VOD: Chicken Run Dawn Of The Nugget (dir: Sam Fell, 2023)

"I'm running a camouflage lesson at noon...if you can find me!"

Following a swift opening recap of the original film, this belated sequel finds the liberated chickens living happily on a idyllic island, until Ginger and Rocky's daughter starts to get curious about what lies 'on the other side of the water', and she unwittingly ends up in a revolutionary meat-processing factory, which leads to a neat reversal of the first film as the chickens have to break in to rescue her.  The gloriously quirky British sense of humour and Aardman's signature (augmented) stop-motion animation remains utterly charming and executed wonderfully.  The set deign and level of detail is particularly ambitious here, with the use of colour and lighting effects stunningly vibrant, and there are plenty of daft chucklesome visual and verbal gags as expected.  The film does not particularly feel as if it is exploring new ground, and it misses some of the original voice cast, but it is more than a match for the original movie, and Dawn Of The Nugget sees Aardman deliver another cosy, warm and funny slice of entertainment for all ages.
 

VOD: Dungeons And Dragons Honour Among Thieves (dirs: John Francis Daley and Jonathan Goldstein (2023)

"She's throwing potatoes!"

Given a proper Game Of Thrones/The Lord Of The Rings high-fantasy treatment visually but delivered with a light, snarky and fleet-footed approach, this long-gestating iteration of the fantasy RPG quickly hits and maintains an entertaining tone that clearly struck a chord with cinemagoers.  The script is never too far from a delightfully silly line of dialogue or reaction,  delivered knowingly by Chris Pine as the roguish Edgin, the ever-reliable Michelle Rodriguez as his partner/straight-person Holga and a very arch Hugh Grant in full pantomime villain mode as the smarmy Lord Forge, from whom Pine is trying to retrieve his daughter. The visual scale and richness of the film keeps it the right side of parody (more The Princess Bride than Your Highness!, thankfully), making it an expensively silly but entertaining enough romp overall.  Look out for the mid-credits scene that echoes Airplane! in addressing an earlier joke.
 

VOD: Transformers Rise Of The Beasts (dir: Steven Caple Jr, 2023)

"I'm not following you!  I'm just escaping in the same direction!"

With big-bad planet-devouring Unicron on the hunt for a Transwarp Key to rule the universe, which somehow ends up in the hands of a museum trainee via a mysterious ancient artefact in 1994 New York, it attracts the attention of the Autobots and the latest round of metal mayhem ensues.  Also thrown into the mix is a young down-at-luck ex-soldier (nicely played by Anthony Ramos) with a sick younger brother plus the Maximals (the mechanical animals from the film's opening skirmish hiding conveniently on Earth).  This franchise finally presents a cast led by non-white actors (and the classic R&B/hip-hop tracks on the soundtrack give it a different feel), but the female characters are still underwritten, and the bizarre Maximals - which were the focus of the trailers - only really make notable showing in the final act.  As ever with this series, the visual effects are shiny, detailed, impressive and seamlessly integrated, and this film seems to take on board the lessons learned from the success of Bumblebee by keeping the story relatively tight and focussed (even if the lack of humans on-screen may be the result of early post-pandemic production).   The shift to picturesque Peru is visually pleasing after the familiar city-bound first act, and the big set pieces at the end of each act are still spectacular (and here relatively easy to follow!), but unnecessary padding is evident.  Rise Of The Beasts is just about an improvement on the last couple of wayward entries, and it does deliver a very unexpected franchise-linking final shot. 

 

VOD: Indiana Jones And The Dial Of Destiny (dir: James Mangold, 2023)

"Some things should stay buried."

A spirited war-time set opening sequence with an effectively de-aged Harrison Ford captures some of the spirit of the early films in this series in a solid start that goes some way to restore faith after the previous film in this fifth and final entry, but the rest of the movie proves adequate if a little tired.  An enthusiastic Phoebe Waller-Bridge plays Indy's shady god-daughter who leads him into one last adventure at the end of the 1960s following his retirement from lecturing.  Reasonably executed throughout and with a couple of fair action sequences, the film potters along in a gentle and perhaps over-familiar manner, with little that really excites or captures interest.  The surprisingly simple story holds together well but has the effect of making the overlong running time feel a bit bloated, making Dial Of Destiny a pleasant final outing with the conclusion that will make any fan happy but overall it is not the most thrilling.
 

VOD: Candy Cane Lane (dir: Reginald Hudlin, 2023)

"If an elf can make it, you can wish for it, OK?"

Amazon gives us yet another variant of Deck The Halls, here with a rein(deer)ed-in Eddie Murphy trying to win his street's best-decorated house prize with his old-fashioned hand-crafted display, but finds himself laid off just before Christmas as his wife heads for promotion in her job.  With the added incentive of a sponsorship prize of $100K up for grabs, Murphy and his youngest daughter come across a mysterious Christmas decorations shop (Kringle's) and the festive fantasy plot elements kick in.  This is one of Eddie Murphy's more consistent and effective performances, and pairing him with Tracee Ellis Ross (TV's black-ish) as his wife works extremely well.  The family dynamics with the three children of various ages and interests works well, and there is fun had with the lively dialogue from the 'living' miniature Christmas figurines.  The film is a little over-long with some unnecessarily extended or filler sequences, but the stuffed narrative keeps things moving along and Murphy's engaging lead performance makes Candy Cane Lane an adequate fun family Christmas film.

VOD: Elf Me (dir: Younuts!, 2023)

"Never stop dreaming, even when you are awake."

This well-made and well-played family Christmas offering from Italy via MGM/Amazon covers four days leading up to Christmas, as one of Santa's crafter elves - an anarchic inventor called Trip - finds himself catapulted into the real world and the life of a sweet, lonely, bullied boy called Elia.  Clearly Amblin-inspired (notably E.T. and Gremlins), the film balances fantasy and the real world elements nicely and has a fun streak of rebellious daftness running through it, all driven by two lovely performances from Pasquale Petrolo (Trip) and  Federico Ielapi (Elia), who play off each other delightfully.  Simple, small-scale, charming and funny, Elf Me is a gentle, delightful, snowy and warm-hearted festive treat best watched in its original language (although the English dub is reasonable), and watch the bloopers playing through the end credits.
 

VOD: The Killer (dir: David Fincher, 2023)

"Isn't it all just human nature?"

Less of a thriller and more of a close character study, The Killer is in many ways a quintessential Fincher movie, with every frame designed gloriously, carefully-controlled pace and a confrontationally intimate journey with its subject, here an experienced assassin whose latest hit in Paris goes wrong, sparking off a personal tragedy and revenge plot.  Michael Fassbender returns to the screen with a precise, captivating and haunting performance, and his deadpan (and occasionally wryly sardonic) introspective narration evokes Noir, forming the backbone of the film throughout its six chapters.  The film also boasts another magnificent hypnotic Reznor/Ross soundscape and very nicely-judged supporting performances.  Like its protagonist, The Killer is masterfully controlled, focused and visually a film to savour, making it a very successful work.
 

VOD: Dashing Through The Snow (dir: Tim Story, 2023)

"A lot of work and definitely overrated."
 

Disney's first new offering of the 2023 season takes us to Atlanta to find separated crisis counsellor/Christmas-averse Eddie (Ludacris) embroiled with the 'real' Santa Claus, who is being chased by a low-rent criminal gang trying to retrieve a crooked congressman's missing tablet.  Although the plot might not be the usual festive fare, the film contains many signature Disney/Christmas elements, from the cute young daughter to the cynic rediscovering his Christmas mojo, but the film feels rather dialogue-heavy and struggles to maintain interest.  The father-daughter relationship works well, but the film is a bit too light on the comedy and festive feel-good elements to make it a holiday classic.

VOD: BEST. CHRISTMAS. EVER! (dir: Mary Lambert, 2023)

"I mean, how much of this can a person take?"

Netflix kicks off its 2023 festive offerings by pitting a regular family against their over-achieving seemingly-perfect former college friend's life to find the truth behind their glowing holiday newsletter and getting snowed in together for Christmas.  Throw in a sub-plot of their children trying to (dis)prove the existence of Santa Claus and an unexpectedly sad third-act twist, it all leads to a suitably feel-good festive ending.  The leads (including Jason Biggs, Heather Graham and singer Brandy) are pleasant, the snowy festive trappings are nice to look at, and the entire feather-light wafer-thin concoction drifts by harmlessly and painlessly for its scant eighty-minutes run time.
 

VOD: All-American Boy (dir: Ian Liberatore, 2023)

"Why did you let it get this far?"

This Kickstarter-funded production finds young college student Sean coming home for the summer, reuniting with his old basketball team buddies and forming an unexpected attachment to his socially-awkward neighbour James that goes horribly wrong.  Playing out a mish-mash of teen TV-movie-of-the-week issues ( including parental separation, sexual assault, coercion, self-harm and homophobia) in a rather simplistic and cliché fashion, it has the feel of a rather earnest but not very able youth theatre group being incredibly serious, but given the gravity of the matters being portrayed the bluntness of the execution undermines it all somewhat.  It is largely competently made, although there are occasional framing and sound issues in this micro-budget effort.

VOD: Meg 2 The Trench (dir; Ben Wheatley, 2023)

"I even made poison-tipped bullets, just like in Jaws 2!"

The first half of this unnecessary sequel is largely muddled nonsense about exploring a deep sea trench and murky corporate espionage, with Idiot Plot to the fore all over the place.  The second half is more familiar blockbuster creature-feature territory of the Jaws/Piranha variety, with three Megs, proto-alligator creatures and an enormous octopus on the rampage at an exclusive holiday resort.   This sequel delivers largely more of the same from the first film, and Statham shoots off one-liners in entertaining fashion just the right side of self-parody.  It has some quirky moments and ideas, but it really could have been directed by anyone competent and is not really a Ben Wheatley film such that we are used to.  Overall, it is all one big glorious mess, perhaps saved by The Stath doing silly action set pieces.