Captain America: The First Avenger (2011) took us back to the 1940s and the second world war, and the arms race between Germany and the Allies. Make no mistake, this was one of the most creative periods in history in terms of innovation, and both sides really were investigating human enhancement

as well as engineering improvements. It’s just that the Americans mostly used volunteers, and the Nazis… well, we all know what they...

Thor (2011) represented a big change of pace for the fledgling MCU. Bringing Kenneth Branagh, Shakespearean actor and director, on to direct and giving him effectively

completely creative control meant Thor looked very different to the previous MCU movies… and

indeed any other superhero movie made before, or since. The Asgard scenes are very Shakespearean in their setting and scope, and the actors Branagh chose really did...

Returning to direct Iron Man 2, Jon Favreau delivered a movie that wasn’t particularly well-received at the time even though it made excellent profits ($623 million off a $200 million budget), but works really well in hindsight. It has some interesting parallels with A Christmas Carol (bear with me here) in that Justin Hammer and Ivan Vanko are representative of Tony Stark’s past and possible future, respectively. Hammer is wh...

After the spectacular success of Iron Man, The Incredible Hulk was a pretty big mis-step for Marvel, even though they proclaimed it a commercial success. Part of the problem was the casting of Edward Norton, who just seems too quiet and diminutive for the role of Bruce Banner. Mark Ruffalo probably isn’t much bigger physically, but he dominates the space around him with a force or personality Norton just doesn’t have. The movi...

Even looking back over a decade later, it’s hard to find a lot to criticize about Jon Favreau’s Iron Man. When you consider that Marvel went with a very dangerous choice of actor in the recently-rehabbed Robert Downey Jr., to play a third-tier comic book character and spent $140 million making the movie, it really was one helluva gamble.

Of course, the gamble paid off. Iron Man grossed over $580 million at the box office, the s...

Before I start this review, I should probably that that The Mummy (1999) with Brendan Fraser and Rachel Weisz, is one of my all-time favourite movies.  So this 2017 reboot has a lot of baggage to get past - not least in that it stars Tom Cruise, who isn't exactly everyone's favourite actor.

If you haven't seen the 1999 version, I think you'd probably really enjoy this. I tried to watch with unbiased eyes, and the movie had...

I took my sons to see Wonder Woman today.

Now, I'm always gonna be a Marvel fangirl. There hasn't been a good DC movie since the original Christopher Reeve's Superman in my opinion - Christopher Nolan's Dark Knight series were way too dark for me and the current iterations of Batman and Superman are just dire. Especially Henry Cavill's complete inability to make any expression other than a pout.

However, having two young sons, I...

Take tissues. You'll need them. I cried twice.

That's about all I can say without getting spoilery, so if you don't want spoilers, don't read on from here.

Despite his apparent immortality and healing factor, Logan's grown old. The adamantium inside him is slowly poisoning him... he's not healing like he used to, he's coughing up blood. He knows there's nothing to be done. He seems to have given up hope; the only reason he's st...

I went along to see this movie with my hubby and sons, in the last week of the school holidays over here in Australia, expecting to be mildly entertained by the usual couple hours of outlandish stunts and occasional one-liners.

MUCH to my surprise, I absolutely loved it.

Yes, the plot’s a bit thin in spots. Yes, some of the stunts are completely and utterly nonsensically unbelievable.

But the xXx franchise has always known how no...