Hot Fuzz (5 Stars)

Here they are again, Simon Pegg and Nick Frost, the greatest comedy duo of the 21st Century. The only others who come close are Dwayne Johnson and Kevin Hart. In this film Simon Pegg (on the right, in case you didn't know) plays Nicholas Angel, a police officer who's been transferred from London to Sandford in Gloucestershire. The London police force didn't want him because he was too efficient and showed everyone else up. Nick Frost (on the left) plays Danny Butterman, a Sandford police officer who joined the police force because his father told him to do it.

The biggest crimes in Sandford are people cutting their neighbours' hedges. There hasn't been a murder in the village for years, but Nicholas soon discovers why. Whenever someone is killed the coroner declares it an accidental death.

Nicholas is all business. He refuses to eat Black Forest Gateau at work.

But he's willing to eat a Cornetto on duty. It's not a problem as long as he isn't driving.

In 2006 Olivia Colman was still unknown. What a cute smile!

"Hot Fuzz" takes a while to get going, but once it starts it's an amazing film.

Success Rate:  + 4.7

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Joker Folie à Deux (5 Stars)

I didn't think it was necessary to make a second film about the Joker. The first film said it all. Joaquin Phoenix was only prepared to make a sequel if it went in a different direction. That's what I saw today. Maybe the film was too different for critics and the audience, but it's exactly the film that Joaquin wanted to make.

Arthur Fleck, the Joker, is in prison for almost all of the film. Long sequences take part as a courtroom drama. On the whole, courtroom dramas are boring, but this problem was solved by interspersed musical numbers. Some were dreams, while others simply happened without explanation. I've read reviews that say the music was out of place. I disagree entirely. The music gives the film its strength. They also say there's not enough action. They don't get it. It was never intended to be an action film.

DC has further distanced itself from the film. There's no DC logo at the beginning of the film. I find this appropriate. The Joker in the film isn't the same character that we know from the comics or the Batman films. The comics are just a rough inspiration for the film. In the comics the Joker is a master criminal; in the film he's just a confused psychotic man.

The film is still in the cinemas, but initial predictions suggest it will be a box office flop. That would be a tragedy. Joaquin Phoenix won an Oscar for his performance in the first film, and he's just as outstanding in "Folie à Deux". Lady Gaga is an incredible actress, as always. Brendan Gleeson, one of my favourite actors, is brilliant as the abusive hospital orderly Jackie Sullivan. In my opinion, this is a film that everyone needs to see. Hurry, while it's still in the cinemas.

Despicable Me 4 (4 Stars)

No review today. I'll wait until my writer's block passes.

Although, to be honest, it's not writer's block preventing me from writing anything. It's writer's distraction, if there's such a thing. My daughter Fiona is visiting me with her children for the next two months. That leaves me little time to watch films, and even less time to write about them. I had to see "Despicable Me 4" in the cinema today, because my grandson Oliver was desperate to see it. Now that I'm back home my other grandchildren are running around shouting "Opa! Opa! Opa!" Blogging is tough!

The Lost King (5 Stars)

This is a true story based on recent events. They've been telescoped in the film. The events seem to take place within the space of a few weeks, but it was actually 15 years, from 1998 to 2013.

Philippa Langley is a divorced woman who lives in Edinburgh with her two sons. She still has a good relationship with her ex-husband, who visits her every day to help with the children. She suffers from a health condition called ME, myalgic encephalomyelitis, which leads to chronic fatigue. Having never heard of this illness I read about it online, and there seems to be disagreement about whether it's an illness in its own right or the symptoms of other illnesses. Whichever is the case, it has an effect on Philippa's life which she has to deal with on a daily basis.

After seeing a production of Shakespeare's play "King Richard III", Philippa becomes fascinated with Richard. He's described as an ugly, deformed man who killed his nephews in order to become king. Philippa doubts this description is accurate. She thinks Shakespeare wrote the play basing his information on the propaganda of the Tudor kings who replaced him. She begins to do research into his life. In particular, she tries to find his grave. His body disappeared after he was killed in the Battle of Bosworth Field in 1485.

During her research she faces resistance from scholars and historians who think they know better than her. Another problem, if it can be called a problem, is that she has frequent visions of Richard III himself. He talks to her and encourages her to continue with her research. Is it possible that these visions were the result of her chronic fatigue? The film doesn't answer this question.

"The Lost King" is one of the best films of 2023. Sally Hawkins' performance as Philippa Langley is outstanding. I've long been a fan of the director Stephen Frears, especially his adaptations of true stories. "The Lost King" is a welcome change to the modern blockbuster movies which use big action scenes to distract from weak plots.

The Secret Life of Pets (3 Stars)

Netflix Thursday #33

Pets need attention, especially dogs. They're sad when their owners go out to work all day. They whine unhappily when the owner leaves, and they're overjoyed when he returns. My parents always owned dogs, and they had a strategy to keep them happy. They always owned two dogs at a time to keep one another company during the day.

Max is a Jack Russell who lives in a New York City apartment with Katie. She disappears for hours every day, as most people do. We aren't told what her job is. It isn't relevant. What we see is that Max is unhappy when he's left alone.

He soon makes friends with other pets in the house. They run up and down the fire escapes, in and out of windows, and they happily play with one another. Neither Katie nor any of the other owners know what's going on, because Max and his friends are all sitting and waiting at the door when their owners return home from work.

Katie thinks the same way as my parents. She buys a large mongrel called Duke to keep Max company. It doesn't work. They don't get on with one another. One day Duke drags Max into the alley, trying to make him get lost, but they both lose their collars in a fight with a gang of stray animals who hate humans. In a series of events they're captured by dog catchers, then freed by the stray animals, then captured again. Max is lost and has to find his way back through the city.

But he finds his way back, and when Katie comes come he's sitting at the door as if nothing had happened. This is the life that pets keep secret.

It's a cute but infeasible story. It'll make pet owners want to close their windows before they go to work.

Success Rate:  + 9.8

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Night at the Museum: Secret of the Tomb (4 Stars)

This is a film that tidily completes the Night At The Museum trilogy. There should never have been a fourth film, even though the final scene leaves it open. Barely. And yet a fourth film was made last year as a Disney Plus exclusive. It's not even a live action film, it's an animated film. I swore I wouldn't watch it, but my grandson Oliver has found out about it, and he wants to watch it. So I'll have to grit my teeth and put up with it. It might be good, but somehow I doubt it.

The best scene in "Secret of the Tomb" is a fight between Sir Lancelot, Theodore Roosevelt and Larry Daley inside an M. C. Escher painting. It only lasts a minute, unfortunately. The fight could have lasted an hour, and it would never have got boring.

Success Rate:  + 0.9

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Night at the Museum 2 (3 Stars)

This is a good example of a poorly made sequel. "Night at the Museum" was a big success at the box office, so there was pressure to make another film. Some of the characters return from the first film, but most of them only appear in brief cameos. There's enough of the first film repeated to raise a smile, but not enough to make the viewer think he's in familiar territory.

The film takes place three years after "Night at the Museum". Larry Daley has given up his job at the American Museum of Natural History to pursue a career as an inventor. I like his idea of a fluorescent torch. When there's a power cut it's easy to find. I could have done with one of those when I lived in England. In Germany there aren't as many power cuts.

The museum is due to be modernised. The exhibits are to be replaced by AI-driven holograms. How dull!

The exhibits are shipped to Washington to be stored underground in the vaults of the Smithsonian. The magic tablet of Akmenrah that gives the statues life should have stayed in New York, but it's stolen by Dexter the monkey and taken to Washington. At the Smithsonian the wax figures come to life, including Kahmunrah, the evil older brother of Akmenrah. The tablet has other powers known only to Kahmunrah, including the ability to raise the army of the dead. Larry goes to Washington to retrieve the tablet and save the world.

The film is dull, and is only worth watching for the excellent performance of Amy Adams as Amelia Earhart. On the other hand, my grandson Oliver enjoyed the film. He liked the slapstick action and the airplanes. Maybe one day he'll write his own blog and give the film a better review.

Success Rate:  + 0.8

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Night at the Museum (4 Stars)

Two years ago I sat down with my grandson Oliver to watch "Night at the Museum". At the time he'd never watched any films, only YouTube videos, so he didn't have enough patience to last the whole film. He gave up after 45 minutes. Today I tried again. Success! He loved the film, and he wants to watch the sequels.

I watched it in German, for Oliver's sake. Usually German dubbing is good quality, but this time I wasn't satisfied. The German dialogue is very fast and excited, even when the original English is spoken clearly. The voice actors put their own interpretation into the roles. I don't appreciate that.

No, the Hungarian bodybuilder Krisztina Sereny doesn't appear in the film. I can't think of anything else to write about the film, so the photo is my way of apologising. Is anyone interested in a gallery of her photos?

Success Rate:  + 3.2

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Minions: The Rise of Gru (4 Stars)

My grandson Oliver is turning into a film fan like me. For the last two weeks he's been begging me to take him to see the new Minions film. Today we finally went. We could have seen it in the original English version, but he said he wanted to watch it in German. I suppose it doesn't make any difference with animated films, because the original version is already dubbed. I'm just curious about one thing: in the German version the Minions all talk with Italian accents. I'm sure the original isn't like that.

After the three Depicable Me films, this is the second standalone Minions film. I haven't seen the first Minions film, but I know that Oliver has watched it in Netflix. I looked over his shoulder a few times, but not long enough to figure out what was happening. I'll have to watch it some time soon. In English, of course.

"The Rise of Gru" takes place in 1976. Gru is still at school, and he tells his class he wants to be a villain when he grows up. They laugh at him and cruelly bully him. Only his loyal Minions can protect him. Gru has already applied to become a member of the world's leading criminal gang, the Vicious Six. They invite him for an interview, but they immediately reject him when they see he's only a child. Before leaving he steals an artefact called the Zodiac Stone from them. He doesn't know what it does, it's just a trophy of his visit, but back home he finds out it's a powerful weapon. It can turn people into any of the animals in the Chinese Zodiac. The Vicious Six pursue him to retrieve the stone. He's also chased by Wild Knuckles, the former leader of the Vicious Six who was betrayed by his colleagues and left for dead.

This is a very amusing film. I enjoyed it, and so did Oliver, who couldn't stop laughing. Maybe he couldn't understand all the humour. There were a lot of jokes about the 1970's. Maybe when he's older he'll understand more. Today he just laughed at the slapstick humour. When he got home he told his mother (my daughter) that he'd had a very good day. That makes the film a success.

The Look of Love (4 Stars)

True Stories #25

Name: Paul Raymond

Lived: 15 November 1925 – 2 March 2008

Film dates: 1956 to 1992

Film made in 2013

I'm biased against Paul Raymond. When I hear his name I always think of him as the man who ruined Mayfair. I mean the men's magazine called Mayfair, not the area in London. Mayfair was the only men's magazine I ever bought. Let me backtrack:

When I lived with my parents my father used to buy men's magazines: Penthouse, Playboy, Men Only, Club, Razzle and Mayfair. He hid them in a box on top of his wardrobe, but I soon found the hiding place and occasionally took a peek. Maybe he didn't buy them; maybe he just borrowed them or swapped them with his friends at work. Probably the latter, because the selection of magazines frequently changed. The old magazines disappeared and new ones arrived in their place. I never asked him. I was about 12 when I started looking at his magazines, and I continued until I was 22.

I divide the magazines into three classes:

1. Playboy and Penthouse were smooth and glamorous. Too American. Not sexy enough.

2. Men Only, Club and Razzle were overtly sexual. Too rough and pornographic.

3. Mayfair was glamorous and discreetly sexual. Perfect for my tastes.

The magazines in the second group were all published by Paul Raymond. I didn't like his style. After I left home at the age of 22 I regularly bought Mayfair. It was the only men's magazine I was interested in. Then, in 1990, Paul Raymond bought Mayfair. Within two months it became a clone of his other magazines. I stopped buying Mayfair. Since then I've never found a magazine to replace it.

Originally, Paul Raymond was known for his musicals and plays that featured nudity. It began very slowly in 1956, but as the laws were relaxed the nudity became more and more explicit. He always insisted that the nudity was tasteful. Based on the evidence of the film, I agree. The problem is that he was ahead of his time. Prudish Britain needed to catch up with him.

The magazines, starting with Men Only in 1971, were more explicit from the start. Paul Raymond also claimed they were tasteful, but I disagree. For me there's nothing tasteful about a naked woman spreading her legs for the camera. That's not what I like.

Those two businesses, the shows and the magazines, are what the public at large knew about him, but he had a third line of business that made him rich. In the late 1950's he began to buy houses in Soho. They were poor quality and cheap, but he predicted their value would rise. He was right. By 1992 his property was valued at £1.5 billion, making him the richest man in Britain.

The film concentrates on Paul Raymond's theatre shows and his magazines. The property business is only mentioned in passing, when he points out to his granddaughter all the houses he owns. We see that he's an immoral man who was unable to remain faithful to any one women. The person he loved most in the world was his daughter Debbie. Was he a good father? In my opinion, No. When he found out that she was taking drugs, in particular cocaine, he made no attempt to stop her. The most disgusting scene in the film is when he gives Debbie cocaine in hospital while she's in labour. It made the birth easier to handle. But at what cost?

Debbie Raymond died of a drug overdose in 1992, at the age of 36, leaving two small children behind. That's where the film ends. That's effectively where Paul Raymond's life ended. He spent the last 16 years of his life in his penthouse suite with the blinds drawn. He was the sad billionaire. Hardly anyone was ever allowed in to see him.

Steve Coogan expertly plays Paul Raymond in a way to make the viewer feel sympathetic with him. But to me he'll always be the man who ruined Mayfair.

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Despicable Me 3 (3½ Stars)

Amazon Friday #24

Two Grus are better than one? In the third film Gru finds out that he has a twin brother called Dru. Funny though. "Grus" looks wrong. I have the feeling that I should write the plural of proper names with an apostrophe, i.e. two Gru's, but I searched online and found out that an apostrophe would be false. I'll have to remember that. I love the English language and try to uphold it, but this is a rare example where my feeling leans in the direction of something that's wrong.

The two brothers look identical apart from Dru having a full head of hair. He also has blond eyebrows. They don't look very similar in the picture above. Maybe this one is better:

Or maybe not. Their radically different clothing hides their similarity.

The biggest difference between the two is attitude. Gru has now fully reformed and has given up his life of crime. Dru has never been a criminal, but he wants to be a criminal, so he's always pestering Gru for advice. It's advice that Gru refuses to give. He's now a married man with three adopted daughters, so he's settled down. He can't afford to be sent to prison for 50 years.

In my review of "Despicable Me 2" I included pictures of all three of Gru's daughters. This time I'll only show a screenshot of Edith, because she's the cutest. Just look at that face! Doesn't she melt your heart? Wouldn't she make you want to reform from a life of crime as well?. Her age isn't stated in the film, but her older sister is 12 and her younger sister is six, so she's somewhere in the middle. I have difficulties estimating the age of real children, so with cartoon children it's impossible. I just know Edith is cute.

The film begins with Gru as a permanent member of the Anti Villain League (AVL). In the previous film he was just assisting the AVL. His membership doesn't last long. He's fired because he fails to catch the new master villain, Balthazar Bratt, who's stolen the world's largest diamond. Gru wants to redeem himself by retrieving the diamond, so he enlists the help of his brother. Dru wants to become a criminal, so Gru deceives him. He just says he wants to steal a diamond from someone, without telling him that he's stealing the diamond from a thief to give it back.

The film has all the slapstick and wild humour of the previous films, but something indefinable is missing. I can't say what it is. Maybe the problem is that we don't see as much of the Minions as we did in the previous films. That's just a Maybe. Early in the film they desert Gru because he refuses to return to a life of crime after being fired from the AVL. Only his two most loyal Minions, Dave and Jerry, remain with him. But evidently I'm in the minority with my opinion. "Despicable Me 3" is the most successful film in the franchise so far, and it's the fourth most successful animated film ever made.

"Lucy, please tell me what's wrong with this film".

Success Rate:  + 10.9

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Despicable Me 2 (4 Stars)

Amazon Friday #21

"Despicable Me 2" isn't as funny as the first film, but it's still a good film. It makes up for the reduced humour by having the atmosphere of a spy film. It's not overtly a spy film, but it still has a James-Bond-ish feeling to it. You need to watch the film yourself to know what I mean.

Scientists in the Arctic Circle have developed a potion capable of altering DNA. This is stolen by an unknown master criminal. The Anti Villain League approaches Gru as an ex-villain to recruit his assistance in finding the villain. Gru protests that he's not an ex-villain, he's just taking a break from crime, but he agrees to help. He teams up with the AVL agent Lucy Wilde. She secretly confesses that she's fascinated by Gru's past, and if he ever returns to crime she'll quit the AVL to become his accomplice.

There's a shopping mall where several master criminals lead innocent lives. Gru and Lucy are sent to work in the mall, opening a jam shop as their cover. While they're hunting for the criminal responsible for the theft a romance develops.

Lucy is pretty, in a cartoonish way. It's just a shame that her nose is bigger than her breasts.

But Gru doesn't notice her big nose. His eyes are elsewhere.

Gru has an even bigger nose. It makes kissing difficult.

Closer...

Closer.....

And they get there in the end!

The girls that Gru adopted in the first film approve. They want a mother.

I always get their names mixed up, so I'm including three posters here, more as a reference for myself than for my readers.

Now I have no excuse for forgetting their names again. Edith is disguised in her picture, but she's easily recognisable from her trademark hat. She's never shown in the films without it.

But as any young child will tell you, the film is all about the Minions. My grandson Oliver can't even remember the name of the film. "Despicable" is such a long word. He calls it the Minion film.

Success Rate:  + 10.8

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Night at the Museum: Secret of the Tomb (4 Stars)

This is the third and final film in the Night At The Museum trilogy. It was made five years after the second film, and it brings the series to a close. Larry Daley (Ben Stiller) quits his job as night guard at the American Museum of Natural History and is replaced by Tilly (Rebel Wilson).

The film also offers closure in a sadder way. This is the last film made by the great Robin Williams before his suicide. He died after making the film but before it was released, so there's a brief dedication to him at the end.

The three films build a single piece of work, so I strongly advise that you watch them back to back in order. I almost watched them back to back, over a two month period, so I enjoyed them more than I did when I watched them in the past, not even in the correct order.

This is the film where Ben Stiller gets to kiss a monkey. Is that allowed on screen?

He's closing his eyes to lose himself in the passion.

Ben Stiller plays a second role as a Neanderthal called Laaa. This leads to him groping Rebel Wilson's chest. All men are animals, even if they don't show it in public. I'd like to grope Rebel Wilson as well, but I'm too much of a gentleman to give in to my urges.

You can read Rebel Wilson's mind. "That was disgusting! If I'd known what was expected of me I would have asked for more money!"

I've heard rumours that a fourth film is planned. Please don't do it. Leave it as it is.

Success Rate:  + 0.9

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Night at the Museum 2 (3 Stars)

There's some confusion about the title of this film. According to the DVD box, its name is "Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian". However, in the opening credits the title screen simply calls it "Night at the Museum". There isn't even a number two to distinguish it from the first film.

The film takes place three years after the original film. Larry Daley has left his job as a night guard and gone back to being an inventor. He's now having moderate success with his Glow-In-The-Dark Flashlight. (I'm British, so I prefer to call it a torch). It's a better idea than it sounds. If there's a power cut and you need a torch, you might not be able to find it in the dark. If the torch's outer casing is fluorescent, it's easy to find. I wonder if these torches are on sale yet.

Larry visits the museum and finds that almost all of the exhibits have been packed in boxes. It's been decided that traditional museums are too old-fashioned. The new museum is to be made up of talking holographic displays. Larry stays the night in the museum to say farewell to his old friends. The Tablet of Ahkmenrah is to remain in the museum, so they won't come to life any more in their new resting place, the underground vaults of the Smithsonian Museum in Washington D.C.

The next evening Larry receives a phone call from Jedediah. Dexter stole the Tablet, so now all the exhibits in the Smithsonian Museum have come to life. Kahmunrah, the older brother of Akhmenrah, has attacked and imprisoned the new arrivals from New York. He wants the Tablet, because it has untapped powers that will help him conquer the world. Larry goes to Washington to save them.

I'm sorry to say that this film doesn't live up to the original. Too much is illogical. In the first film the exhibits were at war with one another, but now they're united, even before they have to face a common enemy. In the first film there were constant communication problems, but now they all seem to understand English, even if they don't speak it. We see all the exhibits from the first film, but several of them, including Sacagawea, shown above, only appear in brief cameos. The new exhibits aren't funny, except for their randomness. The only exception is Amelia Earhart, played by Amy Adams.

Amelia Earhart is comical in the way she's portrayed. She's an independent woman, who doesn't need a man to tell her what to do, but she goes to the opposite extreme, taking any man she wants. In this case, any man means Larry. While he's struggling to save the world, he has to fight off Amelia's attempts to kiss him. It's very hard for him, because she looks insanely sexy in her tight fitting flying outfit.

That's still not enough to make it a good film.

Success Rate:  + 0.8

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