From Sky Box Office: Stake Land Review

Though it cribs most of its best ideas from the cream of the post-apocalyptic genre, it does so in a way that is both compelling and exciting, creating a great apocalyptic atmosphere and bringing new life to a genre that is mostly ruled by the increasingly overplayed Zombie.

The Post-apocalyptic subgenre has seen rather a lot of attention in the recent decade, normally with a focus upon our undead friend. Even me, who loves everything Zombie, has grown to be slightly tired of what is now a tried and tested formula. Therefore when I heard of stake land, which attempted to switch out Mr Z. with a Vampire apocalypse, I was excited, though sceptical. Though my mind quickly jumped to visions of I am Legend (the novel), I quickly remembered I am Legend (the film), and lowered my expectations. What I was expecting wasn’t actually what I got, which was a nice surprise. What I was expecting was a pedal-to-the-metal throwaway apocalypse flick with lots of action, but little consequence. Rather what I got was a nicely balanced and well realised apocalyptic world with a personal touch which reminded me more of The Road, than say, Dawn of the Dead.

From the DVD Shelf: Hobo With a Shotgun Review

The ultimate homage to the low-budget exploitation thriller, Hobo with a Shotgun is a cacophony of blood, gore, and violence...though little else.

Hobo with a Shotgun is one of those films you take interest in purely because of its name. With a name like that, you pretty much know precisely what it’s going to be, and in that respect, it doesn’t disappoint. There are no minced words here, there’s a hobo, he has a shotgun, he uses said shotgun. Overall, I was rather excited to crack this badboy open and see the ridiculousness within. I was greeted with what I expected, joyfully low-budget violence with the tongue placed firmly within the cheek; by the end I felt that my stupidity quota had been filled for the day. That said, I came away not as totally satisfied as I would have hoped.

Johnny English: Reborn Review

Johnny English has returned! The question you got to ask yourself is, why?

When I heard that Johnny English was making his triumphant return to our cinemas, I didn’t really know how to feel. To me it always felt like one of those franchises that never got off the ground, a film that has some good points but had by this point been generally written off as simply ‘mediocre’, despite its genuinely good cast. I didn’t really think that anyone thought back on it that fondly, or felt as if a sequel was warranted, nor that it made enough money to require one of those awful ‘just for the cash’ sequels that we all love so much. So what is Johnny English Reborn? A Reboot? Kicking an already Dead Horse? Or was did Rowen just feel like giving it another go? Well who knows, and in the end it doesn’t matter all that much. Despite the time gap, we have another film which is essentially of the same mould, with many of the same laughs (or similar types of laughs at least) and another story which in the end is just a vehicle for Rowen’s funny Mr Bean-like antics. It’s as if the last eight years never happened!

Trailers: The Avengers

I think my face just melted. I would attempt to try and decipher the ins and outs of the film from this trailer alone, but instead I advise you to just head over to here and read a proper analysis from people who know what they are talking about (at least more than me): Link

From the DVD Shelf: Orcs! Review

A film that does precisely what it says on the tin, here’s another low budget, low-rent comedy horror with well...Orcs (!).

I seem to be riding this strange film wave at the moment, avoiding all that seems notable or what reviewers would term ‘good’ (whatever that really means), instead making a b-line towards what many would term ‘awful’. Well Orcs! (because plainly Orcs wouldn’t be as impactful) certainly falls into this low-budget-straight-to-DVD-awfulness category, but that doesn’t mean it is without its charm. Actually, I had a good time with it, take that film media! (but also, you are probably right). At least it isn’t zombies again. Right?

From the DVD Shelf: Mega Shark Vs Crocosaurus Review

Probably as low budget as you could probably ever get without breaching some kind of law, Asylum Film Studio’s brings us another mockbuster classic asking the pertinent question, who would win in a fight, a big shark, or a big crocodile? By the end of the film, you may have lost the will to live. I certainly had.

Asylum film studios are well known for their terrible direct to DVD releases, many of which rip directly from new releases in an attempt to make some quick cash. Let us not forget the Mockbuster classics that were ‘Sunday School Musical’, ‘Transmorphers’ and ‘Snakes on a Train’ (yeah, really). Alongside these examples of flagrant disregard for copy write law, Asylum has also created (I use that word loosely) a series of monster flicks, such as Mega Piranha, and most famously Mega Shark Vs Giant Octopus. Well now the Mega Shark has returned, but this time, he is facing off against a different, but luckily equally sized foe, the Crocosaurus (which, if you didn’t guess, is just a huge crocodile).

The Inbetweeners Movie Review

It's ungraceful and at times it certainly isn’t pretty, but if you were a fan of the series, or if you just love faecal matter and penis jokes, you’ll probably enjoy the movie spin off of this somewhat popular British television series. Otherwise, I’d steer well clear.

I’m not sure how I feel about the inbetweeners television series. At first I was rather a large fan, enjoying the first series rather a lot. From the heights of the first series though, as with many television series', the creativity of the story lines waned as it progressed and , to my mind at least, there seemed to be a reliance upon increasing crudeness to get laughs (an ever increasing use of slang descriptions of ladies for example), rather than through interesting story lines. To me, then, the film is a pinnacle of this transition, swapping out the interesting and sometimes cleverly written episodes of the first series, with a story line that is probably as bog standard as you can possibly get, but one where the rude jokes are almost always present. I’m not saying that I’m against this, and sure I did laugh rather more than I was expecting, but really beyond these moments there were many others which had me cringing, not because of the constant references to private parts, but instead because the character interaction, dialogue and plotting was so mind numbingly dull, clichéd and in many points arbitrarily enforced.