Steve Jobs

Apple founder Steve Jobs has become a rather scrutinised figure in both documentary and film after his death in 2011. This latest biopic however, comes at the hands of both director Danny Boyle and screenwriter Aaron Sorkin, both of whom are known for their rather honest depictions of the world as it is and portrayals of famous people in not so flattering terms. This already fixating combination of talents is made complete with a subtle but powerful performance by leading man Michael Fassbender.

Steve Jobs is split into three acts, each covering a specific period in the life of the man, taking place prior to a product launch that was important in his life. The first takes place in 1984 at the launch of Jobs' (Michael Fassbender) latest dream product, the Macintosh. He is supported by his marketing manager and confidant Johanna Hoffman (Kate Winslet) as he contends with the mother of his daughter Chrisann (Katherine Waterston) and technical problems with the launch that he blames on Andy Hertzfeld (Michael Stuhlbarg). In 1988, Jobs has left Apple and is working on a new project NeXT, which he thinks will be an important educational tool despite its high price. He also clashes with Apple CEO John Sculley (Jeff Daniels) about leaving Apple and Steve Wozniak (Seth Rogen) over comments made during an interview. Finally in 1998, Jobs is back at Apple and is about to launch the iMac G3, the product that revitalised the company.

Where this film succeds that past films have failed (particulary 2013's Jobs) is that is not an ambitious film in its scope. Instead of covering every aspect of Jobs' life, the film covers three important moments in his career. That's not to say that the film is lacking for details about Jobs' personality or where he came from. We learn a lot from brief flashbacks where characters discuss his background. Despite Sorkin's snappy writing, the film does have a certain level of predictability when it comes to each of the segments. It seems that Sorkin just had a formula for each one and just changed certain details. Somehow this dragged out the movie for me and made the film less riveting than it should have been.

Which was a lot, considering Fassbender's remarkable performance is completely riveting. He plays Jobs as a sociopathic egomaniac who just wants to make the world of his genius. And you do believe that he believes he is the smartest human ever because Fassbender plays him with the right amount of charm, Kate Winslet's role I found difficult to categorise. I was trying to figure out whether she was a lead character orm a supporting one, but I suppose they all are next to who the movie is about. She really was the emotional core of the movie. Seth Rogen's boyish lovability comes in handy as Steve Wozniak and Jeff Daniels plays a more depressing version of the CEO he played in The Martian. Newcomer Perla Haney-Jardine is a strong presence as Jobs' daughter Lisa in the older sequences.

Boyle's biopic is convincing at times and peters out at others and this has to do with a shaky script from the usually strong Sorkin. Fassbender's performance I think will be strong enough for him to take home the big prize at the Oscars.

The Martian

    "I'm Mark Watney and I'm still alive...obviously"

The red sands of Mars have settled following a forceful storm, the sky is a healthy red, the Sun bearing down on the rocky mesa's of the Martian landscape. One certain mound of sand is disturbed by the twitching movements of a man laying prone, waking from unconsciousness. His orange-and-white space-suit is both punctured and sealed by a small piece of debris shallowly embedded in his stomach. The debris, leftover from a destroyed long-range communications satellite, is not the only problem the astronaut Mark Watney (Matt Damon) now has to face as he scans the nearby arid landscape. Close by is the habitat Mark and his team have occupied on the planet for the eighteen days preceding the storm and the remains of the launch pad of the team's only rocket back home, which has long since departed with Mark's colleagues believing him dead. Alone on Mars with no communications and limited food, Watney resolves to sustain himself, to communicate, to survive, or as he puts it to "science the shit outta this."

The Martian, Ridley Scott's latest, distances itself from the last decade of epics from the prolific director (Robin Hood, Prometheus, Exodus: Gods and Kings and Kingdom of Heaven) and also, perhaps especially so, from the recent survival dramas of Everest, All Is Lost, Interstellar and the powerhouse Gravity, most notably through the solid writing from Drew Goddard (Cabin in the Woods, World War Z, Cloverfield, Daredevil). Goddard's writing of the characters in the Martian is a blend of Aaron Sorkin's jargon-fuelled relentlessness and Joss Whedon's comical perfection and wit, which has a wonderful effect on the film's tone. Unlike Gravity's direct minimalism, Everest's biopic cliches and Interstellar's cold, Doctor-Who-eyness, The Martian thankfully manages to keep a keen sense of humour to balance out the drama and despair. And this is sold by an ensemble cast of both dramatic actors and practiced comedians including Damon and Jessica Chastain of Interstellar, Benedict Wong of Prometheus, and Kate Mara, Michael Pena, Sebastian Stan, Jeff Daniels, Donald Glover, Kirsten Wiig and Sean Bean (who delivers a silly and charming Lord of the Rings gag).

                        "Every human being has a basic instinct: to help each other out."

Visually, The Martian is pretty, even with it's occasionally questionable computer effects and over-use of Go-Pro footage. The production design is obviously (and smartly) adapted from Prometheus and at times the score the soaring French horns of that score threaten to burst onto the soundscape here. The obligatory Chinese pandering scenes of The Martian are perhaps even more contrived than those in Trans4mers, and even the Chinese Space Agency exterior is the same as the Chinese corporate headquarters in Age of Extinction. But in summation, The Martian is a sci-fi survival story that is slightly more fun than it is tense, but with a strong ensemble, capable lead, balanced writing and solid production. It all comes together to make NASA's perfectl, pretty and impeccably fashioned geek army and the film's two-and-a-half-hour run-time downright fun.

Dumb and Dumber To

Going into this movie, I knew it could have gone one of two ways. It could have been surprisingly funny, just like the original was two decades ago, or it could of been disappointing. And it did end up being disappointing, not because it was unfunny, but more because we didn't get anything new. One thing is for certain, it says it all in the title.

Harry Dunne (Jeff Daniels) and Lloyd Christmas (Jim Carrey) are reunited after twenty years of Lloyd pretending to be in a catatonic state, just to make a joke at Harry's expense. Harry finds out that he fathered a child with Fraida Felcher (Kathleen Turner) and that she put the baby girl up for adoption. After Lloyd sees the photo of her and falls in love, he decides to help Harry find his now grown up daughter, who is now named Penny Pinchelow (Rachel Melvin).

All in all this movie is almost a carbon copy of the original film. Harry and Lloyd are traveling across the country to find a girl and along the way they foil the plot of another couple (this time played by Rob Riggle and Laurie Holden), who are trying to get rich of someone they are close to. All the jokes in this one are just playing to fans of the original, Billy in 4c (the blind kid with the parrot) makes a return and is even played by the same actor. There is a henchman being extremely annoyed by them in a car until he dies and even the dog van makes a return. I felt like there needed to be newer jokes for a new audience, but apparently the Farrelly Brothers disagree. Sure, there was an obvious Breaking Bad reference, but the joke was extremely laboured and would have done well as a throwaway line.

It is amazing to have watched the careers of Jeff Daniels and Jim Carrey steer in totally different directions. Daniels is now regarded as a fine dramatic actor, whilst Carrey is still trying to hold onto his past as wacky comedic actor. That said, Carrey still possesses his amazing ability as a physical comedian and still throws himself around just as much as he did as a younger man. Daniels slips back into the role of Harry with such ease, that it's hard to believe that he won an Emmy for Best Dramatic Actor just prior to making this film.

All the other actors in this film gave pretty poor performances. Kathleen Turner was a hero in the 80s and 90s with her quick wit, but here she just felt lethargic. Rachel Melvin needs a bit more acting experience before tackling roles like this, because I couldn't help feeling that she is an idiot just like her character. Laurie Holden has never been an actor who has captured me with any of her roles and I know that Rob Riggle can do better than he did here.

Verdict: This movie payed too much service to fans of the original and didn't pave the way for anything fun or new for younger audiences to watch and have something of their own, especially if they were too young to have seen the first Dumb and Dumber.