Hercules (12A)
Hercules (12A)
Dir: Brett Ratner
With: Dwayne Johnson, Ian McShane
Runtime: 98mins
MAN-MOUNTAIN Dwayne Johnson gives an appropriately over-sized performance in the title role of Brett Ratner's Hercules, a trashy but enjoyable blockbuster that keeps its tongue firmly in cheek.
Eschewing the fantastical in favour of the real, and deriving its inspiration from the graphic novel Hercules: The Thracian Wars, this finds Hercules leading a band of mercenaries and mining his success from the legends (true or false) surrounding his demi-god status as the "son of Zeus".
This being a Brett "Rush Hour" Ratner film, subtlety and complexity are in short supply, but thanks to a brisk pace, some decent action sequences, Johnson's charisma and some ham-filled, winking support from John Hurt and Ian McShan, Hercules emerges as a fun romp that rates as a guilty pleasure.
Reviewed by Rob Carnevale
Northwest (15)
Dir: Michael Noer
With: Gustav Dyekjaer Giese, Oscar Dyekjaer Giese
Runtime: 89 minutes
SCANDINAVIA'S crown as the world capital of gripping crime thrillers shows no sign of slipping yet, as this firecracker of a tale shows. Casper (Gustav Dyekjaer) is a bad lad with a good heart, burgling other people's houses to give his family a better life. Going to work for a bigger crime boss seems like a smart career move, until his old employer finds out. Dyekjaer is superb, the tale is sinewy, and the whole enterprise hurtles along like a runaway train.
Glasgow Film Theatre, July 25-31
Earth to Echo (PG)
Dir: Dave Green
With: Reese Hartwig, Teo Halm
Runtime: 91 minutes
WITH bulldozers about to raze their homes to make way for a new road, some best friends forever are getting ready to go their separate ways. With one week left together, strange things start happening in the neighbourhood, so what else can the boys (and girl) do but get on their bikes to investigate? Will pass a school holiday afternoon enjoyably enough, though anyone who has come within a million miles of ET will feel they are speeding down memory lane.
The House of Magic (3D) (U)
Dirs: Jeremy Degruson, Ben Stassen
Voices: Emily Blunt, Grant George
Runtime: 85 minutes
A LITTLE lost cat called Thunder blunders into a creepy old house and so begins a riot of animated adventures. Jeremy Degruson and Ben Stassen's picture has some good gags - I particularly liked the dog who described himself as the Marlon Brando of chihuahuas - and some stunning animated sequences. More involving than the duo's previous offering, A Turtle's Tale, if a long way from Pixar.
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