Margin Call (2011)

Like the 2007-2008 financial crisis that is this movie's context, the problem that befalls Jeremy Irons' investment banking megacorporation cannot be easily explained (something about a flawed equation and always out-of-frame data and graphs that herald tremendous financial loss) so it is hard to care much about this corporate thriller which has its ensemble cast spout platitudes every time the crux of the problem needs elucidation - plus, the people you might actually feel sympathy for, not smug suits staring out of their skyscrapers or weeping in sleek toilet cubicles but the hardworking public who you know ultimately lose out, are kept out of the picture.

★★☆☆☆

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Firewall (2006)

This is one of those thrillers like Panic Room and Red Eye that is built around a criminal's diabolical - but from the get-go ludicrous - plan that descends into chaos before it even begins, but still it goes on and on, and as Paul Bettany's archvillain looks less and less (and less) likely to get anything for the enormous amount of trouble he has gone to (kidnapping Harrison Ford's banking security expert's family, distributing spy camera biros, stealing epipens, doling out poor dietary choices of biscuits, spending a long couple of listless days on his victim's couch eating cereal and watching Fred Flintstone) still he persists with the chaos, to the end carting around the yappy family dog, keeping people alive for no reason, and resolutely ignoring the fact that his criminal gang is destroying itself from the inside as the family of victims rests and listens to their iPods.

★★☆☆☆

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Transcendence (2014)

"Johnny Depp is a brilliant scientist who uploads his conscience to the internet and becomes all-powerful" is a winning science fiction film pitch but the resulting movie is less winning with the film opening a loooong time before Johnny Depp's brilliant scientist uploads his conscience to the internet, so there's a hohum wait for audiences as the pitch is set-up and then, too soon after things start to get interesting, the movie moves into its third act when the all-powerful A.I. is suddenly not so all-powerful, allowing an awkward hurry-let's-find-a-way-to-end-this conclusion.

★★★☆☆

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