Reviews

Baby Reindeer is one of the most compelling, thought provoking and genuinely insightful pieces of TV I have seen. But it's also really entertaining.

Creator and actor Richard Gadd pulls no punches in dissecting his own autobiographical story, going warts and all into some very dark and challenging places. But he also tells it in a way that remains upbeat, often funny and consistently engaging.

It's rare that a male character is allowed to be as psychologically stripped bare as Donny is. But it's unique to see a man dealing with abuse, sexuality, masculinity and self-doubt in a way that is not preachy, depressing, patronising or fake.

The cast are all excellent. Jessica Gunning, who plays Martha, is a complete revelation. I hope we get to see a lot more of her in future shows. Nava Mau really glows in her role, and her contribution to the story is so well done.

This is a series that will stay with me for a long time. So happy to have seen it.

I am amused by those reviewers asking for a second season though. What more do you want this poor guy to go through?

Richard Armitage plays a doctor who's accused of commiting a murder in Beijing. He escapes back to the UK, but he's immediately extradited back to China at the airport. On the plane he is accompanied by a British police officer, played by Jing Lusi. During the flight, things start getting complicated.

The cast are universally good. The production values are decent.

For the script, there's a number of "suspend belief" moments. Lots of people have brought up the unlikely extradition of a British citizen from Heathrow to China with no lawyers or due process. But hey, it's a popcorn spy thriller. I didn't have a high expectation for realism. If you hate that, there's much worse to come in the series, believe me!

Regularly characters behave in dumb ways to let the plot progress (especially the bad guys). And there's plenty of unlikely coincidences to keep it moving.

Also, I know China is the new go-to propaganda boogieman, but jeez - this one is pretty relentless in it's xenophobia of mainland Chinese people. Clearly the writers haven't spent any time there.

However biggest problem for me was the pacing. The series spans 6 episodes, each 1 hour long. There's a lot of padding, and often it moves too slowly and takes itself much too seriously. Far better and more complicated stories have been told in a 1.5 to 2 hour movie. Had it been sharper, faster and less brooding, I think I would have enjoyed it more.

It's ok. Put it on in the background when you're doing something else and it's entertaining enough. Don't think about it too much though, and certainly don't think you're going to learn anything about the world!

It took me a long time to pluck up the courage to see this, as I am a huge fan of the film it's based on, Akira Kurosawa's Ikiru, and I was fairly sure they'd ruin it with modern storytelling.

Thankfully, they didn't. It's almost a scene-for-scene retelling of the original. They modernised some parts - splitting some dialog that was previously in one long scene into a few different scenes for example - but not in a way that diminished their impact or importance.

Bill Nighy was really great, which was a relief as I find him a little repetitive in some of his roles. He still gets his trademark smirk in here a couple of times, but he also fully embodies the main character. I find it hard to imagine many other actors pulling it off in the way he did.

Writer Kazuo Ishiguro did a fantastic job of transposing the movie from Japan to 1950's England. The time period is both repressed and also vibrant, and completely convincing. I adored The Remains of the Day (which Ishiguro also wrote) and once again here he brings his unique perspective on old England vividly to life.

And most importantly, the emotional impact of the original movie is left in tact. It's a hugely moving, beautiful and inspiring story - one that leaves me with a love of life and of living - and I still felt that magic in this retelling.

If you're up for watching a black and white 1952 movie in Japanese with subtitles then I thoroughly recommend Ikiru. It's undoubtedly still better than this, and it's so beautiful to look at. But I am aware that's not everyone's cup of tea, and I am delighted that this faithful remake exists to bring the beauty of the story to a new audience.

In a war-torn near-future USA, we follow four journalists on a mission to get themselves into the centre of the action and capture the perfect photo.

The movie builds a compelling world out of the fallen USA. It takes us through small town America, to huge encampments, to big city warzones, all beautifully imagined. There's moments of peace and quiet, and then jarring, very loud and convincing action scenes. It's a road trip movie that spends more time on the journey than the trailer lets on, but that journey is still engaging.

You are absolutely expected to root for the journalists, and that's where the film falls short for me. It never explains why. They get incredibly excited by photographing people they don't know getting shot, and spend a lot of their time capturing images of corpses, but once they're on their journey they've never seen filing a story, and the impact of their work is never explored.

One young, inexperienced photojournalist is our route into the movie, but she shoots on film rather than digital, and it's never explained where she gets all that film or development kit from, or how she's going to get that out to be published in the modern world.

The main male character never does anything - just smokes weed, gets emotional, and is regularly very excited about being in the middle of the action. He never photographs, never writes, never documents. I have no idea what he does.

And without any impact to their work, it felt to me like we were really following four war tourists across a broken USA, going from one thrill seeking experience to the next. We were supposed to feel bad for them at times when things go wrong, but like watching some influencer hurting themselves by doing something dumb, I didn't. I didn't much care for them or their mission. I don't know why it's important. I was left with a bitter feeling that it's all a bit too exploitationary.

There are many, many better movies about the role of photojournalism, or about war. Civil War's only special hook is that it's set closer to home. It has a role as a NIMBYistic cautionary tale about the direction of current politics, but unfortunately no depth beyond that.

The story follows a down and out, gambling addicted cleaner who accidentally overhears some illegal insider trading and decides to get in on the action. This throws her into a world she doesn't understand and where she is out of her depth - facing up to corporate types, petty debt collectors and dirty gangsters.

The main character is painted as sympathetic, but she's often obnoxious. She cheats, lies, steals, and often ruins every chance she creates herself. Her journey is frustrating to watch, as she regularly brings her friends and family down with her on the way. She is absolutely an antihero, and if you see her that way, I found her quite interesting. I wish her portrayal was more gritty, as it's clear the filmmakers want us to root for her - but often you don't want to.

She's also quite inconsistent - sometimes helpless and hapless, sometimes a strategic genius. From one scene to the next it can be hard to believe she's the same character.

Instead the side characters really are the heart of the show - her kids, estranged husband, friends, colleagues, and even her local shopkeeper show more heart than her, and it's those you mostly care about.

The whole thing is too long and stretched out - it could have been 3 episodes comfortably. The writers create drama to fill in the extra time, which was unnecessary. But I was interested enough in the central dilemma to not be bored.

The story gets increasingly implausible as it goes, but not more than most TV dramas. I still found it entertaining, even when I had to suspend disbelief. The "normal people vs the 1%" dynamic sometimes showed real promise and had interesting things to say, sometimes was a little shallow and patronising.

Overall, I wish it was shorter, and I wish they had embraced the moral ambiguity of the main character more. But I found the core idea compelling, and am glad I watched it. Still better than most things on ITV or Netflix.

The only thing worse than a bad movie is a potentially excellent movie that misses the mark. This is one of those.

On the plus side there's beautiful world building, excellent visuals, a genuinely creepy space weapon, and an intriguing core concept touching on war, propaganda, AI and robotics.

Unfortunately all of those positives are let down by hole-ridden plotting, weak characters, inconsistent motives, chonky dialogue, and a weird orientalism that uses "East Asian culture" as window dressing.

It felt like every plot decision was made to take us from one spectacular (often stereotype-filled) set piece to the next, rather than driven genuinely by the characters or a sense of real time and space. The locations look amazing but are skin deep, with no real connection to the characters within them or why the story has to happen there. So it all feels shallow, and lacking solidity or genuine purpose.

It's a shame, because with a smaller but tighter geographic scale, a better plot, and some more care for the characters, there's a real gem of a movie within reach. But this is not it.

Stuck inside with a bad cold, binge watched everything from Manifest that was on Netflix UK - which was season 1 and season 4. Apparently S2 and S3 are locked out here for some licensing reason.

The show is fun. I found the concept enjoyable, and many of the subplots and twists were entertaining. The characters were sometimes surprisingly well rounded, happy to solve problems with compromise and empathy rather than hyping up conflict for the sake of it. I found most of them likeable.

Sure the show is schlocky in places. A few of the performances are laughably bad at times, there's a lot of cheese, and the whole mythology gets increasingly less grounded as it goes until it jumps the shark a few times over. Some of the dialog is tacky, and some of the CGI is poor.

But despite that I have no regrets. The show kept me entertained, and most importantly, it had a solid ending that wasn't begging for a sequel but instead made the journey feel complete and worthwhile. That's something to be savoured these days.

If you're on UK Netflix and you're worried about skipping S2 and S3, I'd say don't worry. I didn't feel like I missed much and picked up pretty quickly on what had happened in S4. In honesty I'm not sure I could have been bothered to do 4 seasons - the two I watched was plenty.

Overall, if you're bored, you like intriguing sci-fi drama, and you're not allergic to cheese, this is a fun diversion from the real world.

Binged this when bored with a fever on a weekday afternoon, and it kept me entertained.

The concept is intriguing, the acting is solid, the production values are more like Saturday night British TV than peak Hollywood but still not bad.

It's sometimes slow, sometimes preachy, and sometimes silly. Sometimes apparently smart characters do things that don't make sense. Sometimes plot points are forced through without regard for reality. Sometimes whole segments of drama would be solved if two people would just talk to each other. But these are all problems that you'll find in many other B-level dramas.

I probably won't remember this show after next week, but as a fan of end-of-the-world shows and political dramas, this was an ok diversion from a bad cold and I didn't regret investing my time into the 5 episodes.

Nice to see Matthew Fox again too. I liked him in Lost and he shows a new maturity here that I hope we get to see more of in better projects.

From the luke warm reviews I left this movie until I was bored, and was pleasantly surprised.

It feels quite theatrical, relying a lot on narration to tell its story. It's not exciting or dramatic, it's more contemplative and introspective. The trailer oversells the "fun" and "action" side, when it's more of an enjoyable classic mystery.

It centres around a key romance that is meant to be deep and passionate, but unfortunately never manages to find that passion on screen. Which is a shame and pretty mystifying when you've got the talent of Tilda Swinton and the charisma of Idris Elba to get you there. But unfortunately they're never given the chance to smoulder, which leaves you with a fairly pedestrian romance to centre the story around.

Despite that though, there's plenty of fun subplots that are entertaining and intelligently intriguing. And putting aside some dodgy CGI, these subplots are also visually beautiful too.

And after it does make you wonder what you might wish for and where it might lead you.

I think the heavy "by the producers of The Bodyguard" advertising is a mistake, because this is nothing like The Bodyguard.

If you picture an enjoyable easy-watching six-part political spy drama, as might be made by the team behind Murder In Paradise, then you'd be much closer to what to expect.

There's one overarching plot that covers all six episodes, and while it's not exactly John Le Carre, it still kept me hooked throughout.

And then each episode contains a separate subplot exploring the day-to-day dramas of visitors to Barcelona. These can be a bit hit and miss. Some genuinely pull at your heartstrings, some are a bit silly.

The characters are all likeable, the two lead actresses are engaging, the locations look great, and there's a nice paired back contemporary feel to it. It does sometimes drift into "daytime TV" dialog, but not often enough to be a problem.

Overall, a fun night of binging and it kept me a lot more interested than I was expecting. I hope there's more to come!

I'm old enough to remember walking out of the cinema as a teen after seeing the original The Matrix, and feeling like I could fly. So for sheer nostalgia, it's nice to be back in the world that the original created - revisiting the mythology of the virtual world vs real world, checking in on Neo and Trinity, and asking yourself yet again which pill you would take.

But like the original sequels, this gets bogged down in its own cod philosophy, and is so obsessed with endless exposition and explanation that it completely forgets to do any character development. So you don't care about anyone (even Neo or Trinity, especially not the newbies) and when they're in danger it's actively boring rather than gripping.

The most interesting stuff happens with the slightly smug self-referential content at the beginning, which is amusing in places. But even that tires quickly.

I feel there is the gem of a good idea in this film, but it was sacrificed for style over substance, and too much complicated backstorying. I didn't hate it, but afterwards I certainly didn't feel like I could fly.

Get Out is still Peele's best work by far, but this is no dud. Sure, it's sometimes confused and incoherent, often characters act in bizarre ways, and it doesn't really hold together as a whole - but it's also fascinating, unusual, beautiful to look at, and manages to build a few moments of real dramatic tension.

I won't look at the clouds in the same way again for a while, and some moments (esp. The rain on the house) will stay with me for long after I've finished watching it - which is more than I can say for most movies.

The cast were great, and I agree it's Keke's movie - although her character was pretty irritating in the first half.

I hope Peele gets his storytelling mojo back on track in future pictures - but after Get Out, Us and this, I will still be eager to check out his next feature.

Just like classic 70s slasher movies this film takes its sweet time to reach its gory conclusion. Most of the film has fun building characters, referencing classic movies from the past, and dropping plenty of foreshadowing into the mix on the way.

I don't know why everyone is talking about horror, because it's not. If you're here for Hereditary and the like you'll be disappointed. And although there's a porn-related plotline, it's not sexy (and doesn't try to be) - the porn is mostly played for laughs, and as a counterpoint to some of the anti-porn that's to come.

Instead you've got some well-built tension leading to 20 minutes of chaotic, gory slasher nastiness. My wife and I really enjoyed it.

The reviews here are what happens when you piss off a passionate fandom.

• Yes, it's got strong YA teen angst vibes.

• Yes, there's some progressive virtue signalling shoehorned in (nowhere near as much as some reviews make out).

• Yes, the story is weak in places and pacing inconsistent. Dialog can be clunky.

• Yes, it's not faithful to Resident Evil canon, and it's mostly action drama rather than sci-fi horror.

• It's also got some hilarious Microsoft product placement.

But it's ok. It's got some moments of nice action, some of the locations are cool, the cast are generally good, CGI is solid, most zombies look scary.

If you're ok to switch off for some silly action (and you're not a Resident Evil die hard) then it's nowhere near as bad as the other reviews would suggest.

As others here have said, Netflix should have just called it Visiting Nastiness or something rather than Resident Evil, so it doesn't claim to be part of something it's not. Then it would likely have an average score of 5 or 6.

With all the positivity around this movie, I expected more. I guess the overwhelming hype must come from a teen or YA audience.

It's fun and light, with plenty of goodhearted vibes and cartoon action. There's some very loose Truman Show or Westworld themes, but they're just played for laughs - there's specifically no substance here, only style.

Similarly to Ready Player One, you'll see plenty of pop culture references from film, YouTube land, TV shows etc - and there's two fun little cameos - but apart from going "wasn't that from....?" they don't really add anything

I'm getting a little tired of the zany Ryan Reynolds shtick, and there's plenty of that here. If you're still into that, then maybe you'll enjoy watching him do his thing. Jodie Comer brings the film its only real edge, with a two sided performance (super cool hero / nerdy coder) that's very watchable.

My advice: wait until it's free on streaming and enjoy it when you've got nothing better to do. Don't spend money getting it now, like I did.

I watched the Netflix film first, and then thanks to the reviews on that one, discovered this Danish original and watched that too.

The Netflix film is a taught and effective thriller, with a great central performance from Jake Gyllenhaal. It's mostly word-for-word the same as the Danish version. And it's free if you have Netflix!

The Danish version is £2.99 on Amazon. It's less stylish and less melodramatic, but much more believable and affecting. I cared more for all the characters, and despite knowing exactly how it was going to play out, I was hooked throughout. At times I couldn't look away.

The Netflix film adds an unneccesary personal arc, some wildfire-related melodrama, and a set more like a James Bond MI5 office than a 911 (or 112) call centre - all of which reduced the impact and made the film less engaging.

If you're definitely not going to watch the Danish version, the Netflix one is a good bet. If you're ok to watch either, choose this original - it's a lot more suspensful and completely captivating. (Ideally, unlike me, don't watch both!)

I watched the Netflix film first, and then thanks to the reviews here, discovered the Danish original and watched that too.

The Netflix film is a taught and effective thriller, with a great central performance from Jake Gyllenhaal. It's mostly word-for-word the same as the Danish version. And it's free if you have Netflix!

The Danish version is £2.99 on Amazon. It's less stylish and less melodramatic, but much more believable and affecting. I cared more for all the characters, and despite knowing exactly how it was going to play out, I was hooked throughout. At times I couldn't look away.

The Netflix film adds an unneccesary personal arc, some wildfire-related melodrama, and a set more like a James Bond MI5 office than a 911 (or 112) call centre - all of which reduced the impact and made the film less engaging.

If you're definitely not going to watch the Danish version, the Netflix one is a good bet. If you're ok to watch either, choose the original - it's a lot more suspensful and completely captivating. (Ideally, unlike me, don't watch both!)

The Falklands War is so full of interesting moral, military and political dilemmas that it makes an interesting topic to cover - and this does a good job of looking at one side of the history. It's engaging to watch, well performed, and, even as a film, the theatrical format doesn't get in the way.

However it is so blatantly pro-British and pro-Thatcher that you will not walk away feeling like you understand the topic fully. It's the film equivalent of Churchills "fight them on the beaches" speech, full of stiff upper lip, keep calm carry on, and cups of tea.

If you're ok to see a propagandist view of a complex event, this is fine. But make sure you read into the other sides too.

After the critical bashing, I went into this with very low expectations and was pleasantly surprised.

The start of the film presents itself as an intelligent AI based thriller, but it devolves into an increasingly silly b-movie as it progresses. It misses several opportunities to tell smarter stories, instead heading in a bombastic direction - with a conclusion that's both action packed and anticlimactic at the same time.

However I enjoyed it throughout. The cast was ridiculously jam packed with talent - even wasting a bunch like Cillian Murphy and Kate Mara with tiny roles. Xander Berkeley from 24 is credited for a literally 5 second role where he just appears and dies. And he's not even the craziest cameo.

Plus, as it's directed by the cinematographer behind Nolan's hits, you know it's going to be nicely put together - and it is. Much of the CGI and practical effects look great, and the scenery is suitably photogenic.

Overall, if you like sci-fi, and you're bored, and it's free on your chosen streaming service, this is worth a shout.

The film revolves around a dysfunctional family that I had a hard time feeling any emotion for - despite hard work from a fantastic cast.

The Russian shtick was taken straight out of an 80s American action movie, with the better parts blatantly copied from Killing Eve and The Americans. Yelena is so obviously Villanelle.

The social message about the agency and exploitation of women was admirable but felt shoehorned into the story, especially in the final act.

Overall I didn't really care for any of the characters, and the plot wasn't original enough to make up for it. Which is a tragedy when you've got Raquel Weisz, Scarlett Johansson and Florence Pugh on your team.

One of the weaker Marvel movies unfortunately - and I really wanted to like it. The pigs were cute though.

There are great set pieces - but it can't decide on tone. Sometimes it's dick jokes, sometimes it's character building, sometimes it's violence, sometimes it's liberal geopolitics, sometimes it's heads and guts exploding, sometimes it's "emotional" flashbacks.

There are times it takes itself too seriously ("we've got to save the people!". "the government are corrupt!", "lets help restore democracy!") but then just two minutes later they're stepping over innocent people's corpses and making puns about eating them.

Just with the tone, the SFX ranged from amazing to video game too, which was off-putting.

I wanted to like it - and there are times when it really entertained - but after all of it, I found myself confused and uncomfortable, and worst of all, sometimes bored.

All of the main cast put on a great show though. Margot and Idris especially. Polka dot dude and the weasel were underused. Could have skipped the shark.

This is not a stylish heist movie starring strippers - as the marketing would suggest - but a drama about friendship, wealth and morality that happens to feature a heist and strippers. I think most of the reviewers here went into the film expecting the former but got the latter.

It's tonally more like The Big Short meets Marriage Story than the Oceans movies. And if you're into that you might enjoy it as much as I did. Constance Wu and J Lo were great, and I found their story genuinely moving, interesting and engaging.

I read the novel before eventually seeing the film and it's a rare case of the movie elevating and complementing the book. Both make great companion pieces - the book has such beautiful detail and precision, while the movie perfectly captures and condenses the emotion of the story.

The performances are exquisite throughout - and great to see so many of the secondary cast in major roles today too.

The negative reviews on here are right - the story is not original, and you have heard it all before, or some variation. But the world is completely irresistible, the characters bright and entertaining, the songs great and well placed (I generally cringe at songs in movies), and it's just so beautiful to look at.

There's some great jokes - for both adults and children. My wife and I watched it together (kid free) and thoroughly enjoyed every second.

My only regret is that the wife keeps comparing me to Heihei now.