Detractors of Brüno would say that it’s crude and tasteless and defenders would say that it exposes society’s homophobia. Personally, I don’t think it does a great job of the latter but it excels at the former. That’s not to say that there isn’t homophobia present in Brüno, but it’s mainly from the expected sources (drunk fight fans and rednecks) and Sacha Baron...

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‘Ain’t it cool?’ No, not really. Broken Arrow is a dull, embarrassing action film only rendered somewhat watchable by John Travolta hamming his brains out. His performance here is unrestrained and crazy, and all the more entertaining for it. It’s a taste of what was to come in Face/Off. ‘Hush. Hush!’ Easily the best moment in the film is when Deakins (Travolta) kills...

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Baz Luhrmann is not a director I hold in high regard. All of his previous films have either annoyed the hell out of me or given me a blistering headache. He’s a director turned up to eleven, a director who believes more is more, a director who is the enemy of good taste. So colour me surprised when I found myself enjoying his...

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The Golden Compass is a curious film. Based on a not very good novel, it’s neither faithful to the text nor does it try to drastically reinvent it. Instead the filmmakers just fiddle with the chronology of events here and there, omit key scenes and change a couple of the characters a little bit. I can’t imagine the result is satisfying for anyone....

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I can remember watching a Channel 4 documentary a few years back about new age soldiers who would stare at goats and hang weights from their genitals. The staring was supposed to kill the subject they were staring at but I’m not sure what the weights did. Regardless, the documentary was very amusing and had a complete ‘what the fuck?’ aspect to it....

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The opening scene of 28 Days Later shows a bunch of animal rights activists breaking into a laboratory. At first the lab seems pretty ordinary. There are caged animals, there’s a weasely scientist and undoubtedly there are some lousy coffee-making facilities. But then we find out that a bunch of chimps are infected with ‘rage’. As is customary for a bunch of sallow,...

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