FantasticFilmFan

I avoided "Big Game" around the time of its release as word-of-mouth was less than encouraging. I'd thoroughly enjoyed Jalmari Helander's "Rare Exports", and continue to do so with a viewing every Christmas, but I had to trust audience opinion on his follow up, right? Well, I shouldn't have; not on this occasion any way. Much like "Rare Exports", this is a heightened tale of hunting which takes place on photogenic landscapes and well designed studio sets. Its strength lies in inventive action set pieces and the entire production is arguably superior to similar fare such as John Woo's "Hard Target" and "Broken Arrow". The instances of hand to hand combat are the only moments which disappoint ever so slightly, but those are few and far between. Helander has a fine grasp on cinematic technique. His blocking and framing offers up strong imagery, even with inserts. The quality of the photography only seems to dip with some of the 2nd unit aerial shots. Samuel L. Jackson collects another paycheck proving that not only is he 'The Man' but that he's also 'The Man' that's always better than the material he's given. Jackson might receive top billing but the movie's lead character, Oskari, is performed by the excellent Onni Tommila ("Rare Exports"). He's outstanding in a dual language role that's more demanding than Jackson's both physically and emotionally. The cast is also loaded with solid support from Ray Stevenson, Felicity Huffman, Victor Garber, Ted Levine and Jim Broadbent, who chews a great big sandwich - and plenty of scenery - as CIA consultant, Fred Herbert. It's a welcome throwback to action thrillers that used to dominate in the 90s starring the likes of Schwarzenegger, Stallone, Seagal and Van Damme. Wish I'd seen this sooner.

It's been almost 30 years since Kevin Smith exploded onto the independent film scene with his impressive debut "Clerks", and now he's back with a second sequel to it. What disappointed me up front was that Smith skipped the opportunity to return to the signature black and white photography of the original. The colour photography here is flat and boring, which isn't much of a surprise considering none of Smith's movies are much to look at. They're usually ugly as @#£%. Smith made the original "Clerks" for less than thirty grand and yet he somehow manages to make this look much, much cheaper. "Clerks III" frequently feels like the output of a mediocre film student, so it's hard to believe that this thing cost around $7million to produce. The strength of Smith's output has always been with his cast and his screenplays, but unfortunately both are hit and miss this time around. Jeff Anderson is great, but Brian O'Halloran seems distracted or bored at times. Smith brings Trevor Fehrman back as Elias, but maybe he shouldn't have bothered. Rosario Dawson returns for just a couple of moments and is absolutely wonderful, but Smith and Mewes as Jay and Silent Bob are painful to watch. Amy Sedaris is an absolute pro, raising the onscreen performance bar in her cameo as Dr. Ladenheim, but the usually reliable Justin Long misses the mark with a misjudged turn as a squiffy orderly. No, the performances are not all great, and neither are any of the production values. So, you might be wondering, what on Earth does this flick have to offer? Great music, perhaps? No, and the movie has a terrible score. It's bad; goddawful in fact. So what does pop up in the Plus Column? The audition scene cameos are fun and the moments that work best are the brief black and white recreations of scenes from the original "Clerks" which Randall turns into an independent film of his very own. Maybe Randall will be knocking up sub par sequels to that in another 30 years.

Let's not beat around the bush; this movie franchise is bad and we all know it. Paul W. S. Anderson might very well be a terrible film director, but he's proven himself time and time again to be a financially successful one, so there's obviously an audience for his brand of trash. There are many that defend the likes of this and Anderson's "Event Horizon"; many that will claim his movies are blockbuster escapism, and that might be the case, but that doesn't stop them from being bad. There is little to no respectable craft involved with the writing and direction on display here. The photography is uninteresting and 'saggily' framed for most of the duration. The cast are boring to the Nth degree and do little to hold your attention. The highlight of the movie is the 'laser corridor' sequence, which is extremely effective and comes early enough in the movie that it hints at the possibility of decent material ahead. Unfortunately that's about as good as it gets and even that sequence is plagiarised from Vincenzo Natali's infinitely superior 1997 Sci-Fi horror flick, "Cube". There are zombie monsters, but so what? We can see those is 1000s of other equally pitiful throwaway horror movies that are free to watch on streaming services. Do yourself...No, do all of us a favour and stop putting money in Paul W. S. Anderson's pocket and seek out a decent film for a change. Make the effort to find something new, something that's been made with love, by filmmakers that care about the quality of their product. Find something good and rent/buy that for a change. Don't settle for mediocre garbage. "Stop watching this @#£%"...screamed the reviewer that just watched this @#£%!