Wednesday 17 August 2011

Critical Week: Be yourself tonight

Yes, it was rather hilarious to see London's esteemed critics donning 3D specs for a (gulp!) 9.30am Monday morning screening of Glee: The 3D Concert Movie this week. While it was lively enough to keep us awake, it felt like a badly missed opportunity to delve behind the scenes on a show that has turned into a pop phenomenon in just two years.

Other big screenings included the remake of Conan the Barbarian, another missed opportunity, this time to breathe life into an old franchise, and the rather mopey, tame adaptation of this summer's mega-seller One Day. We also got to see two genuinely unnerving movies: the superb festival winner Take Shelter, starring Michael Shannon and Jessica Chastain, and Guillermo Del Toro's creepy-house thriller Don't Be Afraid of the Dark, starring Katie Holmes. The doc this week was Page One: Inside the New York Times, which frankly is catnip to journalists as it explores how this venerable institution has dealt with the huge changes in the media world. As previously mentioned, I also caught up with The Change-up and The Help at Empire's Big Screen event over the weekend.

Coming up this next week, we have Robert Rodriguez's attempt to reboot his children's franchise with Spy Kids: All the Time in the World in 4D, the heist comedy 30 Minutes or Less, the latest in the death-comedy series Final Destination 5, the acclaimed 1970s doc The Black Power Mixtape, and, erm, the erotic Chinese mega-hit Sex and Zen: Extreme Ecstasy in 3D. Wish me luck.

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