FILM: Star Wars: The Force Awakens
CAST: Oscar Isaac, John Boyega, Harrison Ford, Daisy Ridley, Carrie Fisher 
DIRECTION: J J Abrams


J J Abrams had the weight of Hollywood, if not the entire galaxy, on his shoulders.
As writer and director of the seventh installment in the Star Wars franchise, he was expected to satisfy two generations of fans, many of whom had been let down by the last three George Lucas-directed movies. On top of that, with the film’s reported $200mn budget, Disney was looking for something to blow the roof off the box office as well.
But if Abrams was having any sleepless nights, he can rest easy now. Star Wars: The Force Awakens is a triumphant return to form for the iconic franchise — the best of the films since The Empire Strikes Back in 1980. It’s also a rousing introduction to new characters who will likely carry this world forward through two more planned episodes and assorted spinoffs.
Set approximately 30 years after Star Wars: Episode VI- Return of the Jedi, the new film paints a universe where the Empire may be gone but has been replaced by The First Order, a totalitarian regime intent on wiping out all traces of the Republic and any form of resistance. They pledge allegiance to the hideous Supreme Leader Snoke (Andy Serkis from The Lord of the Rings movies in another role that calls for his complete transformation.)
But feisty resistance pilot Poe Dameron (Oscar Isaac), along with his trusty droid sidekick BB-8, aren’t going down without a fight. BB-8 has information on the whereabouts of the legendary Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill), who disappeared decades before without a trace.
The First Order, under direction of the villainous General Hux (Domhnall Gleeson), wants this information, too, and imprisons Dameron. But he finds an unlikely ally in Finn (John Boyega), a renegade Stormtrooper who is rebelling against his programming.
This is a kickoff to a rollicking adventure that will also include Rey (Daisy Ridley), a young female pilot living alone on a desert planet who soon finds she has a higher calling, and old friends like Leia, now General Leia (Carrie Fisher), Han Solo (Harrison Ford) and Chewbacca (Peter Mayhew) in supporting but meaningful roles.
Abrams keeps things moving quickly, even at 135 minutes, and there’s a sense of humour — especially in the interplay among Finn, Poe and Rey — that never gets too campy. Visually, Force is impressive even though it is a bit of a throwback in terms of effects. (Abrams has been quite public in his desire to de-emphasise digital effects.)
And there are a couple of big surprises that will have hard-core fans humming until the next film comes out.
The actors strike the right tone with Englishman Boyega (from the cult film Attack the Block), Isaac (indie fare like Inside Llewyn Davis and Ex-Machina) and Ridley (mostly known for British TV) showing off a cool, easy chemistry.
With these three, Abrams has found a way to represent a global sensibility without coming off forced. And, as George Miller did with his Mad Max: Fury Road, he has crafted a strong female character in Rey, who can more than hold her own in this male-dominated world.
Nit-pickers can find complaints. 
It has enough magic and adventure to satisfy devotees of the original films who have been desperate for a new, worthy installment for decades.
And it will also capture the imagination of a new generation, some of whom wouldn’t know a wookiee from a sand creature. -Fort Worth Star-Telegram/TNS


A dizzying comic thriller


By Colin Covert




FILM: The Big Short
CAST: Christian Bale, Steve Carell, Ryan Gosling
DIRECTION: Adam McKay


The great American tradition of filling one’s pockets with other people’s money has inspired milestones from Glengarry Glen Ross to Ocean’s Eleven, Wall Street and The Wolf of Wall Street. The dizzying comic thriller The Big Short joins that class of “follow the money” classics. It’s a dazzling, muckraking story about financially corrupt banksters committing the biggest fraud in US history.
The film is adapted from author Michael Lewis’ The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine. That nonfiction account followed the massive 2008 mortgage bubble as it triggered financial collapse, blowing the nation’s economy to smithereens. 
This seems like an incongruous topic for director Adam McKay, a past master of goofball gems like Anchorman and Step Brothers. Yet he proves himself a gifted, versatile filmmaker who understands how to entertain without obscuring a message. McKay makes a smart, snarky crisis tragicomedy from the real estate boom and bust. His film balances sardonic character sketches with sober mockery of a culture gone mad with market mania.
The heroes of the tale — sort of — are Steve Carell, Christian Bale, Ryan Gosling and Brad Pitt, all bright and interesting actors doing standout work. They play a diverse group of renegade investment specialists — Gosling’s narration calls them “a few weirdos and outsiders” — suspicious that America is about to jump off a cliff of toxic assets. These smart men are admirable in the ways they fathom the imminent unholy mess. They observed that the real estate boom, driven in part by risky mortgages for bottom-rung buyers (no-income, no-job “ninjas”), was circling the toilet bowl. Those iffy loans, packaged into overrated bonds, would collapse. But the downfall could make immense fortunes for traders betting against the market (and the economy) in the form of credit-default swaps.
The central focus is a labyrinthine situation involving Wall Street jargon about pooled loans and liability structure tranches. This is the sort of thing that stretches creative ingenuity to the breaking point, but McKay explains it in plain English, through the most unlikely interpreters. 
Breaking the fourth wall, he enlists actress Margot Robbie — the blond bombshell from The Wolf of Wall Street — for a bubble bath soliloquy directly addressing viewers to define mortgage bonds. Celebrity chef Anthony Bourdain cooks us a stew of leftover fish to explain collateralised debt obligations.
The film bustles with flashbacks and inspired, subtle effects, like the hushed buzzing of flies when a pair of market researchers visit a Florida housing development that’s all but abandoned. Moments like these make the frequently surreal film oddly realistic and grounded. What better way to represent the coming downfall of the market than by pushing over a tower of Jenga blocks? -Star Tribune/TNS


A deadly secret


FILM: The Hoarder
CAST: Mischa Barton, Robert Knepper, Valene Kane, Charlotte Salt. A
DIRECTION: Matt Winn


A group of strangers are trapped inside a storage locker facility and are picked off one by one.
This is a fairly well-made film and the director does a good job of turning the location into a maze of corridors where danger could be lurking round every turn. There’s also a few welcome laughs thrown in.
Ella (Mischa Barton) is soon to be married and needs to know what is in her fiance’s storage locker before they tie the knot so she enlists the help of her friend, Molly (Emily Attack), whose shady past gives her the proverbial key to the literally locked door. 
But by unlocking the locker, the girls release a dark and deadly secret. Before long, Ella is alone, scared and desperate to escape the confines of the building. 
Matt Winn’s The Hoarder is highly reminiscent of many different films, such as Cube, Vacancy and even the original Alien, but it still has a slight freshness to it. 
All its elements have been seen before but the combination of these elements placed together offers the viewer something that isn’t wholly predictable and, while a long way from ground-breaking, does make for an entertaining movie with the occasional tense moment. 


DVDs courtesy:  
Saqr Entertainment Stores, Doha