Night at the Museum: Secret of the Tomb
Unbroken
The Betsy
The Leftovers
The Theory of Everything
Tinker Bell and the Legend of the Neverbeast
Mister Moses
Wishin’ and Hopin’
Penguins of Madagascar
Interstellar
The final film in Shawn Levy’s unlikely trilogy Night at the Museum, Secret of the Tomb continues the historical adventures as museum exhibits come to life.
The remarkable story of the US Olympian Louie Zamperini, captured by the Japanese during WWII after surviving 47 days on a raft following his plane crashing, Unbroken – directed by Angelina Jolie – seemed a pretty sure thing but has received decidedly mixed reviews and has not turned out to be the Oscar bait it was expected to be.
Everything I know about the late novelist Harold Robbins, whose books sold in incredible volumes, was learned from Basil Fawlty, who said he wrote “the most awful American tripe, a kind of pornographic muzak.” Many of his works were adapted for film and television and virtually all of them received critical pans; 1978’s The Betsy was no exception. Director Daniel Petrie somehow managed to assemble a very strong cast (Laurence Olivier, Tommy Lee Jones and Robert Duvall headlining) for this tale of family infighting (and incest) against a motor-racing backdrop and the film did OK at the box office.
The Leftovers is Damon Lindelof’s show about unexplained (and indeed unexplainable) events and coincidence-driven plot devices, marking a real departure for the writer from his past works, such as Nash Bridges and some other things.
James Marsh’s film The Theory of Everything tells of the relationship between the extraordinary British physicist Stephen Hawking and his first wife, Jane, following his academic rise and physical fall in time with their personal rise and fall as he battles motor neuron disease.
Composed by Joel McNeely Walt Disney Records / 2014 / 57m The second Tinker Bell movie of 2014 and the seventh (and reportedly last) of the series overall , The Legend of the Neverbeast was released in UK cinemas in December and will go straight to video in the US in March.
Composed by John Barry Prometheus / 2014 / 41m 1965’s Mister Moses is an old-fashioned adventure story based on Max Catto’s novel. Set (and filmed) in the newly-independent Kenya, it stars Robert Mitchum as a conman making money by fleecing the natives, natives who he then has to lead across the country when their home is […]
Composed by Matthew Llewellyn MovieScore Media / 2014 / 34m Based on Wally Lamb’s popular short 2009 novel, Wishin’ and Hopin’ is a nostalgic Christmas tale set in New York in 1964. Narrated by Chevy Chase and starring Molly Ringwald and Annabella Sciorra (and a large cast of children), Colin Theys’s film had a limited cinema release […]
Composed by Lorne Balfe Relativity Music / 2014 / 53m A spin-off from Dreamworks’ popular Madagascar series, Penguins of Madagascar sees the birds go off on a spy romp trying to stop the evil octopus Dave, voiced by John Malkovich. I believe it is based on a true story.
Composed by Howard Shore WaterTower Music / 2013 / 129m The middle part of Peter Jackson’s bloated adaptation of The Hobbit, The Desolation of Smaug sees the band of dwarves and a hobbit battling the dragon Smaug to take back the dwarves’ homeland. It’s nothing like a film, lacking both a beginning and an ending, but to be […]
Composed by Hans Zimmer WaterTower Music / 2014 / 72m (regular release) Christopher Nolan’s latest is his attempt to make a science fiction film of meaning, a 2001 for this generation perhaps, with life on earth reaching its end due to overpopulation and humanity needing to find a new home. Matthew McConaughey plays a former pilot […]
Composed by James Newton Howard Republic Records / 2014 / 70m The first part of the third part of The Hunger Games trilogy, Mockingjay part 1 follows the irritating recent trend of splitting popular books into an unnecessary number of films (Harry Potter and even Twilight both also split the final book into two films, and […]
Composed by Alberto Iglesias Sony Classical / 2014 / 78m Ridley Scott is back in historical epic mode for Exodus: Gods and Kings, with Moses (Christian Bale) leading the Hebrews from Egypt. The film has courted controversy before release because apparently it does not strictly present the truth as reported in the Bible.
Composed by Alexandre Desplat Sony Classical / 2014 / 51m The Imitation Game stars Benedict Cumberbatch as Alan Turing, the British mathematical genius who cracked the Germans’ codes and played a pivotal part in the Allies winning the second world war, widely considered the father of modern computing and shamefully prosecuted, castigated and chemically castrated in the […]
Composed by Chris Tilton Ubisoft Music / 2014 / 77m The first installment of the ever-popular Assassin’s Creed franchise developed exclusively for the latest generation of consoles, Unity takes place in Paris during the French revolution and it looks set to continue the series’ success.