Jason Best Movie Reviews & Previews

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Jason Best

Agrees with the Tomatometer 78% of the time.

Publications:: BBC , Movie Talk

Total Reviews:: 448

Listing Of All Reviews & Articles

Showing 1 - 50 of 448

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T-Meter	Title \| Year	Add Date
60%	I'm So Excited! (2013)	" Cruising at a stratospheric altitude of high camp, Pedro Almodóvar's I'm So Excited is a colourful aerial romp that recasts his native Spain's current economic woes as frantic farce... Sadly, it just isn't very funny." — Movie Talk Posted May 7, 2013
——	Robosapien: Rebooted ()	" The film's cloak-and dagger plot barely passes muster, but Cody's antics - which include break dancing, tantrum throwing and blowing raspberries - will probably appeal to those young viewers whose behaviour they mimic." — Movie Talk Posted May 4, 2013
88%	Life of Pi (2012)	" Everywhere you look there are images of beguiling beauty: a mirror-like sea reflecting golden clouds; a sudden swarm of flying fish; an island bristling with meerkats; and a breaching whale glowing with bioluminescence as it leaps out of the water." — Movie Talk Posted Apr 30, 2013
71%	The Look of Love ()	" The film tells this story with gaudy brio, but the tone is wildly uneven, veering between Swinging 60s romp, nudge-wink satire and cautionary fable, as if Winterbottom and Greenhalgh couldn't decide what film they were making or who Raymond really was." — Movie Talk Posted Apr 30, 2013
90%	Bernie (2012)	" Black is a marvel as Bernie, reining in his usual manic persona to give his prissy, camp character an endearing sweetness but leaving what really makes him tick a puzzle." — Movie Talk Posted Apr 30, 2013
78%	Iron Man 3 (2013)	" Joss Whedon gave Downey plenty of knockout zingers in last summer's Avengers Assemble and Iron Man 3 finds the star working with another sharp-witted kindred spirit in co-writer and director Shane Black." — Movie Talk Posted Apr 25, 2013
66%	Love Crime (2011)	" Despite the odd false note, Love Crime's depiction of corporate backstabbing is scarily believable, yet it's as a perversely twisted modern film noir that the film delivers its biggest pleasures." — Movie Talk Posted Apr 22, 2013
——	Bed & Breakfast (2012)	" The plotting is lazy and the broad playing of the supporting characters tips them into caricature. Jake's Latina maid thinks Ana's mannered lawyer is 'light in the loafers'. But, no, he's not gay; he's just English." — Movie Talk Posted Apr 20, 2013
48%	Olympus Has Fallen (2013)	" As bystanders get mown down, the Washington monument topples and the Stars and Stripes is shredded, the onslaught delivers a real taboo-busting frisson... the sequence would pack an even bigger punch if the CGI special effects weren't quite so cheesy." — Movie Talk Posted Apr 20, 2013
74%	Love Is All You Need (2013)	" We've seen Brosnan playing middle-aged totty in a Mediterranean setting before, of course; all that's missing this time is the Abba songs. But Love Is All You Need isn't a Mamma Mia! remix." — Movie Talk Posted Apr 20, 2013
42%	The Majestic (2001)	" Darabont is seeking to recapture the spirit of Frank Capra - with Carrey in the role of a James Stewart or Gary Cooper. Yet even though Darabont shares Capra's dewy-eyed optimism, his film's sluggish pace means he lacks Capra's screwball zest." — Movie Talk Posted Apr 15, 2013
61%	Secret of the Wings (2012)	" The story is slight, but the gentle humour and mild suspense will keep young viewers engaged, and the animation provides its own magic, particularly in the moments when Tink sets foot inside the Winter Woods and her wings gain a shimmering iridescence." — Movie Talk Posted Apr 15, 2013
56%	Oblivion (2013)	" Shot in eye-popping 4K, Oblivion immerses us in its dazzlingly created future world from the start... Kosinski doesn't quite manage to sustain the film's opening promise... But the spell isn't entirely dispelled." — Movie Talk Posted Apr 15, 2013
66%	Spring Breakers (2013)	" A wild ride of a movie, Spring Breakers finds gleeful cinematic provocateur Harmony Korine pitching a bunch of former teen starlets into a headlong spree of sex and drugs and gangsta rap." — Movie Talk Posted Apr 7, 2013
29%	Erased (2013)	" Lianna Liberato's Amy is stunned when dad suddenly reveals all manner of unexpected skills. What kind of father can kill an assailant with his bare hands, speak umpteen languages and unravel a murky international conspiracy?" — Movie Talk Posted Apr 4, 2013
79%	A Late Quartet (2012)	" It's a shame that director Yaron Zilberman feels the need to raise the dramatic stakes so implausibly high, as the actors really are excellent - and the music is sublime." — Movie Talk Posted Apr 2, 2013
40%	Mental (2013)	" The humour is every bit as rude and raucous as before, but Hogan's touch here seems heavy handed and the use of songs from The Sound of Music doesn't work nearly so well as the joyous Abba tunes that drove Muriel's Wedding." — Movie Talk Posted Apr 2, 2013
6%	So Undercover (2013)	" To keep up her cover, Miley Cyrus's private eye has to spout nonsense like 'Totes!' and 'Amazeballs!' while pretending to be an empty-headed ditz... when the story finally gets wrapped up, 'Amazeballs' will not be the word that comes to your lips." — Movie Talk Posted Apr 2, 2013
68%	Trance (2013)	" Trance is dazzling to look at and has a plot that's more tangled than a game of Twister, but once you've been dazzled and have unravelled all the plot knots and kinks you're left surprisingly unsatisfied." — Movie Talk Posted Apr 2, 2013
28%	G.I. Joe: Retaliation (2013)	" Furiously loud and even more furiously dumb, G.I. Joe: Retaliation proudly flaunts the spectacular daftness we've come to expect from action movies based on toys and games." — Movie Talk Posted Mar 27, 2013
90%	Good Vibrations ()	" This is very much Hooley's mythic version of his own life, seen not so much through a rose-tinted lens as a brown nicotine fug... But Dormer's charm keeps us engaged and whenever there's a lull the music gives the movie a thrilling adrenaline shot." — Movie Talk Posted Mar 27, 2013
89%	Compliance (2012)	" That the events in Compliance are taking place in a fast-foot restaurant is equally resonant. The junk food we see being prepared couldn't be more disgusting. Surely, you can't help but think, anyone prepared to swallow that will swallow anything." — Movie Talk Posted Mar 25, 2013
52%	Jack the Giant Slayer (2013)	" McGregor's dashing Elmont never loses his posh sang-froid... and with Tucci gleefully hamming it up as the villain, it's the supporting cast who are full of beans, rather than the overshadowed young leads." — Movie Talk Posted Mar 22, 2013
20%	Identity Thief (2013)	" Without the irrepressible force of comic mayhem that is Melissa McCarthy, road-movie comedy Identity Thief would end up in the ditch. Luckily, the Bridesmaids co-star barrels her way through the plot's stickiest patches." — Movie Talk Posted Mar 22, 2013
26%	Fun Size (2012)	" Justice makes a likeable lead but director Josh Schwartz's comic touch is distinctly leaden and a high proportion of the would-be funny scenes - some of them involving an uncredited Johnny Knoxville - fall flat." — Movie Talk Posted Mar 19, 2013
6%	Silent Hill: Revelation (2012)	" The demon-haunted West Virginia town still gives the creeps... but this belated sequel proves to be only fitfully exciting and scary - mostly because the action stops every few minutes for yet another character to deliver reams of boring exposition." — Movie Talk Posted Mar 19, 2013
85%	Side Effects (2013)	" One moment, we're watching an enthralling exposé of the modern pharmaceutical industry; the next we're reeling from some well-timed mystery-thriller shocks. And Soderbergh, aided by a sharp script and superb cast, wrong-foots us all the way." — Movie Talk Posted Mar 19, 2013
60%	Oz the Great and Powerful (2013)	" When a movie is as beloved as The Wizard of Oz, making a prequel would seem a foolhardy enterprise. Put one foot on the Yellow Brick Road and you risk stepping on your viewers' memories and dreams. Yet Raimi rises to the challenge with dash and dazzle. " — Movie Talk Posted Mar 19, 2013
38%	The Incredible Burt Wonderstone (2013)	" Poking fun at old-school magicians, The Incredible Burt Wonderstone pulls the odd chuckle out of the hat, but despite the starry presence of comic headliners Steve Carrell and Jim Carrey the film fails to dazzle." — Movie Talk Posted Mar 19, 2013
51%	Welcome to the Punch (2013)	" Creevy's film certainly looks slick and stylish, but the script isn't solid enough to make the plot convincing... McAvoy is miscast. So is London." — Movie Talk Posted Mar 15, 2013
30%	Broken City (2013)	" A solidly old-fashioned crime thriller that ploughs the familiar furrow of cops, crooks and corruption in New York City." — Movie Talk Posted Mar 14, 2013
13%	Safe Haven (2013)	" Safe Haven may be predictable and formulaic, but Hallström gives the proceedings a cosy glow and there are a couple of twists before the end: one blindingly obvious, the other blindingly dumb." — Movie Talk Posted Mar 14, 2013
14%	Hansel and Gretel: Witch Hunters (2013)	" It's an amusingly cheeky notion: the siblings from the Brothers Grimm fairy tale as witch-slaying bounty hunters. A defter hand than Wirkola's might have succeeded ... but the film's anachronisms are clumsy and most of the jokes fall flat." — Movie Talk Posted Mar 14, 2013
76%	Premium Rush (2012)	" Joseph Gordon-Levitt' fixed-wheel bike has a single gear and no brakes, and you could say the same of director David Koepp's film, which is light on character and plot. But, even on two wheels, the action is fast and furious." — Movie Talk Posted Mar 12, 2013
87%	Robot & Frank (2012)	" The pair's low-key crime spree provides some gentle suspense, but it's the developing friendship between the grouchy ex-thief and the robot that will beguile viewers most." — Movie Talk Posted Mar 8, 2013
40%	Parker (2013)	" Hackford does supply some genuinely hard-boiled thrills, including the briskly efficient opening heist and a bruising hotel-room tussle for Parker and a would-be assassin. But when Lopez wiggles and pouts her way into the caper, the film goes soft." — Movie Talk Posted Mar 7, 2013
42%	To The Wonder (2013)	" To the Wonder displays all the familiar Malick touches - fragmentary narrative, impressionistic visuals, poetic voiceover - but this time the Malick magic is missing... Kurylenko is left to waft around dreamily like a model in a Boden catalogue shoot." — Movie Talk Posted Feb 27, 2013
66%	For Ellen (2012)	" This low-key but shrewdly observed US indie movie from Korean-American writer-director So Yong Kim pointedly opens with a man at a crossroads, unsure of which direction to take. Decision made, he soon afterwards skids into a snowdrift." — Movie Talk Posted Feb 23, 2013
68%	Cloud Atlas (2012)	" Tykwer and the Wachowskis take Mitchell's complex narrative and give it breathtaking momentum on screen. Admittedly, they lose the novel's element of dazzling pastiche, but they bring out its qualities of rollicking adventure and cliffhanging suspense." — Movie Talk Posted Feb 23, 2013
73%	Unfinished Song (Song for Marion) (2013)	" Parts of the film are cheesy and the whole is undeniably manipulative, but the film is so tender and generous, and its stars so genuinely affecting, that it's easy to forgive the odd bum note. " — Movie Talk Posted Feb 23, 2013
45%	Beautiful Creatures (2013)	" Twilight with witches instead of vampires, Beautiful Creatures serves up another tale of star-crossed lovers blighted by warring supernatural cliques, mapping another invented mythology onto the hormonally charged world of teenage desires." — Movie Talk Posted Feb 16, 2013
15%	A Good Day To Die Hard (2013)	" When they're not leaping off buildings in slow motion, Willis and Courtney trade the odd snarled insult or grudging endearment, but there isn't a line that lingers." — Movie Talk Posted Feb 16, 2013
0%	Run For Your Wife ()	" Truly dire. An offensive, witless farrago... The film's social attitudes - to homosexuality, women, marriage - appear to have been preserved in mothballs since the 1970s. Given air now, they give off an offensive odour." — Movie Talk Posted Feb 16, 2013
52%	This is 40 (2012)	" There are laughs, sure, with Brooks' unabashed moocher coming up with many of the film's best lines... but the overall results are distinctly patchy and at 133 minutes, the film is at least half an hour too long." — Movie Talk Posted Feb 16, 2013
63%	I Give It a Year (2013)	" Mazer's wobbly quality control means that the viewer will be cringing too - Stephen Merchant, as Josh's boorish best friend, delivers a dismally unfunny best man's speech and his subsequent appearances in the story are even more toxic." — Movie Talk Posted Feb 11, 2013
63%	Hitchcock (2012)	" With Hitchcock, Gervasi, maker of beguiling rock documentary Anvil, has come up with a breezy entertainment rather than an in-depth biopic. You won't find any real insights into Hitchcock's filmmaking process or his psyche." — Movie Talk Posted Feb 11, 2013
80%	Warm Bodies (2013)	" Warm Bodies has such a sweet and quirky spirit that it's a shame the movie isn't better. Unfortunately, Jonathan Levine fails to sustain the story's premise and the narrative pace gets stuck at a zombie shuffle." — Movie Talk Posted Feb 11, 2013
86%	Wreck-it Ralph (2012)	" For some, Ralph's spell in Sugar Rush's candy-coloured world may induce hyperglycaemia... but hard-core gamers will have a blast picking up all the gaming in-jokes and references that fly over everyone else's heads." — Movie Talk Posted Feb 11, 2013
47%	Cirque Du Soleil: Worlds Away 3D (2012)	" If the less-than-compelling plot leads you to drift off, it won't be long before another tour-de-force of agility or grace jerks you awake." — Movie Talk Posted Feb 2, 2013

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