Tag: James McAvoy

Film Review: “Together”

It’s like looking into a lockdown mirror!

She and He are so “happy” in lockdown TOGETHER.

Sometimes a film comes along, for better or worse, too soon or too late, that captures current events and our collective state of mind. Together, the new film by Stephen Daldry (The Crown; Billy Elliot), may be THAT film for the COVID pandemic. While its 2020 relevance and verbose, stage play-esque script may turn off some viewers, the phenomenal performances by the lead duo and an honest, unflinching story about a romantic relationship in close quarters elevate this small film to more respectable heights.

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Film Review: Atomic Blonde

Theron heats up a cold city

Lorraine Broughton (Charlize Theron) smokes, drinks, kicks, and kills with the best of them.

Take a world nearing collapse, a main character with oodles of bitchy beauty, add some cold-war cloak and dagger spycraft, throw in some “fluid sexuality,” lots of fight scenes, and just a pinch of back story. Good so far? Not so fast. Take away the script. Take away the music. Take away much of the acting. Not so great? Ok, so put one truly fantastic fight scene back in, and you’re served Atomic Blonde, the Charlize Theron vehicle opening wide today.

First time helmer David Leitch, a former stunt man with co-directing credits on John Wick has taken the graphic novel series The Coldest City and turned it into a mostly a muddled mish-mash that owes much of its existence to Luc Bresson’s La Femme Nikita and Leon: The Professional, as well founding father Doug Limon’s The Bourne Identity.
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Film Review: Split

Shyamalan works really hard to avoid his own traps, and manages to deliver an entertaining thriller.

Creepy personality #1

I really wish M. Night Shyamalan would share a writing credit for once. His screenplays are constantly in need of supervision and a seasoned story writer to cut the fat. The stunted dialogue, contrivances, and lecture hall exposition can sometimes take precedent over plot progression. The same is nearly the case in Split, Shyamalan’s newest film and the most promising return to his mid-late 90s form after many disappointing tries. Split is a tense thriller and features a tour de force from James McAvoy. The film still succumbs to a few stereotypical pitfalls of the thriller genre, but the final product is still an entertaining, and at times chilling, experience featuring shades of Hitchcockian tactics.

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Film Review: X-Men: Days of Future Past

Back to the future past!

So. Damn. Magnetizing.
He’s just so…magnetizing.

The only actors seemingly capable of producing the same intense chemistry with onscreen conversations as Patrick Stewart and Sir Ian McKellan do…are Michael Fassbender and James McAvoy.  Put them all in a movie together and it’s practically a how-to on acting.  Throw in Hugh Jackman and Jennifer Lawrence and you now have one of the most talented ensembles ever.  Oh, wait, Tyrion Lannister, err… Peter Dinklage, too?!  With this billed cast, it could’ve been a biopic about the GEICO gecko and I’d get in line.  Luckily for everyone, it’s actually X-Men: Days of Future Past, one of the best entries in the X-Men series (including all spinoffs, etc.) and an insanely fun film.

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Film Review: “X-Men: First Class”

Caleb Landry Jones, Michael Fassbender, Jennifer Lawrence, Rose Byrne, Nicholas Hoult, James McAvoy, and Lucas Till in X-MEN: FIRST CLASS

starring: James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender, Rose Byrne, Jennifer Lawrence, Nicholas Hoult, January Jones, Kevin Bacon, Lucas Till, Caleb Landry Jones, Zoe Kravitz, Oliver Platt, Jason Flemyng, Alex Gonzalez

written by: Ashley Miller, Zack Stentz, Jane Goldman, and Matthew Vaughn

directed by: Matthew Vaughn

MPAA: Rated PG-13 for intense sequences of action and violence, some sexual content including brief partial nudity, and language.

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Film Review: “The Conspirator”

Robin Wright and James McAvoy in THE CONSPIRATOR. © 2011 - Roadside Attractions

starring: James McAvoy, Robin Wright, Evan Rachel Wood, Alexis Bledel, Kevin Kline, Tom Wilkinson, Justin Long, Norman Reedus, Danny Huston, Jonathan Groff, Johnny Simmons, Stephen Root, Colm Meaney

written by: James Solomon (screenplay/story), Gregory Bernstein (story)

directed by: Robert Redford

MPAA: Rated PG-13 for some violent content.

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