ronmanager's reviews

A very cheesy and harmless seasonal tale this may be. But the male lead is a strange choice as he's batting WAY above his average with his 'dates' in this film. They also have him wearing weird scruffy clothes throughout too. I assumed the actor must have financed the film or something and cast himself!

The lead actress is good as is the daughter but the rest are a little wooden especially the over familiar gas station grandad who comes across as a stalker at the start - little did we know what he was really up to...

Then they topped it all when the chef breaks out his synth and starts very badly lip syncing to an awful love song what he wrote. Quite funny actually though it's not supposed to be.

Switch your brain off and enjoy it though because it's Christmas ain't it?

I watched the film before reading the many 'how profound am I' withering user reviews on here. I disagree with them all. This film is a new take on the original story with a sprinkle of Pan's Labyrinth imagined magic thrown in.

I can only describe it as more of a fantasy version of the book with embellishment and exaggeration of the settings and characters. And a fine feelgood film is the result.

With the multitude of weak rushed films being turned out these days it was a pleasure to watch one as beautiful and escapist as this. I liked it!

I should have known better than to waste time on this. It was just the title that caught my interest. Why even pretend this is supposed to be factual? It's all scripted and reconstructed. Adults acting like giddy children and the gun toting doomsday prepper black clad security guards who are there for what exactly?

And are we really supposed to believe that any time something is allegedly happening, the cameraman - who I assume does this for a living - cannot stand still and has to keep whipping the camera from side to side. "Look camera person, a UFO quick film it? Oh no he's on his pogo stick again..."

Nobody involved has a shred of self respect - just BSers.

There is about 20 minutes of actual 'factual' information in the entire series. The rest is bullsh**ters playing make believe with every bit of rock they find. Like they want it to be like Indiana Jones with water traps, cyanide bombs and the like but just made up. "I don't want to dig here because I've got a bad feeling about it...." Utter nonsense.

As this film has only had one screening so far at The Empire Leicester Square as part of Frightfest 2011, I consider myself one of the lucky few who has seen it.

Andy Nyman plays Martin, a proud but failing hamster of a man, who's gone from well paid middle class Exec to suddenly but secretly unemployed, debt ridden failure. His trophy wife (Neve Campbell), friends and ex colleagues are unaware of the hole that he is. Nyman acts this so convincingly that you found yourself literally cringing as he struggles to maintain his dignity while all around him are stripping him of it.

The film could have been slightly predictable from this opening scenario but it was not. I can't add much further without risk of edging into spoiler territory but can add that there are moments of comedy within the tension that are a welcome relief.

The ending is great and we found ourselves talking about it afterwards in terms of minor events that happened early in the film that became relevant as the film concluded. It is filmed with a very real-life feel to it which makes all the more disturbing.

Best film I've seen at the cinema in ages.

Season Two has just finished here in the UK and I am already on a mission to get Season Three recorded and sent over from the US where it gets shown nearly a year earlier than here.

What an excellent cast with every show containing gritty real life highs and lows but always with so much humour. Tommy is so well played by Leary although it is obviously written by him so I guess it would be. The one liners from Kenny crack me up as does the banter between Sean and the Probie. But all the characters make this the great show that it is.

I've tipped a few people off about this show and they've all come back thanking me. Roll on Season Three - soon!

I watched this on DVD over the last week or so and eagerly awaited the postman daily for the next disc to turn up from my DVD club.

Right from the first episode during training, the characters are all engaging, believable and interesting. So many familiar faces amongst the cast all of whom pulled off this, based on fact tale.

At the beginning of each episode there are interviews with real surviving veterans, describing events as they remember them from each location. It is not until the end of the last episode that their names are revealed as the actual characters you have been watching.

It currently has a rating of 9.5 on here at the time of writing - the highest I have seen for anything - totally deserved.