Tag: 2022

The Moderator

  By

★½
“Falls far, far short of reaching moderate”

Oh, dear. Where to start? Let’s get the positives out of the way. This looks reasonable enough, and clearly was not a poverty-row production. The central idea isn’t bad either: while a vigilante killer taking out misogynistic online sexists is a fairly ludicrous concept, if you squint a bit, you can see how it could have become an acerbic comment on the toxicity of social media. And that’s all I’ve got. For any potential is ruthlessly exterminated by staggeringly feeble execution. We’re there inside two minutes, when an unnamed Russian supermodel wakes, to get a video message from two pals vacationing in Morocco, then turns on the TV immediately to see a news report about them being executed by ISIS, with the video online for all to see. Wait, what?

Ms. Supermodel then visits a shadowy character who gives her a small rucksack telling her it contains everything she needs, including her new identity as “Mya Snik”. This is only the second-dumbest name, because later on we hear of somebody called, I kid you not, Dr. Akula. No, really. The rucksack also contains a scorpion, for no reason ever made clear. Mya then heads off on a somewhat ruthless pursuit of random Internet trolls, leading up to serial rapist and shitty white rapper, Vance Wilhorn (Lane), who is in Morocco too, abusing any young woman stupid enough to hang out with him. And we are talking very, very stupid, as shown by this stunningly terrible piece of dialogue:
    “Do you want to get raped or what?”
    “Oh, come on – don’t start that again…”

Once more, this might all have been tolerable, had it focused on Mya giving scummy perverts their comeuppance. Instead, there are meandering subplots about the Interpol pursuit of her, led by agent Bourdeau (Dourdan), and local cop Selma (Azzabi). The latter lets Mya go after capturing her, because her prisoner recites crime statistics at her, apparently boring the policewoman into hypnotic compliance or something. We hardly ever see Mya even lightly kick significant butt, and her talents evaporate entirely at points. One minute, she’s efficiently taking down security personnel in a resort (albeit to no real purpose). The next, she can’t beat a fat Moroccan tour-guide, who can barely waddle away. I’m not impressed.

There are few things worse than a film which clearly wants to make an earnest point (as evidenced by the quoting of statistics), yet is incapable of doing anything except repeatedly shooting itself in the foot. We’re given no reason to root for or care about the heroine, or anybody else in the picture for that matter. The action is largely feeble, though I did have to laugh at the Interpol agents chasing on foot after Mya’s motor-cycle, which then conveniently falls over. And if you want to see attractive Moroccan scenery, you’d be better off with a Tourist Board promo video. Definitely a candidate for worst movie of the year.

Dir: Zhor Fassi-Fihri
Star: Irma Lake, Michael Patrick Lane, Gary Dourdan, Soraya Azzabi

The Witch: Part 2. The Other One

  By

★★½
“Which witch is which?”

This showed up as a bit of a surprise. Obviously, even the title suggested that the makers were looking for a sequel to The Witch: Part 1. The Subversion. However, I had no idea whether or not it had been successful enough to merit a follow-up. Clearly the answer is yes, though I would certainly recommend you either re-watch, or at the very least read up on, the preceding entry. Even at a rather bloated 137-minute running time, it does not provide any “Previously, on The Witch…” recap. You’re entirely on your own, and after a brief prologue, you will be dropped right into things, though any connection to the previous film only becomes apparent at the very end.

It begins with the escape of “Ark 1” (Shin) from the research facility where she has been undergoing experiments. Stumbling onto a road, she’s picked up by a car containing Kyung-hee (Park), a young woman who is in serious trouble with the gangsters also present in the car. Ark 1 handily defeats them after they get a bit too friendly, quickly earning Kyung-Hee’s gratitude. She takes Ark 1 back to live with her and her brother, Dae-gil (Sung), introducing Ark 1 to the delights of food. The gangsters are none too happy with getting their butts kicked, and regroup for another attempt. They’re not the only ones after Ark 1 either, as her former “owners” sent out an agent, Jo-hyeon (Seo), with talents of her own, to retrieve their property.

As the rather clunky sub-title implies, this is mostly about an entirely different character to the preceding movie. This feels like a bit of a cheat, as if you’d carefully studied for a pop quiz, only for it to be for another subject entirely. Instead, you get a plot which, even at the extended running time, feels rather too over-stuffed. The remarkable coincidence of Ark 1 stumbling into a car containing the very person who can help her, and that simultaneously needs her help, is just the first in quite a few moments where people happen to be in the right place at the right time. I suspect there’s also a plot thread or two more than is beneficial to overall coherence.

This is especially true at the end, where the various factions converge and have a massive battle in poorly-lit conditions. Going by what I saw earlier, this may have been the makers’ way of disguising the CGI. It’s an area with scope for improvement, especially when Ark 1 is demonstrating her remarkable super strength, by hurling people. cars, etc. around with enthusiasm. I suspect this is a victim of second movie syndrome, being the entry in a trilogy that has neither a start nor an ending. I do have to cut it some slack on that basis, and presuming the series is finished (and this was a top 10 film in Korea for 2022), I’ll still be tuning in for the finale. There’s just enough potential, even if my expectations are quire restrained.

Dir: Park Hoon-jung
Star: Shin Si-ah, Park Eun-bin, Seo Eun-soo, Sung Yoo-bin 

Black Site (2022)

  By

★★★
“Better Red(box) than Net(flix).”

This has a fair amount in common with the disaster which was Interceptor. Both films were produced for streaming companies, and are about a sole woman in a remote military location, that is attacked by a terrorist or groups of terrorists. She then has to survive, take on the threat, deal with treachery on the inside, and handle a ticking clock scenario. It is fairly basic storytelling, occasionally dumb, and there’s nothing of note in either, we haven’t seen a hundred times before, with male or female leads. However, this is significantly more watchable, perhaps because it doesn’t push the envelope. One problem with Interceptor was its #MeToo messaging. There’s no such soap-box concerns here, and Black Site is better for it.

The heroine is Abby Trent (Monaghan), a CIA analyst whose husband and daughter were blown up in a terrorist attack on an “Istanbul” hospital. I use quotes, because when the camera zooms out to a satellite view, Istanbul has apparently relocated, from Turkey to somewhere down the Red Sea in Saudi Arabia. It’s not the last time the film’s geography is shaky. Anyway, Abby devotes her life to tracking down “Hatchet”, the man responsible, and is currently working at a secret interrogation facility in the Jordanian desert. Two things about it made me go “Hmmm.” Firstly, it doubles as a data storage location: that’s a no from me in IT. Second, a Mossad (Israeli intelligence) agent is wandering about. Seems unlikely.

Anyway, #2. Hatchet (Clarke) is captured and sent to the facility, only to escape almost immediately. A lockdown is put in place, but comms get cut off, and the rules – at least in this movie – are that after an hour, they’ll be deemed compromised, and a drone strike will wipe everyone out. Abby has to figure out Hatchet’s agenda, deal with insubordination and flat-out double-agents on her side, and discover the truth about the hospital bombing before the clock runs out. Despite the various idiocies noted above, it is all kept moving forward at a decent pace. Once things kick off with Hatchet’s Houdini-like escape and particularly vicious stabbing of his first two victims, there’s little slack or down-time until things go boom.

I’d like to have seen Monaghan given more to do on the action front. There is a decent fight against the in-house traitor; otherwise, she is largely limited to creeping about corridors with a gun. There are subplots, such as the team member who thinks his active experience puts him above taking orders from Abby, which ends with him taking on Hatchet hand-to-hand in a decent battle, albeit with an entirely expected outcome. Indeed, the same can be said for the film as an entity. There are no surprises, yet the action is handled in a professional manner, and this helps paper over the obvious flaws. Director Banks does solid work, considering this was her first feature, so we’ll see where she goes from here.

Dir: Sophia Banks
Star: Michelle Monaghan, Jason Clarke, Jai Courtney, Pallavi Sharda

Death Hunt

  By

★½
“What a stupid hunt…”

Despite a striking poster (well played, PR team), for the first hour, you’ll probably be wondering why this is included here. Corporate lawyer Ray Harper (Tucci) is on the road, trying to convince reluctant local farmers to sell their land for development. He’s also taking advantage of the away time to hook up with his bit on the side, Brooke Hamilton (Malcolm). Both these enterprises are rudely interrupted when the couple are pulled over by corrupt cop, Williams (Johnston), and abducted at gunpoint. They are the next “guests” on an island run by TJ (McDonald), where he and his pals can get together to hunt… The Most Dangerous Game. Except, they can’t find any of that, so have to make do with a middle-aged executive and his other woman.

There have been a whole bunch of these in the past, with the results ranging widely in quality. Done correctly e.g. The Hunt, they can be thoroughly entertaining. Done badly, however… Oh, look: here we are. For this gets just about everything wrong. Let’s start with the genuinely terrible audio mix, in which the dialogue is frequently buried entirely. On the other hand, not hearing the dialogue is often for the best. The redneck hunters come off the worst in this department, being given lines which Larry the Cable Guy would reject as stereotypical and cliched. Just to show how evil they are, the director hangs a Confederate flag on the wall of the island cabin. That’s the level of subtlety we plunge into here.

It’s a good 40 minutes before any significant hunting gets going, and when it does, the entire rest of the film is characterized by rank stupidity on everyone’s part. The hunters mention this is the fifth year they’ve done this, and frankly it’s a miracle they haven’t shot each other in that time, such is the level of their incompetence. They can’t even hit a target which is standing still, in the open, in front of them. Fortunately for the trio, Ray is no more blessed in the woodcraft smarts department, and this brings us to the final 30 minutes, where Brooke suddenly turns into Rambolina. This is a surprise to everyone, since there’s absolutely no foreshadowing of this, such as her being ex-army, or even having a concealed carry permit.

It could have become a sly commentary on sexual politics, with “the little woman” ending up being the one best equipped to survive the situation, going from overlooked bimbo to overpowering. However, that’s a transition which would require actual writing skill, something apparently entirely absent in the creators here. Instead, she ends up more or less handed fully loaded automatic weapons, a radio, and all the equipment needed to survive and turn the tables. Do not get me started on the box full of dynamite conveniently stashed in the cabin. At least they do appear to blow things up physically, rather than relying on crappy CGI explosions. That’s a small mercy indeed.

Dir: Neil Mackay
Star: Marlene Malcolm, Terry McDonald, Omar Tucci, Greg Johnston

Bae Wolf

  By

★★
“LARPing for all.”

There is certainly room for reworking of the tale of Beowulf and Grendel, and making the heroines of this version female is what got me interested in it. However, the warning signs were out very quickly. Opening titles which said “Denmark… 500 AD… (-ish)” are a good sign of what to expect, for it’s clear that the makers were not happy to leave their changes at that. Indeed, they consciously embrace anachronism, especially in the dialogue, which is thoroughly modern, and could not be further from the epic poetry of the original if they tried. And I suspect they did try: congratulations on erasing one of the main reasons the story has survived down the millennia.

The basic story is, at least, largely unchanged. The land of Queen Walchtheo (Petsiavas) is under attack from the monstrous Grendel (Kern), and she sends her daughter, Princess Freawaru (Renew) out to find someone who can slay the beast. Freawaru finds a party of Danes led by Beowulf (Hill), who is disgruntled about the legends making her male: “As if you need balls to hold a sword.” They are commissioned for the job, which is where it gets murky, in a variety of ways. The Danes are a bit sketchy, in terms of delivering the contractually required slaughter; Grendel has mommy issues; and the princess falls for Beowulf, because this is 2022, and everyone has to be gay for no particular reason.

This was apparently shot at a Live-Action Role-Playing (LARP) camp, and to be honest, it shows. This is very much at the “running around in the woods” level of fantasy cinema, and at no point even remotely approaches selling its time and place. It leaves the film precariously perched between two stools, neither historically authentic nor modernizing the story. It drops contemporary characters, attitudes and dialogue into the 5th(-ish…) century, and the results don’t typically work, unless you’re playing for comedy. They can’t quite commit to that either, with a jokey tone, that simultaneously feels like it wants its opinions on gender and sexuality to be taken seriously. The net result at points feels like a political lecture delivered by someone wearing a pink pussyhat.

Yet I couldn’t bring myself to dislike this as much as I might. Beowulf and Grendel are both given more complex characters than in some other adaptations, and are helped by decent performances from the leads. I will also admit, the final confrontation between Beowulf and the much-feared dragon is a great example of how you can genuinely yank the carpet from under your viewer. Let’s just say, very little in this world is as it seems, and the film works best when playing on this line between myth, legend and the facts, along with the way they mutate into each other. If they could have developed this aspect more, in lieu of the less successful elements, the obviously low budget and clunky writing would perhaps not have been so glaring.

Dir: David Axe
Star: Morgan Shaley Renew, Josh Kern, Jennifer Hill, Rachel Petsiavas

Double Threat

  By

★★½
“2-for-1 is not always a great deal.”

If Ryan looks familiar, that’s because she is. She starred in Survivor – no, the other film by that name – and also 626 Evolution, making a fairly decent impression in the former, and let down significantly by the approach of the latter. There, she was billed as Danielle Chuchran: not sure if the name change is a result of marriage, or simply a realization that “Ryan” is a lot easier to remember. Whether you will want to is a different matter: she’s likely the best thing in this, and when it appears, the action is decent. There just isn’t enough of it, and the stuff between the set-pieces ranges from mediocre to cringeworthy.

It begins in a convenience store, where Jimmy (Lawrence, who a very long time ago, was one of the kids in Mrs. Doubtfire!) is chatting up the pretty clerk, Natasha (Ryan). Two armed mem show up: before Jimmy can blink, Natasha has killed them both, grabbed her bug-out bag and exited. A stunned Jimmy decides not to stick around, and drives off, only for Natasha to pop up in the back. Turns out the store was a front for the mob to launder money, and she had skimmed $600,000. They – in particular, the boss’s son, Ellis (Joy) and his top fixer, Ask (Olivieri) – are out to make an example of her. Yet there’s one big twist which might work in her favour: Natasha has a split personality. 

There’s Nat, the sensible, quiet one. Then there’s Tasha, the unrepentant bad-ass who can take very good care of herself. Jimmy has to try and figure out what to do, and with whom, when all he really wants to do is get to the ocean and scatter the ashes of his late brother. Meanwhile, Ellis is bickering with Ask, and being brow-beaten with his father. If this all sounds like a lot: it is. The film basically tries to do too much, and ends up doing little of it justice. It’s the male characters who drag it down: Jimmy is vanilla pudding, while Ellis is a whiny little puppy. Just pit Ask against Nat and Tasha, and be done with it.

Ryan does know how to handle herself in action. The best sequence has her taking on two thugs in hand-to-hand combat, while Jimmy fails to figure out how to operate a gun. This is imaginative and well-done, using her agility, speed and flexibility to counter their strength. On the other hand, then there’s the bit where she steals a bow and a horse from some LARPers and… Sorry, I’ve lost the will to type it out. The film needs to pick a tone and stick to it, Stanley not being able to pull off the shifts necessary. That’s even aside from qualms about the glib use of mental illness as convenient plot device, Nat or Tasha showing up exactly when needed. I hope Ryan can find a better vehicle for her talents, since she deserves better. 

Dir: Shane Stanley
Star: Danielle C. Ryan, Matthew Lawrence, Kevin Joy, Dawn Olivieri

The Huntress of Auschwitz

  By

★★
“About three decades too late.”

I came into this somewhat braced, given its 3.0 IMDb rating, and reviews which tended to be scathing e.g. proclaiming “This May Be The WORST Movie I’ve Ever Seen!” While it’s clearly not great, this is not eye-wateringly terrible. The good news is, it’s probably one performance away from approaching decent. The bad news is, it’s the lead role which is the biggest problem. This belongs to the unnamed Huntress (Watts-Joyce), a supposed American who travels to England, to go after a Nazi war criminal,  Rudolf Tannhäuser (Richards), and deliver the justice he has escaped since World War II. Tannhauser is now living quietly under an assumed identity n a farm in the English countryside.

There’s your first problem. This is clearly contemporary i.e. up-to-date iPhones, meaning Tannhauser would now need to be well into his nineties, even if he had been a 16-year-old when the war ended. He’s painted as considerably more senior, and there’s no conceivable way that Richards is pushing a century. Another issue: there really is precious little hunting, and nothing like the cover. She simply shows up on his doorstep, faking a turned ankle, and drugs him. Then we get a great deal of chit-chat as she tries to convince him to come clean about his past, and he repeatedly says she has the wrong guy. If Watts-Joyce did not have the emotional range of a fence-post, these conversations might have generated some tension.

They stand in sharp contrast to the delivery by veteran actress Lenska, playing concentration-camp survivor Amelia Kaminska. [Lenska was born in 1947, so is at least plausible as a child of Auschwitz] Her simple retelling of the horrors which she witnessed and went through are, far and away, the best part of the movie, and proof of how it’s not necessary to show things, when the delivery of the description is good enough. The film would have been far better a) set in the nineties, and b) with Amelia being the person to go after Tannhauser. The fact he killed one of the Huntress’s great-grandparents feels too distant and impersonal – again, compounded by the lead actress’s inability to sell the necessary emotions.

The pacing has some problems too: particularly in the beginning, there are too many scenes which end up being totally irrelevant. Her meeting with some kind of handler, or the travel montage, culminating in the Huntress standing around for what feels like forever, chatting to a pal on the phone. Once we reach the meat of the matter, with Tannhauser tied up, things improve a bit. The problem is, we’re already over half an hour in, and the film has really offered very little reason to engage with it. Thereafter, you’re waiting for the revenge that you know is inevitably going to come (though I wonder: how easy is it to gas someone to death in the middle of an open field?). It probably needs to be either exploitative or thoughtful: it’s neither, and consequently is unlikely to satisfy anyone.

Dir: Richard John Taylor
Star: Lowri Watts-Joyce, Jeffrey Charles Richards, Rula Lenska, Paul Dewdney

The Reef: Stalked

  By

★★★
“Canoe’s company”

This is a sequel to Traucki’s 2010 film, The Reef, whose synopsis reads: “A sailing trip becomes a disaster for a group of friends when the boat sinks and a white shark hunts the helpless passengers.” I haven’t seen it, yet based on that, I’m not sure I need to. Replace “sailing” with “kayaking”, and you’re more or less here. Perhaps lob in a bit borrowed from The Descent, the trip in this case being partly a memorial for a lost friend. Here, it’s to honour a woman who was drowned by her abusive husband. Her sisters, Nic (Liane) and Annie (Archer), head off with Jodie (Truong) and Lisa (Lister). It’s not long before they find themselves hunted by a shark, and needing to cross open water in order to get help for an injured young girl, who was also attacked.

I’m not joking when I say the shark here appears to be a metaphor for toxic masculinity, as seen in the sisters’ murderous brother-in-law. He is literally the only man in the entire film. Fortunately, once they hit the water, it’s easy to forget the rather heavy-handed messaging which we get at the beginning. However, it does mean you know the death-toll here will be limited, because otherwise the patriarchy will have won. It’s also definitely the shark film with the most F-bombs I’ve ever seen, because Australia. I will say, given the scenario, the heroines exhibit a real lack of urgency in their kayaking. I mean, I would be flailing away like an aquatic helicopter in their situation, rather than the languid paddling they tend to demonstrate.

On the other hand, the makers do an excellent job of combining footage of real sharks with practical effects and CGI, into a cohesive whole. The results are generally effective, and occasionally impressive. The relationship between the women is nicely portrayed; they are not saints, and bicker over the best way to address the situation. Nic seems to be suffering an odd kind of PTSD, after the trauma of discovering her sister’s body in the bath. This translates into her suffering from drowning flashbacks somehow. While I dunno quite how that works, maybe a kayaking holiday isn’t the best choice of vacation?

As ever though, movies like this really are not about logical analysis, because a fear of being eaten alive by sharks isn’t logical either. [They cause maybe 10 deaths a year worldwide, compared to 2,000 killed after being struck by lightning, something we literally use as a metaphor for extremely rare events] They need to connect with the audience on a more emotional, almost a primeval level, and this did it for me on enough occasions to justify its existence. I’m not convinced about the need to try and inject social commentary into shark movies: there are plenty of other horror sub-genres better suited to it. However, it’s still possible to set that aside and appreciate the simple, oceanic pleasures this has to offer.

A version of this review previously appeared on Film Blitz.

The Lair

  By

★★★
“Russian about.”

There is a tendency for directors married to actresses to make them action heroines. This perhaps started with Renny Harlin and Geena Davis, but the most famous example is probably Paul W.S. Anderson and Milla Jovovich (she was previously married to Luc Besson too). It seems that Marshall and Kirk may be heading that way, with her starring in his last two movies. First there was witch-pic The Reckoning, and now this, which blends elements from a number of genre films. Not the least of which are Marshall’s own Dog Soldiers and The Descent. However, you can also throw in Predator, Aliens and perhaps even Starship Troopers. The result is, obviously, derivative as hell – yet I can’t deny, I enjoyed it.

Pilot Capt. Kate Sinclair (Kirk) is shot down in hostile Afghani territory. While being pursued by insurgents, she stumbles across and takes refuge an abandoned underground base left over from the Soviet occupation in the eighties. What’s inside turns out to be very aggressive and unpleasant, and Sinclair barely escapes with her life. She finds refuge in a nearby allied base commanded by Major Roy Finch (Bamber), and her tales of Soviet engineered monstrosities meet with understandable scepticism. Until night falls, and the creatures emerge from their laur and go on the offensive. The next day, Capt. Sinclair and the survivors decide they need to go back to the Russian base and plant enough C4 to reduce it and its inhabitants to their constituent atoms.

The last Marshall film we covered here was Doomsday back in 2008. Since then he has honed his skills more in television; of particular note, a couple of episodes from Game of Thrones, including the spectacular “Blackwater”. He seems to have put the experience to good use here, with a fine eye for the fight sequences between the soldiers and the creatures. There are a lot of practical effects, and the Resident Evil franchise is another clear influence. I do wish the creatures’ talents had been further illustrated: for instance there’s one point where Sinclair is grabbed by a monster’s multiple tongues. I kept expecting this feature to return later; it never does.

There are, unfortunately, too many holes for this to be a classic, with a heroine whose behaviour falls  short of logical, or even making sense. I get the “no man left behind” thing, but dragging all your comrades back into danger, in order to rescue one person, is very different from going in alone (as Ripley does, to rescue Newt, at the end of Aliens). Some of the accents here are flat-out terrible: Bamber’s Southern drawl is the worst – were there no actual actors available from South of the Mason-Dixon line? – but Ockenden’s Welsh isn’t convincing either. I’m also impressed by the way Sinclair’s hair and make-up remain pristine through the entire movie, regardless of what grubby underground trench she has had to crawl through: I guess being the director’s wife has its benefits… As an entertaining B-movie though, I’ve no complaints, and if this couple want to continue down the Anderson/Jovovich road in future, I’ll be fine with that.

Dir: Neil Marshall
Star: Charlotte Kirk, Jonathan Howard, Jamie Bamber, Leon Ockenden

The Adventures of Maid Marian

  By

★★★
“How do you solve a problem like Maria-n…?”

The above rating reflects my deep-held tolerance for low budget cinema. If a film is made with heart, I’m generally prepared to overlook, to some degree, technical shortcomings. Both sides of that equation are present here, in a somewhat revisionist take on the Robin Hood mythos. This takes place after Hood’s original victory over the Sheriff of Nottingham, and he has now gone on crusade to the Holy Lands with King Richard. In their absence, however, the country has not fared well. Marian (Craig) has adopted another identity, and is hiding out as novice nun Matilda, though occasionally sneaks out to help poach from the rich, and give to the poor.

Richard dies abroad, and Robin (Andersen) returns, to find himself greeted warmly by Marian, who has been booted out of her religious order, and not-so warmly by the former Sheriff, William De Wendenal (Cryer), who still bears a grudge against the pair for their role in the loss of his title. Robin is captured and injured, leaving Marian as the only hope of rescue before he’s executed along with his long-time sidekick, Little John (Pellet). Naturally, she is more than up to the task, having both run with the outlaws of Sherwood Forest, and then had to fend for herself, during the three-year span when Robin was overseas. While Marian may be a damsel, she’s more likely to be causing distress, rather than being in it.

She’s certainly more convincing a hero of folklore than Robin, who looks barely old enough to shave, never mind lead a popular rebellion against authority. As a contrast, the last film I saw about the character returning from the Crusades was Robin and Marian, starring a very world weary and middle-aged Sean Connery. Andersen has none of that gravitas, perhaps deliberately to avoid taking the focus away from the heroine. Craig is fine, holding her own dramatically and in action, and occasionally better than fine, even if the ease with which she dispatches enemies close to twice her weight in sword-fights, is painful. In particular, their “armour” doesn’t seem to give them any protection at all: the slightest tap from Marian and they fold like cheap sheets.

As noted, you very much need to be able to look past what is, by and large, an exercise in running around in the forest. There are no bustling towns to be found here: I’m not sure there was ever a scene where the count of participants reached double figures. The buildings are unconvincing. and you never get any sense of this genuinely being the 13th century. However, it is played gratifyingly straight, since otherwise it’d have to compete with fondly-remembered nineties TV series, Maid Marian and her Merry Men (created by Baldrick from Blackadder). Yet it’s also so fast and loose in its cheerful disregard of historical accuracy, it almost plays as a dead-pan spoof. The ending is left wide-open for a sequel, and despite (because of?) all its flaws, I have a sneaking hope that comes to pass.

Dir: Bill Thomas
Star: Sophie Craig, Dominic Andersen, Bob Cryer, Jon Lee Pellet