Watchable. Starts with 80s music but tells about VR games and applies computer game aesthetic. References to 80s pop culture abound but in smartly twisted ways: key elements of "Shining" get incorporated in a game, knowledge of pop culture of the period proves you as a fan and not a commercial exploiter, the main protagonist is a teenager driving a DeLorean, who once gets dubbed "McFly" by a newly met girl, the set revokes "Tron" as well. Recent worldwide audience favourites appear too: Transformers-like giant humanoid machines and zombies. The plot, however, is predictable. And Simon Pegg isn't funny - how comes he gets so many roles beneath his talent?! Top-notch 3D makes it all entertaining. I saw it on a regular size screen and I had an impression that Imax would be overwhelming. An ordinary screen should do just fine.
The trailer of upcoming "Taxi 5" looks like the French have taken after American dumbest comedies where you laugh at people because they are ugly or a midget.
LUIS AND THE ALIENS 3D
Watchable. The 3D makes a minor difference. Very light entertainment. Pleasantly animated, a simple story perfect for children, very derivative for adults: the aliens taking on human forms, a father crazed with a space invasion forgetting his son's birthday, evil social care officers attempting to deprive him of parental rights, alien police, the look of aliens, school bullies. I liked a well-off father reading "The Snooty Economist". An early mid-credit shows the aliens on the petting mat they bought earlier on.
THE HURRICANE HEIST
Walked out. Shouldn't the pre-storm sky have more saturated colours? Everything in the movie is grey: the sky, the vehicles, clothes, interior design, even faces. Apart from a computer hacker in an evening dress. Wooden dialogues. Even the heist plot is ramshackle.
SLIMAKI (SNAILS)
Watchable. A short documentary which could serve as an instruction video for people planning to breed snails. The protagonists are treated warmly and the business with a pinch of salt, especially as the main job turns out to be ensuring the would-be snacks don't run. Not earth-shattering but fun.
NAJBRZYDSZY SAMOCHOD SWIATA (THE UGLIEST CAR)
Watchable. Another short documentary treating the protagonists with lots of warmth. An aged son and mother, both uneducated, very poor and ill protect each other going through life together. He's a smoker and looks older than his mother. Charming but sad as it's about the deprived ones.
MARY MAGDALENE
Watchable. She's the one who set up Christianity following Jezus' death but has been wrongly considered a converted prostitute for centuries so I went to the movie dying to know how they would present her. Like all religious movies it's terribly dignified. All apostles are obedient and reverent. Shot in Matera and near Naples, with inspiring underwater images. Unfortunately downright ugly Joaquin Phoenix, looking like a hobo, is Jezus. The final written note on the screen gives Mary Magdalene justice. It states Pope Gregory in 591 wrongly called her a prostitute. In 2016 Vatican recognised her as the Apostle of Apostles.
AFRYKAMERA 2018
SUPA MODO
Watchable. What appears to be a story of a terminally ill, probably with cancer, Kenyan girl, turns into a comedy about amateurs shooting a superhero movie and that's the best part of the film, e.g. with a guy bringing a mat because the director needed "a carpet" - well, he meant a red carpet. Like in all decent superhero films there's a post-credit.
MEERKAT MAANTUIG (MEERKAT MOONSHIP)
Watchable. Another film about an ill child. But this one is from the perspective of a lovely healthy girl. It's set in an Afrikaans family, shot in lush wooded area of the Limpopo River, and tells partly about dealing with grief and mostly about facing one's fears: "Everyone has a hairy monster stopping them from doing things which are exciting or new." It has an atmosphere of a secret, is slow-paced and told gently. On the other hand it's quite stereotypical and sad. But teaches you to fear nothing and just do what you love.
HIGH FANTASY
Watchable. Black South Africa this time. Arid land of Northern Cape Province. One teenage boy and three girls swap their bodies. He gets "genuinely scared that what he was doing to girls was going to start happening to him now." All of them get crazy about the black issue. Scary how everyone, black or white, hates whites, seeing them as big land proprietors. The "found footage" technique doesn't impair the movie as it's very well shot, acted and with good music and imaginative, colourful typography in the final credits.
ELLEN
Recommended. A harrowing, based on facts, story of a mother driven to killing her own son. Masterfully presents the whole process of her good boy changing into a monster. Produced by a recovered drug addict. Ellen's life is like a history of violence against women in South Africa. Jill Levenberg plausibly renders the main character. Shot in Ellen's real house.
ZULU WEDDING
Watchable.Terribly American: the male lead has a side-kick, there's a fat black woman working in law enforcement, both fiances are amazingly rich. Colourful but cheesy.
ADAMA
Watchable. Delightful animation, mostly watercolours-like, with hues changing along with the geographical regions the boy passes. The story's clear-cut, very linear but lacks the depth it implies to hide. Just another rendition of the Eldorado myth.
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