The Longest Ride (12A)

I have never knowingly watched a film based on a Nicholas Sparks book, and this is something I've been quietly very proud of.

And it seems I've accidentally proved myself right, because despite seeing the trailer and thinking it looked pants I found myself sat in front of his latest offering today.

I'd quite forgotten what the trailer had featured, such was its impact, and I'd either missed or forgotten that Sparks (he of The Notebook, Dear John etc) was ultimately to blame.

The story, such as it is, follows the path of true love with student and future art-loving intern Sophia (Britt Robertson) and bull-riding bare-buttocked man hunk Luke (Scott Eastwood), who throw themselves together after pulling Ira (Alan Alder) from a burning car.

And rescuing his box of letters. These are vital to everything.

From here, and having previously agreed that they couldn't be together what with her moving to Manhattan n all, our loving couple set about being a couple while Sophia spends the hours she's not studying or smooching visiting her new hospitalised friend.

Contrived would be an understatement.

Through these hospital chats, however, Ira (I'm pretty sure Alder only took this part because he wouldn't have to stand or try to actually act) tells the story of how love conquered all for him and his beloved way back in '41.

There are subtle parallels being drawn between the two relationships, which could pass you by if you're not paying full attention.

By that I mean not fall asleep.

Because if there's one thing this film doesn't do, it's subtle.

The dialogue is weighty and meaningful to the point of making you laugh out loud, scenes of longing stares and love-filled smiles smack you between the eyes on a regular basis, while the product placement around the bull riding sequences would give the Bond team food for thought.

Basically, if this was on the Hallmark channel on a Sunday afternoon you'd think it a bit OTT. It's so sweet and sugary it should come with a health warning for diabetics.

And you'd really better love Country. And not just the music. Everything that's Country.

You get line dancing, the bull thing, more Nashville ballads than Dolly's managed in her entire career, boots and hats for all, and a massive ranch.

Obviously.

In fact, this film is so full of people looking longingly at each other in a Country way that bits of the plot seem to have dropped out.

It's the only explanation I can find for the number of times things are mentioned - and accepted as fact - despite never having been mentioned before.

It's like whole other conversations have gone on behind closed doors.

Or maybe while Ira's banging on about life and love in a bygone age.

And the damn thing is so polished you almost need shades to watch it. Even the nostalgia scenes have the same sheen.

Even the bit of war action is bloody polished! It's the best looking muddy field you'll ever see.

And it's long. So so long.

It's actually only two hours, but it feels like twice that. At least.

Which is hugely ironic given you only have to hang on to that bull for eight seconds. It takes skill to make eight seconds feel like a lifetime, but somehow director George Tillman Jr has mastered it.

His other half must be delighted.

All of this pales into insignificance, though, because what has annoyed me most about this film - more than the smouldering looks, the clear use of beefcake to appeal to a certain graphic, the slow-motion horse riding and the appalling dialogue - is that it made me laugh.

Just once, right at the end, and with a "twist" so cliched and obvious I'm ashamed by my own reaction, but sadly laugh I did.

That doesn't make up for the previous 115 minutes, though, even if it was a good laugh.

Jurassic World (12A)

Seriously, what do you want from me? It's not like you're going to pay attention to what I say when there's a dinosaur on the loose-about.

It's not even like you don't know what's going to happen this time round - the whole damn thing is in the trailer.

Even if you've never seen any of the other three, all shocks and surprises are served up in the three-minute taster.

Just in case you haven't picked up on the subtlety and nuance of the back story, however, here's a refresher.

Man with money makes big amusement nirvana with monsters. It all goes to poop. People are surprised that this could happen.

They even reference the first park (although politely ignore Lost World and III) without learning from their own history.

Mind you, neither have we - which is why we're watching this balloon juice.

Of course, this is not a mere repeat of earlier films, no no. That would be too easy.

Yes, there are moments of racing dinosaurs through the fields. Yes, people get chased through jungles. Yes, the aviary is still an issue.

But this time (and you'll like this new twist) they've made a new dinosaur.

A whole new one. Who can, it seems, hide it's body temperature, camouflage itself, hatch a complex escape plan...

All of which will be explained using expositional dialogue so leaden it could have been hewn from the rock the original fossils were found in.

And even if the obvious stuff doesn't bother you (and it should), there are subtler issues that annoy.

Things like it having seemingly rained just before the helicopter takes off, a man who has seen live action with the army yet doesn't remember what safety harnesses are for, oh and would you look at my Apple Watch it's time to mention the product placement.

How the dinosaurs manage to get away with running about without any branding is beyond me, because this film couldn't exist without the non-too-subtle advertising that's going on.

Frankly, it makes a Bond film look measured and principled.

If you can, try and keep count, and see how far you get before the final big fight scenes. I was well into double figures.

Once they start trashing the gift shop and mall, you'll lose count.

And yet none of this would matter if the plot was worth a damn.

Points are made all through the film that Aunt Claire doesn't stay in touch with her nephews and doesn't even know how old they are (NEWSFLASH: She doesn't have to, that's a parent's job).

And yet, knowing full well where she works and how little interest she takes in children, Aunt Claire is seen as the perfect person to send the children to for a weekend.

No pre-amble, no back story, just a swift "hey, kids, you're too young to remember all the times a dinosaur theme park went tits up - have a great trip!"

And again, if the plot was anything more than gossamer thin, this wouldn't bother you.

But this film has been stitched together after a meeting in a pub with people who only half remember the original, been wrapped in carrier bag from the stores of the world and just thrown at the screen.

To be fair to him, Chris Pratt does his best to carry the whole thing - and he clearly isn't taking it too seriously - but the rest of the cast are either out of their depth (in this puddle, I know) or clearly bored.

Bryce Dallas Howard has the look of a woman who remembers being in The Help and can't believe she let her agent talk her into this, while Judy Greer carries the air of a woman who remembers what it was like to be given a back story.

Lauren Lapkus, meanwhile, is the woman with two masters degrees and a PHD who can't believe she's being employed to answer a phone.

The only other person who comes out of this with any credit is Jake Johnson, whose years on New Girl have finally paid off as his comic timing and knowing subtle air almost makes the more ridiculous scenes bearable.

I should be more annoyed by this film than I am. I should be livid that I spent precious hours of my life watching a multi-million pound blockbuster that still - at times - managed to look shonky and cheap.

I should be annoyed that a film I approached with low expectations failed to meet them.

I should be annoyed that this film was a screaming pile of pterodactyl poop.

But I can't be.

Because when it has the word Jurassic in the title, we know what to expect. And even when it's this bad, it's still better than any other film about dinosaurs running wild YET AGAIN in a dinosaur theme park.

Can't wait for the next one...

Survivor (12A)

I was wrong about Survivor.

Last week, when I reviewed Spy, I lumped it in with other films that had Bond pretencions.

Now, in my defence, this is what the trailer would have us believe - Pierce Brosnan may have changed sides, but he was still the running, jumping, shooting guy he so loved being before being retired in favour of Daniel Craig.

But the trailer was misleading.

Instead, Survivor is a simple action movie with ambitions of being a thriller. And to be fair, at times it almost gets there.

The story focuses on Kate Abbot (played very well by Milla Jovovic), a government agent who thinks she's on to something.

Then things go boom, Brosnan's The Watchmaker (no, really) comes after her and she has to go on the run and try to stop a thing.

And that's pretty much it.

And it could have been brilliant.

Sadly, however, someone forgot to suggest a more subtle approach, and as a result this is a thriller where you don't have to do any thinking as the plot points are explained along the way.

Which is criminal, because with some better writing and more judicious editing, there could have been twists and turns instead of a laboured dash in a straight line.

Then there's the dialogue.

Clunky would be a kind word to use. Ridiculous and at times just down-right daft could also be brought in to play.

But it does look nice.

Cinematographer Danny Ruhlmann has done a fine job in making it look slick and atmospheric, with a lot of shadows helping to add atmosphere to cover up the lack of depth.

And, as I said earlier, Jovovich is in great form.

She is thoroughly credible as the American agent battling against the odds. She can handle the action scenes with ease, while being thoroughly believable when it comes to showing actual emotion.

Which is just as well, because Brosnan left his acting chops in his trailer.

Now, granted, playing the world's most wanted assassin (again, really) was never going to require a Shakespearian performance, but at times it feels like even he can't quite believe what he's being asked to say and do.

Brosnan that is, not Shakespeare.

And then there's his action scenes.

Not wishing to be unkind, but Pierce isn't getting any younger. Not a problem when playing a divorced dad in, say, The Love Punch or A Long Way Down (in both of which he is excellent), but when he has to slide down a light fitting?

Yes, it looks great, and has some lovely lighting techniques along with it, but he doesn't look comfortable doing it.

And running after Jovovich is no walk in the park either.

This, on the back of The November Man, would suggest it really is time he accepted he's not 007 any more and got on with making films with substance. Or intended laughs.

Mind you, he's not the only one who fails to have any sparkle.

Dylan McDermott, Frances De La Tour and Roger Rees are just three of the assembled cast who don't seem quite sure why they're there.

But even among all these negatives, there are some positives.

As well as looking nice, the action and explosions are good, and there is a brief spell where - even though you know who is doing what when - you do find yourself edging forward in your seat.

Which actually came as a bit of a shock, because not five minutes earlier I'd been picking apart another scene for it's basic daftness.

And not just because I enjoy doing that sort of thing, no. With Survivor, they kind of leap out at you.

Want to enter a cordoned off bomb scene? Just say "American embassy" to the Bobby on duty and he'll let you through. Need to meet someone at St Pancras around Christmas time? No bother, just drive there and park right outside. Want to stop a car getting in to a busy city centre? Don't speak to the driver, tell the passenger in the back...

Amazingly though, the positives do outweigh the negatives.

Sure, it's unsubtle (wait till you see what's on screen right at the end, just before the credits roll) and does all your thinking for you, but treat it as a 90-minute nuts-and-bolts action romp and you won't come away too disappointed.

Spy (15)

You may not have heard, but there's a new Bond film coming out later this year.

But don't worry if you can't wait that long, because there are two films out right now that will keep you ticking over.

Survivor clearly has aspirations to Bondhood, and even has a former Licensee To Kill at the helm in Pierce Brosnan. (There was also Spooks of course, but the less said about that the better).

Spy, meanwhile, has gone for a slightly different approach.

As you'd expect from Paul Fieg - the man who brought us Bridesmaids and The Heat - it's not a straightforward look at the spy genre.

Instead, it's got it's tongue firmly in it's cheek, it's heart (and there's a lot of love for Bond here) in the right place and - as you'd expect from Fieg and Melissa McCarthy - a bucketload of gags.

The story is not what you'd call complicated - after watching her spy partner Jude Law get shot, McCarthy steps up to go after Rose Byrne's Roya Boyanov, enlisting the help of Miranda Hart (yup, that one) and Peter Serafinowicz.

And the hindrance of Jason 'The Stathe' Statham.

And no stone is left unexploded in the team's bid to pay homage to a franchise everyone clearly loves.

There's a small amount of lampooning, as the women tend to come out on top, but this isn't a Spy Harder or a Hot Shots Part Deux.

Instead, it's Statham and Law's chance to play 007 with slapstick and puke gags thrown in for fun.

And fun it really is.

It's loud, brash, violent (all the blood never spilt in a Bond film is shed here), gross, ridiculous and - perhaps most surprisingly - subtle.

While the big laughs come with McCarthy throwing up after killing someone, or fainting over another corpse, the real gems are in the Bond geek moments.

Ever noticed how Bond films always feature a mildly patronising "local culture" scene every time Bond arrives somewhere knew (which is also handily spelt out on the screen)?

Fieg has.

And every new location is treated to this, and never in a way the local tourist board would appreciate.

Then there's the fight scenes.

Fieg gets right in close, so you can feel every bone break (as well as see and hear it). Every twatting with a frying pan rings around the cinema.

But it's not just a slapstick barf fight.

As well as the glamour and the action, Spy knows it has to have some sort of story with twists and turns (and a large amount of the ridiculous to hold it together) and Fieg delivers here too.

People pitch up out of nowhere to save the day, coincidences handily tie the story together, and there's a casino scene which will have Casino Royale fans grinning like idiots.

That's not to say Spy is perfect.

Miranda is asked to do nothing more than play Miranda - which may help shift her TV show stateside but adds nothing extra here - which is a shame when she can clearly act, and there's a very odd moment when Byrne has overdubbed herself. Obviously so.

There's also a point about an hour in when it feels like you've been in the cinema for days, but somehow Fieg manages to claw it back for his grand finale.

And the celebrity cameo is painful.

But.

All that said.

Spy is a whole bunch of swearing-stuffed fun.

Statham, Law and Serafinowicz are all clearly having the time of their lives, with Serafinowicz in particular almost stealing the show from McCarthy.

Not that that was ever really going to happen.

This is, after all, her show, and again she shows why she is one of the best comedy film actors around today (Mike & Molly never happened, OK? NEVER).

She gives her character depth, her delivery is faultless and she even takes on the action stuff head on and wins.

Spy isn't hard hitting, gritty or satirical. But it shouldn't be.

What it is is a massively fun way to while away a couple of hours.

It won't change your life, but it will make you laugh. A lot.

And that's almost the same thing.

Pitch Perfect 2 (12A)

I still remember watching Pitch Perfect for the first time.

A Glee episode with a better cast was not my idea of fun, but it had so much heart and humour you couldn't help but fall in love with the damn thing.

And they had the decency to leave it as a stand-alone film...

Or not.

Sigh.

Oh well, what else you gonna do on a sunny Sunday afternoon?

Picking up three years after they left us, PP2 has the girls still together and still hugely successful on the acapella scene.

Until Fat Amy has a slight accident in front of the President.

Still, from such unlikely scenarios comedy sequels are born, and so the girls set about regaining their reputation while having personal growth moments en route to the World Championships in Denmark.

Where else?

If you saw and loved PP1, PP2 has everything you want. It's not quite as good as the original (but hey, what is?), but that really doesn't matter.

Anna Kendrick and Rebel Wilson again lead the way, re-energising their characters with huge amounts of warmth and humour, while (as before) the rest of the cast help add to the chaos and the fun.

Holding the whole thing together once more are John Michael Higgins and writer/director Elizabeth Banks as the bitchy commentators who are now running their own podcast and seemingly somehow not getting sued in the process.

Granted, this is not as flawless as the first film - a lot of scenes end up feeling like sketches that have been loosely linked and the German group feel more than a smidge cliched - but it makes you laugh.

There are cheap gags, clever gags, slapstick gags, moments that make you squirm... It's got the lot.

And more cheesy pop and rock songs than you can shake an oar at.

Plus a list of cameo stars that no self-respecting dog could sniff at.

And that's why you can forgive the flaws - up to, and including, the fact no one actually sings acapella as there's always a sodding drum machine kicking about somewhere.

And everyone's been auto-tuned beyond repair.

But hey, that's the modern music industry folks. Quibbles over...

One of the clever tricks PP2 pulls is to sneak in some really dark bits of humour to puncture the more sweet moments, meaning you're never quite sure where it's heading next - while at the same time knowing exactly where it's heading.

It's not dark, or edgy, but that doesn't matter - it's a comedy, it's job is to make you laugh, and it manages that in fine style.

And yes the ending is about as saccharine as you'd expect, but by then you won't care about the fact your eyes seem to be leaking.

Just make sure you stay for the post-credit Voice sequence.

Mad Max: Fury Road (15)

I've driven home from cinemas on more occasions than I care to count.

As someone who passed his test back when it was actually a difficult thing to do, the simple act of hopping behind the wheel and heading home is one I am quite at ease with.

Except for today.

Today, I had to really make sure I didn't just hit the gas and race like hell. I did, however, keep a constant vigilance for other vehicles coming after me.

Because, you know, I'm not an idiot.

And why, I hear you ask, were you behaving like this?

Simple. Mad Max. It's what this film does to you.

Now, I'll be honest, having had a quick refresh of the first three films (the last of which came out 30 years ago) I approached Fury Road with some trepidation.

I know the original trilogy has it's fans, but I can't stand alongside them. The original films were terrible.

And not in a good way.

Terrible acting, abysmal dialogue, plots that made less sense than an unsubtitled Welsh soap opera - they really had nothing going for them.

So why, then, when such a winning formula has been loyally stuck to, was this one so much more fun?

Let's be clear about this from the off - this is not a good film. Not in the traditional sense at least.

The plot (Max is captured, escapes, gets captured again, gets thrown into a chase for others who have escaped, helps them with said escape) is as dumb as you'd expect. Especially when you factor in all the made-up words for stuff, plus the dumb names people are given.

(Before you start, yeah, I know, it's sci-fi, dumb names come as standard - it's just they seem dumber here.)

As for the dialogue, that's a heady mix of half-garbled words crossed with brief moments of weighty prose lacking any real weight.

Then there's Max himself.

As a noted Tom Hardy fan, this is not his finest hour (that's still Locke) - especially given he's channelling his inner Bane, mask and odd accent included.

But.

Despite all this.

Despite everything.

This film is one hell of a lot of fun.

Charlize Theron (as Imperator Furiosa - see, told ya) and Nicholas Hoult both put in fine performances, and while Hardy may not be asked to do much he makes you feel every punch and swing as the endless action set-pieces fly past.

And it's relentless.

Coming in at just under two hours, there really is no let-up from the car chases, fights, shoot-outs, bike chases, scraps, pursuits and melees.

Essentially it's Scrapheap Challenge crossed with Robot Wars held on a Top Gear road trip.

It's simply breathtaking.

You feel every nudge and shove, every shot and stab, every ram, every flame throw. Everything is thrown at you, and it all hits home.

And it just looks amazing, to the extent you can almost taste the dust clouds.

The only thing missing is the kitchen sink, but, you, know, they all disappeared post-nuclear meltdown.

I suspect this film is just as much of an onslaught in a normal 2D screening, but it actually deserves the full IMAX (Mad IMAX if you will) treatment as the 3D seems to just make everything come to life.

And the image of a steering wheel flying straight at my head made my inner-child grin from ear to ear.

As I said, if complicated plots and well-drawn characters with something to say is your thing then Mad Max will be wasted on you.

But if a white-knuckle roller coaster ride that leaves you literally breathless, with genuine peril and threat at every turn (all bets are off on who might survive from very early on) is how you want to spend a couple of hours this not only hits the spot it sets fire to it, drags it through the desert, stabs it, shoots it, stabs it again then runs over it.

And then gets really nasty.

Spooks: The Greater Good (15)

For those of you who missed it, or live in a different country, Spooks was great - and by that I mean the original TV series.

Of course, our American cousins won't know it by that name. They got to watch a series called MI-5.

Nope, me neither.

Anyhoo, where were we?

Right, yes, Spooks. TV show. Now film. Now showing.

And if my screening today is anything to go by, attracting an audience fond of rustling their snack bags and very keen to sit in the seat they booked (which is fair enough, but maybe Odeon cinemas would like to pay someone to actually show people where that is, eh?).

Sorry, wandered off at a slight tangent there.

Spooks. Film. Yes. Quite.

Having lost track of the TV show (which ran for a mighty 10 seasons) quite early on, I was interested to see if you needed prior knowledge or if it stood alone.

Well, thanks to a large amount of expositional dialogue, it stands alone. Although I'm not sure that's a good thing.

Featuring the "legendary" Harry Pearce (played by Peter Firth, whose face looks more and more like a perplexed ham with every passing year), who featured in the whole TV run, the film has Harry legging it while trying to bring down a terrorist and prove there's a traitor in The Service.

Quite a lot to do for one man, but this is Harry Pearce.

He's joined by Kit Harrington (he of Game Of Thrones fame) - who has never been in the TV show - along with a further mix of new and old characters.

And all of this works well and is perfectly fine.

People run around, people get shot or punched, people turn on other people, other people turn out not to have turned on people - it's all as you'd expect and want from a lengthy special episode of a much-loved TV show.

And there-in lies the problem.

To make the transition from small to big screen, you want the whole thing to be bigger as well - bigger set pieces, bigger explosions, bigger runny jumpy bits.

And while they are bigger - in as much as the screen they're now on his huge - they feel like they've come straight from the TV show.

That's not a problem if that's what you're hoping for, but in hitting the big screen this spy drama is automatically now up against Bond, Bourne et al and so the shortcomings become apparent.

Along with the expositional waffle, the key plot points are signposted with all the subtlety of car crash.

At one point (the water bottle bit) the only thing that was missing was a giant arrow reminding you which bit director Bharar Nalluri wants you to pay attention to.

And then there's the writing.

Along with back-story being filled in during serious conversations, you're expected to believe experienced agents would [redacted] or find [redacted] in a sodding bin without thinking 'hey up, that's not right'.

That's not to say, strangely, that Spooks is a bad film. The fight scenes are gritty, there are a couple of good one-liners chucked in for a giggle and Harry Pearce is busy being Harry Pearce.

It just doesn't feel big, grand, epic - like a movie should.

It's an extended TV special shown on a screen bigger than you've got at home and played through a better sound system.

And, in the case of the Odeon, with the lights on.

It's not fast-paced enough, it's not slick enough, it's not subtle enough to hold it's own with the big spy films.

It feels, well, rather British.

And not the films we make now. The films we used to make, ironically, before Spooks was first broadcast.

The acting's great, the directing is functional without being exciting, the script feels a tad thrown together...

You get the idea.

This could have made a great TV episode. Maybe even a decent two-parter.

But as a film, sadly, it falls short of what we've now come to expect from big screen spy sorts.