Jupiter Ascending review

Jupiter Ascending (12A/PG-13, 127 mins)
Directors: The Wachowskis
★ ★ ★ ☆ ☆

If you're after a full-on bonkers fantasy epic that's as beautifully designed as it is camp, then Jupiter Ascending should fulfil most of your requirements. Jupiter (Mila Kunis) is the ordinary earth girl who learns she's a reincarnated space princess, with Channing Tatum as her half-wolf, half-albino, pointy-eared, hover-booted protector in an immensely silly intergalactic power struggle. A first half on earth is mostly a series of stylish fights and rescues, and while the second half gets a bit more talky and plotty, the move to space allows The Wachowskis to go daft with their gadgets and set design. They already reinvented the action wheel with The Matrix so there's not really anything here to make jaws drop, but they can still put together an elaborate, FX-heavy sequence without having to resort to crazed editing. It’s might be missing that massive action centrepiece, but there’s always something worth looking at, Eddie Redmayne hams it up magnificently as the baddie, and in terms of fun it’s far more Flash Gordon than John Carter.

G.I. Joe: Retaliation review

G.I. Joe: Retaliation (12A/PG-13, 110 mins)
Director: Jon M. Chu
★ ★ ★ ☆ ☆

With more coherent action, a lot less dullness and the addition of a couple of star names to the cast, this dumb but passably entertaining sequel to 2009’s G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra is certainly miles better than a woeful first instalment that was largely gibberish. That’s not to say the plot here isn’t nonsensical, because it is, some foolishness about Cobra, the baddies, having created a doppelganger of the president (Jonathan Pryce), then threatening the world with a new super-weapon while a betrayal leads the Joes, the goodies, on a revenge mission. The arrival of Bruce Willis and Dwayne Johnson to the elite military team that is the Joes is a welcome one, and they punch and blow stuff up real good. There’s also more Channing Tatum to be had than was originally planned, with reshoots delaying this sequel’s release by nine months to cash in on him being one of the most popular stars of the past year, and he and Johnson share a nice dynamic. Some nifty gizmos and action sequences that are cool in ways that the core target audience of 12 year old boys will find pleasing are the movie’s bread and butter, but it’s whenever anyone has to open their mouths that it all starts to go wrong, with some truly honking dialogue. But the central sequence, a sensational ninja-tastic chase and swordfight on the side of a mountain, is good enough almost to make this a recommended watch.

21 Jump Street review

21 Jump Street (15/R, 109 mins)
Directors: Phill Lord, Chris Miller
★ ★ ★ ★ ☆

When we first meet Schmidt and Jenko (Jonah Hill and Channing Tatum) at high school they're a classic nerd and jock pairing. Seven years later they're at the police academy together, where they graduate as a couple of bumbling idiots. Their incompetence gets them a transfer down to Jump Street, an undercover programme that involves the pair of them posing as high school students to infiltrate a drug gang. The TV show from the late 80s that made Johnny Depp into a star has been updated into a nicely self-mocking comedy that doesn’t try to spoof cop movies, or even high school movies. Instead it succeeds by doing its own thing, catching just the right tonal wave of stupid mixed with smart, and riding it for all its worth. Hill has matured into an actor of tremendous range and comic timing, and on this evidence he has the potential to do anything. Just like Mark Wahlberg in The Other Guys, Tatum is a revelation, someone not renowned for comedy chops playing it fairly straight and getting results. A couple of plot contrivances in the middle means it takes a bit of a dip, but even this is still able to provide solid laughs in most every scene, something few comedies can lay claim to. Throw in a sensational cameo appearance, and the result is the year’s funniest film so far.

Haywire review

Haywire (15/R, 92 mins)
Director: Steven Soderbergh
★ ★ ★ ★ ☆

In a diner in New York state, two people, a man and a woman, chat in a booth. Suddenly it explodes into violence, as the pair grapple for life and death before the woman escapes the restaurant and gets away in a jacked car.

A series of flashbacks fill us in on the covert missions in Barcelona and Dublin that led to the current situation. The woman is Mallory Kane (Gina Carano), a black ops agent, and the man is Aaron (Channing Tatum), who was part of her Barcelona team.

When the spooks higher up the food chain (Ewan McGregor, Michael Douglas, Antonio Banderas) get together in a room to discuss them, they're speaking absolute jibber-jabber as far as the audience is concerned. The details of the plot are labyrinthine and barely register, but it matters not a jot because this is director Steven Soderbergh cutting loose and having oodles of kick-ass fun.

Just know it involves the usual betrayal and double cross antics, which leaves Mallory on the run and on a mission to bring down those who set her up.

There are two things that raise Haywire a level above your usual action guff. The first is Carano, a former mixed martial arts fighter. Okay, she’s far from the greatest actress in the world, but her physical performance is hugely impressive. Despite the other big names, she’s unquestionably the star, and watching her lay savage beatings on Tatum, McGregor, Michael Fassbender and countless nameless goons is supremely satisfying.

Secondly, the direction from Soderbergh is just so sharp, so smart, so unlike anything you’re likely to see in a standard action film, that every scene becomes a joy. He brings the cool swagger of Ocean’s Eleven, coupled with his indie aesthetic to bone crunching fights that are brutal and unglamorous yet executed with endlessly dynamic choreography.

As icing on the cake, Douglas is hilarious, Banderas unusually slobby, McGregor a twit, and they're all enjoying themselves immensely, which the viewing audience can’t help but pick up on.

It’s not a million miles away from something Tarantino might rattle out - a marquee cast all taking on smaller roles, probably just for the chance to work with the director, fitting effortlessly into action that’s done in sufficiently different ways that you look on the whole genre afresh.