible that make the film so immensely entertaining and pleasurable for the action fan, enhanced by the fact that so much of it is clearly physically realised.  Hardy, Theron and Hoult are absolutely spot-on with their performances and investment in the action.  Sound and effects are superb, and in IMAX 3D the experience is quite overwhelming.  The story is clear and purposeful, and Miller's brilliant staging is epic, from the gorgeous vast desertscapes to the Metropolis-scale workings of The Citadel.  Mad Max: Fury Road is a truly satisfying action movie in every sense and an absolute delirious blast to watch.

FILM: Pitch Perfect 2 (dir: Elizabeth Banks, 2015)

"What an inspiration to girls all across the country who are too ugly to be cheerleaders."

With a return of almost all of the main characters from the original film, Pitch Perfect 2 proves to be a somewhat routine sequel.  After a spectacularly mindboggling teaser that sets in motion this movie's events, this film is essentially a loose (and flabbier) re-run of its predecessor, the character arcs are less developed and less interesting than before, product placement could not be more blatant, and the World Championships gives the writers the chance to extend their simplistic racial stereotyping beyond the USA.  One scene (the campfire scene) brings back the real feel of the 2012 original, and the return of Banks and Higgins as the outrageous commentators is still comedy gold, and owing to the popularity of the Fat Amy character Rebel Wilson is given more screen time but to less effect.  Whilst not a bad film overall, Pitch Perfect 2 does fall short of the original.

VOD: Pitch Perfect (dir: Jason Moore, 2012)

"Do we clap?"
"No.  Never."

The prospect of this teen-girl-chick-flick with Glee thrown in was not a promising one, but Pitch Perfect turns out to be a surprisingly enjoyable movie.  The humour is unusually spiky and adult at times, and the emotional beats come affectingly from character and often with unexpected results rather than necessary formula narrative plotting.  The whole a cappella angle is tolerable, mainly owing to some wicked bubble-bursting by Elizabeth Banks and John Michael Higgins as hilariously non-self-aware competition commentators, and the ensemble (led by the delightful Anna Kendrick) is an entertaining mix of stereotypes whose journey through the movie plays well.

FILM: Spooks - The Greater Good (dir: Bharat Nalluri, 2015)

"If you can't bring in one loopy Cold War relic without shooting him first, then we really are in trouble."

This film extension of the long-running now-defunct BBC TV series was never going to match the big-bucks bangs of a Bourne or Bond, nor the rollercoaster thrills of 24 - Die Another Day, but it certainly beats the recent (similar) UK TV-to-big-screen outing for The Sweeney by sticking to its main strength, namely a clever fusion of old-school spy theatrics and modern-day tech sensibility, making for an entertaining and decently-made thriller.  The Greater Good has a clear sense of cinematic ambition whilst staying true to the series' roots, and it is well-structured.   Peter Firth's Harry provides a magnificently-played centre to the movie, the rather uninteresting Kit Harington is an adequate protagonist whilst the excellent Elyes Gabel is somewhat underused as the main threat.  Inevitably male-led, there are some decent, well-played roles for Jennifer Ehle, Tuppence Middleton and Eleanor Matsuura.  Despite its obvious movie-budget limits, action sequences are sharp and well-made, London looks great and the final showdown is cleverly set up, tense and does not overstay its welcome.   It will be interesting to see how (and if) The Greater Good plays to an audience unaware of the TV show's backstories, but this movie is a pleasing and effective return of an old favourite

FILM: Monsters - Dark Continent (dir: Tom Green, 2015)

"This war is real!"

Dark Continent is less of a traditional sequel than expected, like The Purge - Anarchy, playing more as an expanded-world companion piece to Gareth Edwards' original low-budget hit.  If the first film was an odd-couple road movie with added creatures, this film is The Hurt Locker with an alien enemy.  In fact, take out the monsters and Dark Continent would stand up well as an emotionally and physically harrowing modern warfare movie.  The metaphors are hardly subtle - who are the real monsters here? - and it is a bit over-long, but the film is well-shot, often interesting and has a strong cast.  Joe Dempsie is great, and it is a shame that actors in genre movies such as this rarely get the wider recognition they deserve for terrific work, as Sam Keeley gives a really remarkable leading performance as the Detroit hoodlum turned traumatised soldier.  There is clear potential for a third film in which mankind loses Earth to these strange invaders, but for now this strong sequel works well.

VOD: Space Station 76 (dir: Jack Plotnick, 2014)

 "A female captain???"

This odd little film is never funny enough to be a full-blown parody, and it is too stilted and melodramatic to truly engage or convince, but the idea more or less works to a reasonable degree.  This is an alt-reality space opera, in which all the trappings are the 70s-envisioned future - all Viewmasters, videotapes and rollerboots - and all the characters are either locked into stereotype or harbouring an emotional secret.  The cast strives to find a style with varying results but a lack of overall building through-story and slightly repetitive talky scenes means the film comes across as a rather flat and meandering affair.