http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend Latest videos from CNETTV.co.uk en Fri, 25 Apr 2008 15:24:02 +0100 CNET Networks UK http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-persepolis-10000313.htm Based on a graphic novel, the beautifully hand-drawn, black-and-white Persepolis is an autobiographical story of Marjane Satrapi, an Iranian woman who spent the first decade of her life living a relatively happy childhood in Tehran, before being packed off to Vienna by her liberal parents. The film is a masterclass in economic story-telling, effectively condensing many years into just over 90 minutes, and Satrapi and writer-director Vincent Paronnaud manage to find verbal and visual humour in even the darkest of situations. Fri, 25 Apr 2008 15:24:02 +0100 http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-persepolis-10000313.htm http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-the-eye-10000312.htm Horror flick The Eye is directed by David Moreau and Xavier Palud, who proved last year that they could deliver the scary goods with the French shocker Them. Unfortunately they seem to have left everything that made that film so successful in their homeland because The Eye is about as generic as Hollywood horror gets. The movie plays like a Frankenstein's monster of recent horror hits, and the scriptwriters are so aware that this material is utterly derivative that they even include a jokey reference to The Sixth Sense in the dialogue. Fri, 25 Apr 2008 15:04:01 +0100 http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-the-eye-10000312.htm http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-in-bruges-10000304.htm Acclaimed playwright Martin McDonagh's debut feature In Bruges is probably the first hitman movie to be set in Belgium, a country better known for worryingly fruity beer, Poirot and Jean Claude Van Damme than a violent criminal underworld. The hitmen in this case are a pair of Irishmen, played by Colin Farrell and Brendan Gleeson, who come to the quaint medieval town of the title to cool off after a hit back in London goes wrong... Fri, 18 Apr 2008 17:01:01 +0100 http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-in-bruges-10000304.htm http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-protege-10000302.htm Protégé is a gritty new Hong Kong thriller that's been a massive hit in its homeland. It's a hard-hitting anti-drugs tale in which a cop called Nick has spent seven years infiltrating a heroin gang, run by grey-haired Lin Quin (Andy Lau). It manages to mix some old-school cop high-jinks with a tough addiction drama, and although you've seen it before, the cat-and-mouse game between gang boss and undercover rozzer is grippingly told, with some first-rate acting from upcoming star Daniel Wu, as well as veteran Lau. Fri, 18 Apr 2008 15:56:01 +0100 http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-protege-10000302.htm http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-botched-10000301.htm Kit Ryan's Botched is an Irish-funded but Russia-set movie that begins like any other heist flick - a veteran thief is forced to do one last job by mobsters after a diamond robbery goes badly wrong. Unfortunately for our hero (played by Colin Farrell), but luckily for the audience, this job ends up involving gun-toting nuns, exploding rats and a psychotic killer who believes he is the reincarnation of Vlad the Impaler. Fri, 18 Apr 2008 15:02:01 +0100 http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-botched-10000301.htm http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-the-banquet-10000299.htm William Shakespeare might be the world's greatest ever playwright, dealing with all facets of the human condition, but if he'd been around today he's almost certainly be working in movies. Probably churning out scripts for Adam Sandler vehicles. But since we don't have the man himself, his plays continue to provide rich source material for the cinema screen. The Banquet is the latest movie to take inspiration from the bard, in this case Hamlet. This is the classic tale of murder, revenge and royal power struggles, as relocated to 1st century China. Fri, 11 Apr 2008 13:58:01 +0100 http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-the-banquet-10000299.htm http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-21-10000298.htm The week's biggest release is the No.1 American box office hit 21. This isn't the fourteenth sequel to Seven, or an early film in the epic series that finished with 2001, but a Vegas-based gambling about six young maths geniuses who used their numerical prowess to score big on Vegas's blackjack tables. Although supposedly based on a true story, this tale has been seriously Hollywoodised, with hunky maths geeks, gorgeous maths girls, cheesy romantic subplots and sleazy college professors who look a lot like Kevin Spacey. Fri, 11 Apr 2008 12:25:02 +0100 http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-21-10000298.htm http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-rec-10000297.htm It made a lot of money back in 1998, but it seems to have taken an entire decade for The Blair Witch Project to have a proper influence on genre cinema. In the past couple of months we've had Cloverfield and George Romero's Diary Of The Dead shaking their handheld cameras in our faces, and now Spanish shocker [Rec] joins the club. One night a fire crew is called to an apartment building where an old lady is apparently trapped in her apartment. Unfortunately the poor dear has turned into a demented contagion-ridden zombie, and when the authorities seal off the entire building our survivors must find another way out. Fri, 11 Apr 2008 12:01:02 +0100 http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-rec-10000297.htm http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-funny-games-10000292.htm Anyone who goes to see Funny Games at the cinema expecting a raucous night out is going to be in for a nasty shock - this film is far from funny. Director Michael Haneke's 2008 English-language version is almost a shot-for-shot remake of his original 1997 German-language version, with the same levels of kidnap, brutal torture and murder. The only real addition to this recent version is Naomi Watts, who spends a lot more time in her underwear than the original actress had to. Fri, 04 Apr 2008 15:18:01 +0100 http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-funny-games-10000292.htm http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-i-m-a-cyborg-but-that-s-ok-10000291.htm Chan-wook Park's I'm A Cyborg is not your typical romantic comedy. It opens with a woman cutting her own wrists, and proceeds to tell the story of Young-goon, a mentally ill girl who is convinced she is a killer android and has violent fantasies about massacring a bunch of doctors. Unlike Park's previous film Oldboy, there's no octopus gobbling, but fans of Asian splatter will still lap up the scenes of robotic mayhem. Fri, 04 Apr 2008 11:13:02 +0100 http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-i-m-a-cyborg-but-that-s-ok-10000291.htm http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-lars-and-the-real-girl-10000273.htm The tale of a man and his relationship with a life-size sex doll is not what you'd immediately consider could make a genuinely moving love story, but Lars and the Real Girl somehow manages to combine humour with a poignant look at loneliness and the fragility of the human mind. The emotionally troubled Lars meets Bianca, the girl of his dreams, however unfortunately for Lars he believes she's a living, breathing human being... Fri, 28 Mar 2008 10:24:02 +0000 http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-lars-and-the-real-girl-10000273.htm http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-the-orphanage-10000268.htm The Orphanage is very much in keeping with producer Guillermo del Toro's brand of chiller, which blends visceral shocks with moving character-based drama. It's the story of a couple who decide to reopen an old orphanage, but find their lives torn apart when their adopted son goes missing. In general it relies on a build-up of tension and uncomfortable psychological anguish rather than traditional shocks, however it does contain one of the single best jump-out-your-seat frights since Carrie decided that being buried wasn't much fun after all... Thu, 20 Mar 2008 17:01:02 +0000 http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-the-orphanage-10000268.htm http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-meet-the-spartans-10000267.htm Meet the Spartans is, without doubt, the worst film we've reviewed on Reel Weekend to date. It's the latest in a line of comedies that began with Scary Movie and can only end when the likes of Friedberg, Seltzer and the Wayans brothers are publicly hanged. Like its predecessors, it has a habit of replacing actual jokes with irrelevant references to recent pop culture, and to top it off, finds it necessary to explain those references seconds after they've been screened... Thu, 20 Mar 2008 11:00:00 +0000 http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-meet-the-spartans-10000267.htm http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-the-cottage-10000261.htm The Cottage, directed by Paul Andrew Williams and starring none other than Brookside's Jennifer Ellison, is a worthy entrant to the splatter comedy genre. It fuses broad comedic farce with gory horror thrills, with plenty of limbs getting lopped off, farm implements being put to inappropriate use and shovels through faces. It manages to be a whole lot of fun once it hits its stride... Fri, 14 Mar 2008 14:08:01 +0000 http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-the-cottage-10000261.htm http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-redacted-10000260.htm Director Brian De Palma returns to his low-budget roots with Redacted. The film was shot on high-def video for an American cable channel and looks at life in Iraq for a squad of American soldiers in typically controversial style. It focuses upon the brutal rape of an Iraqi girl by out-of-control American soldiers, and while it's not exactly subtle and doesn't tell us much we don't already know, it's pretty powerful stuff. Fri, 14 Mar 2008 11:30:01 +0000 http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-redacted-10000260.htm http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/dvd-review-the-counterfeiters-10000259.htm For the second year in a row, Germany produced the Best Foreign Language winner at the Oscars, and like last year's The Lives Of Others, The Counterfeiters is a politically charged thriller about uncomfortable events in the country's past. This is a wartime tale, focusing on the uneasy relationship between the Nazis and Jewish counterfeiters, who were offered a slightly nicer life in concentration camps in return for creating fraudulent money and documents... Fri, 14 Mar 2008 11:02:01 +0000 http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/dvd-review-the-counterfeiters-10000259.htm http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-diary-of-the-dead-10000252.htm Veteran horror filmmaker George A. Romero may not have invented zombies, but he pretty much invented the zombie movie as we know it back in 1966, with his undead classic Night of the Dead. George's now back with the latest in the Dead line of movies, Diary of the Dead. Luckily this isn't the tale of a lovesick, 30-something PR zombie keeping track of how many brains she's eaten in her secret diary - it's a low budget, handheld account of the outbreak of the zombie plague from the point of view of a bunch of irritating students. Fri, 07 Mar 2008 15:55:02 +0000 http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-diary-of-the-dead-10000252.htm http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-vantage-point-10000251.htm Pete Travis' Vantage Point is very much a post-24 action thriller, with jerky handheld camera work, sweaty FBI agents running around and a real-time urgency to the plot. It focuses on the attempted assassination of the US president, played by William Hurt, at an anti-terrorism summit in Spain, and we see it from the perspective of eight individuals, including Dennis Quaid's secret service agent, Sigourney Weaver's newswoman and Forest Whittaker's camcorder-wielding tourist... Fri, 07 Mar 2008 09:00:00 +0000 http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-vantage-point-10000251.htm http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-margot-at-the-wedding-10000244.htm Margot at the Wedding, starring Nicole Kidman, Jack Black and Jennifer Jason Leigh, is a dark comedy written and directed by Noah Baumbach, whose previous movie The Squid and the Whale proved a breakthrough indie hit in 2005. Kidman plays Margot, a successful writer but emotional wreck who comes to visit her estranged sister Pauline after she hears she is about to marry a deeply unsuitable man she has only just met... Fri, 29 Feb 2008 13:55:02 +0000 http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-margot-at-the-wedding-10000244.htm http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/dvd-review-eastern-promises-10000243.htm David Cronenberg has brought us many horrifying images over the years - from James Woods inserting pulsating video cassettes into his stomach to Jeff Goldblum transforming into a gloopy insect. But few are as disturbing as the sight of Viggo Mortensen's bits flapping around during the much-discussed bathhouse fight in Eastern Promises, which hits DVD shelves this week. This is the Canadian director's follow up to A History of Violence, and like that film, mixes a mainstream thriller plot with his own distinctive style. Fri, 29 Feb 2008 12:01:01 +0000 http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/dvd-review-eastern-promises-10000243.htm http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-the-boss-of-it-all-10000242.htm The Boss of it All is definitely a comedy, but director Lars von Trier goes out of his way to subvert the genre. The first thing we hear is the director's voice, telling us exactly what kind of film we're going to be watching, and he pops up a bit later to inform us when we're at the halfway point. He also directs using a process called Automavision, in which a computer randomly chooses the camera angles, meaning that at any point, characters will disappear out of frame and sentences will be cut off in mid-flow. Police Academy this ain't... Fri, 29 Feb 2008 11:57:02 +0000 http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-the-boss-of-it-all-10000242.htm http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-rambo-10000233.htm It was inevitable that John Rambo would make his own comeback. Confusingly, this fourth movie in the series that started with First Blood is simply called Rambo, but that's the most unusual thing about it. Elsewhere, it's business as usual as our meat-headed killing machine takes on another bunch of interchangeable democracy-hating foreign scum. In this case, it's the Burmese military… Fri, 22 Feb 2008 12:43:02 +0000 http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-rambo-10000233.htm http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-black-water-10000232.htm Aussie horror flick Black Water takes the classic victims-in-a-single location setting and gives it a fresh spin. A trio of holiday makers on an outback expedition make the unfortunate decision to hire a boat to head upriver into remote jungle. When their boat is upturned by a huge crocodile, our heroes clamber to apparent safety. Unfortunately, they're miles from civilisation, and the only way out is to get back in the water... Fri, 22 Feb 2008 10:35:02 +0000 http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-black-water-10000232.htm http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-be-kind-rewind-10000223.htm Be Kind Rewind is the latest film from French maverick Michel Gondry, who previously brought us Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and last year's The Science of Sleep. Jerry (Jack Black) and Mike (Mos Def) are given the job of looking after a crumbling VHS-only video store when owner Mr Fletcher (Danny Glover) goes away for a few days. Unfortunately, Black gets magnetised while committing an act of environmental terrorism, and somehow wipes every tape in the store. So the bungling duo take it upon themselves to remake the movies using just themselves and an old camera... Fri, 15 Feb 2008 13:57:01 +0000 http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-be-kind-rewind-10000223.htm http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-all-the-boys-love-mandy-lane-10000222.htm All the Boys Love Mandy Lane is the latest in a persistent line of slasher movies hitting our screens, arriving some 30 years since the first Halloween and proving that there's life in the formula yet. Mandy Lane is the gorgeous but chaste new girl at school, and in an attempt to fit in with her peers, agrees to go on a weekend away with them. But someone wants Mandy all to himself, and before long is picking off his rivals... Fri, 15 Feb 2008 12:11:01 +0000 http://www.cnettv.co.uk/film-and-tv/reel-weekend/movie-review-all-the-boys-love-mandy-lane-10000222.htm