The Search Begins.
Choose Life.
T2 Trainspotting is the sequel to the 1996 cult classic and sees director Danny Boyle (28 Days Later..., Slumdog Millionaire) return. The film stars Ewan McGregor (Star Wars, Fargo), Ewen Bremner (Snatch, Black Hawk Down), Jonny Lee Miller (Elementary, Hackers) and Robert Carlyle (Once Upon a Time, 28 Weeks Later). "First there was an opportunity......then there was a betrayal. Twenty years have gone by. Much has changed but just as much remains the same. Mark Renton returns to the only place he can ever call home. They are waiting for him: Spud, Sick Boy , and Begbie. Other old friends are waiting too: sorrow, loss, joy, vengeance, hatred, friendship, love, longing, fear, regret, diamorphine, self-destruction and mortal danger, they are all lined up to welcome him, ready to join the dance.". Was this film just made to jump on the nostalgia train or was Boyle right in bringing us back to this story, 20 years later?...
I'm a Mother F*****g iBoy
iBoy is directed by Adam Randall (Level Up) and stars Bill Milner (X-Men: First Class, Locke), Maisie Williams (Game of Thrones, Cyberbully) and Rory Kinnear (The Imitation Game, Skyfall). "After an accident, Tom wakes from a coma to discover that fragments of his smart phone have been embedded in his head, and worse, that returning to normal teenage life is impossible because he has developed a strange set of super powers". We are all addicted to our phones, is iBoy what the future holds?
Yes! It's the return of 'Spotlight On...' - we tried out this segment for 2 months but dropped it simply because those posts were being out-read by others. However, I had to bring it back because I needed to cover this show - I have been waiting to talk about it for a while, I was just waiting for a reason - the teaser trailer that was dropped a couple of days ago became that reason. Selena Gomez is the executive producer of this show - producing is kind of new to her so I'm exciting to see how she does and whether she picks good projects to back. Gomez has had the rights to the original book for years so I read the book a few years ago and enjoyed it. Now, it's 2017 and we're finally here, an adaption of 13 Reasons Why is just a couple of months away...
There are no more patriots, just rebels and tyrants.
This review contains spoilers
xXx: Return of Xander Cage is directed by D.J. Caruso (I Am Number Four, Disturbia) and stars Vin Diesel (Fast & Furious, Guardians of the Galaxy), Donnie Yen (Ip Man, Rogue One: A Star Wars Story), Deepika Padukone (Chennai Express, Happy New Year), Ruby Rose (Orange is the New Black), Nina Dobrev (The Vampire Diaries) and Toni Collette (The Sixth Sense, Miss You Already). "Xander Cage is left for dead after an incident, though he secretly returns to action for a new, tough assignment with his handler Augustus Gibbons". Vin Diesel is finding it hard to find an audience outside of Fast and Furious recently, was resurrecting a franchise that once saw him success a good move?
Kevin has 23 distinct personalities. The 24th is about to be unleashed.
***MAJOR SPOILERS***
Split is directed and written by M. Night Shyamalan (The Sixth Sense, The Visit) and stars James McAvoy (X-Men, Filth), Anya Taylor-Joy (The Witch, Morgan) and Betty Buckley (Eight is Enough, The Happening). "Three girls are kidnapped by a man with a diagnosed 23 distinct personalities, and must try and escape before the apparent emergence of a frightful new 24th". M. Night Shyamalan started to see more positive acclaim with 2015's The Visit - is it truly a return to form for the king of thrillers?
Auditions Begin...
Sing is directed by Christophe Lourdelet (directorial debut) and Garth Jennings (The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Son of Rambow) and features the voices of Matthew McConaughey (Interstellar, Mud), Reese Witherspoon (Wild, Legally Blonde), Seth MacFarlane (Ted, Family Guy), Scarlett Johansson (The Avengers, Lucy), Taron Egerton (Eddie the Eagle, Kingsman: The Secret Service) and Tori Kelly (musician). "In a city of humanoid animals, a hustling theater impresario's attempt to save his theater with a singing competition becomes grander than he anticipates even as its finalists' find that their lives will never be the same". Illumination's latest offering comes from singing animals - will they be better than the secretive pets or the despicable minions?
Anyone who is anyone will be seen at Café Society.
This review contains Spoilers
Café Society is directed and written by Woody Allen (Annie Hall, Midnight in Paris) and stars Jesse Eisenberg (The Social Network, Now You See Me), Kristen Stewart (Twilight, Snow White & The Huntsman), Steve Carell (The Office, The 40-Year-Old Virgin) and Blake Lively (The Shallows, The Age of Adaline). "In the 1930s, a Bronx native moves to Hollywood and falls in love with a young woman who is seeing a married man". Woody Allen is known as one of the greats - is this yet another win or another rare misstep?
Secrets will be revealed, one unfortunate event at a time.
A Series of Unfortunate Events is the latest serving of binge-watching from Netflix. The show is based off of the series of books of the same name by Lemony Snicket. The TV series has numerous directors throughout (like usual) but stars Neil Patrick Harris (How I Met Your Mother, Gone Girl), Patrick Warburton (Family Guy, The Emperor's New Groove), Maline Weissman (Nine Lives, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles) and Louis Hynes as the recurring lead characters. "After the loss of their parents in a mysterious fire, the three Baudelaire children face trials and tribulations attempting to uncover dark family secrets'. Netflix has come quite reliable in recent years for providing quality entertainment that gets people talking - is A Series of Unfortunately Events upholding that or is it unfortunately time for Netflix to have a misstep?
Don't Think it, Don't Say it.
The Bye Bye Man is directed by Stacy Title (The Last Supper, Let the Devil Wear Back) and stars Douglas Smith (Vinyl, Big Love), Lucien Laviscount (Scream Queens, Waterloo Road) and Cressida Bonas (Doctor Thorne, Tulip Fever). "Three friends stumble upon the horrific origins of the Bye Bye Man, a mysterious figure they discover is the root cause of the evil behind man's most unspeakable acts". It's January, this is a horror film - this is the annual January horror film - does it live up to the awful reputation films like this have?
Here's to the Fools Who Dream
This review contains Spoilers
La La Land is directed and written by Damien Chazelle (Whiplash) and stars Emma Stone (The Help, Easy A), Ryan Gosling (The Nice Guys, The Big Short) and a cameo sized performance from the musician, John Legend. "A jazz pianist falls for an aspiring actress in Los Angeles". People have been talking about La La Land ever since Whiplash was a huge critical success - it has been on the festival circuit earlier in 2016 but it has finally hit mainstream audiences. With 7 Golden Globe wins, 11 BAFTA nominations and probably a string of Oscar nominations - is La La Land truly and deservingly the film to beat this awards season?
Escape is the Only Option.
The Colony is directed by Florian Gallenberger (City of War: The Story of John Rabe, Shadows of Time) and stars Emma Watson (Harry Potter, Beauty and the Beast), Daniel Bruhl (Inglorious Basterds, Captain America: Civil War) and Michael Nyqvist (John Wick, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo). "A young woman's desperate search for her abducted boyfriend that draws her into the infamous Colonia Dignidad, a sect nobody has ever escaped from". Based on true events, this film should be an eye opener to a dark part of Chilean history many are not aware of - is it effective or has Hollywood gone and done its thing?
This post is going to be all about why Moana is underperforming at the international box office and whether it will improve. As soon as Disney fast-tracked Moana after the mega-success of Frozen, everyone has been excited for the film. This is Disney's first princess film since the sisters of Arrendale and while the film has actually received even more critical acclaim than Frozen, audiences just haven't connected with Moana in the same way. Let's have a closer look at this problem....
Currently (as of January 8th 2017), Moana has grossed $450,094,182 worldwide - that is not the kind of number Disney is used to for their recent animated pictures. Frozen grossed almost $1.3 billion and Zootopia also managed to cross the billion mark (and Zootopia was meant to be their wild card for this year!). Moana has also opened in 84% of its markets which means that there are only 9 countries left for it to open in - Japan, Argentina, South Korea, Turkey, Hong Kong, Denmark, Norway, Sweden and Finland. In this case study, the film's I will be comparing Moana to are Frozen, Big Hero 6, Tangled and Zootopia. From the countries I just listed, they made up 29% of Frozen's total gross, 19% of Big Hero 6's, 12% of Tangled's and 13% of Zootopia's - this suggests that not much more money will be made from these new markets. Japan and South Korea are the most promising so if Moana connects well in those territories, the film could go on to close with over $650 million worldwide - this would be in the same range as Big Hero 6. Disney would be disappointed with this total as Moana was expected to be a billion dollar picture and...well, it's not!
If you look that the chart above, I have taken note of how much the most recent 4 Disney animated pictures have grossed in each of the territories and have found the average. If Moana was to maximise it's potential, it could go on to make around $175 million from the new markets bringing it's total to at least $625 million which does not take into account the extra money the film could bring in from its current markets. However, those averages are impacted slightly by the mega success of Frozen so realistically, Moana should be bringing in at extra $110 million from these new markets.
So what went wrong? The film hasn't had bad reviews so there is no reason for audiences not to be going out in their masses to see it. The biggest reason is that it is definitely not a Frozen - Frozen was pretty much revolutionary for a Disney film - the heart of the story were two sisters and any love interests took a back seat. I think this special connection between relatives may be what set Frozen aside. Even though Moana is a strong, independent female character too, she doesn't have that extra edge to touch the hearts of audiences. Some may say the connection with her grandmother or the fact that she is a dreamer but these are all qualities we have seen in animated film before, Moana wasn't as refreshing to audiences.
The soundtrack is liked by those who have seen the film but there has been no standout song and it hasn't actually performed too well. So far, the album has peaked at number 5 on the Billboard 200 and it should have gone to number 1 if Moana was a new phenomenon. I honestly think this is a rare case where Disney has got all the ingredients for a mega success but something unknown happened in the oven and it turned out just mediocre. Another reason could easily be over saturation - Zootopia, Finding Dory, The Secret Life of Pets, Sing, Trolls, Kung Fu Panda 3 are just some of the mainstream animated features that have performed solidly this year and even though Moana would make the list, it is towards the back of the pack - once again, unusual for Disney. Moana was one of the final animated releases of 2016 so audiences could have spent all their money on other things.
Moana's marketing campaign was also pretty light - I think it focused too much on Maui and should have made the film feel like an 'event movie'. I was always excited for the film but the actual marketing didn't make me excited until the final trailer.
So Moana's $450 million may be a little lacklustre for Disney but I think that should improve by the time the film has been released in Japan in March so hopefully this special flick will be able to rise (like the tide) to the $650 million mark. Who knows...maybe the final 9 markets will really connect with it and the film will have a resurgence in its current markets - hopefully we haven't seen the last of this film as it really is going out on a weak note. The good news is though, it has made enough money to at least break even so anything from now onwards is profit for Disney. However, let's not pity Disney too much - they had a cracking year!
Click here to read my review of Moana!
1/2 UPDATE - So almost a month later, let's look where Moana stands. The film still has 5 markets to open in - the spotlight is on Japan. So far, Moana has grossed over $533 million worldwide - it will probably close with or just shy of $600 million. This is a similar performance to Tangled so Disney shouldn't be too upset.
21/3 UPDATE - Moana has been released in all of its markets now and currently has a total of just over $606 million worldwide which is a positive - it will still have another couple of weeks till it has completed closed so $620 million is probably the maximum Moana will reach at this point. Not bad Disney, not bad.
See You Soon!
2016 may not have been the year where Suicide Squad was the best film released (it was not even close) but I still stand by the fact that there was one true piece of greatness hidden within the rubble and that was Margot Robbie's Harley Quinn who was my favourite character of 2016 and one of my favourite film characters of all time. My obsession with the character actually started before the film's release - I just had a feeling I was going to be a fan of Quinn from just the set pictures. I have to admit, I am yet to read the comics and I wasn't that aware of Quinn as a character before the announcement of Suicide Squad so some may call me a 'basic fan' but I love Robbie's portrayal of the character and I think my obsession is going a little too far.....
Your Destiny is in Your Blood.
Assassin's Creed is directed by Justin Kurzel (Macbeth, The Turning) and stars Michael Fassbender (X-Men: Days of Future Past, Prometheus) and Marion Cotillard (Allied, Inception). "When Callum Lynch explores the memories of his ancestor Aguilar and gains the skills of a Master Assassin, he discovers he is a descendant of the secret Assassins society". Video game movies still haven't had their big break - this is the third one from 2016 - can it beat both Warcraft and The Angry Birds Movie to become the first video game movie to actually be great?
Stories are Wild Creatures.
A Monster Calls is directed by J.A. Bayona (The Impossible, The Orphanage) and stars Lewis MacDougall (Pan), Sigourney Weaver (Alien, Avatar), Felicity Jones (Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, The Theory of Everything) and Liam Neeson (Taken, Batman Begins). "A boy seeks the help of a tree monster to cope with his single mom's terminal illness". Based on a best selling book and from an acclaimed director with classic Hollywood stars - is A Monster Calls the perfect recipe for a perfect film?
