First up, this all-in-one Sony VAIO desktop PC.  Just before Christmas I installed the top of the range version of this machine for my boss.  That one was £1,700 worth of the cream of the crop featuring 8Gb of memory, a Blu-ray writer and more bells and whistles than the local pet shop.

This one is a far more terrifying prospect, as it is for my Mum.  This particular model is at the other end of the spectrum, but with the Core i3 chip and a modest but workable 3Gb of RAM I actually rather like it.  Being designed for the person with slightly tighter purse strings means several corners have been cut.  The keyboard and mouse are wired, the screen is bright but nothing like the cream of Sony’s crop, and the fit and finish of the entire unit is a little cheaper.

But for a touch enabled device that will be used for general internet use, iTunes and writing this should fit the bill perfectly.  Most retailers seem to be selling this one for around £800-825 but we found it online from Marks & Spencer for £770.

Next up is this Samsung Omnia running Windows Phone 7.  I bought this as a Christmas present for Sally, and haven’t gotten round to writing a proper post about it yet.  One will be coming in the next couple of weeks.  But initial impressions are very good.  The AMOLED screen is bright and crisp, but lacks the iPhone’s retina display for colour claritry and reproduction.

And finally this is the first time I’ve had to procure a MacBook for work purposes, and I’ve been setting up the 15″ MacBook Pro on the left (my 13″ model is to the right for a size comparison).  Unfortunately I couldn’t update everything in OS X through the work firewall so I simply HAD to bring it home.  No really, I had no other choice.  Ahem.

As with everything Apple this model is absolutely gorgeous, with small enhancements since I bought mine around 18 months ago such as a smaller Magsafe power adapter and now a Core i5 processor.  I’ve set up Boot Camp on it as well so it’s now running the 64-bit version of Windows 7 Home Premium, which seems to perform extremely well.

That’s it for now.  As I mentioned above there will be a proper post about the Windows Phone 7, and I’m working on a couple of probably quite lengthy ones relating to both the Apple and Microsoft digital home eco systems.  Watch this space.

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When I was sent Bad Boys to review I went back and did a little digging to refresh my memory, and came back with the unwanted statistic that the film is now fifteen years old.  Was it really fifteen years ago I went to see this action film from a director I hadn’t really heard of starring The Fresh Prince?  I went along with friends for the ride, and initially ended up slightly disliking the experience.

It was loud, brash, bold, stupid and contained a lot of yelling and swearing.  Not that I have any problem with the latter whatsoever, but some movies just drop constant f’bombs for the sake of it and revel in their edge adultness.  Bad Boys is a big offender in this category.

The movie centres around Miami detectives Lowry (Will Smith) and Burnett (Martin Lawrence) working Homicide.  When the departments career drug bust gets stolen from under their noses by a drugs kingpin named Fuchet (after inside assistance from cop Eddie Dominguez) our heroes have five days to crack the case before the unit is shut down and they are all reassigned.

I’m sure you don’t need me to go any further with the plot.  This is the movie that effectively launched Will Smith’s career with a budget that is now roughly his salary alone.
Bad Boys is a great action movie of its time, still slightly in the Die Hard/Lethal Weapon mould before everything got high tech and CG driven.
As thin as it may be, Bad Boys relies on its story, the action, characters and the chemistry between the two leads which is pitch perfect.
Yes they shout, they scream and yell at each other at regular intervals, but Lawrence plays the slightly comedic sidekick to Smith’s straight as a die action cop movie protagonist perfectly.

As with all Bay directed movies, Bad Boys is stylishly shot showcasing Miami and the surrounding areas.
Bad Boys may be two hours of macho cop action movie, but it’s an incredibly entertaining ride primarily thanks to the already mentioned chemistry between the leads.  Many of the movies most memorable lines are improvised (such as the convenience store FREEZE MOTHER BITCHES sequence) which gives the dialogue a believability we often don’t see in Hollywood screen writing.

Bad Boys contains considerably less action that its sequel, but it serves to prove what director Michael Bay can do when money doesn’t grow on trees and CGI robots aren’t destroying the planet.

Audio Visual
Bad Boys comes to Blu-ray as a catalogue title from SPHE with the standard 1080p MPEG4 encode we always seem from their titles.
Many movies from around the time of Bad Boys tend to have a slightly soft look about them, and Bad Boys reminded me of A Few Good Men, a very bold and colourful movie but a little soft in the visual department.

There is no doubt that this is the best that Bad Boys has ever looked, and although the source isn’t pristine (there are some dirt specks here and there) this Blu-ray is a considerable step up from the already high quality DVD version.

That’s not to say its perfect, and many could argue that if the movie received the full on remaster treatment that it deserves it could look better.  But Bad Boys looks above average for a catalogue title reissue, and fans should seek this new version out.

On the audio front we have a DTS HD Master Audio track that is indicative of the time of the movie as the picture quality.  Bad Boys is a very solid soundtrack, explosions are suitably boomy and dialogue is clear through the centre channel.

But anyone expecting a miracle and for BB to sound like a modern action film that really excels as a DTS HD MA soundtrack such as Die Hard 4.0 will be sadly disappointed.  That’s not a slight against this track, just the more stereo-bound soundtracks from that particular era.  As with the picture it is a considerable step up from its DVD counterpart, but is nowhere close to being a reference disc.

Bonus Features
Nothing new here, in fact this Blu-ray release contains less bonus features than the special edition DVD of Bad Boys.

Michael Bay Commentary – This commentary is a good listen for anyone interested in the filmmaking process primarily because it’s his first movie (although this track was after he had made a could more movies) and has a very low budget so there’s no “this was all handed off to ILM” chat here.  This is a lengthy information dump about the moviemaking process and contains a lot of technical and personal information.

Putting The Boom & Bang In The Bad Boys – Not a talking head feature in sight on this Blu-ray, just a standard def documentary feature the effects crew.  Michael Bay likes to blow stuff up, and these are the guys who make it happen.

Save for a couple of music videos that’s it!

Summing Up
I have a lot of love for Bad Boys.  Although my initial impressions of the movie weren’t exactly stellar back in 1995, repeated viewings on DVD have made it one of my favourite action movies with a wealth of quotable lines.

This Blu-ray release does as much justice as the movie could possibly have without a fully extensive remaster, leaving a visually impressive and sonically middle of the road affair.
My only major gripe is with the lack of any new or enhanced special features.  If there was a Bad Boys 3 on the horizon I’m sure we would have had special editions of both movies with new interviews, documentaries and commentary tracks.

For now, this BD release of Bad Boys will semi-please fans with what is a reasonably essential catalogue title purchase.

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After five years in development (three of which were remarkably silent publicly from Remedy Entertainment), a change to a single platform and assorted trailers we finally have the game itself.  While I have always said that Resident Evil 2 is my favourite game of all time, I add a caveat that Silent Hill 2 is right up there with it, and on a purely story level alone it trumps Capcom’s slice of survival horror perfection.

From the first moment I saw Alan Wake I got the Silent Hill vibe from it (before Konami started farming the franchise out to anyone who would pitch an idea for a sequel) and became very excited.  Small American town, idyllic perfection which all goes to hell when the lights go out?  Count me in.

But I have to confess that when I finally started playing A.Wake I felt a little bit underwhelmed.  Why had what appeared to be a rather run of the mill third person action game been in development for five years?  Clearly Alan Wake has been a long time labour of love for the relatively small development team of 45, but where was the hook?

It didn’t take long for me to stop being such a nit picking moaner and start enjoying the game, because the real star of Alan Wake is the story, the characters and the setting.  One of the greatest criticisms of the game from the early reviews was that towards the end of the game the action got in the way of just wanting to learn more about the story.  This is a testament to the writing and storytelling from Sam Lake and the team at Remedy that the story is more engrossing than the action at times.

Let’s talk about the action for a moment, because I want to get my minor moans and niggles out of the way right up front here.  The action is very well crafted but it very quickly gets very dull and repetitive.  There are perhaps only five enemy types (The Taken, posessed by the darkness/black presence) so enemy variety is not so much on the menu.  A typical encounter will find you faced by between three and five enemies, two will attack you straight out and the other three will flank and try and, for want of a better phrase, take you from behind.
It’s alright for the first couple of chapters, but the action soon gets repetitive and while things do become more tricky when objects in the world become possessed (anything from barrels to diggers), the core mechanic never really changes.

As you would expect weapons change up as you progress from the standard hand gun to shotguns, a hunting rifle, and my favourite, the flare gun.  You also have supplemental secondary ammo such as flash bangs and flares (distress rather than the fashion variety).
Yes Alan Wake is all about light and dark.  In the light you are safe from the monsters, but in the dark you are in their playground.  Wake carries around one of three different lanters/torches/flashlights (pick one depending on where you live in the world), going from standard, heavy duty and then up to a lantern.  You use the light to burn off the darkness from enemies before you can use your firearms.  Flare guns, flashbangs and other light weapons can do this, or just outright kill your enemies.

As an action game, Alan Wake is solid but not outstanding.  Remedy have taken the unusual approach these days and have not included an easy game mode.  Normal, Hard and Nightmare are your three options and the difficulty level doesn’t bow down to inexperienced players.  I played through the game on Normal and save a couple of daft mistakes I never found the game to be too hard a challenge, but I can see that inexperienced players may put down the controller and walk away in frustration.  This would be a shame because they would be missing one of the finest narrative driven psychological adventure games in years.

For while the story in Alan Wake is pure pulp stock shlock Stephen King fayre, it is without a doubt in my mind the best game of this type that I have played since Silent Hill 2.
When you start to delve into the small town world of Bright Falls you see where the love for the game and its characters the creators at Remedy have, and why it has been in development for so long.

Wake himself is actually not the most likeable of characters in the early stages of the game, a sulky novelist suffering from writers block.  He swaggers and pouts around like a sullen teenager while his wife tries to make him cheer up and get back his creative spark.  When she pushes him a little too far that’s when the story kicks off properly and the mystery of Alan Wake starts to unfold.

I am deliberately not mentioning the story in any detail here because I feel that anything I say about the plot would spoiler it considerably.  But suffice to say as the chapters progress, and Wake meets more characters such as the town sherrif and the superb comic relief manager character Barry, things rapidly pick up from what feels a bit like a nature ramble through the woods (with killer light fearing enemies, naturally).

Alan Wake is broken up into TV show like episodes.  At the start of each episode you see a “Previously on Alan Wake” plot retread, and while this works far better than it did in Atari’s Alone in the Dark, the episodes are between two and three hours long each (depending on how much you are ambling around the game world looking for collectible thermos flasks and manuscript pages) as opposed to the 42 minutes of a standard US network TV show.  I ended up playing the first couple of episodes/chapters in one sitting and then taking the rest of the week to play through the game, usually taking two days to complete one section.

Alan Wake’s six episodes are split into multiple chapters, so there is a fairly lengthy game here (some may say a slightly too bloated one), albeit one with an ambiguous and rather rushed ending.  When the credits rolled I was taken completely by surprise with a “Is that it?” sensation as the achievement unlocked for completing the episode.
But this particular adventure for Alan Wake is being closed out properly by the free downloadable content episode that is coming in July.  So there’s a couple of months wait before discovering the final part of this particular mystery.

I am also extremely glad for once that I preordered the special limited edition version of the game, which comes with a soundtrack CD, a bonus disc containing lengthy documentaries, trailers (one unreleased), exclusive avatar items and dashboard themes as well as unlocking a special video commentary feature for the main game.  This is one thing I feel probably should have been included with the regular version as well, as after installing the commentary you can watch a DVD/Blu-ray style video window commentary from various members of the Remedy team at specific parts of the game.  But as it is laden with spoilers you certainly wouldn’t want to watch it on your first play through of the game, and they tell you this right up front.

I often feel a sense of apathy towards certain game genres when I play too many of them (especially first person shooters) but just recently I have become a third person action game junkie, and despite having spent over forty hours playing Splinter Cell Conviction, I had no qualms about playing through perhaps a dozen hours of Alan Wake.  Nor do I mind starting the game again and going back for the atmosphere, the characters and the collectibles.  Those damn fine cups of coffee thermos flasks aren’t going to find themselves…

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If certain web forum trends are to be believed then once every few years people who play videogames a lot (or have done for a long time) usually tend to go through an occasional “why do I do this?” phase.  Of course I’m no expert on this particular subject, or any other for that matter, but every time I read forum posts usually titled “Tired of gaming” or “Gaming apathy” they tend to let in an unmetered tide of responses from people who are either going through a similar experience, or have recently done so.

I’m not going through one of those particular mid-gaming life crisis episodes right now, far from it.  But as well as the “why do I do this?” question I like to hold up a counter point when a game reinforces my primary relaxation hobby (especially as the evenings are too bright at the moment for film and TV watching).  This tends to be a game that I wouldn’t normally have purchased, but have done so either on a whim or it has been reduced in price.  Fable II was at the top of the pile of games I never thought I would want to play, let alone enjoy.  Then I sunk over sixty hours into completing it multiple times.  But the game that has done it for me this time is Splinter Cell Conviction.

I’ve never been a fan of the previous Splinter Cell games.  When I tried them on the original Xbox they seemed a little overcomplicated (or I was just overly simple), but people who liked them really enjoyed them.  I was never really one for stealth action games, and after getting caught one too many times by guards I gave up and went onto something else.
I only bought Conviction really so I could play online co-op with Mr DXEndar, promising that if I was offered the contract I was going for them I would buy it.  I won the contract, and a promise is a promise.  What has happened since I got the game has been nothing short of a revelation for me.

Fans of the original games have voiced concerns over this particular title as the focus of the game has shifted more towards a straightforward third person cover based action shooter (along the lines of Gears of War) and the stealth emphasis has been somewhat toned down.
But in reality you can play the game as either type, you can go in guns blazing, make as much noise as possible and enjoy some very frantic and heated firefights, or you can take the stealthy approach.

I started by playing the game like I do with most action games if I’m perfectly honest, I play on the easiest difficulty level to get through the game and see the story to its conclusion.  Then if I have really enjoyed the experience (and if I’ve paid full price, I want to get the best value for money I possibly can) I will go back and play it again on a higher level, and then play some co-op or multiplayer if it is included.
Looking at the single player campaign first of all, much of the back story went straight over my head but the game moves along at a fast pace and is incredibly slick.  At times it feels very much like an even more stylised (and cliched for that matter) episode of 24.  But one of the ones with action obviously.

But instead of just throwing level after level of “infiltrate base/warehouse/mansion” rinse and repeat ad nauseum gameplay, the action (or lack of it depending on how you are playing) changes up enough that you don’t get bored.  I won’t give away any spoilers here, but every now and then everything changes so you are going through a definite third person shooter, some enforced stealth and an excellent free running sequence.
This is where the revelation happened for me with Conviction.  I enjoyed the single player campaign a lot, I got the game on Friday and started playing straight away before moving into some co-op (more on that in a moment) and then going back and completing the single player story on Sunday.

But after completing the game I took a break for a few minutes and started all over again on the next difficulty level (Normal).  When I did this I completely changed my play style, moving to a far more stealthy approach.  Climbing up drainpipes instead of just hiding behind cover, going for stealth kills and very much biding my time.  I played solidly again all through Monday, completed the game and started yet again on Realistic difficulty!  This is completely unheard of for me to do with a game of this type.  Usually by now I would have moved onto another game from the library, and Mass Effect 2 has been sat waiting for some love.

After an enforced break yesterday I have spent all morning today playing the game through to its completion yet again on Realistic and you know what?  I will gladly play it all over again!
So the single player probably takes around seven or eight hours to play through, and it is broken down into eleven chapters.  But for multiplayer there is a prequel co-op campaign which I would gustimate takes around three to four hours to play through.  I have yet to complete it at the time of writing, but we played for around three hours with the end still some way off.  It doesn’t change up the core mechanics of the game one bit, but as an extra added bonus with new characters and different environments it makes for great fun.

Then there’s the on and offline multiplayer that I haven’t even touched on yet.

So I take my non-existent hat off to the folks at Ubisoft for finally releasing this oft-delayed game, and can happily say they have made a convert out of me.
Next week: Alan Wake.

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But after Final Fantasy XIII and Just Cause 2 (from the purchase of Eidos) comes Nier, an action RPG that is clearly showing the veteran Japanese publisher trying to find a market that likes Japanese games, but would rather have more action than RPG.
The game is published by SE, but has been developed by Cavia, a studio probably best known for Dragon Ball Z and Drakengard titles along with some Resident Evil lightgun shooters.

The game focuses on the title character Nier, a man searching for a cure for the killer Black Scrawl virus that has infected his daughter Yonah.  During his search early in the game Nier encounters a magic book named Grimoire Weiss (voiced by a man doing what appears to be a very good James Mason impersonation) who has a semi-beige alignment as you are never quite sure whether his motives are good or evil.
You also soon team up with a fellow warrior named Kaine with a penchant for bad language and also happens to be a hermaphrodite.  So not exactly your typical bald space marine companion.

As with so many games these days, you begin with all of the games available magic powers, fighting off hordes of enemies known as Shades, only to have everything taken away from you as the action shifts to a completely different locale and you have to learn the basics of combat until you encounter the book with all the answers.

During these early stages you are introduced to the world of Nier through a thankfully short series of fetch quests as you run around your home town hub world, before heading out into the wide green yonder.  On the first quest I had to pause the game and actively think whether I have ever had to kill sheep to further my progress in a game before.

Once you pick up Weiss after a relatively linear dungeon crawl the world opens up, offering typical fetch or assassination side quests to build up gold and items to supplement the main storyline.

Much like the recent Darksiders game from THQ, Nier takes a number of elements from different genres and presents a sort of mash up of action game, RPG, puzzler, and even top down/side scrolling shooter.  It results in a game that is slightly unsure of what it wants to be, trying to please different categories of gamer rather sticking to one or even two of them.
This also means that the game doesn’t particularly excel in any one particular area.  The combat is enjoyable but feels far looser than a game such as the sublime Bayonetta or God of War III.  Nier is something of a jack of all trades/master of none experience at times, but none of its elements can be described as being bad.

Navigating around the world will be frustrating for some, as the wide open spaces need to be backtracked several times during the course of the roughly thirty hour main game experience.  The game world isn’t exactly pretty either, it’s probably best described as functional.
But at least this means there isn’t any slowdown, and the game moves along a fair pace.  Functional is a word that can be used to describe a lot of things regarding Nier as a complete package.  It lacks the spit and polish of a truly flagship Square published title, and looks something like a title that was conceived and developed during the transition from the Xbox/PS2 generation to the 360 and PS3 versions that have been released.  Nier isn’t a particularly pretty game, but where is does truly shine is the soundtrack.

Nier contains some of the most memorable music I have heard in a game for a long time, and it seamlessly blends depending on which environment you are in.  Choirs sing and chant in the peaceful areas, string guitars play in the quiet library.  The score complements the action perfectly, and while you will hear it played over and over again (particularly some of the chants) it never grates to the point that you want to switch it off.

While the game isn’t what you would call a Triple A top tier developed title, that’s not to say that it’s a bad game.  Far from it, I’ve played far, far worse titles than this and Nier tries extremely hard to change things around while you are playing to keep you interested.  Walk into your house and the action flips from free roaming 3D to a side-on view.  During some of the combat sections the camera moves to a top down shot, then blending seamlessly back to regular action when you move onto the next section.

Ultimately I admire Square Enix for publishing a title like this, and stamping their name all over it.  It’s good to see what are typically such stanchly Japanese companies trying things out in an attempt to obtain a wider audience.  Nier tries hard to appeal to a broad range of people, but the whole is not greater than the sum of its parts.
So as a third person action game is pales compared to its luminaries, and isn’t hardcore enough to be classed as a typical RPG.  Does it do enough to make me recommend it?  Yes, primarily because the game tries so very hard and the story is actually rather compelling.  It might not be the prettiest game around, but Nier sounds great, has decent voice acting and is a fun enough way to spend thirty hours.  Plus unlike Final Fantasy XIII, you don’t have to wait fifteen hours for the action to start.  Nier is worth taking a look at.

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John pondered holding up a boombox to save the world

Hollywood has a large number of easy targets for vitriol such as Jerry Bruckheimer or Michael Bay who produce loud, visually stunning movies that are devoid of any quality story or character development.  As many people sagely state “Michael Bay likes blowing sh*t up!”, and let us be frank unless we sit watching art house cinema and complaining about the fall of society, we all like to see stuff blowing up.

Another of these soft targets is Roland Emmerich, an unashamed creator of retina burning movies such as Independence Day and Godzilla.  And for each of their hackneyed, cliché laden plot devices I have to say I do rather enjoy an Emmerich movie.

Conveniently sidestepping the mess that was 10,000 BC we now have 2012 which is billed as the disaster movie to end all others.  It stars John Cusack in a somewhat blatant studio paycheck role as Jackson Curtis, a published novelist and divorced father of two.  Sadly his book only sold a handful of copies, and insistence at sticking with the vocation cost him his marriage to the always charming Amanda Peet (Kate).
Jackson is driving a limo for a Russian billionaire Yuri Karpov (Zlatko Buric) while Kate is living with plastic surgeon Gordon (Tom McCarthy).

This group makes up the human interest part of the movie, as the Mayan forecasted end of the world date of 2012 rapidly approaches, and the proverbial hits the domestic appliance.
Scientists in India and a US adviser named Adrian Helmsley (Chiwetel Ejiofor) were aware of the upcoming crisis, and in secret the US has been using labour from around the globe to construct a series of arks that will ferry the “great and good” of the world’s elite who can afford the one billion dollar (per person) price tag to be part of the new world order.  All this coming under order from the US president (Danny Glover) and slimy self-centered naer do well Carl Anheuser (Oliver Platt).

Before moving on to discuss just how well the CG team destroy much of the entire planet I have to take a very slight stand for the story here.  Yes the down on his luck, heart of gold Dad routine has been done a million times before.  Yes, you root that he will get back together with his estranged wife, and hope the new plastic surgeon will meet an untimely demise.  The kids are cute and we want everyone to survive (pretty much).
But as trite as some of this stuff is, the movie actually has a few subtle nods to themes such as making peace while you still can, and it doesn’t shy away from bumping off characters at regular intervals.  So while this isn’t, and was never meant to be Shakespeare 2012 has genuine heart underneath the multimillion dollar effects.

And finally to those effects and for the most part they are spectacularly impressive.  There is some very ropey CG at times (witness the family escaping in the limo as the streets fall apart around them) but on the whole the action is pretty spectacular.

Hollywood seems to be welcoming anything flying into buildings these days, and mass destruction on a global scale is served up for our entertainment.  But don’t worry folks, the little people are only CG!
My own personal feelings about “we got a plane, you’re all dead, sorry” moments aside, the two and a half hour runtime whips by relatively quickly.  Action sequences are fairly close together and the story never really gets too sluggish to the point you would be looking at your watch and waiting for the next tidal wave or earthquake.

2012 is big dumb fun with a surprising amount of heart, and as a reference disc it will give any system a serious workout.  Just don’t expect high art and you won’t walk away disappointed.

Audio Visual
Lets get down to business right from the off here.  2012 is a reference disc, pure and simple.  Visuals are gorgeous, and this 1080p MPEG4 encode is nearly almost rock solid.  Save for a couple of contrast issues in darker scenes it is spot on.
As with a lot of CG laden movies the clarity of the Blu-ray transfer shows up a few slightly wonky effects shots, but scenes such as the image above of the cast escaping as the city collapses around them is mesmerising.  Just watching the buildings collapse, glass shatter, etc is simply stunning.

While watching the movie I Tweeted to say it had possibly the best audio I’ve ever heard in a home disc release, and bar a couple of minor niggles I did notice later on during the film I stand by that knee jerk 140 character reaction.  The DTS HD Master Audio soundtrack is a powerhouse that gives each and every speaker in your surround setup a serious workout.  Even during quiet conversation scenes such as on the aeroplane full of Yuri’s cars the rear speakers are constantly chattering with clanks and clangs.
The minor gripe is the bass could be a little more bombastic during some of the serious destruction scenes.  Watch a movie such as Die Hard 4.0 and enjoy the shoot out scene where Bruce Willis first meets Justin Long.  Gunshots rain down, heavy deep and thumbing bass abounds.  I would have expected something similar here, but considering the whole world is going to hell in a very large handbasket, things can be a little weedy at times.

Those minor items on the snagging list aside, this is a great looking and sounding disc.

Bonus Features
This UK presentation of 2012 is interesting.  In the US there were two releases, a standard single disc with just the movie and a few extras as well as a two disc Special Edition with a load of HD exclusive items.

We get a single disc version containing all the extras from the Special Edition.  Good for us, but I wonder whether bitrates were dropped anywhere to keep everything down to a single BD50?

Anyway, the following features are included:

Audio Commentary – Roland Emmerich and his co-writer/composer Harald Kloser given a very functional and information heavy commentary on the movie which is technical but not particularly awe inspiring.  There’s a lot of tidbits here but I wouldn’t say it’s a must listen.

Picture-in-Picture Commentary – Same goes for this one, not particularly great but you do get the added bonus of the cast and crew giving talking heads and some behind the scenes production stuff.

Alternate Ending – I’m very glad that this isn’t the ending that they used, as it cranks up the shmalz to eleven and negates some of the tough choices the filmmakers made in sending a small message through letting people go.  Visual effects aren’t finished and there is no soundtrack.  It’s nice to have here to show what could have been the ending, but a good reminder of why it wasn’t.

Deleted Scenes – One for the check box on the back of the packaging, five very short and unmemorable scenes that were right to be cut.

Roland Emmerich: The Master of the Modern Epic – Bring your sick bag, it’s ten minutes of people showering praise on how amazing Mr Emmerich is.  Really Sony, you can do way better than this.

Interactive Mayan Calendar – Nice bit of fun this one. You have four options beginning with some video telling about the Mysteries of the Mayan Calendar and some extras for reading the glyphs themselves.  The Mayan Horoscope is good for a bit of fun.

An Actor’s Perspective – A chat with the principal cast about making such a physical movie.

Science Behind the Destruction – This featurette is making a link between the Mayan calendar and the science that the movie is based on.

Designing the End of the World & Countdown to the Future – I’ve lumped these two features together because they go hand in hand to deliver just over three quarters of an hour that makes up the bulk of the features here.

As you might expect the former is going deep into the CGI of the movie.  I’m a sucker for these kind of features showing the computer tech behind the final image and this one is very heavy on behind the scenes material.  The highlight of the features for me (no prizes for guessing what the low point was).  The second part is focussing more on the Mayan beliefs that we’ll all be getting our comeuppance before the next round of videogame consoles are released.  It’s a well paced scientific feature.

Summing Up
This is a Marmite movie for many folks, you either like Mr Emmerich’s brand of visual insanity or you view him as a hack to be vilified.

Personally I enjoyed 2012, despite it being two tons full of cliché for most of its considerable runtime.  The CG effects are spectacular, the disc looks and sounds amazing and the features are decent enough to keep fans entertained.

If for nothing else, 2012 is a must have reference disc to keep in your collection.

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It is taken as a given that Pixar are the rightful rulers of CG Animated Movieland(TM) and despite numerous imitations none of the other studios can replicate their magical formula.  Dreamworks continue to cram as many pop culture references as is humanly possible into their outings, and previous Sony titles have been a trifle insipid such as Open Season.

But now we have Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs, based on a childrens book I have never heard of (because I am neither a child or a parent), it follows the story of Flint Lockwood (voiced by Bill Hader) a well meaning inventor who just can’t quite get things right.  Still living with his stoic father (James Caan) on the tiny island of Swallow Falls, Flint is trying to realise his lifelong dream of being a great inventor in a custom made laboratory in the back yard.

Here he is ably assisted by monkey Steve, and Flint is working on a machine that can turn water into food if only he can find enough power to do so.
The once prosperous town is now a veritable ghost town and the nefarious mayor (Bruce Campbell) is trying anything he can to bring tourists into the area.

So when Flints invention finally works and starts raining cheeseburgers down on the town, this greasy manna from heaven is just what the town needs to really be put on the map (and is located under the A of the Atlantic Sea on the map, a nice touch).
Rookie weather anchor Sam Sparks (the always dependable Anna Faris) is on hand to report the incredible story, but when the town starts requesting anything and everything falls from the sky the inevitable DANGER zone is soon entered.

When the steak hits the flan, Flint and Sam (and STEVE!) have to save the day before the entire world is covered in a food mountain.

I will happily admit I was proven wrong by Cloudy With A Chance.. I was half expecting another slightly uninspiring Pixar wannabe but ended up with an animated movie that finally holds a candle to Pixar.
Unlike a movie such as Shrek which has numerous references that go over the heads of children but strike a chord with parents and adults that are a little more…risque, Cloudy amuses adults but in a cheeky manner.

It is its cleverness that makes Cloudy such a joy to watch, and while the “stick legs, large body” animation style won’t be to everyones taste the technical brilliance of the animation is the closest thing I’ve seen yet that comes close to that other studio (especially the water).  Oh and Mr T is in it.  I could have saved myself 500 words and just said that.

Audio Visual
Digital perfection.  That is all I can say, we have a 1080p MPEG 4 encode and a DTS HD Master Audio soundtrack that are pure reference quality.  It goes without saying that a digital movie from a digital source going direct to a digital format is going to be as close to perfect as you can get and that is what you get here.

The picture is stunning and the audio packs a real punch to all of the speakers (especially in the action packed final fifteen minutes).

Bonus Features
Commentary – Co-directors Phil Lord and Christopher Miller join up with Flint voice actor Bill Hader for an extremely lively commentary!  There’s no staid and dull chat here, just a whole lot of friendly banter.  Anyone looking for a technical commentary will be left out in the cold this time around, but having listened to plenty of these over the years this light hearted muck about was a welcome break.

Making Of – Again its a light hearted featurette than runs for 11 minutes which is a little EPK-ish.  Director and voice actor interviews pad out the runtime but its a bit of throwaway fun.

Music Video – Speaking of throwaway.  Yes it’s a music video, which also gets a 2 minute making of.

The Voices – This is more like it.  A featurette that features on voice actors Bill Hader, Anna Faris and of course Mr T.  The theme of lark about fun continues here.  Again.  Mr T.  Say no more.

Extended Scenes – A couple of scenes  are slightly extended, one with unfinished animation and they total three minutes.

Progression Reels – This is a feature for viewers who have been crying out for a little bit of technical info.  Visual FX supervisor Rob Bredow introduces some animations that show the process a fully animated movie goes through.  Sadly, its only for ten minutes.

Early Development Scenes – Some storyboard sequences that are hand animated from early in the movies development process.

BD Exclusives – Interactive “Splat” Feature.  One for the younger viewers and perhaps the young at heart (I did find it rather amusing).  You can select to throw various food items (including meatballs, of course) at the screen while watching the movie and then clean them off with a “virtual squeegee”.

Flint’s Food Fight Game – A Java based Space Invaders clone where you (yes, YOU!) must fight against Flint’s food machine.

Summing Up
With the exception of Disney’s Bolt, few animated movies have come even close to replicating the Pixar magic, and Bolt even had overseeing from Andrew Stanton.  Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs is a delightfully fun animated romp that will entertain both parents and children.

I can’t praise this movie enough, from the superb animation, picture quality, sound and vocal performances right down to a decent set of bonus features this is a top notch Blu-ray disc.  Oh and it comes with a DVD copy as well.  A must purchase.

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For the past few years there have been numerous articles written in countless magazines, on gaming web sites and blogs about the state of the Japanese gaming industry.  Where once Japanese companies, games and studios ruled the roost, now we find some of the largest players in the electronic entertainment business are from the US with behemoth publishers such as Activision and EA.

Even the Japanese companies themselves can see that games designed for a Western audience will guarantee better sales than a purely Japan focussed one.  Just look at Capcom designing Dead Rising for the ranks of zombie lovers.  Even they have now taken things one step further by farming out development of the sequel to a Canadian studio.  So a Japanese gaming that apes Western ideals now just being straight up developed in the West.

I am a big fan of these big budget Western developed titles, but there is something special and in many cases utterly insane about a Japanese developed game.  Especially one that provides a look into how the Japanese interpret Westerns tastes.
This is one of the reasons why I love the Resident Evil series so much.  The games are intrinsically Japanese, but are set in the US with over the top characters and storylines.  And frankly, there is nothing more utterly insane than Bayonetta.

While the box may say Sega, this is essentially a Capcom title with some Sega influences.  With developer Platinum Games being made up of former Capcom employees who were once Clover Studios.  Clover brought some critically adored games such as Viewtiful Joe and God Hand to the world, which fans worshipped but the general populous steered clear of in droves.

When the widely respected EDGE magazine here in the UK gave Bayonetta a 10 out of 10 score even I raised a quizzical eyebrow.  How could what looked like an evolved version of Devil May Cry earn such a coveted score?

I played Bayonetta on and off for all of last weekend, only stopping for family duties.  When I stopped playing on Friday night I dreamed about the game.  Any chance I got I was firing up the Xbox 360 and sneaking in some extra playtime.  For me to be so consumed by a game in this way is an extremely rare occurance these days.

The fact of the matter is this: Bayonetta is one of the finest action games I have ever played.  It takes the Devil May Cry style formula, updates it and makes it more accessible to novice players while not taking away a challenge for experienced ones.
The game looks and sounds stunning, and is littered with references to both Capcom and Sega games (you collect gold rings straight out of Sonic, and the music on the car radio in one cut scene is Magical Sound Shower from Outrun).

What playing Bayonetta for around ten hours these past few days has reminded me why I love Japanese games so much.  Because they can be intense, funny, utterly ridiculous and completely non-PC and on top of everything else the most important thing of all; FUN!

Bayonetta takes the best bits of my favourite gaming genres, twists them together, adds a pinch of genius and delivers a game that should be universally adored by anyone who has ever held a joypad.
I really hope that Bayonetta sells well, but it does seem to be a game from an almost dying breed.  You don’t get games like this from anywhere outside of Japan, but people need to keep buying them so the developers can keep making them.  This has the feel of God Hand with all of its ridiculous craziness but amped up even higher.

In fact…oh to heck with it.  Bayonetta is one of the best games I have ever played, and it is even getting close to nipping at the heels of Resident Evil 2 to become my favourite game of all time.  I have played a ton of identikit first person shooters, third person action and role playing games over the past few years that I can hardly remember the plot of.  It may be fresh in my mind, but Bayonetta is a game I will go back and play again and again.  Pure, inspired, insane genius.

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This re-imagining (which is Hollywood’s latest word for remake) comes from director Tony Scott and stars Denzel Washington (a Scott favourite) and John Travolta.
The plot centres around Washington playing a New York MTA employee named Walter Garber, a high flyer in the transit system who has been busted down to Dispatcher after some alleged improprieties over an order for new trains.

Travolta plays the villain of the piece, the leader of a group of train hijackers named Ryder who along with a bunch of thugs take control of train Pelham 1 2 3.  They hold the passengers hostage for ten million dollars which has to be delivered within one hour, otherwise Ryder is going to start getting trigger happy with the passengers.  Naturally our man Denzel starts the conversation with Ryder until chief hostage negotiator Camonetti (John Turturro) comes on the scene and starts to try and broker a deal.  With unhappy consequences, naturally.

What follows is a lot of back and forth between Washington and Travolta on the trains’ radio, interspersed with some light action before setting the movie up for a more action packed finale.

As I alluded to at the start of the review, my biggest problem with Pelham is that it doesn’t quite know what sort of a movie it wants to be.
Given that the movie is in semi real time ala 24, the imposed hour that Ryder gives to the City of New York (and grease ball mayor James Gandolfini) is supposed to make things fast paced and exciting it felt like one of the longest hours I’ve experienced.
When you strip everything off the movie itself it actually isn’t really that exciting.  This theory seems to pay off for me given that Scott unleashes almost every camera trick in the book to try and spice up the tension level and ends up coming off as extremely annoying.
We have the circular sweep shot when a discussion is going on (those who suffer from motion sickness look away for several scenes), we cut to a helicopter flying through the sky which has frames chopped out so it looks edgy and exciting (or you think “is this Blu-ray disc skipping or something?”).  There’s the Google Maps/Live overlay sweeps around the city we have seen before in Scotts movies like Enemy of the State (my personal favourite).

So the movie is so achingly desperate to make you think things are exciting it is at times extremely offputting.
So we can safely say this isn’t an action movie, although there is some semi-decent action right towards the very end of the movie on the crowded NYC streets).

In actual fact, Pelham is more of a character piece (with annoying camera sweeps) than anything.  Many of the movies high points for me were the conversations between Ryder and Garber with Washington turning in a typically studied and acted performance.
But for me extra credit must go to Travolta for adding several little nuances to the character of Ryder who is constantly on the edge of losing it (and frequently does), all the time looking twitchy and edgy.

However, for every quality character moment there are some real clunkers elsewhere, particularly with the teenager talking to his girlfriend on his laptop via WiFi.  This emo bint is more concerned that her soon to be shot by terrorists boyfriend won’t say “I love you” to her while she’s pouring out her heart, making a noise and probably watching Twilight on another screen.
These two also provide the lowest point of the movie whereby apparently in New York you can’t just say “I love you” you have to add “fucking” into almost every sentence.  So don’t you worry readers, the really fucking love each other!

I realise that much of my review of this movie may come off sounding rather negative, but Pelham isn’t a bad movie.  It’s just a slightly odd one.  It has been marketed as an action movie (which it isn’t) whereas it is closer to a thriller (without too many thrills).  Both Sally and I enjoyed the experience of watching Pelham which has many high points, just don’t expect it to be a blown the barn doors off action thriller ride experience extravaganza(TM).

Audio Visual
As per usual we have an MPEG 4 1080p encoding on a dual layer BD50 disc from Sony, and as we should expect from a brand new movie it looks superb.
For his last few films Scott has gone for a very specific look to his movies starting off with Enemy of the State but really coming to the fore with his other recent Washington starring movies Deja Vu and Man on Fire.  Intentionally grainy image, slightly muted but still bold colours and high contrast.

This may sound like a recipe for visual disaster but the encoding on this disc is spot on.  Dark scenes (of which there are a lot given that the train is stuck in a tunnel for an hour) never lead to any problems with black levels or colour bleeding.  Facial definition is good, this is a typically solid transfer from SPHE.

On the audio front I’m pleased to report that Sony are continuing to use DTS HD Master Audio as the sonic codec of choice (or at least they have since Angels & Demons which was the last movie I reviewed several months ago).
This is a pretty punchy track, which really comes alive towards the end of the movie as the action ramps up, but there is plenty on offer throughout the rest of the dialogue heavy movie with environmental audio all helping to create a fully encompassing soundscape.

Given that there is a lot of dialogue here, it is always at the forefront of the mix so there are never any “what did he say?” moments.  This is a very solid soundtrack to go with the equally impressive visuals.

Bonus Features
We start off with two commentary tracks, one from Tony Scott and the other from writer Brian Helgeland and producer Todd Black.
Really you can pick one track here and skip the other, as a lot of the information given is repeated but either track is a fairly engaging listen, particularly Scott’s.  Both tracks cover the film making process, the original movie, MTA, etc but if you aren’t a fan of commentaries then you just need to check out…

The Making of Pelham 1 2 3 – This 30 minute HD documentary pretty much sums up all you need to know about making the movie itself.  Much of the runtime is taken up dealing with the logistical aspects of filming in NYC itself and the MTA involvement, with cast interviews surprisingly light the spotlight focuses more on the actual MTA workers themselves which makes a nice change.  Definitely a big step up from the usual EPK fayre.

The Third Rail: New York City Underground – Running at 16 minutes in HD this feature focuses more strongly on the MTA themselves (who already get a large amount of screen time in the preceding feature) and showing how the producers, cast and crew dealt with filming in the tunnels.

From the Top Down – WHAT?  A feature on maybe some action or special effects?  Or a character study perhaps?  No, five minutes of talking about hairdressing which is effectively “the lead characters have their hair done with clippers”.  Can you hear the bottom of the barrel being scraped yet?

Marketing Pelham – Or it should be given its proper name “all the trailers stitched together”.   Barrel scrape confirmed!

Summing Up
The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 is an enjoyable movie provided you know what it is.  A character drama with light action overtones that features excellent performances from its lead and supporting cast (mostly).  Tony Scott’s frenetic camera work may not be to everyone’s taste (particularly mine) but this disc is definitely worth a rental or a purchase if you are a fan of the actors or just well put together Blu-ray discs.

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While the book is a prequel to The Da Vinci Code, this movie adaptation is set after the religious romp and sees Tom Hanks reprise his role as Robert Langdon, fortunately with a far more sensible haircut this time.

Whereas TDVC hopped from location to location, Angels & Demons action primarily takes place over the course of an evening in a single location.
Under the guise of the shadowy Illuminati, a mysterious someone has stolen a canister of antimatter from the Hadron Collider (where Gordon Freeman simply has to work, preparing for a resonance cascade) and kidnapped four leading bishops who are in-line to become the next Pope of the Catholic church.  The scoundrel is saying that each Bishop will be executed in a suitably grizzly fashion at a particular time unless someone can track them down before biblical wrath is laid down.  Oh and the antimatter canister will explode as soon as the battery runs down, laying waste to Vatican City.  So no pressure then.

Fortunately that someone is Robert Langdon, who has been petitioning the Vatican since has last religious sojourn to allow him access to their archives to continue his writing.
Langdon is collected and stuck on a plane to Rome to assist, and immediately comes into contact with the movies grumpy Swiss Guard chief (Stellan Skarsgard) and Sophie Neauveau substitute Vittoria Vetra (Ayelet Azurer) who just happens to be a brilliant physicist and is also rather pleasing on the eye.

While the Bishops are locked in a debate to choose the next Pope, Camerlengo Patrick McKenna (Ewan McGregor) is temporarily placed in charge of the Vatican, and immediately gives Langdon the access he requires.

What follows is a tightly plotted series of hops around Vatican City following clues to the location of the next Bishop.  As with TDVC there is a sub-plot of “not everything is quite as it seems”, and some slight misdirection that is perhaps a little too obvious.  Of course nobody is parading around in the background carrying a banner saying “He looks a bit shifty, doesn’t he?” but it doesn’t take a genius to work out who is really the mastermind behind the attacks.  Be sure to watch the movie before the special features of course, as they blow the plot entirely.

As a two and a quarter hour movie it is closer to a thriller but without quite enough thrills than an action movie.  Unlike its predecessor, this movie is a much tighter experience and there aren’t any particularly long exposition scenes here.  While it isn’t the most exciting movie you will watch this year, there is an enjoyable workman like quality to Angels & Demons that often comes from Ron Howard’s movies.

It would be easy to describe Angels & Demons as middle class, middle of the road filmmaking but it would be doing something of a disservice to what is actually a surprisingly fun movie.  I will readily confess that before I watched it, I wasn’t particularly looking forward to doing so.  Not that I have anything against Dan Brown, Tom Hanks, Ron Howard or anyone else involved in the movie, but it felt like it was going to be something of a chore to watch it.  As it turned out, I was pleasantly surprised by the pacing, story and acting.

Regardless of what I say, Angels & Demons has already made a fortune for Sony Pictures, and will continue to do so in home disc format.  It might not set the world alight, but if you are looking for a well directed, acted, scored and edited movie you can do far worse than give Angels & Demons a try.

Audio Visual
Angels & Demons is presented in the Sony standard MPEG4 encode at 1080p and as you would expect for a new release, everything looks pristine.
Colours around the Vatican City are rich and detailed, particularly as the sun is setting.  As the action switches to night and murky interior sets black levels are rock solid and there is nothing to fault here at all.

The intricately detailed rooms inside the Vatican look beautiful, and even the CG blends fairly well.  As filming inside the actual Vatican was completely off limits many sets are recreated in the studio with a lot of green screens and blended in post production.  Apart from the helicopter sequence towards the end of the movie, I never noticed the joins between the real and digitally created worlds.  This is a great transfer.

On the audio front things are a little more interesting because every Sony Pictures disc I have reviewed so far has used Dolby TrueHD audio.  Angels & Demons bucks the trend and delivers a DTS HD Master Audio soundtrack that is as suitably workmanlike as the visuals.

Deep bass is particularly impressive during scenes such as the firing of the Hadron Collider at the start of the movie, and the climactic helicopter sequence.  Other scenes lack a little in overall punch, but then environmental audio makes up for these shortcomings with plenty going on in the rear channels for much of the movie.

To be fair, a Dolby TrueHD track would probably have sounded just as good here, but I have always favoured DTS HD MA and am intrigued to see if Sony continue to use this as their codec in the future.
Overall a very impressive looking and sounding disc.

Bonus Features
I have yet to mention that this Blu-ray disc contains both the Theatrical and Extended cuts of the movie.  But unlike the lengthy additions to the Da Vinci Code Extended cut, the difference here is a mere seven minutes.  To be perfectly honest the Extended Cut just adds a bullet point to the box and removes the need for a deleted scenes section.  This is basic exposition stuff, nothing particularly different.

As per usual, extra bonus points go to Sony for providing all of the bonus features in 1080p HD.

MovieIQ – Got an internet enabled BD Live player?  MovieIQ is a new feature that is included on Angels & Demons that provides informational text throughout the movie covering many facets of the movie.

Powered by Gracenote, MovieIQ is probably best described as being a Wiki for movies and the information you can access changes as the scenes in the movie alter.  For a far better description of the feature (including some handy screenshots), check out this Engadget article.

I must confess that like many other folks I do find BD Live to be a little bit pointless (and slow) but this is the first feature I have genuinely enjoying using.  It’s rather fancy watching the information update as the scenes change.  I’ve always enjoyed informational text tracks, but having them become more interactive like this is a bonus.

The Path of Illumination – This is the main feature on the disc, it’s essentially a series of behind the scenes featurettes put together as an interactive map, and the official blurb says “in which viewers follow Robert Langdon’s journey through Rome, exploring architecture, discovering new facts, seeing additional behind-the-scenes footage and interviews from each location, and discovering more about the four altars of science — all in the quest to unlock the path of illumination.”

So like I said, it’s a fancy interactive map but it’s good fun.

Rome Was Not Built In A Day & Angels & Demons: The Full Story – I have lumped these two featurettes together because they effectively make up a single documentary that has been split up into two pieces.  And somewhat bizarrely the “Full Story” version is the shorter of the two.

Head scratching aside, this is a comprehensive documentary that covers all of the key aspects of the films production, featuring lengthy discussions with the crew.  In fact these documentaries unusually only feature a few soundbites from Tom Hanks, letting the behind the scenes folks take centre stage for once.
This is way ahead of many puff PR pieces that tend to adorn these discs, reminiscent of some of the Bond documentaries.  Although nowhere near that comprehensive, this is well worth a watch.

CERN: Pushing the Frontiers of Knowledge – Want to watch something that will make you feel intellectually barren?  This 15 minute featurette goes behind the scenes at the CERN institute (where the Hadron Collider is located).  If you can don’t get lost when the scientists start talking about their work then you are a smarter person than I.  But it is well worth a watch to see what some of the finest minds in the world are working on.

Summing Up
In many ways I enjoyed Angels & Demons more than The Da Vinci Code.  The story itself is more basic, but keeping the action in one location over the course of a few hours makes for a more exciting experience that moves at a brisk enough pace to avoid boredom.

This Blu-ray disc looks and sounds superb, the bonus features are comprehensive without being over-the-top-exhaustive and the BD Live features actually add something worthwhile to the presentation.
All told this is a great disc that is well worth investigating.

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The other Peter Cullen

A short while ago I wrote a post entitled Death of the Cinema, where I talked about how the movie going experience has been somehwat lost to me recently.  Rising ticket costs and the fact that the sound and picture quality, combined with the fact I have to do at least a forty mile round trip to see a movie from home, have left me devoid of any interest in the medium.

All the more disturbing is that I didn’t have the enthusiasm to want to go and see Star Trek (despite rave reviews from friends), or Terminator: Salvation.  So when Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen was getting close to release, I treated it with a great big “meh”.  I was all set to wait for it to come out on Blu-ray and enjoy the experience at home.

Then the movie was released here in the UK, a week before the US to a series of underwhelming reviews.  It got panned, and when the US critics weighed in it wasn’t a prettier picture either.  I effectively had my mind made up for me, I wasn’t that bothered by the movie in the first place and if it really is as bad as people are saying then it must be terrible, right?

We didn’t have much planned yesterday bar a visit to my folks, and I wanted to do something a little different.  There were a couple of times last week I considered “doing a Billy No Mates” and going to see Transformers by myself after work.  But decided against it, by the time I had watched the movie I would be exiting right in the middle of rush hour.  Anybody who knows anything about the Poole and Bournemouth area knows that you really don’t want to be around during work kick-out time.  So I didn’t bother then.

I decided “screw it”, the first movie was incredibly flawed but even though the picture won’t be up to my stupidly anal, moaner high standards, and it would be a little on the pricey side, I enjoy the spectacle of a Michael Bay/Transformers movie and I wanted to see it.  So we did, and I’m glad that we did.

I’m starting to wonder why it is I listen so intently to what people say on internet message boards, because they primarily seem to be populated by people who are determined to hate everything and everyone.  They get some kind of perverse pleasure in spending money to see something, determined that it will suck without even giving it a shot, and positively racing home to, well for want of a better phrase, shit all over it.
Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen is, to my mind anyway, not entirely deserving of the critical drubbing it has garnished.  And let us not kid ourselves here, the general public clearly don’t take much notice of what critics say anyway given it took a record $60 million on its first day of release in the US.

We chose to see the movie at 4 o’clock in the afternoon, that is when it was being shown at the largest screen at the Tower Park Empire Cinemas complex (which, by the way has now almost finished its refit and it looks much better for it, shame the projectors are still the same, moan moan, repeat to fade).  Unsurprisingly as the movie is very much aimed at young boys and their fathers who grew up with Transformers (something that certain critics never seem to grasp, and probably never will.  They are never going to make a movie that is wholly based around the cartoon, it’s been 25 years, please move on) there were a lot of families there, lots of excited boys with their Dads and a number of Mums who were along for the ride.  Astonishingly they all behaved perfectly, a little rowdily to begin with but who cares?  Once the movie started they were silent for the entire duration.

Turning to the movie itself, a few notes about its flaws.  Yes, the movie is too long.  It is decidedly saggy in the middle, just as the first one was.  But this time around it feels a little better paced, rather than having to wait for any action whatsoever this time around it is liberally spaced throughout the entire movie so you are never left waiting for too long.

The story, well yes it is total bobbins but we aren’t watching a remake of Othello now are we?  The wafer thin plot does what it has to and give what it is designed to be, something that holds together the premise of “some really big robots beat the crap out of each other”.

Alright let’s break down the other things about the movie that are bad very quickly so I can get onto the positive stuff.  Yes the dog humping is overdone, once for a cheap laugh would suffice, twice is not necessary.  The cheap humour like Bumblee “peeing” on someone, robot farting, etc?  It’s designed for cheap laughs, and in my screening they got plenty.  From the kids, and the parents alike.  Sorry robot snobs, there’s nothing wrong with a bit of fun even if it is a little daft and crude.  I chuckled, and didn’t feel the need to put on my Autobot t-shirt and hug my boxed G1 Optimus Prime when I got home.
Finally a word on the stereotypes.  Every single character in this movie is a stereotype, even some of the Americans.  All of the Autobots are US cars, there is an Audi R8 Decepticon at the start of the movie and certain other Decepticons are Volvos no doubt indicating that any form of automobile that isn’t built in Detroit is inherantly evil.  Then there are the stereotypical “gang banger” type characters, complete with a gold tooth and snappy dialogue.  I have to agree with the other critics here, those characters are extremely unnecessary and rather offensive.  They really could have used toning down.

I must admit I sneered a little at the picture quality at the start of the movie.  Mentally berating the lack of sharpness and brightness to the image.  Then an inner voice told me to shut up, stop being a joyless prat and enjoy myself.  I listened, and enjoyed.
I had a blast with Revenge of the Fallen, the criticisms above aside.  This is an incredible action movie, and an absolutely astounding technical achievement.

There is so much more action this time around, and it kicks off right from the start.  I lost count of the number of times I found myself mouth agape, just unable to fathom just how ILM create the CG in this movie.  The stand out action sequence for me is in the forest where Optimus Prime takes on three Decepticons, and delivers a throaty “I’ll take you all on!” roar that had the kids jumping and cheering in their seats.

The action is also easier to follow this time.  In the first movie the camera was more focussed from the POV of the human characters, so when we saw the robots it was usually from the “waist” up.  There are plenty of long shots that show the full side characters fighting from a distance, which looks all the more impressive.  Which left me wondering why so many critics claimed they couldn’t tell what was going on because the action is so frenetic.  It’s fast, yes, but it’s not “make you vomit”, shaky cam fast cut nonsense like Quantum of Solace.

Revenge of the Fallen is supposed to be popcorn chomping escapism, designed to sell toys just like the cartoon did 25 years ago.  Yes it has a lot of flaws, but the target audience loved it, I loved it, and even Sally admitted that she enjoyed it when we walked out into the sunshine nearly three hours after we walked into the theatre.

The point I am trying to make with this post is that it is so easy to be swayed by what other people say, to form an opinion without trying something out for yourself first.  I’m not saying everyone should wander around with a permanent grin thinking everything is super great, and shouldn’t be sarcastic or cynical about anything (movie or otherwise).  But I really did enjoy Revenge of the Fallen and would encourage people to see it with an open mind, rather than preconceived notions from what someone else has fed you.  Maybe I will do the Billy No Mates bit and go and see Star Trek as well before it leaves the cinema.

One step at a time…

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This sequel gives us a reboot to the franchise.  After many years in development hell that finally saw Jane get tired of waiting for his second shot at the character, and brings the relatively unknown Irish actor Ray Stevenson to the role.
Warzone is a far more over the top outing for the character, creating a decidedly more comic book style world of daft named villains and one dimensional supporting characters as opposed to the slightly grittier real world of the first movie.

In actual fact, right from the start I was very impressed with how director Lexi Alexander managed to create a very well styled comic book look for the movie through the use of colour and lighting.
But back to the plot of the movie itself.  The vigilante Frank Castle has been on the loose for quite some time, and the movie begins with him taking out the Cesare crime family after the big boss has just avoided some serious prison time.

The families’ top enforcer Billy Russoti (The Wire’s Dominic West) escapes with his goons to their nearby hideout only to find his way into the bottle crusher that leaves him for dead.  During the ensuing fire fight, Castle kills an undercover FBI agent named Nicky Donatelli.

Donatelli’s partner (played by Colin Salmon, yet another British actor forced to fake an American accent) joins up with the NYPD Punisher task force (actually two blokes in a basement with a lot of files) in an attempt to avenge his partner, and his family.

In a scene that appears to be an utter rip from the Joker reveal in Tim Burton’s first Batman movie, Rusotti becomes known as Jigsaw and embarks on at attempt to complete a deal he started before his extreme makeover went awry, busting out his criminally insane brother “Loony Bin Jim” from the asylum to assist.

Castle tries his best to make amends with Donatelli’s late wife and daughter, sparking a connection with the little girl, but unsurprisingly not making any headway with the widow (played by Julie Benz).
What follows is a series of ridiculously over the top, bloody encounters that will turn off the more casual action movie observer.  This is an extremely violent, no holds barred action movie, not quite up to the levels of Crank insanity, but certainly not for the faint hearted.

Personally I’m not particularly squeamish, so the action didn’t bother me and am actually surprised at just how well it is executed given the movies relatively paltry $35 million budget.  The fight scenes are well choreographed, and it is directed in a slick, but classic style.  There is no over the top MTV style editing or shaky camera work here.

As I mentioned previously, the film itself actually looks very good, it is certainly a well put together and stylised comic book world.  There is a bold use of colour in many of the scenes, particularly as much of the movies action takes place at night.  Daytime scenes are also good, tweaking the colour palette to give the whole movie a limited colour palette the works extremely well.

Unfortunately for me, the movie itself just doesn’t hang together.  For the man who will always be the incredible Jimmy McNulty in The Wire, West mugs up his performance that just doesn’t hit the notes properly for a stumbling villain.

Likewise, Doug Hitchison is flat out irritating as Loony Bin Jim, and the couples sociopathic rampages aren’t well timed enough to be funny, and the attempt at humour doesn’t even make them remotely scary.
Stevenson himself actually does a pretty decent turn as Frank Castle, able to handle the action with emotional detachment but can show little flashes of humanity well when interacting with young Grace.

The rest of the supporting cast are merely cyphers that have come straight out of the comic book supplemental characters basement with Salmon being the exception to the rule, representing what could be Castle’s “light” side.  They are decent enough, but let’s face it, we aren’t re-enacting Shakespeare here are we?  My only real bugbear is with Julie Benz who is a very competent actress, but seems to have had some work done to her face that leaves it smooth and emotionless.

Punisher: War Zone is a fairly decent action movie that is one of the better attempts at bringing a comic book to the big screen.  Sadly it is let down by a pantomime villain and a lack of particularly likeable characters, but that is nearly outweighed by the over the top action that is enough to keep most viewers chomping through the popcorn.

Audio Visual
While the movie itself is a little hit and miss, this 1080p MPEG4 transfer is a surefire winner.  I gave a critical pasting to the visual quality of the first movie, but have no complaints about this second instalment.

Comic book worlds always contain plenty of bold colours, usually set in very dark environment with a sprinkling of rain thrown in for good measure.  War Zone is no exception, and all throughout the movie the transfer is rock solid.  You will hear no complaints from me regarding the black levels that could so easily have been a real problem given the amount of night footage up against primary colours you find here.

After having reviewed a number of rather lacklustre catalogue makeovers in the past, its a joy to be reminded at just how good a well encoded HD transfer can look.  Top stuff.

Sonically this disc is very interesting.  War Zone is a Lionsgate Pictures release, who are part of Sony Pictures.  In the US the disc was previously released under the Lionsgate name, with a 7.1 DTS HD Master Audio soundtrack.  Here in the UK it is a SPHE title, and has been changed to a Dolby TrueHD track as it is their format of choice.

I have long made it known that I rate DTS over Dolby Digital, and would be interested to see if there is a big difference between the two discs but this True HD track is a boneshaker.

During the many action scenes all of the speakers are going bananas, the subwoofer is in constant growl mode, and bullets ricochet around with even more veracity than in the recently reviewed The International.
Loud, chaotic and definite demo material.

Bonus Features
Commentary – First up we have a commentary from director Lexi Alexander and cinematographer Steve Gainer.  Alexander is quite outspoken with her thoughts and views on the movie, and this is quite an informative track from a technical standpoint, but is unlikely to appeal to Punisher fans in general.  I found it quite interesting and helps to flesh out the making of the movie a little better than the rest of the bonus material.

Making Of – This is quite a bog standard EPK type affair running at just under ten minutes.  The main cast and crew talk about their characters and that’s pretty much it.

There are also three featurettes called Training to Become The Punisher, Meet Jigsaw, The Weapons of The Punisher and Creating the Look of The Punisher.  Most are around five minutes in length and give bite sized chunks of information.

My favourites are the Training which shows just how much effort Stevenson put into becoming Frank Castle, and the Look in which the decision to allow only three colours into each scene is described to create a more authentic comic book feel.

Summing Up
The Punisher: War Zone has quite a European active movie feel about it, the director is German, and many of the cast are either British or Irish, all adopting American accents.  While the story itself is hardly genre defining, the action more than makes up for its other shortcomings.  This Blu-ray disc looks and sounds fantastic, and while the supplemental features are a little thin on the ground, they receive bonus points for all being in HD.

It won’t be to everyones taste, but The Punisher: War Zone is well worth a look for action and comic book fans alike.

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One of Owen’s colleagues is murdered at the start of the movie after a particularly mysterious car park rendezvous with an executive from the bank (who himself later ends up sleeping with the fishes).  The bank seems to have eyes and ears everywhere, including a number of hit men who are sent out on contract killings to neutralise anyone who opposes the family…sorry, the bank.  But a Mafioso style family is little scarier than the prospect of the manager of your local HSBC waiting in the bushes to take you out with a stapler and some sharpened Post-It notes.
Salinger is working in conjunction with assistant District Attorney Eleanor Whitman (the always delightful Naomi Watts) trying to build the case against the IBBC.  Following the murder of

Salinger’s colleague, the pair begin a globetrotting (hence the movie’s title) jaunt trying to track down executives, work in conjunction with politicians, New York cops and enjoy a particularly breath-taking shoot out at the Guggenheim museum, all the while trying to bring down the bank.

This description of The International probably makes it sound far more exciting and popcorn munching than it actually is.  Don’t get me wrong, I think The International is an extremely well-acted, directed and edited movie, but if you are expecting Bourne levels of action then you’ll have to look elsewhere.

I use Bourne as a jumping off point, as from the look and feel of the movie it is the closest comparison to The International.  It occupies a place in the real world; this is no hyper real Hollywood spy drama.  This is a proper gritty drama, more akin to dialogue heavy 70s movies such as The French Connection.

What I particularly liked about The International was the way that it is shot, with use of various architectural landmarks from around the world as silent characters (of which there is plenty of information about in the bonus features).  Cinematography is beautiful here, and each of the cities that Owen and sometimes Watts visit has their own look and feel.

Continuing with the movies positives, while the movie is sometimes rather slow moving, its key action sequence at the Guggenheim museum is a fantastic orgy of guns and destruction.  It’s worth the wait, as the bank undertakes some rather excessive measures to silence its pesky critic.  Director David Tykwer isn’t afraid to splash around the claret either, with some particularly nasty deaths for the supporting cast.  It’s a shocking wake up call for a movie that is relatively sedate at times.

It’s not a whitewash of gushing praise though for The International though.  While I enjoyed the movie, the use of a main character who has burnt out from a previous job and is now hell bent on taking down the enemy at any cost is more than a little old hat.  Clive Owen is great in that kind of a role, and he is certainly very good here but I’m more than a little burnt out on burnouts.

While she is billed as a main character, Naomi Watts plays far more of a supporting role than an equal lead.  By her own admission in the making of documentary, she tends to play the damsel in distress role a little too often.  So it is good to see her playing such a strong character juggling her duties as a career woman and mother.
I also applaud the decision to not have any kind of romantic interest between the two leads whatsoever.  These two are working together towards a common goal, and an unwanted romantic subplot is mercifully jettisoned (but hinted at during the extended scene on this Blu-ray).

As I have already mentioned, I enjoyed The International a great deal.  The European crew have crafted an action thriller that moves along at a pace that is quick enough to just about satisfy the fans of more gritty movies such as Bourne and even the rebooted Bond, but may well leave them wanting more action and less intrigue.

If you are looking for an enjoyable couple of hours that will make you think rather than just switch your brain off, you could do far worse than The International.

Audio Visual
It’s business as usual on the encoding side from Sony here; 1080p MPEG4 has long been their codec of choice, and no doubt will continue to be so.  It’s a belter of a transfer as well.

The movie has a very intentional down tempo look about it.  Colours are muted, and many locations are suitably grimy and overcast.  The exception to the rule is the movies climax in Istanbul, which is a welcoming contrast to the rainy and overcast Berlin of its inception.

Contrast is slightly tweaked but isn’t too hot to make anything look unnatural, whether it be the stunning architecture or the actors faces.  The quality of the transfer certainly does justice to the beautiful photography of its various locations.  There is a little grain in evidence, but this is intentional on the part of the filmmakers.  As The International isn’t a special effects laden blockbuster I can’t really describe it as reference material, but there are elements that can be picked out as being particularly notable.
The shootout in the Guggenheim is without a doubt the movies trump card, and contains the most use of bright light and colour.  You will hear no complaints from me regarding the visual quality of The International, it is a very solid transfer that cannot really be faulted.

The visuals are equally matched by the superb Dolby TrueHD soundtrack that accompanies them.  As you would expect, the movies key action set piece at the Guggenheim is also a showcase for the sound design and is sure to have the neighbours asking you to politely turn it down.
This sequence really is something special, with bullets ricocheting across all speakers, bass booms and glass breaks with suitable ferocity.
That is not to say that the rest of the movie is a letdown, far from it.  Director David Tykwer is also responsible for the bustling, yet minimalistic score which is a pleasure to listen to.  Add on the subtle use of ambience and you have a truly superb Dolby TrueHD soundtrack that reminds me just how far we have come with these new releases when compared to the large number of catalogue titles I review.

Bonus Features
Plenty to go around here and almost all of it is in HD.

Commentary – Director David Tykwer and screenwriter Eric Warren Singer provide a very entertaining commentary that is surprisingly open and honest and reflects a more Euro-skew than the more traditional Hollywood back slapping.

I have never been a particularly big fan of commentary tracks either on DVD or Blu-ray, and these days I far prefer the Picture-in-Picture tracks.  But this is one of the better non-actor commentaries that is well worth a listen; you can spot a mile off whether a director is really invested in their movie, and Tykwer is definitely a very enthusiastic participant.

Picture-in-Picture Track – I’m really starting to enjoy watching these, as with Ghostbusters and Terminator 3, The International contains an informative PiP track.  There is some overlap with the other featurettes on the disc, so there is repetition but not so much that it becomes annoying.
As you would expect, there is plenty of chat from the producers, the director, actors and assorted others detailing all aspects of the production.  There is also plenty of behind the scenes footage to keep things interesting.  If you are interested in that sort of thing, of course.

Making Of – I am always appreciative of a “Making Of…” which isn’t just an extended EPK fluff piece.  This half hour HD documentary features all the usual suspects talking about the movie, its themes and locations.
It’s hardly genre defining, ground breaking stuff of course, but the feature focuses more on the locations and visual styling’s of the movie than just the “we went here, this person was great to work with” puff pieces we are used to.  As with the PiP track, there is some overspill of material here that also encroaches on the other features.

Extended Scene – There is a scene relatively early on in The International when Naomi Watts’ character is introduced in Berlin.  She bundles Salinger into a taxi and instructs the driver to take them to the Concorde Hotel.  My ears perked up at this, as I stayed in this gorgeous hotel when I was in Berlin a couple of years ago.
Sadly, we didn’t see anything of the hotel (wait for it)…until now!  This ten minute scene which was no doubt cut for time to stop meandering fills in a few gaps in the film from that moment.  It also introduces a hint of sexual tension between the two leads which is nowhere to be seen in the finished cut.  It adds some more dialogue between the pair at the hotel (the walls weren’t painted blue when I was there, that may be more down to the production designer who used specific colours for each location) and even gives Clive Owen a teenage daughter.

This extra material is good, but I think it was the right decision to remove it.  Salinger’s complete character change to chummy Dad in the sequence with his daughter is very much at odds with his demeanour for the rest of the movie.  Some might say it adds a much needed few moments of light.  Either way, it’s worth a watch.

Guggenheim Featurette – Rather oddly, this is the only feature here that is in SD even though many of the interview pieces were shot at the same time as those that are featured elsewhere.  Even so, this is a brief six minute feature chronicling how the filmmakers recreated the beautiful Guggenheim museum in a disused train yard in ten weeks.

Architecture Featurette – I enjoyed this one, another six minute featurette in which the director and primarily the production designer talk about their use of architecture around the world in the movie.  From the enormous Autostadt in Wolfsburg which doubles as the banks HQ to the Guggenheim and others, the crew discuss their use of classic and modern architecture.

Autostadt Featurette – As I have already mentioned, part of Volkswagen’s HQ in Wolfsburg, the Autostadt is used as the headquarters of the IBBC.  It is the first time the incredible location has been used in a movie, and this all too brief featurette focuses on the companies “theme park” for customers and tourists.
Being a German car and modern aesthetic fan, this is pure bliss for me.  It also helps to explain the prominence of Volkswagen and Audi vehicles throughout the movie.  I’m no fan of excessive product placement, but at least it is handled with care and isn’t forced down your throat.  You won’t see Clive Owen crouched down next to the radiator grille of an A6 and pause to admire it at least.

Summing Up
Every now and again I get to review a movie that really appeals to me, and The International is definitely ticks the boxes that make it a little bit special.  It is perhaps a little slow paced and meandering at times, but its emphasis on story, aesthetics, minimalism and architecture elevate it above other action thrillers.
The movie certainly isn’t perfect, the underuse of Naomi Watts and cookie cutter burnout character of Salinger are the most glaring issues I have with it.  But these aren’t enough to stop me from whole heartedly recommending The International.
SPHE have served up a fantastic looking and sounding Blu-ray presentation, that contains just the right amount of extras to justify spending the extra cash on this HD disc.  This is also my longest Blu-ray review to date, which pretty much says it all.  A must buy.

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Disturbingly the 25 years since its theatrical release have passed by in the blink of an eye (I can still remember the first time the old lady ghost in the library scaring me out of my seat), and we finally have the long awaited Blu-ray release. More than just a catalogue reissue, Ghostbusters has a lot to live up to.

Usually with a review I detail the finer points of the plot before giving my own critique, pretty much review 101 material. But Ghostbusters is such a well known movie that such an exercise would be pointless. Everyone knows the plot of this film; three friends go into business busting ghosts. Another one joins, ghosts get busted and a few years later a not so well received sequel appears.

Ghostbusters is a pure 80s movie, filled with wit, charm and a spin off cartoon series. I love this movie, everyone my age loves this movie and it keeps getting better with age. Nostalgia is a wonderful thing, but all too often when we return to things that we hold so dearly from our childhood they aren’t quite as incredible as they were back then. Fortunately, Ghostbusters is part of the rare breed that can truly stand the test of time. A pure classic.

Audio Visual
So here we have it. A remastered version of Ghostbusters on Blu-ray, presented in 1080p encoded in MPEG4. Is it really what we want? Yes and no.
You have to approach the picture quality of Ghostbusters with a little perspective. The movie is 25 years old, and no amount of technical restoration wizardry is going to make it look like a blockbuster movie from 2009.

So with that in mind, Ghostbusters looks as good as it possibly could do on Blu-ray. The source print suffers incredibly from grain. From the opening shot to the final climax the movie is plagued with film grain, but this is pretty much all you can say that is negative about this transfer. The level of fidelity in the image is extremely high, and colours pop without being overkill.

There is no doubt about it, Sony have done a great job with this remaster. The special effects blend extremely well considering that many modern Hollywood movies show up shoddy effects work with a high def transfer. Ghostbusters looks great, provided you rein in your expectations.

Sonically we have a Dolby TrueHD soundtrack which is also very competent considering the source. The movie is very front speaker heavy, which does lead to a slightly imbalanced mix overall. But during key action scenes everything seems to spring into life, especially the Slimer sequence.
The track is definitely a great enhancement over the DVD release; you can certainly hear far more environmental audio than in previous home releases.
Explosions are suitably boomy, dialogue while sometimes slightly muffled at times is all perfectly balanced in the mix. As with the picture, the audio for Ghostbusters is extremely competent.

Bonus Features
25 year anniversary: check. Videogame to tie in with the release featuring the original cast: check.
Remaster of the movie with a load of new features? Check once again. And there really are a load of special features here.

Audio Commentary – Harold Ramis, Ivan Reitman and Joe Medjuck provide a lively and entertaining commentary to start off the special features. There is a lot of information divulged on this track covering all aspects of the filmmaking process. An extremely comprehensive commentary. Disappointed there’s nobody else on the commentary? Don’t be.

Slimer Mode – This is the finest feature on the entire disc. Slimer Mode is a picture in picture commentary track that features nonstop information from pretty much everyone involved with the movie (except the notoriously reclusive Bill Murray and now retired Rick Moranis).
You name the person, they are on here from the actors, the director, producer and a cavalcade of effects and production people. Even Blade Runner uber expert Paul M. Sammon puts in an appearance.

When the video isn’t playing (and that is a very rare event) pop up facts take up the slack. This is one of the finest features on any Blu-ray disc I have seen to date. Fans of the movie should check this track out right away.

Blu Wizard – Blu Wizard allows you to choose which of the discs comprehensive special features you want to watch while the movie is playing. When you reach the appropriate trigger point, seamless branching kicks in and displays the feature before putting you right back into the action again.
Just by looking at the list of features is daunting in itself. There is a lot here, choose wisely! Or just watch all of the features at the end of the movie like I did.

There featurettes are a mixture of old and new. The new stuff is all shot in HD, and begins with Ecto-1: Resurrecting the Classic Car. This is a showcase for taking the original Ghostbusters car and completely revamping it for the modern day. It’s very much a fluff PR piece but is enjoyable. It’s also backed up with a companion piece about the car choc full of stills and video.
Next up is a making of piece for the new Ghostbusters videogame, it maybe a promotional piece but it’s great to watch the original cast back together talking about this new addition to the franchise. The game looks pretty good too.
There is also a brief trailer for the game.

Scene Cemetary – Ten deleted scenes in terrible 480i quality which are mainly small extensions to existing scenes. They are great to watch but are very much cut for time features.

1984 Featurette – What you would these days call an EPK featurette, you forget how bad the voice overs for 80s featurettes are! This is a talking head piece, featuring some behind the scenes stuff with the cast but it’s just an extended commercial.

Cast & Crew Featurette – We spin forward to post Ghostbusters 2 where the cast and director talk about the making of the film. The comprehensive information overload continues, without repeating information.

SFX Team Featurette – Just as the name suggests, the visual effects team talk about various aspects of the movies special features. You also get some multi-angle shots and storyboard comparisons.

Summing Up
Ghostbusters is a classic movie that is still just as enjoyable on Blu-ray as it was 25 years ago in the Bournemouth ABC cinema. This new remaster is absolutely fantastic, it looks and sounds great and is crammed with bonus features that will keep the legions of Ghostbusters fans happy.

This is an essential purchase.

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The best way to describe Marley & Me is to lift a quote from Peter Bracke’s review from HD Digest.

It’s really a romantic dramedy, which uses the conceit of one really cute puppy as a narrative device to string a series of love and life lessons upon.

Based on the non-fiction book “Marley & Me: Love and Life with the World’s Worst Dog”, the movie follows the real life story of John and Jennifer Grogan which begins with their wedding. Both are reporters, with Jennifer being the most respected journalist and John being the put upon wannabe. They move to South Florida, and to begin with they start ticking items off Jennifer’s pre-written list of things she has planned out for their time together.

Concerned that Jennifer’s biological clock is ticking, John consults his serial womanizer best friend Sebastian (Eric Dane) who suggests that the newlyweds get a puppy to stave off the urge to hear the patter of tiny feet.
The puppy in question is Marley, an almost too cute for words Labrador who is suspiciously cheaper than his brothers and sisters.

Marley turns out to be a bit of a handful, chewing through dry wall and pretty much everything else in the couple’s small house.
In the meantime, John is asked by his boss (Alan Arkin) to temporarily write a column in the paper rather than report the news that nobody cares about. The movie really begins to take off when John starts incorporating stories about Marley, and time begins passing extremely rapidly.

In the blink of an eye Marley is four years old, John is doing well with his column and it’s time for the patter to finally make themselves heard. After a miscarriage (which is very sensitively handled) Jennifer soon falls pregnant and it is from hereon that things become more strained as the years go by.

By the time the movie concludes and the years have passed by, you can guess what happens as happens to all family pets.
I am happy to admit that I really enjoyed Marley & Me. The pacing is rather slow, and the movies two hour runtime did feel like a lot longer, but I never felt myself wishing it would come to a close.

Aniston and particularly Wilson do a great job of bringing these two real life characters to life. Some of the stuff with Marley acting out does feel a little forced so that people who think they are watching some funny dog hijinks don’t feel cheated. But the movies dramatic moments are handled very well and have a realness that is usually missing from a tinseltown flick.

It’s never overly exciting, but Marley & Me is a good, well acted and thought provoking movie that is well worth taking a look at.

Audio Visual
Marley & Me comes to us from Fox with a 1080p MPEG4 transfer that looks beautiful. As with movies such as Catch & Release, Marley has a very natural, light, bright airy look about it. Being set in Southern Florida for a large part helps, but the later scenes when the couple move to Philadelphia are particularly beautiful.

Lots of autumn sun shots abound, and much of the movie is set during the daytime. Night sequences look just fine as well, with everything looking just as it should. Hardly reference quality, but then this isn’t an effects laden spectacular. Spot on.

As per usual Fox bring out my favourite HD audio format, DTS HD Master Audio for the soundtrack but as with Bride Wars it doesn’t matter a jot anyway because the movie is dialogue focussed anyway.

But the track itself is perfectly fine, the few times the rear speakers light up everything sounds just fine, dialogue is crisp and clear and the music never tries to drown out anything it shouldn’t. A perfectly passable track.

Bonus Features
There are a few lightweight special features on the disc, and the quality is split between HD and SD.
There are four featurettes entitled Breaking the Golden Rule (fluff interviews with the stars and the real John and Jennifer), Finding Marley (choosing the dogs – very cute), On Set With Marley (a 3 minute jokey mock feature) and an animal adoption spot.

There are also a few gag reel outtakes and the most substantial feature is a collection of 19 deleted scenes which is mainly stuff that was cut due to time restrictions.

There is also a Dog Training trivia track which is a picture in picture track which pops up various training tips throughout the movie.

Summing Up
Not at all what I was expecting, Marley & Me is a rather heartwarming but never schmaltzy movie telling the story of a family through the life of its treasured pet.
This Blu-ray looks beautiful, sounds just fine and contains enough fluff extras to keep dog lovers (and even cat ones like myself) happy.

After a series of movies which I have been slightly underwhelmed with, Marley & Me is a pleasant surprise and a definite recommendation from me.

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But turning to the movie in hand, Terminator 3 has already been released elsewhere on Blu-ray (as well as HD DVD for that matter) by Warner Brothers. But now we are seeing it released here in the UK by Sony Pictures on the back of the fourth instalment (Terminator Salvation). It has also been given the proper makeover treatment this time around, with HD audio and a decent encode. But more on that later.

The movie finds John Connor (Nick Stohl) now drifting from place to place finding work where he can, but generally staying off the grid. But the man who once was Edward Furlong soon ends up in trouble, crashing his motorcycle and finding pain medication at the local vets. Here he runs into Catherine Brewster (Claire Danes) a former high school friend who becomes involved with her one time crush when the vets gets…crushed by a leather clad (ahem) TerminatriX (Kristianna Loken) who has been sent back from the future to kill John and several other targets who would become his Resistance leaders.

Yes Judgment Day wasn’t stopped at the end of T2, merely put on hold. But fortunately Arnie is back, reprogrammed to protect John and Kate.
What this does of course lead to is a whole heap of sci-fi action, massive explosions, iffy dialogue and an excuse to hear the box office tills ring once more (although not to the degree that was expected).

Bringing Terminator 3 to the screen in many ways is a thankless task for director Jonathan Mostow. James Cameron passed on making a third movie, which if we are brutally honest, didn’t really need to be made in the first place.
So we can accept it as a given that T3 would never, ever come to close to the classics that proceeded it. But what we have here is something of an aboration in the movie industry, T3 is effectively the most expensive indie flick ever produced and because it was self financed to the tune of $200 million it is missing many of the things I find so annoying about modern action flicks.

There is essentially no product placement in this movie, which is always one of my major bugbears these days. There are items used such as Nokia phones, but they never ever give you a gratuitous close up of the logo or brand name.
The action is also extremely well put together; it doesn’t give you motion sickness by jump cutting every second (or even less than one) for a start. There is no shaky cam, no handheld nonsense, just decent filmmaking. I know I run the risk of finally filling in my membership form for the old farts club here, but I’m not the only one who finds the modern MTV filmmaking style to be particularly irritating.

And the action itself is good, really good in fact. The crane truck chase as Arnie, Kate and John escape from the T-X is a fantastic sequence. Visual effects are all incredibly strong, especially for a six year old movie.
It may not be Cameron-sized insanity but throughout the 109 minute runtime there is plenty of action, and you are never left waiting impatiently for the next round of explosions to start.

T3 also ends on something of a downer, perhaps only to continue the series of movies but given that we have had to wait six years for another (starring every director of photography’s favourite Christian Bale) and one minus The Governor too things obviously didn’t quite work out the way the producers had planned. Indeed T3 was Jonathan Mostow’s last directorial gig.

Ultimately Terminator 3 is a slight oddity. Schwarzenegger was still in shape and manages to pull off playing The Terminator one last time, but manages to make the performance rather cringe worthy in many places. The massive payday and box office percentage he was paid helped I’m sure.

Kristianna Loken does a decent job as the T-X, and her face offs with Arnie make for a good fight, Claire Danes does a good turn as Kate Brewster and even Stohl is ok is nothing special as John Connor.
I know many people dislike Terminator 3, and claim it ruined the franchise and assorted other overblown internet forum posts to repeat until the credits. But I enjoyed it for what it is, a sci-fi action movie with a big budget and a lot of action. Which reminds me that I really must go and see the new Star Trek movie.

Audio Visual
SPHE presented T3 with its usual 1080p MPEG4 encode, and it looks far nicer than other catalogue titles I have watched over the last couple of years.
HD transfers of older movies can make special effects work stand out as looking a little more fake (the Blu-ray version of I, Robot in particular comes to mind), but not so here.

Colours are ever so slightly muted, so the image doesn’t pop and shine like a new release would (but once again this isn’t a new movie) but that doesn’t mean T3 isn’t a looker.
There is a very slight grain to the image which doesn’t detract from some obvious tweaking of the visuals in places such as the crane car sequence (filmed during the day, but its supposed to be around dawn). Night shots look pristine, black levels great and metallic surfaces look suitably shiny. And metallic. What I’m saying is T3 looks very nice on this Blu-ray, and is a great enhancement over the DVD.

Sony can sometimes turn out some slightly underwhelming Dolby TrueHD soundtracks on its discs, but not so here. This one is an absolute belter. Explosions are extremely punchy, giving the subwoofer a real workout. It’s not quite window rattling, filling troublingly deep as with a new movie like The Day The Earth Stood Still, but it’s certainly a vast improvement over the Dolby Digital DVD track, and the DD+ that was on the HD DVD.

What really impressed me the most was the surround speakers are always doing something. Even in exposition scenes where there is a lot of talking such as the RV trip across the desert, wind can be heard whistling around from all directions. In fact if anything there is a little too much going on,perhaps the environmental audio could have been tweaked a little lower in the mix.

But when the bullets start flying, and stuff starts blowing up, this track is right up there with the best of them. Fantastic stuff.

Bonus Features
As is often the case with these older catalogue titles, the bonus features from the T3 DVD have been ported over and kept in their original SD form. There are a few featurettes which are largely just fluff material (although I did enjoy the Macfarlane toys one), a documentary that is pushing the limits of what you could call a documentary given its 13 minute runtime), a gag reel, theatrical trailer and a single deleted scene.

There are also two commentaries (there were three on the previous US BD release), one very fun one with Mostow and his three leads which is a great group recording. The second is a solo track from Mostow which is a bit dryer but that is the nature of the solo commentary.

When the movie was originally released on HD DVD, it featured one of Warner’s first “In-Movie Experiences”, or to give it a better name, a picture-in-picture track. At that time the Blu-ray format was still playing catch up with these advanced features, but now the Profile 2.0/BD Live specification is with us and the feature has been ported over for this Blu-ray.

It’s a great track as well, throughout the movie video windows pop up with chat primarily from director Mostow, but the actors also appear on cue when required to fill in the blanks. There is also a ton of on set and behind the scenes footage that isn’t included in the other featurettes. So this track is a must watch for Terminator fans.

The disc also features the new Cine-Chat feature, where you can watch the movie and chat online with other folks doing the same thing. Once again, to me this seems rather pointless.

Summing Up
While purists may not like it, I enjoyed T3 for what it is – big, dumb fun. It’s a very competent sci-fi action movie that looks and sounds great and has a decent set of extras. Is it a worthwhile upgrade from the DVD? Absolutely, the transfer is very good, the sound is superb, and while the extras have been seen before, it is worth it for the picture-in-picture track.

It may have been released more times that a serial offender, but this version of Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines is the latest and greatest. Well worth a look.

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So clearly it makes more sense to rent titles I will only want to play once (whereas serious multiplayer titles such as Gears 2 or Left 4 Dead will always be in my collection), and then get rid of.
It is also a good way of playing games that I would never want to buy knowing full well that they are either of dubious quality, or just may not be the game for me.  And £40 is a lot of money to spend to find that out, and you can only do that so many times before finally learning the hard way.

So for £10 a month I can have as many games as I like, one at a time.  I filled up my list with stuff such as X-Men Origins: Wolverine, Wanted: Weapons of Fate (there’s a large use of colons in game titles these days) and Riddick.
Oh and the game I’ve been wanting to try out because pretty much everyone who has played it has said “You know what, it should be terrible but it is actually a lot of fun.”, and that is 50 Cent: Blood on the Sand.

Rather unfortunately I have succumed to a cold bug that Sally has had all week, so my plans for going out and enjoying the sun today have been put on hold.  Instead I’ve taken to being wrapped up warm, dosing myself up with cold medicine and warming up my gaming glands before the Fable II DLC is released tomorrow.
The game arrived this morning, and in a move that I can only described as unprecedented I have already completed it!  I sat down and played the game through in one sitting, stopping only to make cups of tea.

By all rights the game SHOULD be appalling.  Take the Unreal Engine, crank out a Gears of War knock off starring 50 Cent and one of three members of the G-Unit.  It sounds bad right?  But it’s actually a lot of fun.
BotS is something of a guilty pleasure game, almost like a straight to DVD action movie.  Actually, think of a Jason Statham movie and you sort of get the idea.  People love them because they are what they are: daft action movies that are tremendous fun.

The storyline is so ridiculous it can’t really be called a story.  50 Cent and the aforementioned G-Unit play a show in “Unnamed Middle Eastern Country” but don’t get paid.  The promoter offers a diamond encrusted skull (still with me?) as collateral until he can cough up the ten million dollars you are owed (suspend reality now, I’m sure there is no way that 50 Cent could summon that kind of money for a show as his music career does seem to be somewhat on the wane).

Sadly the skull gets stolen and Mr Cent and his homeys need to retrieve said skull.  What this leads to is a fairly generic action game across a series of missions (nine in total).
What continues to astound me now even as I’m typing this is that it is a very solid shooter!  The level of polish is by no means up to a Gears level, but the game looks good.  The combat is fine, the weapons selection solid and the whole thing feels very satisfying.  There are a couple of vehicle sections where you drive and your homey does the shooting, and one on-rails helicopter shooter which is fantastically satisfying.  Ironically, sales have been miniscule.

This is definitely a three out of five star title, maybe even a four.  What really makes it a cheesy action movie guilty pleasure is the dialogue spouted between “Fiddy” and his G-Unit compadre.  F-bombs drop in literally every sentence, making this a game that earns its 18 rating before the first five minutes are up.

Action game fans searching for something decent to play during the current leaner gaming months could do far, far worse than check out 50 Cent: Blood on the Sand.  I’m going to have to check my temperature again, I can’t believe I just typed that.  Nor can I believe that I am seriously considering playing through it again before sending it back.

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In days gone by a decent chick flick was a no brainer to produce, anything from Working Title was usually golden and provided Saint Hugh or Duke Colin were involved then it was guaranteed to make a mint. When the two came together in the same movie with Bridget Jones’ Diary it was the ultimate woman fantasy (if Pierce Brosnan was also involved the planet may well have exploded).

But in recent years there have been a slew of female-centric movies that have started to go off the boil. The second Bridget Jones movie made the character an annoying pain in the arse, and since then we have had clunkers such as the adaptation of PS, I Love You and 27 Dresses.

So we come to Bride Wars from Fox, can it reignite my chick flick guilty pleasure enjoyment? In short, no.

The wafer thin premise is this: Kate Hudson and Anne Hathaway star as Liv and Emma, two lifelong best friends who have been planning their own dream weddings ever since witnessing one at the Plaza Hotel as children.

The pact they made was that they would both get married at the famous hotel when the happy time came. Fortunately the pair’s boyfriends propose within 24 hours of each other and they head off to see New York’s finest wedding planner Marion St. Claire (played by Candice Bergen). Two June dates at the Plaza are arranged for them and then, oh whoops, what a shocker, there is a mistake and the two weddings are booked for the same day.

With neither of the two friends willing to budge on altering the date (The Plaza is also booked solid for the next three years) what follows is an ever escalating series of bitch moves to try and ruin each other’s wedding as the big day approaches.

Sounds terrible? It is. The trouble with Bride Wars is that neither of the main characters is even remotely likeable. Both Liv and Emma come off as a pair of spoilt brats throwing hissy fits because they can’t get what they want. Aged 14 perhaps vaguely amusing, but at 26 it’s just embarrassing.

As I said at the top of the review, I really enjoy a good chick flick. Perhaps one day I will do that again, but for now we are stuck wading through stuff like this. Hathaway and Hudson can (and should) do much better than this.

Audio Visual
The one thing this disc has going for it is that it looks very nice. The 1080p MPEG4 encode pops and shines in all the ways that a new movie release should.
The movie has a very natural look, there are no fancy filters or effects and New York looks particularly pleasant in the spring sunlight.

All the natural light means that there are few night scenes and those that are here don’t give any cause for concern. If you really must be put through the ninety minute ordeal that is Bride Wars, at least your eyes will have something to feast on.

Sonically Fox produce a DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack which is completely non-essential as this is a dialogue focussed movie. The rear speakers hardly made a peep during the ninety minutes I was forced to endure Bride Wars.

Bonus Features
There are a few deleted scenes and EPK style featurettes to finish off the disc. Terrible movie, almost bare bones feature-wise. For that, I am grateful.

Summing Up
I’m glad that critical consensus of Bride Wars is pretty much “it sucks”, because I was starting to think there was something wrong with me. Fortunately, my chick flick afficianado didn’t think a great deal of it either “It was alright” being the reply to my question as to whether she enjoyed it. Swiftly followed by “I’m glad we didn’t pay for it”.

A romantic comedy should be both romantic and funny. Bride Wars is neither of these. What it is is 90 minutes of sheer nonsense and should be avoided like the plague.

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Now in 2009 it seems almost a distant memory that The Da Vinci Code was absolutely everywhere back in 2004. So it was inevitable that a big budget movie adaptation would be made a couple of years later, a given that it would make an absolute fortune (over 750 million dollars worldwide according to Wikipedia) and that the movie would be a showcase for the Blu-ray format for Sony Pictures.

But HD movie fans have had to wait a while for its release, with a prequel movie to Brown’s other novel Angels and Demons set for release soon, and a sequel book also coming what better time to no doubt synergise the back end (or some such other marketing nonsense) and release the movie?

So what of the movie itself then? Well I don’t need to recount the plot as judging by the sales of the novel pretty much everyone on the planet has either read, or at least heard about it.
Suffice to say this is a fairly faithful adaptation of the novel, with Tom Hanks in the lead role of Robert Langdon (complete with a ridiculous haircut) and Audrey Tautou as Sophie Neveu. Throw in a bunch of well respected actors such as Sir Ian McKellan, Paul Bettany and Alfred Molina and you are laughing all the way to the bank.

As is so often with Ron Howard movies, it is good but never great. Functional without being too fussy. Howard is often criticised as a safe director, but given his box office earnings he is certainly very good at what he does. Anyone who is involved with Arrested Development is alright in my book, and here Howard does a good job with the source material.

Here on this Blu-ray we are seeing the extended cut of the movie released for the first time in England. It has existed on DVD in various European countries but this is the first time I have seen the whole 176 minute buttock numbing extravaganza.
But it is an enjoyable, if rather long a talkie, 176 minutes provided you take The Da Vinci Code for what it is. At its heart it is just a good yarn, completely and utterly preposterous and contains plot twists you can see from Google Earth. Action scenes are fast paced and exciting, and as a way of passing an evening with a takeaway and a bottle of wine you can do far worse.

Yes, The Da Vinci Code may be the Magnolia of the movie world, but sometimes there is nothing wrong with a bit of it here and there.

Audio Visual
As you would expect from a relatively new movie, the source print of The Da Vinci code is pristine and this 1080p MPEG4 encode is as good as you might want it to be. A lot of the movie is extremely dark, with plenty of moody Louvre painting shots thrown in for good measure. The colour palette of black, brown and red is well represented here and doesn’t give any form of black crush.

Skin tones all look fairly natural, this isn’t a particularly glossy or flashy movie and the encode matches the movie itself. Functional, sometimes exceptionally so.

As usual Sony has served up a Dolby TrueHD soundtrack for this release and on the whole it is very good. The action sequences ramp up the score in a suitably rousing way, giving all of the speakers a good workout. There are never any dialogue level issues that I noticed, Audrey Tautou does talk a little quietly at times but the majority of the extension dialogue is well represented.

Bonus Features
Sony have gone all out here with a 2 disc edition for The Da Vinci Code, and the lion’s share of that second disc (save for some trailers) contains a very lengthy documentary that has been chopped up into many smaller bite sized featurettes.

The documentary is in HD and is extremely well produced. Owners of the double disc DVD will recognise huge chunks of it, but there are six new sections that have been added for the Blu-ray release.
Exhaustive is certainly a good word to describe what is on offer here. Plus the EPK talking head stuff fits in with the more interesting behind the scenes footage (much of which is extremely interesting). For fans only perhaps, but this is a cracking documentary that any fan of the book or film should get a great deal of enjoyment from.

Back on the main disc, there is also a rather strange commentary from Ron Howard.
Rather than give a commentary on the entire movie, Howard provides insites into selected scenes (28 in total). A full commentary would have been nice, because Howard sticks to the script and bashes out an awful lot of information about his movie and the actors involved. I’m not really a fan of solo commentaries, but just like the Day The Earth Stood Still track, it proves they can be done well when the director has a genuine interest in the source material.

As you would also expect, there is a quick look at the upcoming Angels & Demons. What you get is an intro from Ron Howard, a scene and then the theatrical trailer.

The most interesting feature on the disc is a picture-in-picture track called Unlocking the Code. As with many PiP tracks, when something or interest occurs you will see an icon appear on the screen. These codes are unlocked and you are treated to various nuggets of information which come in the form of video, stills and pop-up info.
It may sound like a bog standard PiP track, but Sony deserves extra credit for the way it fits in with the overall vibe of the package.

There is also some BD Live content on the disc. The first item is to go behind the scenes of Angels & Demons and learn about the Illuminati. You can watch this video (which at review time also spells the word “see” with 3 e’s) when the disc has officially been released, but sadly my review copy has that item locked up.

There is also going to be highlights from the red carpet of the Angels & Demons premiere in Rome. You’ll have to check back on the week of May 11^th to see that one.

The disc also includes CineChat, a BD Live feature that allows you to watch the movie and have a chat window running with other movie watchers, who can talk about it with you as you go through. Call me old Mr Conventional but I like to concentrate on the story of a film, rather than keep an eye on what other people think of it. I know a few people who would enjoy using this feature, but it would be something I would only use to chat about with my own friends rather than random strangers. It’s an interesting idea, and a decent use of the BD Live system. Although a few extra servers wouldn’t go amiss! It took a month of Sundays to try and download anything from the BD Live portal!

Summing Up
The Da Vinci Code is an enjoyable, flawed, but ultimately rip roaring bit of pulp novel nonsense. The story is so preposterous you can’t help but wonder why so many people were up in arms over it. This Blu-ray release is a very well put together package from SPHE, the documentary material is very well put together, PiP track is also bursting with information that isn’t just recycled from the documentary, and there are some good BD Live features to keep fans happy.

The movie looks and sounds great, this is a rock solid package that was worth the wait for fans.

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The last time we went to the cinema was last year for Quantum of Solace.  It looked and sounded terrible, and I have mentioned in the past here that while the Empire cinema at Tower Park in Poole has been going through a multi million pound refit, all of that money has gone on seats and making the foyer look slightly less shabby.

The projection equipment and sound systems are still the original stock that were first installed when the complex was originally opened in 1989.  Naturally back then it was state of the art, and after an appalling showing of the remastered Star Wars in Bournemouth we switched to UCI (as it was then) as the parking was free and it looked and sounded several times better than the ageing Odeon in Bournemouth.

Each and every year we would go to the cinema practically each and every week during the peak release season.  Both of us love movies, and it is true that the only way to really experience a great movie is on a giant screen with a kicking sound system.
But then the ticket prices started to rise sharply, and given that I have to drive at least a 40 mile round trip to go and watch a film it became apparent that it would actually be cheaper to wait for movie until its DVD release and purchase it, rather than go and see it.

But at that time we didn’t have high definition TVs, Blu-ray, HD DVD or even upscaling DVD players.  So watching a DVD on a SCART connected widescreen CRT TV with the audio coming through its in-built speakers really wasn’t much of a comparison for sitting in the dark with a screen that fills your peripheral vision.

But then those things came.  I bought into the HD home cinema market extremely early, purchasing Panasonic’s first HD plasma that was released here in the UK (at the time the Pioneer set was slightly superior, but also came with a superior price tag of around £500 more).  I bought Pioneer’s flagship upscaling DVD player and set the rest of the ensemble off with a Denon amp and Kef speakers.  The only change to that core setup now is moving to the Onkyo amplifier and the addition of HD DVD and Blu-ray players.

Very quickly it became apparent that the quality of a decent home cinema setup was easily outshining the cinema experience.  This wasn’t just limited to Tower Park either.  The Vue cinema at Gunwharf Quays in Portsmouth is a great venue, the sound systems are superb, the seats are large and the picture is…well, it’s better than at Tower Park that’s for sure but everything looks a little..muddy.  The downside with Gunwharf as well is to go there it is an 80 mile round trip!

I will happily admit that I am a little bit anal about this type of stuff.  Having now reviewed an awful lot of HD movies you look at things in far greater detail than the average person who doesn’t care about colour bleeding or bad surround audio mixing.  My acceptability barometer is always Sally.  “It looks alright to me” is a phrase I have heard so many times over the years I’m sure she says it just to wind me up a little.  But even when we saw Quantum of Solace afterwards Sally said to me “The picture was terrible, and the sound quality is much better at home”.

If we fast forward to a few weeks ago and QoS was released on DVD and Blu-ray.  Remembering the wishy-washy picture that we saw at the theatrical presentation I was blown away with just how crisp and clear everything was at home.  The earthy colours popped and shone, the DTS HD Master Audio soundtrack is absolutely thundering (just watch the first sequence where Bond is chased in the Aston).  While my TV is nowhere near the size of a cinema screen (yet) I was far happier sprawled out on the sofa with a soft drink and popcorn that didn’t make me wonder why I barely got any change from a £10 note.

Upon a couple more viewings I actually rather like Quantum of Solace now as well.  It’s not as good as Casino Royale by a long chalk but it was certainly more enjoyable the second and third time round being shown in the way it was designed to be.  Just as an aside at this point I will point out that the reason I didn’t review the Blu-ray is that it is distributed by Fox rather than Sony Pictures, so I didn’t receive a review copy.

So watching a movie in my own home is now by far a more enjoyable prospect than hauling myself out to the cinema, but the ultimate nail in the coffin for my moviegoing pleasure came today.  This weekend sees the release of Fast and Furious in cinemas.  I love trashy movies, and the Fast and Furious series is the ultimate in ridiculous, over the top beefcake/car porn action.  It’s pure dumb fun and I really want to see it, so I thought let’s throw caution to the wind and go and watch it.  But after visiting the Empire Cinemas web site it informed me that it would cost £17 for two tickets I realised that the old premise of it would be cheaper to buy the movie when it comes out on disc is now just as timely, and it is in HD.

So for now I’m done with cinema viewing.  Why go out and spend more for something you can enjoy for less, and better at home?
But on the plus side, there is always Orange Wednesdays.

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