Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
Cast: Michael B. Jordan, Sylvester Stallone, Tessa Thompson, Dolph Lundgren, Florian Munteanu, Phylicia Rashad, Russell Hornsby, Wood Harris, Milo Ventimiglia, Andre Ward, Brigitte Nielsen.
Stories are rarely neat, sequels are never planned that far in advance and yet somehow the Rocky/Creed franchise manages to stitch together a series of films that by rights have no business being thought of in the same bed, let alone sharing a ring together.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10
Cast: Rachel Weisz, Rachel McAdams, Alessandro Nivola, Anton Lesser, Allan Corduner, Nicholas Woodeson, David Fleeshman, Steve Furst, Trevor Allan Davies, Sophia Brown, Clara Francis, Lisa Cohen, Cara Horgan, Liza Sadovy, Bernice Stegers.
Sexuality and faith have never been reliable bed-fellows, the angst that exists between the two states of human need and suffering is only countered by dogma and the words of interpretation; to be different, to love against doctrine and the word of theological study, is to face, in some quarters, questions, if not exile.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
Cast: Odessa Young, Hari Nef, Suki Waterhouse, Abra, Colman Domingo, Bill Skarsgard, Joel McHale, Anika Noni Rose, Bella Thorne, Maude Apatow, Cody Christian, Danny Ramirez, Susan Misner, Kelvin Harrison Jr., Noah Galvin, Lukas Gage, Jeff Pope, Joe Chrest, J.D. Evermore.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10
Cast: Christopher Eccleston, Aneurin Barnard, Tom Wilkinson, Gethin Anthony, Freya Mavor, Nigel Lindsay, Marion Bailey, Emma Campbell-Jones, Velibor Topic, Carol MacReady, Marcia Warren, Nathalie Buscombe, Orion Lee, Eileen Nicholas, Cecilia Noble, James Kermack, Keir Charles, Tim Steed, Neelam Bakshi, Mark Penfold, Parth Thakerar, Ashton Henry Reid, Terenia Cooper.
There are themes within art that many find unsettling, they seek to disapprove and claim that such investigations into the world of the person seeking suicide for example as an answer to their problems and ills are mawkish, they believe it is a form of self-pity that should not be encouraged, dangerous perhaps and potentially threatening to society.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * *
Cast: Claire Foy, Sverrir Gudnason, Lakeith Stanfield, Sylvia Hoeks, Stephen Merchant, Claes Bang, Synnove Macody Lund, Cameron Britton, Vicky Krieps, Andreja Pejic, Mikael Persbrandt, Paula Schramm, Volker Brich, Saskia Sophie Rosendahl, Pal Sverre Hagen.
In much the same way that many insist the James Bond franchise of films has run out space in which to turn, driving its Aston Martin series persona into a cul-de-sac of revenge and suggested toxic masculinity, so too does the character created by Stieg Larsson, Lisbeth Salander, facing her own accusations of misandry and brutality. An eye for an eye perhaps, a reflection of modern times and a heroine in which punches back harder than those who seek domination by sheer size and brute strength.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 5/10
Cast: Taron Egerton, Jamie Foxx, Ben Mendelsohn, Eve Hewson, Jamie Dornan, Tim Minchin, Paul Anderson, F. Murray Abraham, Ian Peck, Cornelius Booth, Kane Headley-Cummings, Scott Greenan, Lara Rossi, Kevin Griffiths, Bjorn Bengtsson, Yasen Atour, Nick Wittman, Josh Herdman.
When you re-imagine the tale, there will always be arrows of derision ready to take aim and fire off volleys of shots of criticism; tampering with a classic is for some beyond acceptable, the story should be sacrosanct, etched in stone and forever told in a way that respects the past, as much as it pays esteem to our memory of it.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10
Cast: Eddie Redmayne, Jude Law, Katherine Waterston, Alison Sudol, Dan Folger, Johnny Depp, Zoe Kravitz, Callum Turner, Kevin Githrie, Ezra Miller, Claudia Kim, Cornell John, Carmen Ejogo, Wolf Hall, Derek Riddell, Rosie Corby-Tuech, Ingvar Eggert Sigursosson, Andrew Turner, Alfrun Rose, Janie Campbell Bower, Brontis Jodorowsky, Hugh Quarshie, Keith Chanter.
Some actions undertaken in life require no justification for their existence, and regardless of what you may think of the whole Harry Potter Universe and its ever-growing list of additions and supplements, what cannot be denied is the way in which J.K. Rowling has endeavoured to bring audiences together, either through the volumes of pages, or through the effect of the cinema screen.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
Cast: Viola Davis, Liam Neeson, Michelle Rodriguez, Elizabeth Debecki, Carrie Coon, Cynthia Erivo, Colin Farrell, James Vincent Meredith, Brian Tyree Henry, Daniel Kaluuya, Robert Duvall, John Bernthal, Manuel Garcia-Ruflo, Coburn Goss, Ann Mitchell, Jacki Weaver, Garret Dillahunt, Jon Michael Hill.
A new generation, a new audience, one that gets transplanted out of 1980s Britain and into the heart of 21st Century Chicago politics and undercurrent of American crime, Widows might not have been one that its enormous fanbase might have ever thought needed updating but it is one that works, that makes the absolute use of the grime and seemingly untouchable attitude of modern politics and its strange bedfellow of corruption, criminality and violence.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
Cast: Channing Tatum, James Corden, Zendaya, Common, LeBron James, Danny DeVito, Gina Rodriguez, Yara Shahidi, Ely Henry, Jimmy Tatro, Patricia Heaton, Justin Roiland, Jack Quaid, Sarah Baker, Kenneth Holden Bashar, Peter Ettinger, Jonathan Kite, Jonathan Mangum, Joel McCrary, Vanessa Ragland, Clara Sera, Luke Smith, Jessica Tuck.
It is regarded as bad form to not enjoy and fall in love with an animated film, whether by the masters of the art in Disney or Pixar, or through to the dominant Japanese Studio Ghibli, or even timeless shorts created by the Warner Brothers, it is considered almost reverential to praise the genre from the highest peek when viewing a film in which thousands of hours of work have been painstakingly thought out and applied.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *
Cast: Maxine Peake, Rory Kinnear, Pearce Quigley, Sam Troughton, Alistair Mackenzie, David Moorst, John Paul Hurley, Philip Jackson, Ian Mercer, Lizzie McInnerny, Victor McGuire, Tim McInnerny, Jeff Rawle, David Bamber, Dorothy Duff, Julie Hesmondhaigh, Lee Boardman, Steve Huison, Rachel Finnigan, Robert Wilfort, Karl Johnson, Neil Bell, Fine Time Fontayne, Paul Brown.