JJ McD (jjmcd)
Leitrim, Ireland
JJ's Recent Reviews
American Reunion
R
It can't be described as being too bad. It is what it is: a fourth film in a franchise about awkward sex-capades. It's just no longer set in high school, it's a...reunion. Typical dross here and there but actually hillariously funny at other times. Particularly Seann William Scott who personified a brilliant modern comic character in the Stiffmeister. He returns just as fresh as ever. Worth an oul gander.
Attack the Block
R
Low budget and not really filled with any great insight. Just a good idea that has been embellished into a gloriously entertaining film. It's got a soft core, which is needed to make the film more appealing to the masses and it has an interesting ability to draw you in even though you haven't got the foggiest what these guys are saying most of the time (that is if you're not from inner-city London and live on a block). Has the term 'Carpenter-esque' been coined yet? Cos that's what this is. Eeetz wicked, ya get me!
JJ's Favorite Movies
Ran
R
This is a masterful and almost perfect visualision and dramatisation of a story that anyone has ever commited to a film reel, in my opinion. The depiction of war is perfectly composed and eeriely envisioned, almost celestially. Every scene is so theatrical that it sometimes feels you are looking at an outdoor stage. It epitomises the intensely stringent character of the Japanese and their complex feudal history. Kurosawa: undoubtedly in my eyes, the master of cinema.
Chinatown
R
Masterful suspense and noir that epitomises a landmark in film-making. Grim, pessimistic and so god-damn gorgeous to look at. 37 years on and films still fail miserably to look as good as this does. A seismic narrative that is expertly envisioned by Polanski, who pops in himself for a scene-steeling cameo. You truly will be on a knife-edge throughout!
