2012 Preview...

Phil's Quick  look at what’s wetting our whistle for the upcoming year in films... 

MOST EXCITED:  THE DARK KNIGHT RISES

In Brief: Really?  I need to tell you why?  Okay – Nolan has never made a bad film.  The first two Batman films were simply amazing. This one has Catwoman & Bane.  All this and the fact that The Dark Knight was soooo good... well this wont disappoint.  Trust me.

The Rest:

2.The Hobbit: Part 1

In Brief: Peter Jackson returns to middle earth for the back-to-back Hobbit movies.  A great cast (including several Rings alumni who also make a return to middle Earth), epic source material and top notch FX all but guaranteed means that this is one of the must watch films of the year. 


3.Prometheus

In Brief: The trailer is superb and It’s Ridley Scott making a return to the world of Alien.  Okay so Scott can be a bit hit and miss over the past few years but if the story is what it’s been reported, it sounds simply superb. 


4.The Avengers 

In Brief: Thor. Captain America. Hulk. Iron Man. Nick Shield.  This is the culmination of 4 years of Marvel planning coming together in one Epic film.  This is what Blockbusters should be.


5.Amazing Spiderman 

In Brief:  This one I’m less confidant about if I’m being honest HOWEVER the cats is great, the director a promising track record and a stand up villain in the Lizard something tells me that this could just be the shot in the arm that this franchise needs.


Bubbling under: 

Expendables 2 (I so want it to be good) , Piranha 3DD (didn’t turn up last year), The Dictator (Borat & Bruno were superb, this could be better) , Snow White & The Huntsman (great idea), 007: Skyfall (Bond, back and kicking arse with probably it’s best cast & director yet!), Django Unchained (Tarantino!) , World War Z (Great book)

* * * * * * * * * 

POTENTIAL STINKER OF THE YEAR: TWILIGHT BREAKING DAWN PART 2

In Brief:  Shooting fish in a barrel it may be but again is this one isn’t another dull, teenage wet dream of a movie then I’ll eat a tramps hat.  Look I don’t go out my way to hate these films but they kinda make it easy, don’t they!

Bubbling Under: Men In Black 3 (2 was pretty poor), GI Joe Retaliation (even with the Rock it’s going to be dull), Ghost Rider 2 (Again... piss poor original), Total Recall (I so want to be wrong!), 21 Jump Street (Just no!), Red Tails (Lucas making a WW2 movie.  No), Dredd (Again another film I want to be good but just cant see it)

Last Year... My Projected HIts & Misses

So how did I do in 2011?  Urm... well not great.

For the Best:  I tipped Cowboys & Aliens, The Hangover 2 & Sucker Punch as films to watch.  Oh and Cars 2.  All in all then four of the least well received movies of 2011.  Cars 2 was Pixar’s first critically disliked film, whilst Sucker Punch topped most people’s ‘Worst’ list.


I also pegged Battle Los Angeles which actually wasn’t bad.  At least Harry Potter, Captain America, Thor and X-Men were MUCH better. 

As for the Stinkers?  Well Twilight Breaking Dawn part 1 was a dead cert and it didn’t disappoint.  Well in terms of being crap that is.  

Transformers 3 was my worst film of the year, Scream 4 was dire, Pirates 4 was dull & Green Lantern was also bad so all pretty much came in as expected.