The King's Man (2021)

Are there people in the world, really, who weren't immediately repelled by this series' titles' shifting, changing spacing and punctuation, who in fact watched and so enjoyed the tiresome teenage-boysy action of the first two cartoons they thought what was needed, yawn, was a wartime period backstory that awkwardly combines Saving Private Ryan-style solemn battlefield war history with high-camp devil-may-care superhero derringdo?

★★☆☆☆

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The Menu (2022)

What a great idea to pit artist - those that serve up their creations - against art lovers - those that take this creativity, eat it up and either appreciate it or spit it out -- and how clever to do that in a kitchen where the artist, the chef, exerts tight artistic control (and so is particularly vulnerable to criticism) and where so much hyperbolic reality tv is set and where the discussion of food art has reached such a fever pitch that it simply begs to be lampooned, but the concept sags like a failed souffle at about the third course where a rush of ideas - the need to be not just clever about art but also woke about metoo and world finance - turns a sharp satirical observation about art into an uncentred all-out food fight.

★★☆☆☆

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Spectre (2015)

A message from beyond the grave from Judy Dench's M sends Daniel Craig's icy James Bond from a Dias de Los Muertos parade in Mexico to Austria, Morocco and to the deserts of Northern Africa as he hunts the head of a powerful network of evil, in this 24th Bond instalment, for the most part a spectacular thrill ride but punctuated with a number of scenes in which the agent's luck is groanworthy.

★★★★☆

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The Constant Gardener (2005)

A political intrigue involving British government officials and drug companies plays out in Africa in this mostly satisfying film adaptation of the John le Carré novel, with Rachel Weisz playing an aid worker who dies mysteriously after uncovering a conspiracy and Ralph Fiennes her diplomat husband left to fill-in the movie's two-hour run-time until an unlikely but convenient "reveal-all" letter is finally dug up.

★★★☆☆

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Maid In Manhattan (2002)

Better examples of this sort of "rising above one's station" comedy include The Secret of My Success, Working Girl and even, kind of, The Devil Wears Prada but self-conscious performances by J Lo, Stanley Tucci and Bob Hoskins and uninspired writing keep this a middle-of-the-road romcom, one about a maid mistaken for an upper crust socialite and chased around town by a Senatorial candidate.

★★☆☆☆

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The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014)

The world revels in Wes Anderson movies and this was especially the case upon the release of this precious, childish, irritating, laboured pantomime about a hotel concierge involved in a theft and murder, a movie which plays out like all of Wes Anderson's movies, like a storyboard - stylised and empty.

☆☆☆☆☆

CINECAL: ONE SENTENCE REVIEWS

Hail, Caesar! (2016)

Joel and Ethan Coen's movie about a 1950s Hollywood film studio is full of near versions of real Hollywood personalities from that era - Carmen Miranda, Esther Williams, Gene Kelly, Lash LaRue - embroiled in a plot ripped from 1950s celebrity tabloids and while it is certainly exuberantly acted and full of elaborate period detail, the movie's biggest problem is that it distances viewers looking for meaning - it's neither a light, frothy comedy spoof nor a biting political religious satire, but probably just a largely point-free Coen brothers indulgence - them revelling in the things they love.

★★★☆☆

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Skyfall (2012)

A masterpiece addition to the Bond canon, up there with the recent Casino Royale as one of the best Bonds ever made, but why are M and the agent with the license to kill left in such a dire pickle in the end with just a doddery old Groundskeeper Willie with a shotgun to help?

★★★★★

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The Reader (2008)

*SPOILER ALERT*

Don't believe the poster: this is a very dreary drama, not a provocative thriller, that asks audiences to sympathise with a paedophile serving life in prison for war crimes she considers less abhorrent than illiteracy.

★★☆☆☆

CINECAL: ONE SENTENCE REVIEWS