DVD Review - July 7 | Kidderminster Shuttle

Damon Smith takes a look at the week's latest releases.

Film of the week

Now you see me (12A, 115 mins) Thriller/Action. Jesse Eisenberg, Isla Fisher, Woody Harrelson, Dave Franco, Mark Ruffalo, Melanie Laurent, Michael Caine, Morgan Freeman. Director: Louis Letterier.

Released: July 3 (UK & Ireland)

Nothing is what it seems in Louis Letterier's high-stakes game of cat and mouse between four crowd-pleasing Las Vegas illusionists and the FBI. Every narrative twist could be a double-bluff, every failure a carefully orchestrated diversion and every flirtation a calculated exercise in audience manipulation.

Screenwriters Ed Solomon, Boaz Yakin and Edward Ricourt hold all the aces and for the opening 30 minutes, their collective sleight of hand dazzles and intrigues in equal measure. Now You See Me sets up the tricks, engineers them with elan and coolly reveals the ingenious method behind the on-stage madness.

Alas, when it comes to the grand final illusion which takes up most of the second hour, director Letterier doesn't play entirely fair. He untethers the plot from plausibility and logic, allowing everything to teeter risibly on coincidence, physical improbability and outrageous good fortune. We might just forgive the script its outlandishness if a tongue was wedged firmly in cheek, but the film is deadly serious about its jiggery pokery.

The prologue introduces us to close-up conjurer Daniel Atlas (Jesse Eisenberg), escapologist Henley Reeves (Isla Fisher), mentalist Merrit McKinney (Woody Harrelson) and street magician Jack Wilder (Dave Franco), who are successful in their own fields, dazzling small audiences with their showmanship.

Each performer receives a Tarot card bearing the same information: "March 29, 4:44pm 45 East Evan St. NY, NY"

As instructed, the quartet arrives at an apartment in New York, where a dazzling light show reveals an illusion that will stun the world. One year later, Daniel, Henley, Merrit and Jack are reborn as The Four Horsemen.

In front of a live audience, they choose an audience member at random and magically transport their stooge to a bank in Paris to raid millions from the vault. With their sponsor Arthur Tressler (Michael Caine) and renowned sceptic Thaddeus Bradley (Morgan Freeman) watching in the aisles, Daniel, Henley, Merrit and Jack pull off this seemingly impossible feat.

Within hours, they are under arrest and facing interrogation by FBI Agent Dylan Rhodes (Mark Ruffalo), who doesn't want the case, nor the added distraction of Interpol agent Alma Dray (Melanie Laurent). The cops quickly learn that they underestimate the magicians at their peril.

Ignore the gaping plot holes and Now You See Me is a lot of fun. The script trades heavily on the sniping banter between the four magicians, who always seem to be one step ahead of Rhodes and the authorities. Action scenes are orchestrated at full pelt including an explosive car chase and a night-time race across rooftops.

The film's pivotal nugget of information becomes blindingly obvious well before Letterier engineers the big reveal, but it doesn't greatly temper our enjoyment, simply giving us more time to piece everything together.

:: Swearing :: No sex :: Violence :: Rating: 6/10

Released

The Internship (12A, 119 mins) Comedy/Romance. Vince Vaughn, Owen Wilson, Rose Byrne, Aasif Mandvi, Josh Brener, Dylan O'Brien, Tiya Sircar, Tobit Raphael, Max Minghella, Josh Gad, John Goodman. Director: Shawn Levy.

Released: July 3(UK & Ireland)

Product placement in Hollywood films dates back to the 1920s and nowadays it's commonplace for blockbusters to offset some of their astronomical budgets with shameless plugs.

Elliott lured E.T. out of hiding with an oft-mentioned peanut butter candy and James Bond's antics have always relied on luxury cars and watches.

This summer, Superman's titanic battle with General Zod in Man Of Steel razed all of Metropolis except for one branch of a nationwide shop chain and Brad Pitt took time out from battling the undead in World War Z to chug a can of his favourite soft drink in glorious close-up. Saving the world is a thirsty business.

The Internship takes promotional tie-ins to the next level, constructing an entire film around one globally recognisable brand and extolling its virtues for almost two hours.

Shot on location at the San Francisco corporate headquarters of an internet search engine, Shawn Levy's buddy comedy is essentially a glossy promo for a new generation of hi-tech companies that hope to inspire creativity by transforming workspaces into playgrounds.

"It's rated the best place in America to work," rhapsodises Vince Vaughn at the beginning of the film as he and Owen Wilson embark on a quest for "the intangible stuff that made a search engine an engine for change".

They play watch salesmen Billy (Vaughn) and Nick (Wilson), who are stunned when their company goes out of business.

"Watches are obsolete. So are you!" laments their boss (John Goodman).

Unperturbed, Billy applies for an internship and the two men are delighted to sail through a video conference interview. Arriving on the west coast, Billy and Nick discover they will be pitted against dozens of other applicants in team-based challenges that will weed out the mental wheat from the chaff.

The buddies are paired with oddballs Neha Patel (Tiya Sircar), Stuart Twombly (Dylan O'Brien) and Yo-Yo Santos (Tobit Raphael), who are mentored by lovable geek Lyle (Josh Brener). From the very first assignment, Billy and Nick's team fails to impress Mr Chetty (Aasif Mandvi), who runs the internship program, and they lag way behind posh rival Graham Hawtrey (Max Minghella) and his high-fliers.

The Internship has a smattering of laughs but Levy's film increasingly becomes clogged with sickly sentiment. Some of the gags wear thin very quickly, like Billy repeatedly saying "on the line" instead of online, or inspiring his team to greatness with references to Flashdance.

Vaughn and Wilson share likeable onscreen chemistry, and the latter sparks with Rose Byrne in a throwaway romantic subplot.

The central narrative feels like it could have been generated by a computer from the keywords 'misfits', 'triumph' and 'adversity', duly delivering an uplifting, feel good resolution to confirm that the geeks shall indeed inherit the virtual Earth.

:: Swearing :: No sex :: Violence :: Rating: 5/10

Chasing Mavericks (PG, 116 mins) Drama/Action/Romance. Gerard Butler, Jonny Weston, Elisabeth Shue, Abigail Spencer, Leven Rambin, Greg Long. Directors: Michael Apted, Curtis Hanson.

Released: July 5 (UK & Ireland)

Like the daredevil teenage surfer whose incredibly true story is dramatised in this adrenaline-pumping biopic, Chasing Mavericks almost wiped out, but managed to ride its luck.

Director Curtis Hanson (LA Confidential) fell ill midway through production and Buckinghamshire-born filmmaker Michael Apted stepped in to complete the inspirational tale of one young man taming Mother Nature. They share credit for an overly reverential tale of rousing triumph against the odds.

Traumas behind the scenes haven't generated any ripples on the big screen because Chasing Mavericks is an uplifting, if formulaic, sports movie that benefits greatly from breathtaking sequences on the water. Screenwriter Kario Salem restructures the facts into a snappier timeframe, and his affection for legendary surfer Jay Moriarity, who conquered the mythical Mavericks break in California at the tender age of 15, rings loud and clear in every glib line of dialogue.

Yet for its slavish devotion to our expectations, the film still manages at least one surprise rooted in shocking fact. Lead actors Gerard Butler and Jonny Weston performed most of their own stunts, which adds to the spectacle, although some judicious editing clearly slows for stunt doubles to take to the monster waves in key sequences.

Jay Moriarity (Weston) feels at home on the waves and he is determined to ride the monstrous waves close to the home he shares with his depressed mother (Elisabeth Shue). His father left when he was eight so Jay became the man of the house at an early age, putting aside adolescent crushes on best friend Kim (Leven Rambin) to keep his family afloat.

After much pestering, Jay convinces veteran surfer Frosty Hesson (Butler) to train him for the epic trial of riding Mavericks, which can swell to 50 feet high. A father-son bond forms between the prodigy and the old-timer and Frosty neglect his wife (Abigail Spencer) and children to guide Jay to greatness - which includes instructing the teenager to hold his breath for at least four minutes and to eat healthily. While Frosty becomes a positive male authority figure for Jay, the youngster enriches his mentor's life too.

Chasing Mavericks paints Moriarity as a sun-kissed saint on a surfboard, who led a clean, honest life devoid of drugs and alcohol, and weathered unkind words from the bullies in town without batting one of his blue eyes.

Butler's American accent is not as robust as his abilities on a board, but he's an appealingly gruff curmudgeon who warms to his protege. Cinematographer Bill Pope delivers some terrific sequences of the Santa Cruz coast, and of the brave souls who risk life and limb to ride that one perfect tube of cascading water to immortality.

:: No Swearing :: No sex :: Violence :: Rating: 5/10

Also released...

The Bling Ring (15, 90 mins)

Released: July 5 (UK & Ireland, selected cinemas)

Inspired by a 2010 feature in Vanity Fair magazine entitled The Suspects Wore Louboutins, The Bling Ring dramatises the outlandish true story of a group of bored, celebrity-obsessed teenagers, who broke into the houses of the rich and fabulous to pilfer their designer couture. Writer-director Sofia Coppola creates a film that is just as plastic and emotionally hollow as the protagonists, centring initially on self-conscious loner Marc Hall (Nick Prugo), who nervously arrives at high new high school and is delighted when Rebecca Ahn (Rachel Lee) takes him under her wing and initiates him into her coterie of fashion-conscious teens: Chloe (Claire Julien), Nicki (Emma Watson) and Sam (Tess Taylor). Rebecca follows Paris Hilton's every move and when she learns that the socialite will be out of town at a high profile party, she encourages Marc to find Hilton's address so they can break in and rifle through her clothes. When the police fail to come a-knocking, Rebecca and Marc begin to make nocturnal visits to the homes of other celebrities including Rachel Bilson, Orlando Bloom and Lindsay Lohan, and they take along the rest of the posse. However, the group's expanding wardrobe of designer fashions does not go unnoticed by their classmates and eventually other students alert the police to the thieves in their midst.

Bula Quo! (PG, 90 mins)

Released: July 5 (UK & Ireland, selected cinemas)

Rock legends Status Quo witness a crime and go on the run for their lives in Stuart St Paul's action comedy. Francis Rossi and Rick Parfitt (playing themselves) play a sold-out gig in Fiji as part of their 50 Year Celebration tour. They head into a private bar where they witness sadistic gangster Wilson (Jon Lovitz) knocking off a rival gambling ring using the tried and tested method of Russian roulette. The musicians flee with evidence of the murders and Wilson's goon in hot pursuit. The band's resourceful manager Simon (Craig Fairbrass) and a cheeky intern Caroline (Laura Aikman), work tirelessly to keep Francis and Rick alive while dodgy tricky questions from tenacious reporter Dave (Matt Kennard), who senses that Status Quo could be at the centre of the biggest scoop of his career.

A Field in England (15, 90 mins)