Tag: I Swear

2025 Film Awards: Day Four

On By troubledproductionsIn AwardsLeave a comment

Best Opening

Dangerous Animals

Two tourists go on a boat so they can swim with sharks. They’re then killed, with a knife. Wonderful way to subvert expectations. Up until the murder, it feels like a romantic comedy. It’s so sudden, blink and you’ll miss it.

Opus

Sets up how important the musician is. I like it. It didn’t just TELL us he’s a big deal, it showed us; his music, his talk show performances, his fans. It all feels real.

The Last Showgirl

The character performs an audition. Very nervous, and obviously lying about her age. Anderson is best known for essentially being Ms. Fanservice in the 90’s. So to see her so emotionally naked and visually honest in the opening scene? Shows you what it’s going to be.

The Woman In The Yard

Ramona watches a video of her deceased husband. It’s weird she filmed that moment, but it’s very sweet, and sets up SOOO much very quickly. Sets up what their relationship was like, sets up that they’re having problems fixing problems in the home, even the way she’s watching it sets up that he’s dead. Genius.

Winner

Final Destination: Bloodlines

The disasters have always been a highlight of these movies, and Bloodline is no exception. Some truly all-time great kills, with the funniest death of a child you’ll see. The childs death made you realise that nobody was safe in these movies; death will come for anybody, regardless of age. Subverts expectations slightly, with it being a vision from a descendant rather than the actual person. It’s been years since a Final Destination movie, and scenes like this make you curse that time.

Worst Opening

A Minecraft Movie

Steve wants to mine but can’t as is a child, he comes back as an adult. Overly long, plus I feel it would have made more sense if he first arrived in the other dimension as a child, would have explained how he became so good at building.

Black Phone 2

A young girl makes a phone call. Doesn’t really look like the rest of the film. Does come back later and tie into the narrative, which is a plus. But isn’t something that will hook people in. Plus, the central performance isn’t great.

Fantastic Four: First Steps

Sue and Reed at home being domestic. I have very specific issues with this opening, the big one being that it’s kind of mundane and dull, especially when there’s a REALLY good introductory scene afterwards of a talk show host explaining the characters background. That would have been a much better opener.

Lilo And Stitch

Stitch is being investigated. Not how I would have opened it. Mainly because it seems weird to open a live-action adaptation of an animated movie with a scene that’s mostly CGI. Feels like you’d want to showcase the filming locations.

Renner

I know it’s a common joke to make that the vanity cards that open up films are so long they seem like an actual movie, but the opening credits for this legit seem like a vanity card.

Winner

The Accountant 2

A character dies, and it’s one of the blandest deaths you’ll ever see. It feels like it belongs in a lesser movie.

Best Moment

A Real Pain – Pictures At A Statue

The group posing for pictures with a statue. It shows everything that works. The character interactions, the warmth, and the sadness. You can show that scene and instantly know the characters.

Companion – Lying To The Police

Her encounter with the cop. She can’t lie, but she can change her language to non-English so the cop can’t understand her. Genius.

Eternity – Enter The Archives

The first trip into the archives is very sweet. This is one of best demonstrations of love.

Final Destination: Bloodline – Tony Todds Goodbye

This broke me. The subtext is obvious, but so beautiful. Any other year, this would have won.

I Swear – Fucks In A Car

Not fornication, just swearing. Lots of swearing. You wouldn’t think two people swearing would be so sweet, yet it is.

September 5th – Whoops, We Were Wrong

I wasn’t that familiar with the events of the movie. So I was genuinely blindsided by the reveal that their sources were wrong, the hostages haven’t been saved, they’ve been killed. This will catch people out, and it will horrify you, as it should.

The Ugly Stepsister – Makeover

Weird choice, as I didn’t even have this as best moment in the end-of-year roundups for some reason. Probably because I wrote that section just after seeing the movie, whereas this is new, so I’ve had time. With time, a certain moment has stood out; when Elvira is forced to go through a makeover. Not a “haircut and makeup” makeover, full on mutilation. There’s one moment in particular that stands out: chisel to the nose. It’s simple, not overly bloody, but it makes me wince whenever I think about it.

Urchin – Karaoke Bar

Three people singing an Atomic Kitten song should be skippable. But it’s incredibly sweet, and the way the three characters do it tells you so much about who they are. It’s the only part of the movie that has genuine emotion.

Winner

Sinners – Music Montage

Sammie plays in the bar, and we see it conjuring spirits of the past and future. It’s a good thing nobody was close to me at the cinema, otherwise they would have heard me say, “That? That’s fucking cinema”.

Worst Moment

Fear Street: Prom Queen – Dance Off

It feels so out-of-character for the people involved. It baffles me that this was left in there.

Good Fortune – Arj Gets Fired

He deserved to get fired. He stole from his employer. He has no justification for being annoyed. Which makes him kind of unsympathetic, and hurts the message of the movie.

Heart Eyes – Killer Reveal

Films like this have to nail the killer reveal. Part of my dislike for the sixth Scream movie is down to how much I hated that reveal. It’s similar here. It feels lazy. I get what they were going for; but the rest of the film is too genuine to do something so subversive this late in the game.

Kinda Pregnant – Threesome/proposal confusion

It feels incredibly fake. It would be like if you invited someone to your house on their birthday and all their friends were there, along with a birthday cake and a sign saying “Happy birthday”, but it wasn’t for their birthday, and you get annoyed at them for daring to think you were planning a birthday for them.

M3gan 2.0 – Villain Reveal

I called it within seconds of the character being introduced. I guessed not only that they would be the villain, but also their motivations.

Renner – Attack The Thieves

Purely because the way its shot (quick flashes whilst he’s asking what to do) makes it come off as a fantasy sequence rather than reality. The visually unclear storytelling happens a few times, but its most clear then.

The Bad Guys 2 – Wrestling Match

It’s weird how this film can open with a heist/chase that makes such great use of space and logistics, and then forgets that they’ve shown us how big the wrestling ring is, and you can’t run for more than a second without hitting the ropes.

Thunderbolts – Kid “Death”

Mainly because it reveals that the people shadowed away to oblivion weren’t actually dead, there’s no way Disney/Marvel would kill a young child in that manner.

Winner

Until Dawn – Explosions In The Bathroom

Don’t get me wrong, it was enjoyable, it was bloody, and it was entertaining. But it also demonstrated how luck-based the whole premise was. For a game based around “your decisions have consequences”, it’s annoying how the choices have no impact. “Don’t drink water or you’ll explode” is not a lesson. If the characters’ choices don’t matter, why should I give a shit?

Best Closing

Bring Her Back

Laura carries Cathy’s corpse into the pool and cradles it as the police arrive. The best way it could have ended. I did fear it was going to end with her winning.

Fear Street: Prom Queen

Someone gets bludgeoned with a trophy. Nicely thematic way to end their life, and I liked that they didn’t die immediately. They collapse, there’s not that much blood, but you can tell by the way they’re speaking that their brain is fucked.

Friendship

A hostage wig disaster. Nope, not giving you more information or context.

Novocaine

He visits Sherry in prison. Delightful surprise that there are consequences to actions. Always nice to see that in a movie like this.

Spinal Tap II: The End Continues

Stonehenge related disaster. And there’s some great stuff in the credits. It comes very quickly yet doesn’t feel unsatisfying. It helps that the jokes are very funny, plus the way the “disaster” happens makes sense and suits the narrative.

The Roses

The two reconcile. Awwwww. Then almost certainly die in a house explosion that we don’t see.

Wolf Man

He’s in pain and gets shot. Best way it could have ended, had actual emotion.

Winner

Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery

Jud has reopened the church, the jewel being the hidden centrepiece. This franchise has a habit of NAILING the endings, and that continues here. It’s closer to the ending of the first film than the sequel, but that’s not a bad thing. It’s immensely satisfying.

Worst Closing

A Minecraft Movie

The ending song is not as good as the film thinks it is.

Avatar: Fire And Ash

The ending implies that Spider will play a bigger part in the next one. He sucks, so that does not bode well.

Final Destination: Bloodlines

Most of these movies end the same way: with the “survivors” about to die. As such, it’s getting a little hard to care about anybody in the franchise.

I Know What You Did Last Summer

One of the killers is still alive. This is revealed in casual dialogue. Far too casual. “wearing jeans to your wedding” casual. Tone-deaf. That’s without even going into the killer reveal, which is one of the weakest I’ve ever seen.

Opus

“haha you caught me but that was my plan all along”. I don’t know why, but for some reason this didn’t vibe with me. It just didn’t work or land the way it was intended.

Superman/Relay

Both of these suffer from the same unrealistic ending: rich people are punished for their misdeeds. That’s like if Casablanca ended with the characters becoming robots and assassinating Hitler.

The Monkey

A bus of cheerleaders die. Funny, but needless and a bit TOO stupid.

Until Dawn

A car pulls up to a snowy cabin. A clear reference to the game, I assume. It’s shot in such a way that it’s obvious it’s SOMETHING, so I can only assume it’s that. Incredibly unsubtle.

Winner

The Woman In The Yard

It cannot be overstated how much the final third absolutely torpedoes any goodwill the rest of the film provides. A visual and narrative mess which confuses deliberate confusion for scares, rapid cuts instead of tension, and a final shot “reveal” that doesn’t actually reveal anything going by online discourse which gives it two different meanings. It feels like the writer isn’t sure he’s going to get another shot at writing a horror film so crammed as many horror tropes and conventions as he could, regardless of whether it worked for the story he was trying to tell.

2025 Film Awards: Day One

On By troubledproductionsIn AwardsLeave a comment

Funniest/Best Comedy

Nominees

A Real Pain

At times, this is the saddest film you will see, it will break you. That’s to be expected; it’s about family trauma, mental health, and the holocaust. What you may not expect is just how funny it is. So whether its with sadness or with laughter; one way ot another you will end up crying. The laughs are big enough to just about carry you through the sadness. They’re logical laughs, too. Based on believable character reactions. If you tell people what this film is about it will be difficult to convince them it’s a comedy. Once they watch it though, they’ll get it.

Deep Cover

I was weirdly charmed by this. I think the trailer lets it down, ruining most of the jokes by changing the timing or removing the context. If you think about it too hard, then the plot does fall apart. Thankfully the jokes are good enough to tide you over the plot issues. It could be funnier, there are multiple missed opportunities, especially towards the end. But the jokes that are there are pretty damn fine.

Heads Of State

No idea why, but my brain links this and Deep Cover, so the fact I put Deep Cover in this category kind of meant I had to put this here too. There are some great comedic action scenes, especially the one where they land and fight a random group.

I Swear

When this site was set up over a decade ago, there were some discussions that had to be made. Among those; the slogan. We hit upon “Making you feel guilty for laughing”. Whilst that may not be totally accurate now due to our move away from lists/opinion pieces and towards reviews, I like to think it’s still incredibly accurate when I showcase scripts (trust me, I’ve got one lined up the next time there’s a lull in reviews, and it was written just to see if I can make a VERY dark scene work). That slogan would also be accurate for I Swear. It’s so inappropriate that you can’t help but laugh. I never thought I’d say this; but this will make you laugh at a cancer-stricken woman being punched in the face. It would be so easy for this to cross the line and be offensive, but the writers make it work. It’s also weirdly sweet at times. The scene of him and the teenage girl in the car (it doesn’t go where you think it does) is both hilarious and sweet.

The Naked Gun

Not quite as joke-filled as the original movie, but if it’s a genuine surprise that you can say something like “sometimes there’s a whole 40 seconds without a joke” then you know a film is packed with gags.

The Roses

This got the loudest laughs of any film I saw this year. Absolutely shocking, but also brilliant.

Winner

Fackham Hall

Very similar to The Naked Gun in terms of comedy style and consistency. Fackham Hall wins out purely based on the fact that I’ve excitedly told more people about it. I haven’t felt a need to watch The Naked Gun trailer again (although I have kept an eye out to see if it’s been added to digital services), but I must have watched the trailer for this at least once a week since I watched it. The only surprising part is that a Jimmy Carr movie would be so inoffensive.

Scariest/Best Horror

Nominees

Companion

Not a traditional horror movie, more of a thriller. But I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention this. In terms of actual movie quality, this is probably the best of this list. But in terms of horror? Not quite. The gore is fantastic though when it is used.

Drop

Not quite as close to the horror genre as the directors previous work. But it would be hard to argue this doesn’t belong here at all. It’s such a simple premise, and one which hits straight at modern fears.

Heart Eyes

For 75% of the runtime, Heart Eyes is a damn fine horror movie. It falls apart at the end with the reveal of who the killers are, but before that it’s a modern classic. Brutal, smart, and (importantly), characters you don’t actually want to see die, so you are worried when they’re near death.

Sinners

Actually, forget what I said about Companion. THIS is the best movie in this category, probably one of the best movies I’ve seen all year, in fact (definitely top 3). It is more of a horror movie than Companion, it just takes longer to become one.

The Monkey

Silly, utterly ridiculous. But so inventive and bloody that I couldn’t help but feel warm towards it.

Weapons

I didn’t rate this as high as a lot of people did, but it would be naive of me to not say how creepy it is when it does work. I had a few issues, but they’re pretty much all personal preference.

Winner

Final Destination: Bloodlines

This was a new experience for me. I’ve seen all the Final Destination movies before, but on TV or DVD, but Bloodlines is the first in the series that I’ve seen in the cinema. It’s difficult for a movie this far into a franchise to still feel fresh. The deaths are as good as ever, incredibly creative and able to make you scared of everyday things.

Worst Comedy

Nominees

Bride Hard

I can’t sum it up better than William Bibbiani did in his review on TheWrap:

“It’s abrasively hard to watch. It’s not just that the jokes fall flat, it’s that the film looks like a pile of celluloid got chopped up randomly and reassembled in what the editor could only assume was the correct order, because the script mysteriously vanished”

Happy Gilmore 2

I suppose my main issue with this movie comes down to the fact that in the time since the first movie, I’ve matured as a person (not by much) and as a movie-watcher, and it doesn’t feel like Sandlers tastes have matured at all. The references to the original don’t feel organic, and the film doens’t trust that you recognise them, so they include flashbacks which disrupt the momentum.

Winner

Kinda Pregnant

The key to comedy is truth. It’s why no comedian has started a routine with “don’t you hate when you’re drinking a glass of lemonade and it mutates into a cheese sandwich, but your girlfriend is allergic to dairy ever since she was bitten by a yak?”, because that’s not a situation anybody can buy into, so the jokes won’t work. The central premise of Kinda Pregnant isn’t one you can buy into, and the way some background characters react makes it even more unbelievable. There are a few good laughs; I particularly liked it when she got a classroom to boo a small child, but those moments are too few.

Worst Horror

I Know What You Did Last Summer

Were people crying out for this film? Was there a need for it to exist? The third one is universally regarded as one of the worst horror films of all time (and think of the ground THAT covers). This version has some fairly decent kills, and it is nice to see some of the original characters again. But there’s not much else to it. It’s a tonal disaster, especially at the end. The story falls apart under the smallest bit of scrutiny. The first movie is incredibly closely tied to Scream, and it’s hard to argue against the feeling that the release of this was entirely due to that franchise being rebooted a few years back.

Keeper

Not so much a story, more a collection of creepy moments.

M3gan 2.0

I legit love this movie, but it’s not a good horror. Tbf, it’s not trying to be, but the expectation was it would at least play to horror tropes slightly.

Silent Night, Deadly Night

It had some good ideas, and I will always appreciate watching Nazi’s die (especially on the news), but SNDN was far too stupid for me to enjoy. Similar to other films in this category, the plot falls apart once you think about it. The murders all seem to happen in a vacuum, having almost no consequence on the town. I’m not saying every sentence needs to be “I haven’t seen Bob around, have you?”, but if a hundred people die in a small town, people should notice. Also, the deaths in this aren’t meant to be scary, you’re supposed to cheer them.

Winner

Until Dawn

Videogame adaptations are hard; do you adapt the story, or the general spirit? Whenever somebody says “dude! They should make a Grand Theft Auto movie, it would be sick” I wonder what that would actually be like. The fun in GTA is playing it, not the story, so a film would just be a ridiculous gangster movie. The best adaptations attempt both. It feels like Until Dawn focused on story, and in doing so, ruined what made the games great. I haven’t played the game, but I’ve played the Dark Pictures Anthology games and The Quarry, made by the same company. What makes those games special is choice; how seemingly innocuous decisions can kill people. Plus; you have to stick with your choices. It’s all about consequence. So an adaptation which makes a point of saying that consequences don’t really matter because it will all reset seems to have missed the point.

Most Unique

Freaky Tales

You really don’t see many anthology films, so that alone is weird. But the tone of Freaky Tales is what sets it aside. It feels like a comic book adaptation. The science fiction elements are so underplayed it’s almost as if the film doesn’t think it’s worth mentioning because they’re so normalised in this world. I can see why people would dislike this movie; but it’s certainly charming, and unlike anything else I’ve seen all year.

Here

This is a fascinating concept; essentially the history of a house told in a non-linear fashion with the camera never moving. It doesn’t always work, with the crossfading being a bit too distracting at times. It definitely would have been easier to maintain momentum over a shorter runtime, but I’m glad that it tries. It’s not exactly a success, but it’s too impressive to be a failure.

Presence

A host story (very much NOT a horror) from the POV of a ghost. That aspect is really helped by the flowing camera movement. I may not have liked this film, but I appreciate it.

The Second Act

A film that’s so meta that it almost folds in on itself. Too meta, even for me. This will frustrate the hell out of 90% of people, but the 10% of people who like it will love it. I don’t think I’ve ever been as weirded out by a realistic film.

War Of The Worlds

“Unique” doesn’t always mean “watchable”. I love a good screenlife film, and am always excited to watch one when it comes out. An alien invasion movie made like this is a fascinating prospect, but this doesn’t even come close to living up to what it could/should be.

Warfare

Another gimmick, this time, a war movie that takes place in realtime. Not many films portray the reality of war, this at least shows the horror, how it can completely fuck with your head. Essentially, it’s PTSD: The Origin Story.

Winner

Good Boy

A horror movie from the POV of a dog, I haven’t seen anything close to this outside of a video game.

Saddest

A Real Pain

It’s weird that a film can be in both the “funniest” and “saddest”, this manages it, and is a big part of why (spoilers) I’ve nominated it for best film of the year. It’s not just because of the holocaust mentions, the approach to mental health will also be depressingly realistic to those who suffer (or those with basic empathy).

Key scene: So many options. I’ll go with Benji when he loses his cool on the train. Other moments are sadder, but that’s when the mask falls furthest.

Bring Her Back

I was not the biggest fan of this film, but I appreciate the way it showed parental grief. It’s the grief that adds another dimension to the character, turning her from just another horror movie villain, to someone with relatable motivations; motivations which will break you slightly.

Key Scene: I guess the whole thing. The limits that Laura went to so that she can bring back her deceased child.

I Swear

To paraphrase the film: it’s not the tourettes which makes this film sad, it’s peoples reactions to tourettes which are the problem.

Key Scene; When he gets hospitalised due to a misunderstanding. You can tell that he is worried that that’s what his life will be like from now on. That he is always at risk of someone beating the shit out of him because of something he can’t control.

Winner

Final Destination: Bloodlines

I could spin a yarn about how this movie touches on survivors guilt and mortality, and say this film is on that list because of that. Really, it’s because of one scene, and one scene only.

Key scene: Tony Todds farewell. He wrote it himself, he knew he was going to die soon and was given the chance to say goodbye to horror fans on his own terms. Other movies have been sadder all the way through; but the real-life meaning behind the sadness is why this wins.

Sweetest

Freaky Tales

It seems like the modern world is designed to cause division and anger: from football teams, to wrestling companies, to MCU/DCEU (and even then there’s subdivision between Snyder/Gunn). In those times it’s nice to see films like this; films which demonstrate we can all come together in one uniting perfect ideal; knocking seven shades of shit out of nazi cunts (fuck off)

Karate Kid: Legends

This film was not made for me. It was made for fans of the franchise, or people who, at the very least, had watched one of the films in the franchise. I went in relatively blind; yet was still charmed.

Winner

Heart Eyes

You wouldn’t expect to find a horror movie in this section, but here we are. The romantic relationship between the two leads is what separates this movie from other horrors. The romance is so great that I would have been genuinely disappointed if it turned out he was the killer; it would have actually made sad for the character, just as heartbroken as she would be. Of course, I also would have criticised it for being predictable, but still.

Most Me

Essentially, films which may not be great, but I connected with on a personal level. Films which I would show someone to best explain my taste and personality.

Companion

Bloody, funny, and feminist as fuck. Some people have described this as “anti-male”, it’s not. It’s anti-abuse, and if you see that as “anti-male” then that says more about you than it does the movie.

Matt And Mara

A “platonic” friendship full of awkwardness and conversations that consist of pop-culture references? This is the exact type of thing I write. So it’s a shame I didn’t like this. Possibly because it’s so close to me that all I could see is how I would have done it.

Queen Of The Ring

It’s a film about wrestling, of course, this would appeal to me. The soundtrack is very me too, the cover of Gods Gonna Cut You Down in particular, does feel very geared towards me.

The Ugly Stepsister

I’m a fan of retellings, and few have been done as slickly as this was. A few of these types of movies have been bad, so when it’s done well it’s a huge relief. This doesn’t just retell the story, it brings its own identity to it too. There’s some great stuff in here, stuff that will stick with you long after the credits roll (actually, this was released on streaming services, so it’s actully “long after you get a pop-up telling you to watch something else because god forbid a streaming service actually lets you settle with the impact of a movie instead of just forcing the next one down your throat).

Winner

A Real Pain

A depressing yet hilarious film that touches on mental health, isolation, mortality, and the holocaust? Love it. Plus, it stars Jennifer Grey, who I’ve always had a soft spot for.

2025 In Film: Day Nine (The Almost Amazing)

On By troubledproductionsIn Year round upLeave a comment

Companion
Ups: Bloody
Feminist as fuck
Great performances
Funny.
Genuinely great mid-twist.
Downs: It doesn’t seem to live up to its potential.
Too many important things happen that don’t affect the plot.
Best Performer: Sophie Thatcher
Best Moment: Her encounter with the cop. Genius.
Worst Moment: The suicide of Eli doesn’t quite hit as it should.
Opening: Iris talks about meeting Josh, then states she kills him later on. Doesn’t give the game away too much (unlike the trailer).
Closing: She waves to another companion. It should have been better.
Best Line: You’re right. I do know you. I know everything about you. I know you take almond milk in your coffee. I know you like your bedsheets untucked. I know your favourite hobbies are bar trivia, video games, and prattling on endlessly about everything the universe owes you. I know that you always need to be in control. I know that you have a below-average-sized penis. And I know that you think that having a few million dollars will disguise the fact that you are just a sad, bitter, weak human being.
Original review here

Heart Eyes
Ups: Some great kills.
Fantastic chemistry between the leads.
The attacks have weight.
Downs: The reveal is underwhelming.
The red herring is too obvious.
Best Performer: Olivia Holt
Best Moment: The meet-cute. May be a bit weird to put that in a horror movie, but it’s central to the characters working and you easily buy into it.
Worst Moment: The reveal. Easily.
Opening: Two (insufferable) people die. They really are annoying.
Closing: The couple are still together. Very sweet.
Best Line: I didn’t know that murder was a love language.
Original review here

I Swear
Ups: A touching look at an often misunderstood condition.
Highlights how far we’ve come in disability acceptance (but still not far enough)
Downs: Not every part of his story is needed.
Doesn’t mention he was part of a BBC documentary, which kind of undermines his message somewhat.
Best Performer: Maxine Peak.
Best Moment: When he meets the young girl with it.
Worst Moment: When he moves into a council house and ends up a drug dealer. Could excise that entire section and you wouldn’t notice.
Opening: Him receiving an MBE, and swearing at the Queen.
Closing: Video footage of the real person. He does actually punch Dottie in the face.
Best Line: The problem is not Tourette’s, the problem is that people don’t know enough about Tourette’s.
Original review here

Nobody 2
Ups: Violent.
Fun.
Sets up future films.
Good soundtrack
Downs: Not as good as the first one.
Some baffling decisions made by characters.
Best Performer: Bob Odenkirk.
Best Moment: The arcade fight.
Worst Moment: As much as I did enjoy it, Lendina killing everyone in the casino. Those are tourists, that would raise attention.
Opening: Hutch has to go on assignments to pay off the debt caused by his actions in the first movie (consequences!), we see how one of them goes.
Closing: A batshit insane Home Alone-style shootout in a fairground. Wonderful.
Best Line: Never bring a machete to fucking Katana duel,
Original review here

Predator: Badlands
Ups: Charming.
Wonderful world-building, the planet truly feels alive.
Ties into the Alien series, but not too obviously.
Downs: We don’t see enough of the Kalisk to make it feel like a genuine threat.
Characterisation snaps back too often, makes it seem like we’re being shown out of order.
Best Performer: Elle Fanning.
Best Moment: The trio taking over the base. So much fun.
Worst Moment: The tooling up sequence. Don’t get me wrong, it is pretty damn great, but it’s also not clear enough what some of the things are.
Opening: Introduces Dek and his brother, only to then kill one of them off. Sets the stakes up, and shows you just how expressive Dek can be.
Closing: Patricide. Really the only way it could end.
Original review here

Queen Of The Ring
Ups: Some GREAT music.
Genuinely fascinating story.
Friendly to newcomers without being insulting to fans.
Downs: Could explain some stuff more.
Skips some parts too quickly.
Best Performer: Emily Bett Rickards
Best Moment: When she wins the title.
Worst Moment: The shoe-horning of Vince McMahon Sr. seems weird.
Opening: Her fighting in Georgia. She’s struggling, in a lot of pain, and her son helps her back.
Closing: The match finishes in a draw, there’s shenanigans. Then text saying what happened to the main characters. “She never got to wrestle in the Garden” is tearjerking.
Best Line: “what we ask our wrestlers to put their bodies through in the ring, is what we ask our fans to put their emotions through in their seats”
Original review here

Superman
Ups: Very much needed at a time like this.
Understands its characters.
Great world building.
It’s nice to have a villain who’s evil. Not “misunderstood”, not “i can fix them”, just someone who is an irrefutable piece of shit.
Downs: Lacks iconic music.
Sets up films which might not happen.
Best Performer: David Corenswet
Best Moment: When Lex shoots Malik. Classic heel move.
Worst Moment: The whole “opening a crack in the earth” plot.
Opening: Quick text summary of metahumans and Superman, then footage of him after he’s had the shit kicked out of him. Brave to start a Superman movie with a shot of him being vulnerable.
Closing: Luthor’s scheme has been uncovered, and the billionaire has been arrested. Bit unrealistic.
Best Line: I am as human as anyone. I love, I-I get scared. I wake up every morning, and despite not knowing what to do, I put one foot in front of the other, and I try to make the best choices that I can. I screw up all the time, but that is being human, and that’s my greatest strength. And someday, I hope, for the sake of the world, you understand that it’s yours too.
Original review here

The Fantastic Four: First Steps
Ups: Nice time capsule.
Different.
Has heart
Never slips visually
The characters genuinely feel close.
Downs: The Natasha Lyonne sub-plot goes nowhere.
Doesn’t make you that excited for Doomsday
Best Performer: Pedro Pascal
Best Moment: The Silver Surfer flashback
Worst Moment: Sue Storm being brought back to life. Mainly because it takes sooooo long to happen, when everybody watching knows not only what will happen, but how it will happen.
Opening: Sue and Reed at home being domestic. I have very specific issues with this opening, the big one being that it’s kind of mundane and dull, especially when there’s a REALLY good introductory scene afterwards of a talk show host explaining the characters background. That would have been a much better opener.
Closing: The five are about to appear on a talk show but have to leave for some unspecified emergency. Would have been nice to see what it was.
Best Line: Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.
Original review here

Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery
Ups: Great performances.
Good character development of Benoit.
NAILS the closing.
Downs: Not as good as the other two.
The central mystery isn’t that compelling.
Best Performer: Daniel Craig
Best Moment: The ending.
Worst Moment: When Nat stabs the body, doesn’t really work.
Opening: Priest punches someone in the face and reassigned.
Closing: Jud has reopened the church, the jewel being the hidden centrepiece.
Best Line: Here’s what’s gonna happen: Benoit freakin’ Blanc and I are gonna ask you all some questions, and you all are gonna answer them and we’re gonna get to the bottom of who killed Monsignor Wicks and why and then… that’s it!
Original review here

I Swear (2025) Review

On By troubledproductionsIn ReviewLeave a comment

Quick Synopsis: The true story of John Davidson, a man with an issue which causes people to mock and belittle him, being Scottish. Oh, he also has Tourette’s syndrome.

It’s difficult to figure out how to judge “based on a true story” films. Do you judge them on their own merits as a film, or does the true story itself affect reactions? I change between the two. Personally, I see it as a “factual errors won’t stop me liking a movie, but it will make me like it less”. The Iron Claw, for example, made multiple errors. Not small ones, they lied about the number of brothers who died for one thing. But I still enjoyed that movie. Well, I say “enjoyed”, it made me cry. It also matters how important the lies are to the key themes and climactic moments. Bohemian Rhapsody made a few errors that felt disrespectful to the memory of Freddy, mainly in terms of the timing of his diagnosis. That soured me on it somewhat.

How is any of that relevant here? I’ll come back to it at the end, because it is important when I talk about my feelings towards it and how I feel a bit iffy about it. But I’ll start with the positives. I Swear is a beautiful movie, not visually, but narratively and emotionally. It’s heartbreaking at times. Especially since so many of the problems faced by the main character are entirely down to how others react to him, rather than what he’s done. From the teachers (and his parents) assuming he’s just being a little shit, through to the police arresting him, and the judge in one of his court cases basically saying Tourette’s doesn’t exist. It’s frustrating to see him being unable to clear the hurdles which society has placed in front of him and then chastised him for not being able to clear.

It’s comforting to think that society has moved on (in some aspects) when it comes to disability acceptance. And it’s horrific to see how backwards society was just a relatively short time ago. It’s comforting how it ends, when we see him speaking as an advocate, talking to the police about how they can do better, speaking to schools telling them to stop being dicks, and talking to other people with Tourette’s about their lives (and talking to their family members too).

There are moments where the film does feel like it’s using the condition for laughs, but it never feels like it’s mocking it, which is important. It’s a film coming from a place of understanding and education, something which is a lot easier to do when it’s anchored by such great performances. I’m not entirely sure how many of the supporting cast have the condition, but I suspect that a few of them do. Robert Aramayo doesn’t, and I’m sure specialists will be able to spot that, but as a casual movie-goer, it’s easy to believe. Ordinarily, that would mean I call him the best performer, but he’s acting alongside Maxine Peake, who constantly feels like she’s one film away from being an A-list superstar.

Now onto the bad (and referring back to what I mentioned earlier about the “based on a true story” complications). Well, “bad” is overstating it, but most of the weak parts come from the same problem: the desire to tell a complete story. Yes, that is admirable, but it feels like writer/director Kirk Jones is determined to tell as much of the story as he can, so he squeezes things in when there’s no natural narrative space for them. There are at least two minor subplots which could be excised completely. Literally, if you cut out the sections, the narrative gaps would close themselves with no indication that something was missing. Yes, those sections do show us how sad his life can be at times, but they feel so episodic and are never referenced again, so they feel a bit pointless.

Now onto the other issue: what’s not mentioned. The closing credits show real-life footage of the characters. It’s good to see how accurate the performances and moments are (it shows that he does occasionally accidentally punch his friend in the face). But some of it was from years ago, and it made me wonder who filmed it. Turns out, the main character was the subject of a BBC documentary when he was 16, then again at 30, and once more at 37. Those documentaries are NEVER mentioned or referred to during the film, which feels a bit weird. It kind of changes the narrative, because he’s no longer a youth leader just because of his work in the local community; at least part of it would have been because of his notoriety for appearing in a documentary. My main problem is that there are so many interesting stories that could have led to: how did he feel about his portrayal in that documentary? How did his town feel? More importantly, in the 1980s, kids were dicks. Their response to seeing Joey Deacon, a kid with cerebral palsy, on Blue Peter, was to use “Joey” as an insult. It’s not hard to imagine that seeing John Davidson on television would have had a similar effect; kids would have used his name as an insult. That realisation, that he’s seen as a national joke, would have been an INCREDIBLY powerful scene to see. It’s strange that a film that was so focused on telling us everything left out such an important part of his life and journey. It would be like making a film about One Direction and not mentioning The X-Factor.

Overall, I Swear is kind of hurt by it’s “based on true story” nature, but also improved by it. In general, it is definitely worth seeing. I caught it at a secret screening. For those unaware, that’s a thing that Cineworld do where they preview a film, and you have no idea what it is until you go in. Ordinarily, the title card for these is usually met with a few people walking out, as it’s not what they expected. I Swear is set to be released on 10th October. Before that, we have:

One Battle After Another

The Strangers: Chapter 2.

Radiohead X Nosferatu: A Symphony Of Horror

Him

The Smashing Machine

All of those are pretty big deals, and it’s not difficult to imagine that some people went into this screening expecting it to be one of those (I felt certain it would be One Battle After Another). Despite the almost guaranteed “oh, didn’t think it would be that”, nobody left when the title came up. Nobody left at any point. That’s a HUGE deal for a secret screening. I was at a “Halloween Classics” secret screening a few years ago, and somebody left when they found out it was The Shining, and that’s a classic. The fact that this held everybody’s attention is a sign of how good it is. It should do well, and it will be received well, but it may not be something people remember in 5 years’ time.