Mission: Impossible Fallout (2018)

About the only area that could be improved is the likeability of the central characters but otherwise action doesn't get much better than this two-and-a-half-hour string of foot, motorbike, car and helicopter chases filmed so spectacularly every microfacial expression on Tom Cruise's Ethan Hunt's face is crystal clear as he careens cars through city streets, dogfights over Kashmir, sprints glamorous European city blocks at roof level and, as is known very well right from the start, saves the world from the dastardly plot of a bamboozling number of counter- and counter-counter-spies in what is essentially the same plot as Rogue Nation.

★★★★☆

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Pixels (2015)

It doesn't know whether it wants to appeal to kids of the 80s or simply to kids and so for the former it is too childish and for the latter it is inappropriately adult, but if you are a kid of the 80s nostalgic for old-school video games and can look past horrible sexism and scenes of troubling male pack-mentality bullying and sleaze, this comedy about a world under attack by 80s video games is often funny.

★★★☆☆

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Kiss Kiss Bang Bang (2005)

This pulpy crime comedy has mismatched investigators, one an injury-prone small-time crook, the other a tough guy P.I., hilariously bungling their way through a seedy LA investigation involving long lost sisters, body doubles, setups, and an enormous body count, and features scenes and situations that play out again very similarly in the 2016 The Nice Guys, also directed by Shane Black and it too inspired to some extent by the pulp crime books of Brett Halliday.

★★★★☆

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Source Code (2011)

A jumble of sci-fi ideas that couldn't possibly end up making any sense, ends up making sense in this smart and snappy action flick that pulls a final, surprising emotional punch.

★★★★☆

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