Category Archives: Thriller

The Dark Knight Rises review

July 22, 2012 flawintheiris

Directed by Christopher NolanWritten by Jonathan and Christopher Nolan, from a story by Christopher Nolan andDavid S. Goyer. Batman was created by Bob Kane in DC Comics.And so it ends, eh? When Christopher Nolan was handed the reins to the pointy-eared vigilante franchise and Batman Begins came out in 2005, the character could only go…Read More

London Boulevard and The Double reviewed

February 14, 2012 flawintheiris

Just in case you think I've not been seeing anything lately, here are two new reviews of films I caught up with on DVD. (It's almost too cold in Halifax to go out to the movies, I'm just sayin'.)London Boulevard, the review up at The Coast, offers another sterling Colin Farrell performance. And The Double,…Read More

Haywire review — Terrific spy thriller delivers wall-to-wall action

January 21, 2012 flawintheiris

Directed by Steven Soderbergh | Written by Lem Dobbs | 93 min | Hoopla Oh, how much fun is Haywire? It's from Steven Soderbergh, who is always an interesting director—I'm a big fan of The Limey, Out of Sight, sex lies and videotape and Solaris, with much respect for Traffic, last year's Contagion, Erin Brockovich…Read More

Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol review

December 19, 2011 flawintheiris

Directed by Brad Bird Written by Josh Appelbaum and André Nemec, based on the TV series Mission: Impossible created by Bruce Geller | Netflix People talk about how the Bourne movies updated the espionage action thriller for the new century, in the feel and the look of the thing. Just consider how the director of…Read More

Contagion review

October 2, 2011 flawintheiris

Directed by Steven Soderbergh | Written by Scott Z. Burns | 106 min | Netflix I've read that Soderbergh's intent with this virus thriller was to make a film akin to producer/director Irwin Allen's disaster movies of the 1970s, which included The Poseidon Adventure, The Towering Inferno and The Swarm. The template of those pictures…Read More

The Debt review

September 4, 2011 flawintheiris

Directed by John MaddenWritten by Matthew Vaughn, Jane Goldman and Peter Straughan,based on the film Ha-Hov by Assaf Bernstein and Ido RosenblumRachel Singer (Helen Mirren), ex-husband Stephan Gold (Tom Wilkinson) and ex-pat David Peretz (Ciaran Hinds) are national heroes in their homeland of Israel. In the mid-1960s they were Mossad agents, assigned to East Berlin…Read More

The Mechanic (2011), The Mechanic (1972) reviews

June 13, 2011 flawintheiris

(2011) Directed by Simon WestWritten by Richard Wenk and Lewis John Carlino(1972) Directed by Michael WinnerWritten by Lewis John CarlinoBoth now on DVD For fans of action movies, watching these two workman-like examples of the genre is a great lesson in how much they've changed in the past 40 years.These days we expect our action…Read More

Hanna review

April 8, 2011 flawintheiris

Directed by Joe Wright Written by Seth Lochhead and David Farr Hanna is a lot of things. On the surface it's what the trailer says it is: Saoirse Ronan is the titular teen, raised since diapers to be a polyglot killer by her father, Erik (Eric Bana) in a shack in the snowbound wastes, hiding…Read More

Source Code review

April 4, 2011 flawintheiris

Directed by Duncan JonesWritten by Ben RipleyI'm enjoying these recent high concept science fiction pictures—though some more than others—including Limitless and The Adjustment Bureau, and now Source Code. This new film is built around another simple premise with a whisper of The Twilight Zone to it, not so unlike the idea of a secret, invisible…Read More

Limitless review

March 16, 2011 flawintheiris

Directed by Neil BurgerWritten by Leslie Dixon from an Alan Glynn novelLimitless is a movie for our over-medicated times, and a concept so high and wired that the picture refuses to let you down until the credits roll. Sure, it could have been a whole lot more than just a rush, but in terms of…Read More