Tag: Film Reviews

The Dink (2026) Review

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Quick Synopsis: A washed-up tennis prodigy turns to pickleball to save his father’s country club and confront his past

One of these days, Apple TV is going to make a great film. Some of its TV output has been superb, but its straight-to-streaming selections have been poor. It has made some good movies, but they’ve generally been films that received cinema releases. I’m not complaining about that: I’ll always support films getting a cinema release. But it does make Apple TV a difficult streaming service for me to justify once the new season of Ted Lasso finishes.

On the plus side, none of them have been particularly awful. They’ve had some that are bland, but nothing as bad as some of Prime’s offerings. It’s into this state of mediocrity that we’re given The Dink. That’s particularly disappointing because Josh Greenbaum has made two films that I have a strong fondness for: Barb and Star Go to Vista Del Mar and Strays. Based on those two films, he’s the correct choice to direct Spaceballs 2. Based on The Dink, I’m worried.

It reminds me of the worst parts of comedies made by what the media dubbed the “Frat Pack”, and the comedy that surrounded it: Judd Apatow, Ben Stiller, Jack Black, Will Ferrell, etc. The sort of films that would find a joke and then run it into the ground. Like they were improvising, but not bothering to edit because they wanted to make sure everybody got their shtick in. It would be improved if it tried to be less of a comedy. If it stopped trying to shoehorn jokes into scenes where they don’t belong. Especially since it derails both the realism and characterisation for the sake of getting another joke in.

The insistence on comedy also comes at the expense of emotion. The film reveals late on that Dustin didn’t break his wrist in a freak accident, but broke it on purpose because he was ashamed of losing in front of his dad. That’s powerful. It should be a turning point in the narrative, something that changes how we see him. At the very least, his dad should find out and realise the trauma he’s inflicted on his son. Nope. It changes nothing. It’s not helped by the way the film treats everyone as comedy characters rather than real people. So you don’t actually give a shit.

There’s some weird narrative logic here. The film starts with Dustin’s dad being annoyed at him for banning people from the club for playing pickleball. But then his dad holds a meeting saying they need to ban pickleball players from the club because he thinks they’re being too demanding with requests like, “Make it so our court isn’t a deathtrap.” If he’s genuinely that annoyed by the pickleball players being there, wouldn’t Dustin banning them be exactly what he wanted?

Not that it’s all negative. The John McEnroe bits are funny, particularly because of how absolutely absurd they are. It’s one of the few running jokes that doesn’t run out of steam. He’s weirdly good at comedy. Less so is Mary Steenburgen, which is strange because she’s usually REALLY good. But for whatever reason, she’s not at her best here. To be honest, it’s difficult for anybody to stand out when the characters aren’t people so much as caricatures. Nobody is given enough depth to really show what they can do. Aaron Chen seems promising, though. I get the feeling he’d make a great best-friend character.

The biggest problem is that The Dink feels like it thinks it’s funnier than it actually is. There are funny ideas here, but they’re buried underneath jokes that don’t land and characters that you don’t buy. There’s a better film hiding underneath all of this. If the father-son relationship had been explored properly, the movie could have been genuinely sweet. Instead, the comedy constantly gets in the way of what could have been a surprisingly effective emotional story.

Josh Greenbaum has already shown that he can make ridiculous comedy work. Barb and Star Go to Vista Del Mar is completely bonkers, but it understands exactly how ridiculous it is. Strays is similarly stupid, but there’s a confidence to it. The Dink feels much less controlled. It’s as though everyone involved is trying so hard to make sure we’re having fun that they’ve forgotten to trust the material to actually be funny.

It’s not terrible. There are some laughs, a few good performances buried underneath the caricatures, and John McEnroe is consistently entertaining. But for a comedy with this much talent, The Dink is surprisingly forgettable. Greenbaum has proven he can do much better. Hopefully Spaceballs 2 reminds me of that.

Pressure (2026) Review

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Quick Synopsis: The massive Allied seaborne invasion of Normandy is completely prepared, but one vital detail remains unconfirmed: the unpredictable British weather

People talk about superhero fatigue. They say audiences are fed up with superhero movies, and that’s why the MCU has gone slightly downhill in the last few years (nothing whatsoever to do with a lack of planning whilst trying to plan out a multi-film saga). I get it. Going to another movie where people in costumes make quips between punching people in the face can make you feel like you’re living in a cinematic Groundhog Day. I have something similar: I’ve seen too many World War 2 movies. If I put together all the films I’ve seen about the war in one continuous playlist, it would probably end up being longer than the war itself. I know there are lots of stories to tell about that war: nationalism, pride, heartbreak, humanity. But those stories could be told against the backdrop of almost any war. Personally, I think part of the reason filmmakers keep returning to World War 2 is that it’s one of the few wars with an unambiguous villain, one that was conveniently distinctive enough to give filmmakers a visual shorthand that audiences instantly recognise.

A big reason I’ve grown tired of World War 2 films is their predictability. It’s hard to find tension when we know what’s going to happen. That hurts films like Pressure, because we already know what happened; it’s like watching a football game where you already know the score. Although I should point out, for a film that relies so heavily on us knowing the significance of D-Day, it doesn’t actually do much to explain what D-Day was in the first place. But back to the point. We know how it ends; D-Day was a success. So either their weather predictions were wrong, and the attack was launched anyway, or they were right, and it didn’t matter. The film can make me worry about the weather, but it can’t make me worry about D-Day.

That’s an issue I’m not really sure how you get around as a writer. You can tell that Pressure is trying, though, by adding interpersonal conflicts and a possibly dead wife. The interpersonal stuff works well because, unlike D-Day itself, we don’t know what’s going to happen. Does his wife give birth? Do the different countries start to respect each other? We don’t know, and we need to watch the film to find out. It’s a small moment, but it adds so much. That’s probably the smartest thing the film does. If it can’t make me wonder whether D-Day will happen, it can at least make me wonder what happens to the people who are trying to make it happen. The problem is, the film is fighting against history itself. You can put as many arguments, disagreements and personal dramas between the characters as you want, but there’s still a giant historical event looming over everything, telling us roughly how this story ends. Weird to say, but sometimes the biggest problem with history is that we’ve already seen the ending.

That doesn’t make Pressure a bad film. Far from it. The performances are solid, and the film does a good job of making something as potentially boring as weather forecasting feel important. Plus, the pacing is surprisingly good. Even though the whole thing is basically men looking at charts, it never feels slow or boring. Even though, as I said, it’s predictable, that doesn’t mean I wasn’t invested in the characters throughout. I knew what would happen, but I never wanted to leave the room.

As for the performances, there’s not a weak link here. Andrew Scott proves his leading-man chops, although his character is a bit too similar to the sort of roles his Sherlock co-star Benedict Cumberbatch often plays. I’m glad Brendan Fraser’s comeback is continuing; he’s finally getting the kinds of roles he deserves. He’s become an actor who can bring real gravitas and emotional weight to these kinds of roles. He throws himself into it, giving the character the emotional weight the role requires. Surprisingly, I found the best performer to be Kerry Condon. I’ve previously seen her in the MCU (hey, I’m referencing Marvel again) and the haunted swimming pool movie Night Swim. She’s much better in this, giving a performance that carries the historical weight of the story. Her character is basically a side character, but she’s so important to resolving the interpersonal conflicts that you wouldn’t be surprised if the film ended with her winking and floating into the sky with angel wings. Although that may have hurt the historical accuracy.

In terms of directing, Anthony Maras does a decent job. But this is another World War 2 film, and visually, it suffers from the same problem I’ve had with so many others: it all looks incredibly familiar. The storms themselves look dangerous; even the biggest idiot wouldn’t sit there thinking, “but it’s just a bit of rain”. We don’t see a lot of battle scenes; this isn’t that kind of movie. But the ones we do see are horrific, with none of the violence presented as glorious. The scenes of people being shot down en masse are deliberately ugly.

I didn’t know anything about Exercise Tiger. I was much more invested in the brief moments covering it than I was in the D-Day landings. That’s probably because I didn’t know the outcome. There’s something refreshing about being given a piece of history where I can’t sit there mentally ticking off the things I already know are going to happen. It’s the only part of the film that made me sit up and pay attention, because for once I felt like I was actually learning something.

Unfortunately, Pressure can’t completely escape the shadow of the event it’s building towards. It’s essentially a film about whether the weather will allow D-Day to happen, even though we already know that D-Day happened. That’s a pretty sizeable spoiler sitting in the room, and unfortunately it’s wearing a swastika. Still, there is enough here to make Pressure worthwhile. It’s well acted, competently directed, and somehow manages to turn meteorological data into something resembling a thriller. That’s quite an achievement when you consider that the main antagonist is essentially the British weather.

I just wish it had given me a little more of something I hadn’t already seen.

Maybe that’s my own problem. After watching this many World War 2 films, perhaps I’ve developed my own version of superhero fatigue. I don’t need another film to remind me that war is horrible, that ordinary people were put in extraordinary situations, or that the Nazis were bad. I know. I’ve got the message. You can stop giving me the pamphlet. What I do want is a story that makes me curious. Give me the weird little corners of history. Give me the events I’ve never heard of. Give me the people whose stories haven’t already been turned into three films, a miniseries and a prestige television drama. Pressure comes close to that. The weather forecasting gives it an unusual perspective, and the cast makes it easy to spend time with these characters. But ultimately, it is still another film standing on the beach at Normandy, pointing at something I’ve already seen coming from miles away. Plus, the omission of Sverre Petterssen’s work means the film isn’t even as useful as a history lesson as it could have been.

It’s good. It’s interesting. It’s well acted. But I think I’ve finally reached the point where, whenever I see another trailer for a World War 2 film, my only thought is, “Haven’t I already seen this?”

The Death Of Robin Hood (2026) Review

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Quick Synopsis: A wounded and ageing Robin Hood retreats to a remote island, where he is forced to confront the violent legacy of his past and the legend he has left behind.

There have been countless adaptations of Robin Hood. Yet, much like King Arthur, the failures far outnumber the successes. My personal favourite? Men In Tights. Robin Hood: Men in Tights, that is. I’m talking about the movie; I’m not saying my favourite thing to see is men in tights. The Death Of Robin Hood (TDORH, pronounced The-door-rah) isn’t even the only Robin Hood movie released this year. I think. There are conflicting reports as to whether The Uprising even counts.

So, how does this compare to other Robin Hoods? Have to say, not well. There’s not much of the Robin Hood you actually know in here. He barely fires an arrow; there’s no Maid Marian, no Merry Men, and he doesn’t even spend any time riding through the glen. Yes, this is a deconstruction of the myth, but I’d like to have seen more of the myth they’re trying to deconstruct. Instead of starting the movie with him killing someone, start with an overly dramatic scene showing a courageous, heroic moment. Let us see him as the hero the myths say he is. Then, later on, show us the reality of that scene. Give us the legend first, so we have something to compare him to.

So that’s it as a Robin Hood movie. How about as a movie on its own merits? Does it work then? Kind of, eventually. But only once he gets to the island. It’s here that the film gets close to showing its potential. It’s atmospheric, haunting, and weirdly beautiful. It’s also where the film finally settles into exploring its themes. The road to get there is far too long, though. As I said, not a fan of the opening third.

It’s also weirdly confusing. Most of the characters look very similar, and the film is lit naturally, with a lot of scenes taking place at night, so it’s hard to figure out who is doing what to whom. You’re constantly having to recalibrate your thoughts about what’s going on. You think someone is being attacked and killed, then it turns out it was another white guy with a beard. It’s a visual mess, and it doesn’t really need to be. Everything in that opening could have been told through flashbacks once he’s already on the island. If Robin Hood wakes up on an island, near death, it would be perfectly believable for him to then explain how he got there.

The entire opening third could even have been told through creative opening credits. They could have tied it into the visual style by telling the story through old-fashioned paintings. Even a voiceover would suffice. This film seems to actively avoid voiceover, to its detriment. It’s like it’s terrified that people may actually understand the film.

The performances are fine. Hugh Jackman is good in the title role, the only negative being that the character draws parallels to his performance in Logan. Bill Skarsgård feels a little wasted in it; I’d have liked to have seen more of him. He’s such a good performer but isn’t really given enough to do here. Jodie Comer is as good as she always is, but the extended opening means she never feels as big a character as some of the others. I was surprised by Faith Delaney. Her performance was tremendously assured and confident for someone so young. I felt sure I’d seen her before, but nope. I think I got her confused with Alisha Weir. The music feels era-appropriate, which I appreciate. Nothing worse than a medieval movie soundtracked by fucking Katy Perry or Eminem.

There’s a lot of interesting ideas in TDORH. But the film never seems confident enough to explore them, preferring the audience to discuss them in the pub afterwards. The idea of myths being more powerful than truth is an interesting one. Maybe we should have seen that. Maybe we should have seen how, despite being a monster, he did inspire people to rise against oppression. The closest we get is Brigid responding to her family’s deaths at the hands of RH by deciding to dedicate her life to healing others. But that idea is said so briefly that it doesn’t really have any weight. We don’t even need something that complicated; even seeing other people tell the story would work. Cut between different groups of people telling the tale of Robin Hood around small fires, showing how his myth lives on.

It approaches guilt in much the same way, flirting with it but not being able to fuck it when they get to bed. It is aware the concepts are there; you can tell that much. In the end, it just feels like a thesis, a proposal, a writer saying, “These are the themes we want to explore,” then forgetting to actually do so.

I would mention how the villain is portrayed, but there’s not really one. There are various people who want to kill Robin, but no big bad. There’s nobody he fears or dreads. Really, the only villain is his own past. The whole “man versus self” narrative is valid, but we need to believe he’s genuinely at war with himself. He doesn’t seem broken enough as a character for that to work. This goes back to what I said about the theme of guilt; the exploration of it is paper-thin. We’re told he’s haunted by it, but he doesn’t seem to be.

This is another reason I think the opening third was unnecessary. We see him brutally kill people, with the implication being that he does this a lot. Yet we’re supposed to believe that he’s haunted by the deaths he’s caused? Compare this to The Odyssey, where Odysseus clearly carried the burden of his past. There’s not even a turning point as to why Robin feels this way. He doesn’t come face to face with the consequences of his brutality. Yes, people try to kill him, but they’ve been trying for a while, so that’s not a change which happens in the film. It needed a “wow, I’m a shit” moment.

The ending is fine. He dies. I’m not putting a spoiler warning because it’s in the title of the movie. And it’s what it should be: powerful, emotive, and with an air of redemption. Yes, it would have been nice if his death had some purpose, if he died defending the island from someone coming to take revenge on him. But there is something nice about how it feels like he just gives up. He’s old, he’s tired, and he’s looking after fucking children. It’s not a warrior dying on his sword, because the film recognises he doesn’t have the nobility required for that. It’s an old farm dog wandering out into the cold to be at peace.

It’s one of the few moments where the insistence on deviating from the legend helps it. The rest of the time, it feels so determined to avoid what we’ve seen before that it fails to present anything worthwhile. It doesn’t provide us with a villain to root against. It doesn’t provide us with a look at the country at the time, so we can understand why someone like him might become a legend. And it doesn’t tell us how his myth permeates among ordinary people. It’s so scared of being standard, it ends up being hollow.

I remember watching Avatar: The Way of Water in the cinema years ago. Just after the moment which should have been the ending, but was actually the bit before the closing section, I saw someone get their phone out. Ordinarily, this annoys the hell out of me, but in that instance all I could think was, “Yeah, fair enough.”

Something similar happened here. There was someone in the room who was asleep; I know this because he was snoring loudly. Whoever he went with felt no need to wake him up. Nothing I put in this review will sum up this movie better than that.

This should be great; it should change how we see the character. As it is, it’s just okay. If Uprising does actually turn out to be about Robin Hood, I can already tell I’m going to get the two movies mixed up. Deconstructions of this nature should be unique and unforgettable; they should not be as bland as this is.

It’s better than some of the other recent attempts at the character, but in a few years, when I’m on Pointless and I’m asked to name actors who have played Robin Hood, I can guarantee Hugh Jackman would be a low scorer.

The Testament Of Ann Lee (2025) Review

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Quick Synopsis: A musical biopic about Ann Lee, founder of the Shakers.

I didn’t know much about The Testament Of Ann Lee (TTOAL, pronounced like Tee-total if you slightly miss the final t), I just knew it was highly regarded, and it involved religion in some way. I can see why people like it. It feels very much like an “important” movie. It’s incredibly well-crafted, and from a technical standpoint, it’s hard to criticise it.

But I’m still gonna. Really, most of my criticism is based on how they tell the story. It’s a (according to Wikipedia) “historical musical drama”. Musicals are weirdly viewed. They’re seen as “fun”: bright colours, big emotions and joy. There are some which are high-concept and serious (Les Misérables, Annette, The End), but they’re few and far between, and, with the exception of Les Misérables, they aren’t the musicals that really penetrate popular culture.

I’m not opposed to serious musicals, but I think there’s a fundamental flaw in using the format for a biography. Because of the inherently theatrical nature of musicals, biographies don’t always suit the style. It’s hard to suspend disbelief when everybody suddenly breaks into song. You’re never really given a chance to think, “Wow, this really happened,” because the music keeps reminding you that you’re watching a constructed performance. You know the singing didn’t happen, so your brain finds it difficult to accept that everything else did too.

It’s different when it’s a biopic of a musician, because music is naturally part of their story. But a religious person? It’s odd. TTOAL gets around this somewhat by making the music extremely religious, almost choral. But that creates another problem: a lot of the songs start to sound very similar. To be fair, they’re somewhat limited by the subject matter. It would be pretty strange if the characters suddenly started rapping or performing opera.

It starts off well. It lets you know very quickly that the religious themes will be heavy, as will the weirdness. There’s also some really good music. It’s an odd experience watching a film and not being entirely sure whether it’s a horror film or a biography. I like it, though. At the very least, it shows ambition. It immediately changes the expectations of anyone who went in expecting a standard musical.

The performances are all great. Some reviewers have described it as the best performance Amanda Seyfried has ever given. I disagree, preferring her performance in the criminally underrated The Last Word. Her performance in TTOAL is certainly more difficult, because of the added pressure of singing, but I felt she was more natural in The Last Word. They’re two very different roles with very different demands, though, so perhaps it’s unfair to compare them. The more obvious comparison is her performance as Cosette in Les Misérables. She’s MILES better in Ann Lee. She makes a very good Ann Lee. I like her when she’s Ann Lee. (That joke only works if you say it like “angry” in the Incredible Hulk voice.)

The supporting cast are similarly good, although I found myself more interested in some of the performances than in the characters themselves. This is partly because the film is so committed to its style. Everyone feels like they’re performing in the same strange religious nightmare, which is presumably the point, but it does make it difficult to become attached to individual characters. They’re often there to represent an idea as much as they’re there to be people.

I didn’t even notice Christopher Abbott or Shannon Woodward, despite both having appeared in two of my hidden gem picks from the last few decades. I’d actually made a point of keeping an eye out for them in future works.

Ultimately, my biggest issue was that I never really fully bought into the premise. I recognised that what I was watching was powerful and important, but I never felt that it was powerful and important myself. The story is inherently difficult to dramatise. The story of Ann Lee is, to a large extent, about what she felt; this means the film spends a lot of time dealing with ideas and concepts rather than events. For a biography, I don’t think I learnt much about her or her life. I remember that she was born on the 29th of February, but that’s about it.

On the positive side, it’s ambitious. And I’d much rather watch a film like that than something lazy. When I watch a film, I can sometimes find myself thinking, “Does the writer/director NEED to make this?” and the answer is usually lacking. But this? I can see why someone needs to make this. That shines through in every scene. So much effort has been put into everything: the production design, the costumes, the music. They all feel like they’re combining as part of a decisive vision. Even when I didn’t necessarily like the choices, I understood the decisions behind them.

Maybe that’s the frustrating part. I didn’t dislike it. I just didn’t connect with it as much as I needed to in order to really enjoy it. I completely understand why someone would see this as a five-star movie (7 stars in the Tokyo Dome). But it didn’t work for me. Maybe that’s because there was no part of me that was particularly interested in Ann Lee or the Shakers (which would be a great name for a ’60s band). Before the film, I had no interest in learning about them, and after the film, I still have no interest.

TTOAL is ambitious, technically impressive and often genuinely beautiful. Amanda Seyfried is excellent, the music is strong, and there’s enough weirdness here to make it stand out from the endless stream of conventional biopics. But I think the same theatricality that makes it distinctive also creates its biggest weakness. I was always conscious that I was watching a film about Ann Lee rather than feeling like I was witnessing her life. I never suspended my disbelief enough to become fully invested.

Perhaps that’s an unfair criticism of a musical. But if you’re going to make a musical about a religious figure rather than a musician, you’re already asking the audience to make a pretty substantial leap. TTOAL makes that leap confidently. It just didn’t always land where it wanted me to.