Hellboy (2019)

Hellboy is the weakest film yet from director Neil Marshall, who has been away from cinema screens for far too long (his last solo project was Centurion, almost a decade ago). But a weak film from Neil Marshall is still something that I'll happily watch ahead of films from many other directors. Because Marshall has consistently provided me with entertainment, thrills, and some of the best moments in modern genre cinema. So, despite the critical and commercial failure of this movie, I was always going to give him my time.

David Harbour is the actor now taking on the main role, and Ian McShane is his father figure, but this will all feel very familiar to fans of the property. All you need to know is that an evil sorceress, a "blood queen" named Vivienne Nimue (Milla Jovovich) is trying to come back and get her revenge, despite having been dismembered and her body parts placed in different locations, and part of her plan involves Hellboy taking charge of Excalibur and unleashing a kind of hell on Earth. Hellboy is helped in this adventure by a young woman who can communicate with the dead (Alice, played by Sasha Lane) and a skilled soldier type (Ben Daimio, played by Daniel Dae Kim).

I could spend just as much time writing about all of the little mis-steps that stop this from being a great movie, but I am choosing instead to try and heap a little praise upon it. Enough people have told you why you should give it a miss. I am going to try and convince you to give it two hours of your time.

First of all, forget the previous Hellboy movies. They are fantastic, and few people have the same attention to detail when it comes to creating cinematic worlds as Guillermo del Toro. So it's important to remember that as you go into this. It's not a Del Toro film, and it's not trying to be. I think too many people gave this a viewing while still holding on to their love (and well-earned love, at that) for those other movies.

Second, this is a good cast. Harbour does well in the main role, and McShane has become a master of stealing scenes while appearing in smaller roles in recent years. Jovovich has a blast as the big baddie, and is especially fun in the roles that have her still waiting for her body to be fully assembled. It's a shame that Lane and Kim aren't as much fun as they could be, let down by a script that doesn't seem to know what to do with them for large sections of the runtime, but that's compensated for by the performances from Sophie Okonedo, Thomas Haden Church (in a brief cameo), and Stephen Graham, voicing a "henchman" creature named Gruagach.

Although the script by Andrew Cosby may not be as strong or interesting as it could be, everything moves along energetically enough, with some fun set-pieces interspersed throughout that allow Marshall to deliver some blood and guts around people who roll their eyes and swear at the monsters attempting to push them off their mortal coil.

The special effects are varying in quality, the score from Benjamin Wallfisch is foot-stampingly good, and the whole thing is just a flawed bundle of messy fun. Which is sometimes the best kind of fun (hey, get your mind out of the gutter). Give it a watch and you may agree.

6/10

You can buy the movie here.
Americans can buy the movie here.

Venom (2018)

The more I think about Venom, the more I find to like about it. The fact that it is such a strange . . . mess (not unlike the titular character) just adds to its appeal, and Tom Hardy gives a fun central performance, both physically and vocally.

The basic story goes like this. Hardy is Eddie Brock, a journalist who has a habit of pushing things too far in order to get to the heart of any story. His latest story concerns shady happenings at a science facility, overseen by Carlton drake (Riz Ahmed). He ruffles feathers, he gets sacked, and he ends up with a symbiote attached to his body. This is a creature that can stay hidden within Eddie for some time, but breaks out when the host body is put in danger, or when it gets hungry. It can appear at other times but those are the two main motivators. But will it destroy Eddie, or will the inevitable pile of corpses end up with his own being the last one upon it?

I just described the performance by Hardy as fun but that's really the word that I should use to describe this entire film. It's fun, it's a romp, and there are times when it's madder than a bag of badgers. Full marks must go to the cast and director Ruben Fleischer, because everyone somehow knows the best way to work with material that has the potential to vary wildly in tone, yet manages to remain consistently darkly comedic.

The script, written by Kelly Marcel, Jeff Pinkner, and Scott Rosenberg, manages to stay just the right side of dumb. The characters aren't very complex, the main baddie is obvious from the very first scenes, and it seems that everyone understands that viewers want to see Tom Hardy developing new powers and transforming into something that will happily bite the heads off people.

This is Hardy's show, from his conversations with himself to his manic nervousness as he tries and tries to get his body back under his own control, and he's a star completely unafraid to throw himself completely into things. It's easy to praise actors as fearless when they're cast in roles that require them to bare themselves completely, both emotionally and physically, but Hardy is equally fearless in a different way. In fact, it's at least partially down to his sheer presence and force of will that this ends up being as entertaining as it is. Ahmed is fine, although there are a number of scenes when his more understated performance feels a bit out of place, and Michelle Williams plays her part, which leaves her sidelined for a lot of the movie, with a twinkle in her eye that suggests she got paid a decent amount for a role that let her have more fun than many of her more prestigious turns.

Is there anything here to dislike? Of course there is. The CGI is varied in quality (sometimes excellent, sometimes eye-searingly awful, especially in one or two scenes that have far too much going on), the grand finale is a bit of an anti-climax, and, perhaps worst of all for fans of the character, Venom has been turned into a softened version of the beast that comic readers have enjoyed for many years. That will upset some viewers. But it doesn't harm the film in any way, and I already have high hopes for the inevitable sequel.

8/10

Venom is available to buy here.
Americans can pick it up here.

The Rocketeer (1991)

From the films of his that I have seen, director Joe Johnston hasn't made a movie yet that I have disliked. Okay, I may have dodged his worst films (I've yet to see The Pagemaster and Hidalgo, to name two contenders) but the man seems to be a consistently safe pair of hands for mainstream blockbuster fare.

Not that you would always know that at the time. Just look at the poor reception for some of his perfectly acceptable outings (Jurassic Park III and the really very good The Wolfman). Which brings us to The Rocketeer.

I am not going to try claiming that The Rocketeer is a misunderstood masterpiece. I am not going to create any petition for it to be given a special edition re-release and some overdue sequels. I'm just here to tell you that it's a good film. Sometimes it's very good. It's also easy to see why it didn't really set the box office alight.

Bill Campbell plays a young pilot, Cliff, who finds a prototype jet pack that was stashed away by a thieving crook. Using the jet pack, with a helmet made by his buddy (Peevy, played by Alan Arkin), Cliff turns himself into quite the flying sensation. His real identity may be a secret but everyone will know him as The Rocketeer. Unfortunately, this gets him caught in the middle of a Nazi plot. It also doesn't help him look any better in front of his beautiful girlfriend (Jenny, played by Jennifer Connelly), or the dashing actor (Neville Sinclair, played by Timothy Dalton) who might be looking to steal her away.

Not quite lively and bright enough for younger viewers and a bit too silly in places for older viewers, The Rocketeer finds itself in a strange middle ground. It's hard to know who exactly it is made for. Having not read the graphic novel it was based on, I don't even know if fans of the source material would be pleased or disappointed. All I can say is that this always appealed to me thanks to the many mornings I found myself watching TV and catching some random episodes of King Of The Rocket Men.

As well as the main jetpack-based premise, there are a lot of other simple pleasures here. Campbell may not be the most charismatic of leads, but he does perfectly fine in his role (feeling very much like the old-fashioned kind of wholesome lead he is supposed to be). Arkin is fun, Connelly radiates, and Timothy Dalton might just be the most fun that he has ever been in a non-comedy film. Seriously, almost every moment featuring Dalton's character is a delight.

You also have some wonderful production design, it's just a shame that they somehow didn't lean in even further with the retro style, and you get a rousing score by Howard Shore. There's also some nice swashbuckling, some enjoyable aerial stunt work, Paul Sorvino and Terry O'Quinn having fun in supporting roles, and an excerpt from a fake film that I really wish we had seen become a reality; The Laughing Bandit.

Johnston may show restraint throughout much of the film, certainly in comparison to the approach of some other directors, but he makes the most of the set-pieces to throw some great action on the screen, and make things as bombastic as they can be. It's an instinct that serves him well, and served him equally well when he was employed to helm the excellent Captain America: The First Avenger almost two decades later.

7/10

Get this Bluray, which plays here on UK players as well as on American players (from my experience). Sadly lacking in extras though.