Fifa 08 vs PES - PS3

"It's coming home - oh yes!! Just look at the PES pimped PS3!?"

And while we wait for PES 2008, we play Fifa '08...

EA Sports, it's in the game... etc...

"He goes for glory..."

Fifa ‘08 (PS3)

Electronic Arts

Reviewed by Matt Adcock

It’s coming home, it’s coming home, it’s coming… football’s coming home (to the next generation), in this case to Sony’s powerhouse PS3. But is this the year that EA nick a smooth Man United style win from the slick ‘footie–tastic’ Pro Evolution Soccer or will they manage to trip themselves up in a Tottenham* stylee… i.e. letting in as many goals as they score!?
I found myself playing Fifa ’08 on a massive high definition screen in Virgin’s Megastore in London on the night before it launched. I had a few minutes to kill as I was waiting for my mate Mike who was en route to check out a press screening of Black Sheep with me – but I digress…
My initial thoughts were ‘oh man it’s beautiful’ because the Fifa ’08 is seriously visually gorgeous, I mean like a dripping wet rubber dress wearing Keira Knightley (of footie games), absolutely stunning.

This is next gen graphics doing what we want them to do – burning detail into the retinas of all who see them. I was impressed, the pitch looked so good you could almost smell the freshly cut grass, the stadiums glistened and even the fans looked the part and yet at the same time the players for all their motion capturing technology still look like the slightly uglier mutant brothers of their real life counterparts. No matter, visuals can only get you so far, it’s gameplay that makes of breaks a game, gameplay and possibly super advanced A.I. In Fifa ’08 the players make over 1000 decisions every second, can apparently strike the ball in a virtually infinite number of ways and the ball physics take into account wind speed, player skill / balance, spin from the pitch etc… But all of this would be for nothing if it didn’t play well.

So you ask ‘Matt, how does it play?’ and I reply ‘FIFA ‘08 is a surprisingly wonderful realistic football sim - one that will make you think like a real player no less’. And by that I don’t mean, thinking ‘I should be earning at least £50k more a week for all my skills!’ or ‘Who’s that pop starlet in the VIP box?’ No, I mean, ‘I’m going to take the ball on the outside of my foot, control it, dummy the last defender and score!’

Just so we’re clear – I it plays real sweet, real like erm, real football!? Yes there’s no more sticky feet or homing missile passes, the game ebbs and flows with disturbing authenticity – you’ll have to fight for every ball. This didn’t go down so well with my 6 year old son – he soon defected back to Fifa ’07 on the PS2 but for someone looking for a more realistic footie experience, step up for some quality Fifa action!

Darkmatters rating: öööö (4/5 might actually be a worthy PES alternative this year...)

*I’m a Tottenham fan…

"in other non related gaming news... look how good it is when lots of women who have played Laura Croft all put on black rubber catsuits - erm, yeah, that's it really"

The Kingdom - review

"Foreign policy - gets seriously tooled up!"

The Kingdom (15)

Dir. Peter Berg

Reviewed by Matt Adcock

Cut to the interior of a claustrophobic run down apartment block somewhere in Saudi Arabia (which is the ‘Kingdom’ of the title). The tension is off the scale as special FBI agent Ronald Fleury (Janie Foxx) crouches outside a door behind which the terrorist cell responsible for murdering hundreds of innocent American civilians might be waiting. He turns to the only back up he has – a local police Colonel who has been assigned to help Fleury’s investigation. As they prepare to burst into the room and possible death, Fleury asks “Which side do you think Allah's on?” The Colonel without missing a beat replies: “We are about to find out!”
This scene sums up The Kingdom completely – a rousing battle cry for the ongoing gung ho U.S. ‘war on terror’, complete with a peek into the limited understanding about the full religious and cultural issues at stake.
Director Peter ‘Very Bad Things’ Berg aims for maximum edgy nightmare ‘what if’ real world paranoia with this piece of fantasy confrontation and culture clash. He is reunited with the gorgeous Jennifer Garner (who he acted alongside briefly in the TV show Alias), and The Kingdom almost comes across as big screen spin off of that high concept U.S. agents saving the world show.
Foxx puts in some good work as agent Fleury, who is very much in the mould of last year’s Tubbs from Miami Vice. His small team which includes the Chris Cooper (explosives), Jennifer Garner (forensics) and Jason Bateman (intelligence) – are given five days to identify and take down the extremists who are believed to still be in the Kingdom.
The slow build up which packs a high ‘cliché per minute’ ratio and isn’t as gritty or authentic as it thinks it is, but it works in a simplistic way only to ramp up to an incredible kick-ass finale. The Kingdom is a film for those who want to have their irresolvable cultural conflict issues painted by numbers in broad strokes and then go home having witnessed justice being served with extreme prejudice.
It’s super slick and morally dubious in equal measure – but it sure does deliver in the action stakes. The last 20 minutes are possibly the most exciting I’ve witnessed in the cinema this year but then I’m a sucker for tasty cinematic gunplay, oh, and Jennifer Garner!?

Out of 5 you have to go with a solid 3.5 (The last minutes mins are worth 4 out of 5)...

Darkmatters ratings:

Action öööö – Crunching and tasty stuff, worth waiting for
Laughs ööö – FBI policy making!?
Horror öö – Nothing too grim
Babes öööö – Garner's still got it!

Overall ööö1/2 (Seriously flawed but redeemed through action)


"Garner - looks good in anything, even FBI issue fatigues"

More of my semi obsession with Jennifer G: http://darkmatt.blogspot.com/2005/01/jennifer-garner-great-looking-but.html

Darkmatters: H O M E

Black Sheep - review

Black Sheep (15)

Dir. Jonathan King

Reviewed by Matt Adcock

Baa baa black sheep, have you any wool?
Yes sir, yes sir – three bags full,
but I’ll rip your throat out and munch on your insides before you get your damned hands on it!!

Prepare to witness the ‘Violence of the Lambs’ in this new horror comedy where hills are alive with rampant killer sheep (yes you read that right). Black Sheep is the happy tale of Henry Oldfield (Nathan Meister) who manages to overcome his debilitating terror of sheep and return to his family’s farm in order to sell his share in it. But all is not right because his brother Angus has instigated a reckless ‘super sheep’ genetic engineering programme which has the unfortunate side effect of turning the once peace loving ovine grass munchers into flesh craving mutant nightmares.

Writer / Director Jonathan King has created a madcap, vegetarian’s worst nightmare writ large which drips gore and laughs in equal measure. The thousands of sheep are the stars with their eerie blank eyes, cloven hooves and newly acquired taste for humans – these are woollen predators that mean business. New Zealand’s gorgeous rolling pastures are put to good use as the picturesque backdrop to the humans vs sheep carnage and the Antipodean connect continues through the use of Peter Jackson’s WETA workshop who supply the grizzly special effects.

The cast go about the very silly plot with plenty of gusto – which features freakiness like being sexually assault by a ram, horrifically turning into ‘were-sheep’ and of course much running away from the bloodthirsty flock. A love interest for reluctant hero Henry is injected through a ditzy environmentalist named Experience (Danielle Mason) – so you could almost say this is a date movie, it really depends on what ewe want from an evening out I suppose…

The director assures us that ‘no sheep were harmed in the making of the film’ but he goes on to say ‘though I must say there were days when I wanted to!’
Overall this is promising debut from King and it will be interesting to see where he goes from here.
Black Sheep could well be described as this year’s ‘shorn of the dead’ such is the gleefully macabre action on offer. You might say ‘baa humbug’ but I assure you that you won’t see a better mutant killer sheep film this year!

Out of 5 you have to go with a much better than expected 3.5 (Mutton dressed as lamb but tasty chops anyway!!)...

Darkmatters ratings:

Action ööö – Bleatings a plenty
Laughs ööö – Lots of wooly fun
Horror ööö – Make sure your finish your popcorn early on!
Babes öö – Unless ewe look at sheep 'that' way

Overall ööö1/2 (wolf in sheep's clothing)


"does this guy taste like chicken to you?"

Darkmatters: H O M E

Warhawk - review

"I feel the need, the need for PS3!!"

"On March 3, 1969 the United States Navy established an elite school for the top one percent of its pilots. Its purpose was to teach the lost art of aerial combat and to insure that the handful of men who graduated were the best fighter pilots in the world.
They succeeded. Today, the Navy calls it Fighter Weapons School. The flyers call it: Warhawk, err, sorry - TOP GUN."

Warhawk (PS3)

Incognito / Sony

Reviewed by Matt Adcock

There is a unique feeling that only gamers who have experienced the all out thrill of a no holds barred Warhawk death match against 31 other tooled up killers have felt… It’s a primal, hair raising, endorphin rush – adrenalin overloading your sensory perception, your reflexes heightened and a wild animal bloodlust pounding through your veins… All around you bullets fly, rockets whiz and grenades explode, tanks are pounding the area with their heavy shells, jeeps rake your position with machinegun fire, then from nowhere comes the fearsome sight of a WarHawk jump jet coming over the rise, before you can react there are ground to air missiles being launched at you backed up by large calibre chain gun fire. You’re blown into the air from the multiple impacts – a warrior’s death, a noble way to go – but just another point to the pilot of the Warhawk!

I’m not kidding when I tell you that WarHawk is the future of multiplayer online warfare. It all looks stunning from the air or the ground, run, drive or soar across the various battlefields the words ‘jaw dropping’ do not adequately convey the sheer wonder of the graphics which boasts unprecedented draw distances and gorgeously violent battle effects.Freedom is the name of the game – you can play it however you want, take a mate or two or three online with you in cool split screen action. Or go for glory alone in a ranked game and reap the benefits of rank progression, which allows for new options of customisation to open up – for example if you fancy fighting in a Viking helmet, it’s there to be unlocked… The PS3 has been in need of a decent companion to Resistance Fall of Man’s online shooting antics and Warhawk delivers the best multiplayer shoot ‘em up fun yet.

Warhawk is a multiplayer only game but it wasn’t always that way, there was going to be a single player campaign but when it looked a bit sub par – Incongnito took the bold decision to go all out on the making the online game experience the best ever. And it is very impressive, even with masses of players in different vehicles all going at I’ve not noticed any lag. The weapon list is currently basic pistol, knife, grenades, assault rifle, sniper rifle, mines and the always-good rocket launcher. Warhawks have their own air to air and air to ground weapons power ups – plus a sneaky invisibility and useful chaff option. modes. Death Match, Team Death Match, Capture the Flag, Zones and Dogfights – those are the your options.

If you’re at all a fan of shooting, flying or just blowing things up – you need Warhawk in your life. More maps, vehicles and weapons are coming in the form of downloadable content via PSN – which will give the already highly addictive game an even longer lifespan.

Darkmatters rating: ööööö (5/5 a superb 'must buy')


"take your mates online with you on a single PS3!"

Darkmatters: H O M E

Mr Brooks - review

"Surprisingly not a film about my mate Mike Brooks"

Mr Brooks (18)

Dir. Bruce A. Evans

Reviewed by Matt Adcock

Want to play a game? Let’s play ‘Marshall says’…
OK, Marshall says: “follow that attractive couple home and scout out their house.”
Nobody will suspect you because you’re a wealthy, successful businessman – a real pillar of the community.

Marshall says: “create a believable excuse for you to be working late into the night.”
This is easier than expected because you’ve got your own glazing studio in which you can work on projects (it comes equipped with a handy kiln / incinerator).

Marshall says: “murder the attractive couple for kicks and ensure that there’s absolutely nothing that can tie you to the scene of the crime.”
Aha, now we’re having fun, you see serially killing random people is our hobby and we’ve been meticulously doing it for years – we even have our own media moniker - ‘The thumbprint killer’.

Marshall says: “you were stupid and someone took a photo of you at the murder scene.”
Oh dear, now this is a problem, how could we have been so foolish, this could undo all our carefully laid plans.

Marshall says: “everything you know is over as the photographer is going to blackmail you.”
HHhmmmm, need to think about this carefully, but wait, seems this isn’t going to be your average blackmail request…

Marshall says: “you’ve either got to find a way to kill this scumbag or face life in jail…”
Yes yes, details details. Does this schmuck know who he’s dealing with here?

Marshall says: “he can’t tell you anymore or it will ruin the plot of Mr Brooks for you!”
Fair point that one, this is a film worth seeing without knowing too much detail.

And so it is that Mr Brooks (Kevin Costner on a blistering return to form) leads a double life – by day sweet natured businessman and father, - by night a serial killer who has evaded capture for many years racking up a huge bodycount in the process. His mental instability is brilliantly realised by having William Hurt play the ‘voice in his head’ – Marshall who only Brooks and the audience can see. Director Bruce ‘Kuffs’ Evans does a credible job of turning Kevin Costner into an antihero to rival the mighty Hannibal Lector with this sharply plotted and brutally satisfying thriller. It shows the charisma that Mr Brooks emanates in that by the end you’re more likely to be willing him to get away with his dastardly deeds than see him brought to book by dogged Detective Atwood (Demi Moore).

Marshall says : “go and see Mr Brooks!”
– for once it’s worth listening to the voice in your head because he seems to have a good taste in films!

Out of 5 you have to go with a much better than expected 4 (Marshall told me to give it 5 but I think 4 is fair)...

Darkmatters ratings:

Action ööö – Enough to keep it all ticking over very nicely
Laughs ööö – some wry dark humour
Horror ööö – some pretty icky kills
Babes ööö – Brook's daughter is cute (see below)

Overall öööö (who'd have suspected Kostner of having it in him?)


"like father, like daughter... subplot alert!"

Darkmatters: H O M E

Halloween 2007 - review

"long haired greasy metal head... is the new Michael Myers!"

Halloween (18)

Dir. Rob Zombie

Reviewed by Matt Adcock (@Cleric20)

According to child development psychologist Dr. Samuel Loomis: “the darkest souls are not those which choose to exist within the hell of the abyss, but those which choose to move silently among us.” This concept has perhaps never been as clearly and unsettlingly realised as in the original Halloween film by John Carpenter back in 1978.

Now we’ve a modern remake of that highly influential ‘daddy’ of pretty much every other slasher film to stalk the big screen, and this one is made by self-confessed horror aficionado Rob Zombie.

Director Zombie declared his love for the original Halloween and that he hated the 7 increasingly stupid sequels, his vision was ‘to make Halloween scary again’… Oh dear… After witnessing his efforts I have to report that he’s failed on the brief -  this is nasty, sure, but it's meat-headed and slack-jawed, basically low on scares.

There’s a big difference between tense creeping dread and explicit, obnoxious violence shown just to disgust. Unfortunately, nobody told Zombie and his Halloween lumbers from one graphic death scene to another with little pause for breath or any build-up of suspense. Whereas Carpenter's dark-souled killer had an eerie menace and proffered no insight into the reason for his homicidal rampaging. Zombie’s Michael Myers is nothing more than a long-haired nutcase who developed a taste for slaughter after an unhappy childhood. 

The other major difference between the two versions of the film is in a word - ‘titillation’, the modern redneck Halloween seemingly having a ‘compulsory topless clause’ written in for all it’s female characters. Even Zombie’s wife who plays the distraught mother of psychopathic Myers is a pole dancer – move along if looking for any sort of female empowerment.

 
The opening 40mins where we meet ten-year-old Michael Myers (a meaty performance by Daeg Faerch who is convincingly disturbed) is of some interest as it tries to flesh out the background as to why he becomes a monster. Unfortunately knowing that he tortured animals for fun and got nothing but abuse from his stepfather didn’t add to the mystique of the legendary killer, it just made me lament the world that is probably very much the experience of far too many youngsters.

Halloween 2007 is an interesting spin on the original but it's brutality-over-substance. If you’re looking for a really scary movie this Halloween I’d pick 30 Days of Night which is equally nasty but shows that you can mix frights with kills.

Out of 5 you have to go with a:

3 (Halloween goes grindhouse)...

Darkmatters ratings:

Action ööö – there be chopping n stabing n beating
Laughs ö – not really (I might have missed the dark humour)
Horror öööö – yep it's pretty nasty stuff
Babes öööö – ouch, titillation indeed

Overall ööö (remake worse than original shock...)

Darkmatters: H O M E

Shoot 'Em Up - review

Shoot ‘Em Up (18)

Dir. Michael Davis

Reviewed by Matt Adcock

Blam, blam, blam, blam, boogie, blam, blam…

There goes Matt walking into Cineworld, he seems to sense that something isn’t right, he turns and rolls to his left drawing two handguns and opening fire on the mass of onrushing Tom Wade-esq hoodlums who are firing returning fire wildly but going down screaming as Matt’s high impact rounds smash through their knees, thighs and groins… In seconds the foyer of the cinema is awash with dead and dying bad guys, Matt is up and running towards screen 11 (his favourite) where Shoot 'Em Up is playing. As he approaches the doors a busty babe (vaguely G. VMD alike) dressed in an all leather outfit bursts out of them holding a baby. Matt pushes her out of the way and blows another legion of pursuing bad guys away…
/ whoa - sorry about that, day dreaming again…

OK, basically Shoot 'Em Up is a non-stop excessive bloodbath presented in loud-and-proud Looney Tune ‘shoot-o-vision’!
It’s not going to be everyone’s cup of tea – one reviewer whined “describing in the strongest possible terms how misogynistically offensive I found this 86 minutes of embarrassing hell” (link: http://gingerkidjoe.blogspot.com/2007/09/shoot-em-up-or-shoot-me-down-please.html) but me? I’m a just sucker for gun play in movies and I enjoyed Shoot ‘Em Up more than probably most others…

Yes it’s all morally reprehensible and on no instance should anything in the film be replicated in real life, but for a maximally violent escapist waste of time, there’s little around that can touch it!!
“I'm a British nanny and I'm dangerous” smirks Mr. Smith (an on form Clive Owen who is obviously finding the whole thing an absolute blast) he’s teamed up with hooker called DQ (Donna Quintano) played by the eye wateringly gorgeous but seriously actingly challenged Monica ‘The Matrix 2&3 Bellucci. The film revolved around them trying to protect a baby from uber nasty hitman Mr. Hertz (Paul ‘Sideways’ Giamatti) who get’s to spew lines like “You wascally wabbit” when he spots Mr Smith munching a carrot and dropping Bugs Bunny dialogue.

Stand out scenes include a skydiving battle royale and the highest bodycount sex scene ever; "Talk about shooting your load," says Smith after the deed leaves a host of baddie henchmen full of lead.
There is a gleeful noirness to the wannabe John Woo action and set pieces that you’ll never forget such as when Smith hits a van full of baddies head on, goes through the windscreen, landing in their van and shoots them all at close quarters “So much for seatbelts” he says coolly.

Out of 5 you have to go with a bullet to the frontal lobe 4 (Disengage your brain for maximum enjoyment!!)...

Darkmatters ratings:
Action ööööö – memorable!
Laughs ööö – what’s up doc?
Horror ööö – body parts akimbo
Babes öööö – Bellucci is gorgeous

Overall öööö (shoot first, ask questions about the morality and taste later)


"you lookin at me?"

Darkmatters: H O M E

Death Proof - review

Death Proof (18)

Dir. Quentin Tarantino

Reviewed by Matt Adcock

“Ladies we're gonna have some fun…” the name’s Mike, Stuntman Mike and I’m death proof (at least when in my mean modified Dodge Charger). The bad news is that my definition of ‘fun’ is crashing you off the road – safe in the knowledge that whereas I’ll likely walk away with minor injuries – you’ll be splattered liberally across the highway…
I’m really just your average guy – the type of grizzled loner that you might bump into in any given bar. I do like foxy women though, they gotta have some curves, gotta be sassy and ready to party. I met this one group last night who I overhead saying that they were looking for a “Kinda cute, kinda hot, kinda sexy, hysterically funny, but not funny-looking guy who they could get with” – well they certainly found me, and last I heard they were still being scrapped off the tarmac.
No, I admit, it’s not very sociable for me to go around ram raiding nubile beauties and turning them into steaming road kill but I just can’t seem to help myself. Of course I blame the script writers – and you may well too if you venture to see Death Proof because whilst I’m lined up to be an iconic antihero with a literally ‘killer’ line in cars, I’m also criminally underused (think Darth Maul from Star Wars Episode I).
This is the first of Tarantino’s five movies I’ve left feeling a bit under whelmed rather than having had my senses scorched with a zeitgeist burning overdose of cool. But it’s hard to put my finger on exactly why that is. Maybe it’s due to a criminal dearth of action? The UK version of Death Proof might not come as part of the originally envisioned ‘Grindhouse’ double bill as it did in the States but it is boosted with an additional 25mins of fairly inane dialogue. What it could have done with however is an extra 25 mins of tasty action because I’ve yet to meet an action / horror movie fan who’d rather watch two dimensional characters witter on unconvincingly rather than getting stuck in to some serious danger. Oh and the cinema owner where I saw this asked that I point out to potential viewers that the scratches, jumps in film and general fuzziness are all intentional – to help capture that original grindhouse B movie feel, seems some people didn’t quite understand though and have been complaining!?
But to sum up, Death Proof basically goes ‘Vroom, vroom, screech… splat, blah, blah, blah, blah zzzzzz.’
Shame.

Out of 5 you have to go with a weaker than hoped 2.5 (too much blah, not enough splat)...

Darkmatters ratings:
Action ööö – good but not enough
Laughs öö – couple of wry giggles
Horror ööö – splatter elements were good
Babes öööö – do the words 'smokin hot' mean anything to you?

Overall öö1/2 (could have been so much more)

Darkmatters: H O M E

Superbad - review

Superbad (15)

Dir. Greg Mottola

Reviewed by Matt Adcock

Wassup people, step right up for the teen comedy of the year – it’s rude, it’s juvenile and it doesn’t flinch from diving inside horny young men’s minds and spraying what it finds all over the screen… But then that’s what you get with a script written when the makers were still teenagers themselves. Superbad is a full frontal expose of the hopes (mostly involving foxy females), fears (mostly of not fitting in or not getting any action) and need for camaraderie (the essential hanging out with pals) that boys of a certain age have.

Hats off to director Greg Mottola because although this won’t appeal to everyone, Superbad is special in that despite its sex obsession a la Porky’s or American Pie – it also manages to be sweet natured at heart. Some of the credit must go to producer Judd Apatow who’s other films include The 40 Year Old Virgin and Knocked Up, as these are very much kindred genre-mates.
Superbad is the nerdalicious tale of three pals as they face their high school graduation with a sense of trepidation at their lack of prowess with the fairer sex. Virgins to a man, they hatch a plan – in the best tradition of teen movies – to get laid before they face the world of college.

First there’s slightly tubby Seth (a cracking turn from Jonah Hill) and his best friend Evan (a nicely understated Michael Cera) who form the backbone of the story. But the third part of this infantile trinity is uber dork Fogell (a movie-stealing Christopher Mintz-Plasse) who creates possibly the best on screen nerd hero ever.

Stir into the mix two hilarious slacker cops (Seth Rogen and Bill Hader) who come into the plot via Fogell’s mission to try and buy booze for a graduation party using his running gag fake I.D. named just "McLovin". Everything is set for a night of high mischief as the boys find themselves out of their depth, desperately trying to woo the objects of their desire – a concept which may or may not resonate with you depending on how you spent your teenage years…

Is Superbad for you? Just ask yourself if you want to witness on duty police officers putting on Star Wars voices, friends partying, falling out, making up and maybe finding out a little what matters in life…

Out of 5 you have to go with a lots of fun 4 (how bad you want it?)...

Darkmatters ratings:

Action ööö – snogging n fumbling
Laughs ööööö – you'll laugh loud and long!
Horror ööö – tampons aren't optional!
Babes öööö – young but hot!

Overall öööö (It’s loud, lewd super-good fun!)


"McLovin almost getting to live up to his name"

If you liked this you might like: http://darkmatt.blogspot.com/2007/08/knocked-up-review.html

Darkmatters: H O M E

Atonement - review

Atonement (15)

Dir. Joe Wright

Reviewed by Matt Adcock

Remember when you were young, when you thought that you knew it all… but actually hadn’t a clue? Sometimes a lack of life experience can lead one to make wild jumps to very wrong conclusions… with serious consequences.
This is the core dynamic of Atonement, a tale of heavyweight heartbreak and life long repercussions stemming from the misled mind of 13 year-old Briony (Saoirse Ronan). It is her actions as a child that tear apart the blossoming relationship between her older sister Cecilia (Keira Knightley) and Robbie (James McAvoy) and lead to a lifetime of regret as she tries to atone for what she has done.
Atonement is based on the book by Ian McEwan which director Joe ‘Pride and Prejudice’ Wright has brought vividly to the screen. The cinematography is just stunning, with scene after scene vying to burn itself into your memory – be it the lavish English country house or the haunting battle ravished beaches of France.
From the moment it all begins, there is a fantastic balance between the seemingly idyllic upper class sanctuary of Cecilla’s family home and a growing sense of unease, which is built up both by the threat of the coming war and the obvious sexual tension swirling amongst the assembled characters.
Everything explodes on one fateful night; an initially comic-seeming wrong note being delivered scene, by young Briony (who reads it and later acts on the fanciful ideas it has generated in her mind), leads to a miscarriage of justice that cannot be undone.
The cast are universally superb and Knightley gives her best performance to date as the stunning Cecilla, whose breathtaking emergence from a fountain at one point is quite possibly the scene of the year for males the world over… McAvoy is excellent too - both as handsome love stuck housekeeper’s son, then as the battle beaten everyman soldier trying against the odds to return to his love through the hell of the Dunkirk retreat. The lingering tracking shot across the beaches at Dunkirk to the strains of ‘Dear Lord and Father of Mankind’ is as vivid a portrait of hell as you’ll ever need and must have taken an astonishing amount of coordination. The words of the much loved hymn resonate through the films plot:
‘Breathe through the heats of our desire, thy coolness and thy balm; let sense be dumb, let flesh retire’… By the end of the film you’ll have the sense that some wrongs simply cannot be adequately atoned for in this life.
Atonement is a devastating, heartbreaking, absolute modern classic – highly recommended viewing.

Out of 5 you have to go with a classic 5 (vey cool, very well made - and Keira!!)...

Darkmatters ratings:

Action ööö – enough and well paced
Laughs öö – one very funny scene!
Horror ööö – some grim war stuff
Babes ööööö – Knightley is unbelievably sexy (see below)

Overall ööööö (one of this year's highlights!)


"here are six great reasons to see this film!!"

Darkmatters: H O M E

The God Delusion - review / response

Star Wars VII - No real hope featuring 'Darth inSidious'...

The God Delusion

By Richard Dawkins

Review / response by Matt Adcock


“Science flings open the narrow window which we are accustomed to viewing the spectrum of possibilities…”
Richard Dawkins

Unfortunately, it seems that the existence of God is one possibility that is just a step too far to make it onto this wonderful ‘spectrum of possibilities’. I must declare an interest here – whilst I’m a born again Christian, I enjoy listening to and thinking about other people’s views, thinking and beliefs (some of my best friends are devout atheists – doesn’t mean I don’t respect and love em…). But according to Dawkins, apparently I’m deluded and my personal faith is nothing but wishful thinking – obviously that’s just his opinion but in The God Delusion you can read his arguments as to why he thinks it's like that…

Dawkins wants to make it absolutely clear that there can be no rational, conceivable way for any non intellectually challenged, brain washed or conditioned individual to justify actually believing in God. It is his stated intention that he hopes ‘religious readers who open it (The God Delusion) will be atheists when they put it down’- which is at least a candid admission of his evangelizing mission on behalf of atheism.

In case he ever reads this I have to quickly say “sorry my angry friend but while I found your book an interesting rant against the worst excesses of religion (which I would happily join in with) - there is nothing here to make me want to consider giving up my faith”.

And ‘rant’ is an apt word; I’d love to have a good conversation with Dawkins over a lunch or something one day but maybe with the proviso that it be only after he’s been to see a good anger management therapist… You can almost see Dawkins’ red faced vitriolic statements steaming off pretty much any chosen page of The God Delusion, come on man, let’s chill a little, it might add some readability to the clunky angry prose.

At several points I was moved to make small annotations in my copy of The God Delusion – much along the lines of Dawkins himself who scribbled ‘teapot’ on ‘page after page’ of Alister McGRawth’s book entitled Dawkins’ God: Genes, Memes and the Origin of Life, in reference to the ‘celestial teapot whose existence cannot be disproved’… My small annotations weren’t teapots, mine were tiny phalluses which indicate wherever I though Dawkins was ‘being a bit of a knob’…

E.g. many times Dawkins puts hypothetical words into the mouths of hypothetical theists etc – but surely that only proves what a great imagination he has, you can’t expect to use that device to sway a supposedly scientific argument – can you?

An imaginary atheistic thinker might say:

“An otherworldly pall lies over the horizon; surely it is our human struggle to press ever on towards this desolate place where we will find that our significance in the cosmos has turned our minds to bramble jelly… From there we can only resign ourselves to being beings of inordinate minutiae… sweet, delicious and lovely on toast or crumpets but minutiae all the same…”

But then again, he might not, and even if he did – it’s only because I made him and his words up!?
That’s heavyweight argument that for sure…

One thing I also found a bit weak was where Dawkins backs out of any 'is there a God?' argument using his ‘Creative intelligences, being evolved, necessarily arrive late in the universe, and therefore cannot be responsible for designing it’ line. To me that just indicates a complete inability to comprehend the supposed nature of God, who by default, if He did exist would be outside of His ‘created’ universal laws… i.e. He might have created everything that we can detect with our God given intellects (refined by natural selection if you like that theory – why not?) but that doesn’t limit Him to having to only operate in or obey the scientific laws which He created.

You simply cannot have such a being confined by the same scientific rules that we the ‘created’ are – it would be like a hypothetical (to use Dawkins’ way of presenting ideas) sentient artificial intelligence in a PlayStation 3 game pondering how the ‘creators’ of the game could possibly not be made up of the same ‘game code’ that they are made from and limited by the rules of (thus whilst the creator is able to exist outside of the entire ‘game universe’, the denizens of the game universe cannot understand how the creator is able to ‘break the rules by which they are designed to operate within’).

Then there’s what my wife pointed out as Dawkins’ ‘shuffling of feet and hedging of bets’ with his chapter entitled – 'why there almost certainly is no God', come on man, if you’re so sure that you’ve called your latest book ‘The God Delusion’ you might as well follow through on your convictions and say ‘why there is certainly no God’ – or are you keeping just the tiniest get out clause for yourself should He one day turn up and confront you about all this nay saying business?

I’m just playing of course but more than that – hopefully I’m ‘consciousness raising’ about the fact that this is one seriously annoyed atheist… Consciousness raising is something Dawkins goes on and on about in most disgusted terms when talking about children being called by their religious backgrounds… Still, that's his thing I guess.

Overall The God Delusion is of interest only really to those looking for a one sided ‘anti God’ reference tome but the ‘selectedness’ of the material presented – especially the edited bits of the bible that Dawkins refers to is grating after a while… Kind of like only being able to hear one side of a conversation.

Out of 5 you have to go with an overall Darkmatters rating of öö1/2 (was hoping for more balance - and less anger!!)

Darkmatters: H O M E

1408 - review

1408 (15)

Dir. Mikael Håfström

Reviewed by Matt Adcock

Hotels are naturally creepy places... Just think, how many people have slept in that bed before you? How many of them were sick? How many... died?
Here we are again then; in another haunted hotel dreamt up by Stephen King and it’s in room 1408 that jaded ghost disproving writer Mike Enslin (John Cusack) is in for a truly hellish night… You however have choice as to whether or not you join him in this slick but slightly disappointing wannabe mind-bending horror effort.
For those seeking a full on, freak out terror fest, you might well find 1408 is more of a Travel Lodge experience to The Shining’s five star Ritz – adequate but nothing you’re going to remember very fondly. After an impressive build up thanks in no small part to Samuel L. Jackson as Gerald Olin who has the dubious pleasure of being manager of The Dolphin Hotel, the action homes in on the room of the title. And the freakiness kicks off in promising style (at least judging by the traumatised look on my mate Matt Landsman’s face - his review is below for your reading pleasure) with one of the most unnerving jump scenes to hit the screen this year clue: look out - she’s behind you…
But it’s mostly down hill from then on as the frights get exponentially fewer and less effective as the film focuses on Enslin’s emotional torment depicted through some scattershot and over the top special effect set pieces. Cue various run ins with the spectres of previous victims of room 1408 (56 people died there seeing as you asked) and then an ill advised sentimental reunion with his dead daughter that heightens the schmaltz to an uncomfortable level. It seems that the short story this is based on didn’t stretch to the hour and a half running time without some obvious padding and treading water.
Mikael ‘Derailed’ Håfström is however a competent director and had a decent budget to play with, which only makes it all the more of a shame that the end product leaves you feeling a bit ‘meh’ rather than ‘ooh I’m freaked out’…
You don’t need to be a maths genius to notice that the digits in 1408 add up to 13.This could either be construed as a spooky sign of where to find some horrible fun to witness or perhaps more aptly in this case just ‘unlucky for some’…

Out of 5 you have to go with an averagely shocking 2.5 (redrum redrum redrum)...

Darkmatters ratings:
Action ööö – freaky bedroom action ahoy!
Laughs öö – couple of wry laughs
Horror öööö – one great shock doesn't make a great film
Babes ö – the dead aren't sexy

Overall öö1/2 (scary -ish but not enough)

second opinion:

1408 (15)
Dir. Mikael Hafstrom
Reviewed by Matt Landsman

Adapted from a Stephen King short story and directed Swedish Mikael Hafstrom (probably best known for Oscar-nominated "Evil" (2003) and "Derailed"
(2005)) this film was said to be the return to a more traditional suspense filled horror after the recent descent into the so-called "torture porn" such as "Hostel: Part II" and like minded films that are cutting a bloody path through the horror genre.

Mike Enslin (John Cusack) is a writer specialising in books about haunted places and paranormal phenomenon who has a sceptical view of the afterlife following the untimely death of his daughter Katie. The death leads to him abruptly abandoning his wife (Mary McCormack) and moving from New York to Los Angeles where he tries to put his life back together and finish writing "Ten Haunted Hotel Rooms". It isn't until he receives a postcard addressed from the Dolphin Hotel in Manhattan with the simple message "Don't Enter 1408" that Mike decides to return to New York and see what Room 1408 of the Dolphin Hotel has to offer.

After ringing the hotel, Mike is informed by Dolphin manager Mr. Olin (Samuel L. Jackson) that the room is "not available". Not next week. Not next month. Not ever. Mike is convinced this room is the basis of the final chapter of his book and only the threat of a lawsuit manages to persuade the hotel to agree to his stay. On arrival, Mr Olin informs Mike that 56 deaths have occurred in the hotel's 95 year history - all in room 1408, and all those that check in are soon to check out via rope, razor blade, window, or the occasional heart attack and stroke, always within an hour. The official conclusion according to the hotel manager is "It's an evil f---ing room."

What follows is a film that fails to deliver in quite a few areas. The premise of the film is intriguing and the acting is strong and convincing with Cusack carrying the film in what is virtually a one man show. The psychological horror that writers Scott Alexander and Larry Karaszewski were aiming for was uninspiring and obvious, from the unplugged radio that constantly played "We've Only Just Begun" by The Carpenters, to Enslin's emotions towards his daughter which are played on too frequently throughout the film and only further waters down the effect of fear that the writers struggled to produce by softening up the situation instead of invoking the terror and distress that this film needed more of. But then again, what more could you have expected from the duo that wrote "Agent Cody (Malcolm in the
Middle) Banks"?

American writers often fail when it comes to the Japanese-esque psychological horror (see: US and Japanese versions of The Ring Two) and the temptation that Alexander and Karaszewski fell into was teasing the prospect of American hack-and-slash in a probable attempt to please US viewers, but never delivering the goods in order to keep this suspense-based. Unfortunately, having a foot in both camps weakened the effect of either method of building tension and furthering the plot as the film seemed to lose it's focus. At times it is difficult to know if Enslin is supposed to be battling against some unseen evil or his own emotional instability caused by the death of his daughter and breakdown of his marriage.

1408 is worth watching if you like a good horror film but don't expect to be blown away by this one. For an altogether better mix of Stephen King and hotel-based horror you're better off sticking with The Shining, which this film doesn't even get close to.

Darkmatters: H O M E

Knocked Up - review

Knocked Up (15)

Dir. Judd Apatow

Reviewed by Matt Adcock

Hi my name’s Ben, I’m a chubby slacker with no prospects but I’m out for the night and through drink haze I meet you – a stunning blonde out celebrating your job promotion in a funky club… I really like you, there’s definite chemistry so perhaps we can see a bit more of each other? Who knows, one thing might lead to another and before anyone can say ‘be sure to take precautions’, we could be up to our eyeballs in nappies and baby grows… It does…
That sound funny to you?
It certainly is in Knocked Up, the irresponsible but consistently hilarious new comedy from the makers of The 40 Year Old Virgin. Somehow this manages to be full of laugh out loud situations and pack a sparkling comic script that mixes lewd stoner ‘blokes’ comedy with wry relationship observations. In fact Knocked Up is a surprisingly shrewd lifestyle commentary for our times, which encompasses the reality of responsibility, the nature of love and many of the heartfelt emotions that go with parenthood preparation.
So the question is: can life-long loser slob Ben (Seth Rogen) get his act together enough to be a suitable father for career minded babe Alison (Katherine Heigl) or are they doomed not to make it?
Many amusing trials stand between these two strange bedfellows living happily ever after - with their new soon to be offspring. Firstly there’s the small matter of Ben’s slacktastic housemates with who he is trying to set up a ‘celebrity nude scene’ website. These guys exist in a perpetual ‘frat house’ puerile atmosphere where smoking weed is considered a high art form and females are mostly only creatures seen in movies. Then there’s Alison’s sister Debbie (Leslie Mann) whose marriage to wisecracking Pete (Paul Rudd) is not really an advertisement for blissful family life. If you go to see this with a date, there’ll certainly be plenty to discuss on the way home.
What’s great is that Knocked Up doesn’t fall into the problem faced by many comedies where they take a funny set up and then by halfway through forget to keep delivering the laughs. It’s rude and juvenile to the end (which didn’t go down well with my wife) but I admired the conviction of the filmmakers in sticking to their guns.
And if Knocked Up sounds like your cup of tea, look out for Superbad in a few weeks which cold be this year’s American Pie style teen comedy – the bad taste laughs keep coming!

Out of 5 you have to go with a really funny 4 (safe sex is important but not as funny)...

Darkmatters ratings:

Action ööö – bedroom action ahoy!
Laughs ööööö – Ho ho and indeed ho Mother f****r
Horror öö – you might want to look away if squeamish during the graphic birth scene!
Babes öööö – Heirl is delicious!! (see below)

Overall öööö (very good!!)



"oooh, you would..."

Darkmatters: H O M E

Shoot 'Em Up...

"new contender for 'Matt's film of the year!'

Here's what Variety said about it:

"Director Michael Davis makes the transition from straight-to-DVD stinkers to the bigscreen in conspicuous fashion, with an action movie that is violent and vile in equal measure. When hitman Paul Giamatti is dispatched to assassinate a pregnant woman, not-so-innocent bystander Clive Owen intervenes on the baby's behalf, unleashing a firefight of epic proportions. Good taste is the first fatality in this gonzo thrill-seeker, sure to offend mainstream dispositions, yet too stylistically audacious to dismiss outright."

- check the trailer here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4t-tT2rBFoU

Am very very excited about this one...

The Bourne Ultimatum - review

The Bourne Ultimatum (12a)

Dir. Paul Greengrass

Reviewed by Matt Adcock (@Cleric20)

Will you commit to this program? You will no longer be the person you are now, your memory will be wiped and everything you know will change including your name.

You’re life will be spent executing targets with cold, calm, ruthless precision – never asking ‘why’?
On the plus side you’ll become an unstoppable fighting machine who can dispatch assassins, security forces and thugs with your bare hands.

Driving will take on a new level of danger as every time you get into a vehicle you will find that there are armed people chasing you, smashing into you and generally trying to end your life… This is the world of Jason Bourne and it’s high time you gave it another visit.

Matt Damon steps up again for this third slice of Bourne ‘one man extermination machine with a grudge against those who created him’ action and boy does it deliver on the action goods. If you’re in the mood for some heart pounding, no holds barred, sweaty palmed espionage excitement – accept no substitute. Paul Greengrass directs with gritty flair, much as he did with The Bourne Supremacy - the crunching action flashes across the globe taking in Tangiers, Madrid, Paris London and New York.

The many and varied fights are really quite satisfyingly brutal, surely pushing the limit for a 12 rated film, Bourne is one guy you really don’t want to get into fisticuffs with. Damon knows exactly what is required in his role because in Bourne he has helped create a powerful and more believable cinematic super spy alternative to Bond.

This time it’s David Strathairn who is the shady CIA mastermind with lots to hide who is on Bourne’s hit list, but he’s balanced by Joan Allen’s ‘nicer’ CIA section chief and a great supporting cast that includes Paddy ‘Hot Fuzz’ Considine as a beleaguered Guardian journalist. Add to this a succession of violence prone CIA black operations ‘assets’ who we are led to believe are lounging around in hotels the world over just waiting for the order to go out and exterminate someone (mostly Bourne actually)…

"Bourne's farts cause havoc"

For me The Bourne Ultimatum is the best of this summer’s action movies, delivering effective non-stop tension-inducing thrills and managing to wrap up refreshingly in less than two hours.

My advice is to commit to this programme as soon as you can...

Out of 5 you have to go with a bone crunching:

5 (Bourne to be wild)...

Darkmatters ratings:

Action ööööö – so much and so good!

Laughs ö – not really a laugh a-thon
Horror ööö – brutal beatings ahoy
Babes öö – Julia Stiles is cute

Overall ööööö (loved it)

Darkmatters: H O M E

Rush Hour 3 - review

Rush Hour 3 (12a)

Dir. Brett Ratner

Reviewed by Matt Adcock

It’s certainly been quite the year of the ‘threequel’ and up until now they’ve been a mixed bag but generally at least averagely amusing, entertaining and / or even impressive in places but I guess it couldn’t last… See, however much you might not have loved this Summer’s 3rd entry block busters – get ready to experience a new vapid low in entertainment values… Welcome to Rush Hour 3.
Yes, watching the third Rush Hour film is like being punched repeatedly in the face by a gibbering idiot (otherwise known as the director Brett Ratner to be precise). There is nothing new here, and what there is was done better in the previous two outings. Chris Tucker does his offensive motor-mouth jive again, Jackie Chan mugs up as the oriental, butt kicking, culturally inept detective again and erm, that’s it really.
You know that there’s little hope of decent entertainment when in just about every scene you think to yourself ‘ah – this is like *name other movie here* only not quite as good’… In fact the only memorable fresh bit I can recall was when the two heroes use a nun to translate their attempted interrogation of a French speaking suspect, but the interview degenerates into them having her straight faced relay various threats and swear words… It’s the audience that they end up torturing…
The Oscar for ‘Best supporting actor in a completely rubbish movie’ would go to Yvan Attal, who is a French cab driver who hates Americans because of their international warmongering but who undergoes a Damascus Road conversion thanks to our two bumbling heroes so he ends up buying into the shoot first rhetoric of most U.S. action films.
Speaking of the so called ‘action’ on offer here – it is weak and utterly unexciting, if you look in the dictionary under ‘lack lustre’ you might well find a reference to the many dull fight scenes in Rush Hour 3. So if the action sucks, surely the comedy will save this purported ‘action comedy’ then?
Alas not – this writers of this tripe should hang their heads in shame at the lazy jokes and contrived supposedly funny situations that they have regurgitated. I think perhaps there is a metaphor for the whole movie in the scene where Tucker and Chan slide into a foul reeking open sewer which taints them both – that certainly could be where their careers are heading if they appear in any more rubbish like this!

Out of 5 you have to go with a piss poor 1 (you'll feel 'mugged' if you pay to see this)...

Darkmatters ratings:
Action öö – what passes for action here...
Laughs öö – very poor effort
Horror öö – I did get a bit worried that Chan might hurt himself at his age...
Babes ööö – some but not enough to improve the film overall

Overall ö (won't ever want to see this again!)

Darkmatters: H O M E

Evan Almighty - review

Evan Almighty (PG)

Dir. Tom Shadyac

Reviewed by Matt Adcock

Let me ask you something. If someone prays for patience, do you think God gives them patience? Or will He maybe give them the opportunity to be patient?
If courage is prayed for, does God give you courage, or does He give you opportunities to be courageous? And if someone prays for their family to be closer, do you think God zaps them with warm fuzzy feelings, or does He give them more opportunities to love each other?
These are the theological idioms spouted by God (Morgan Freeman) in Evan Almighty – a quirky, gentle but not altogether successful follow up to 2003’s Bruce Almighty.
This time there’s no Jim Carrey so director Tom Shadyac has picked Steve ’40 Year Old Virgin’ Carell (who played the Carrey’s newsreader nemesis in the first film) to be the mortal whose life God decides to step into in a supposedly comical way. Alas Evan Almighty fails to raise many quality laughs relying on animals pooping jokes and unsightly facial hair of biblical proportions… However, once you get past the fact that you’re unlikely to be splitting you sides, the central premise of a modern day U.S. Noah's Ark story turns out to be a not altogether unenjoyable family friendly experience.
Evan you see is a man going places having just become a Congressman and he is all set for a successful career in politics, But when he is visited by God and asked to build an ark in order to survive a soon to occur flood (which is almost believably given the British summer weather this year) he’s not sure how he’s going to make it happen. Life gets complicated further when pairs of animals of every kind begin turning up unannounced and following Evan around. It doesn’t take long for Evan to be branded a ‘weirdo’ and his ark building project to make the TV news – seems today’s people are no more receptive to the pleas of a doom mongering prophet than they were in Old Testament. The climactic special effects however which sees the ark finally getting put through its’ paces are quite something to behold.
If you’re looking for comedy, Evan Almighty doesn’t really warrant missing out on the Simpson’s high jinks but if you’re seeking a summer holiday parable, which might make you pause and consider life, Evan’s your man.

Out of 5 you have to go with a hairy biblical 3 (nice but not that funny!)...

Darkmatters ratings:
Action ööö – the flood is class
Laughs öö – some but not enough to make it a 'comedy'
Horror ö – add some stars if you fear beards
Babes ö – nope

Overall ööö (God is giving you the opportunity to wait for this on DVD)

Darkmatters: H O M E

Here be very tasty dragons... Lair PS3

Just...

look...

at these screens...

I'm a bit excited about LAIR!!