Bovie Movie

England, 2027: this green and pleasant land is now a dirty dystopia in which humanity has become infertile and its childless society is crumbling as refugees and terrorists fight the fascist powers that be. Submerged in this chaos is alcoholic former activist-turned-bureaucrat Theo Faron (Clive Owen), who watches in despair from the sidelines until a surprise visit from an ex-lover (Julianne Moore) offers him an unlikely glimmer of hope. Mexican director Alfonso Cuarón (Y Tu Mamá También) here delivers a truly startling take on PD James’s downbeat novel, reworking its apocalyptic theme through the cracked prism of the post-9/11 era. Owen is excellent and there’s a glorious turn from Michael Caine as an ageing, pot-smoking ex-political cartoonist. But it’s Cuarón’s film: his hand-held camerawork apeing news broadcasts as it records nerve-shredding action set pieces in tense, unbroken shots. True, the proceedings are occasionally marred by a surfeit of plot exposition, yet the stark triumph of Children of Men lies in how its visceral vérité style brings the realities of a War on Terror fought in distant lands crashing back onto British soil. 

Chechen rebels take over a Russian nuclear plant and it’s up to a mysterious agent(Snipes) to stop them.

Daniel Craig effortlessly makes James Bond his own, and the 21st movie in the series goes back to basics for this resoundingly entertaining spy adventure. GoldenEye director Martin Campbell has obviously been watching the Bourne franchise, and here he gives the superspy a gritty makeover, upping the violence content (the opening sequence, shot in grainy black and white, is particularly brutal). He also strips Bond of much of the slightly camp humour — thus no appearance from gadget-man Q. The plot is essentially an origins story, as a rough-around-the-edges Bond gains his two zeros (the two authorised kills he needs for his infamous licence) before tackling villain Le Chiffre (a splendidly thin-lipped Mads Mikkelsen) in a game of high-stakes poker. Craig’s humanised, more flawed interpretation of the role balances Campbell’s physical direction and co-writer Paul Haggis’s sparing wit, while Eva Green provides an alluring love interest. Apart from a chaotic and overlong last act, this is a triumphant new beginning. 

JOSH, 40’s, a respected engineer, is asked by his company to inspect a Nuclear Power plant in Russia. He’s reluctant to go, but when he discovers there has just been a minor earthquake in the region he’s on the first plane out. The reason for his change of heart? His ex-wife, RACHEL, works at the plant, and his kids, DYLAN, 17, and CHERIE, 14, are living in the area. Upon arriving in Russia, he’s taken on a tour of the power plant by EMILIO, the manager of the facility. He finally meets up with Rachel, only to receive the cold shoulder. She’s busy checking the nuclear core after the tremor, concerned that there might be a leak in the coolant system that’s causing it to overheat. That night Josh studies the readouts from the plant and discovers an anomaly. The core does seem to be overheating. He goes Rachel’s apartment with the figures in hand, but again receives a cold reception. Rachel takes the paperwork from him, but shuts him out in the cold. Literally. As he walks away Josh sees his kids up at the window, looking down sadly. The next day Rachel packs the kids off to school, tells them that unfortunately they probably won’t be seeing their father. He’ll be leaving as soon as the job is over. At the power plant, Josh tries to convince Emilio to shut down the reactor until they investigate the possible leak, but Emilio will hear nothing more about it. He ignores Rachel’s safety warnings and orders the engineers to take the plant to full power… Meanwhile, Dylan and Cherie arrive at the American Academy and talk about Josh. Cherie misses him, but Dylan puts up a front, pretending not to care. Cherie talks about skipping school and heading over to the Power plant to see him. Dylan warns her not to, but she’s headstrong. As soon as the coast is clear she sneaks out of class and heads down to the subway… Josh takes a group of engineers down to the nuclear core to investigate the possible leak when…Disaster strikes…A MASSIVE EARTHQUAKE, 8.2 on the Richter scale rocks the Russian countryside. Small fires break out all around the plant’s Uranium core, threatening to start a meltdown and cause an explosion ten times the size of Hiroshima… Cherie’s subway train rocks violently in the quake, before becoming trapped when the tunnel entrances collapses at both ends … And then as quickly as it began, the quake stops…And now the real stories begin… Josh discovers that the coolant lines were leaking and there is insufficient water at the plant to help fight the fires. When Emilio tries to increase the coolant pressure he ruptures the main pipeline from the reservoir ten miles away. Now no water can reach the raging inferno… Dylan discovers that Cherie did indeed skip out of school, and now it’s his responsibility to find her. He races through the devastated streets on a borrowed motorcycle, trying to find a way in to the collapsed subway tunnels… Cherie extricates herself from the wreckage of the subway train and helps the other passengers caught in perilous situations… Josh finds himself locked in the containment area around the core when the plant’s automatic safety measures snap into effect. He must use all his skill and ingenuity to find a way back to the surface. Time’s running out as the core overheats… Thinking fast Rachel comes up with a solution: They could save the plant using the water from the reservoir. The only problem is they’ll have to flood the subway system… And so begins a race against time as the core threatens to meltdown and Josh and Rachel fight their way into the subway tunnels, desperately trying to save any trapped passengers, including their children. But Nature’s got one final surprise for them…Another MASSIVE QUAKE!

Producer Jerry Bruckheimer focuses on family audiences with this boisterous and likeable action feature. While too lightweight for most adults, its slapdash mixture of cheeky humour, speedily shot chase sequences and dim-witted monkey business should hold the attention of youngsters. Surprisingly, Liz Hurley’s erstwhile boyfriend Steve Bing co-wrote the story and screenplay, in which calamity-prone friends Jerry O’Connell and Anthony Anderson are dispatched to Australia by O’Connell’s mobster stepfather (Christopher Walken) to deliver $50,000 to a shady associate. When a wild kangaroo runs off with the cash, the pals set off across the outback in pursuit, assisted by wildlife conservationist Estella Warren. Though Warren adds little more than tight T-shirt titillation and Walken’s so stereotyped he’s almost boring to watch, it’s O’Connell and Anderson’s spirited banter that carries the film. As for the eponymous marsupial, this semi-CGI creation pops up so infrequently you almost feel cheated. 

The first American theatrically released 3-D movie from a major studio since 1991’s Freddy’s Dead: The Final Nightmare, Spy Kids 3-D: Game Over is the third entry in three years in Robert Rodriguez’s family-oriented action-adventure series. Along with the four members of the Cortez family, played by Antonio Banderas, Carla Gugino, Alexa Vega, and Daryl Sabara, most of the characters from the first two films have returned, including Fegan Floop (Alan Cumming), Romero (Steve Buscemi), Machete (Danny Trejo), Dinky Winks (Bill Paxton), and Donnagon (Mike Judge). This time around, Carmen (Vega) is kidnapped by the evil Toymaker (Sylvester Stallone) and imprisoned inside a virtual-reality game. It’s then up to Juni (Sabara) to venture into the game and save his sister from the villain’s clutches. The film’s three-dimensional segments take place inside the game. Also starring Salma Hayek, Spy Kids 3-D: Game Over is actually the first of two 2003 films directed by Rodriguez that complete a trilogy, the other being Once Upon a Time in Mexico, the third installment in the El Mariachi saga.

What could have been a mediocre survival story is turned into an eminently watchable action adventure here thanks to the performances of Anthony Hopkins and Alec Baldwin. Hopkins plays a billionaire who suspects fashion photographer Baldwin covets his beautiful young wife (Elle Macpherson). But when their plane crashes in the Alaskan wilderness, the rivals must learn to depend on each other to survive. Lee Tamahori’s crisp direction is enhanced by David Mamet’s hard-boiled dialogue and Donald M McAlpine’s awesome camerawork. 

One of Hollywood’s quintessential productions, this musical adaptation of L Frank Baum’s classic fable is probably the most beloved fantasy film of all time and the ultimate family picture. It has something for everyone: wonderfully strange lands, fun-scary moments, a dazzling assortment of fairy-tale characters, fabulous songs to take us all somewhere over the rainbow, a peerless Judy Garland performance, and meaningful messages in abundance. Continuously enthralling, this is one hardy perennial you can never tire of watching. Uncredited King Vidor directed some of the sequences. 

Combining culture-clash comedy with Honey, I Shrunk the Kids-style special effects, this assured version of the Lynne Reid Banks novel from director Frank Oz is low-key fantasy with a high-grade impact. A young boy discovers that an old cupboard given to him on his birthday can animate his playthings in this enchanting family fable. Ultimately he must learn responsibility when he brings his toy Indian (well played by rap artist Litefoot) to life and starts treating him like a human Action Man. Muppet maestro Oz and his screenwriter Melissa Mathison never get too heavy, condescending or cloying with their sweet-natured message, and the results are funny, inspiring and moving. A wondrous and winning experience that every age-group can share. 

This is the first, and best, of the tales about the Australian outback’s living legend, who can wrestle crocodiles with his bare hands and subdue ladies with his naked charisma. Paul Hogan took his lager-commercial he-man into the big time with this New York-set “fish out of water” tale, and the result is as agreeable as if it were Tarzan himself coping in the concrete jungle. Director Peter Faiman’s languid pace gives us time to appreciate this particular Wizard from Oz as he survives sophisticates’ taunts and outwits the Big Apple’s street villains. It’s a pity Hogan couldn’t keep the momentum going for later movies, but for this, at least, he created a totally likeable hero.