Tears Of the sun (2003 )

'Tears of The sun ' is an engrossing and above average look at modern day soldiers , as navy seallieutenant A.K. Waters ( Bruce Willis ) and crew must choose between duty or humanity to rescue Dr Kendrcks and her companions.

Kendricks an american citizen helps victims of an ongoing civil war at a Catholic mission in a remote village to which Waters and his elite squadron are sent to rescue. Refusing to leave without the rest of the villagers Waters reluctantly agrees to Kendricks demands to escort them all to safety via helicopter lift. Going back on his words, Waters leaves the villagers behind and only takes Kendricks. Refusing to obey strict orders Waters decides to head back and rescue the rest of the distraught villagers by escorting them to the border and hopefully out pursue the army of rebels at there tail.

It is this trek through the perilous and dense jungle where they try to evade their pursuers that really gets you involved. Witnessing at first hand the brutality of the gathering rebel army makes there passage to safety even more compelling. 'Tears Of The Sun ' is an unusually thought full and compelling movie. Basically an action movie yes! But much more than that may suggest at it's most basic level with it's moral dilemmas and humanitarian concerns.

GOOD EGG

THE MUMMY - TOMB OF THE DRAGON EMPOROR

Having rather liked the the first two mummy films i was looking forward eagerly for this , the third installment.Sadly it is a great dissapointment.

One could criticize the film on many levels, with it's cheap looking CGI effects, terrible convoluted storyline and some of the most irritating dialogue your likely to hear. Not to mention also the absolute lack of chemistry between the main characters. One major criticism being the replacement of Rachel Weisz by Maria Bello. Such a massive error here, her fake accent and clumsily unconvincing action scenes are to put it mildly, horrid. I get the feeling that Rachel Weisz wisely { no pun intended } gave this whole affair a miss by realizing what a mess it would turn into.

John Hannah fairs slightly better and tries to bring some comedic relief to it all, but ulimately fails to do so. At one point he yells at the mummies ,while attacking them from an aeroplane, calling them bastards... oh dear, how far out of character could you possibly get!

 Brendan Fraser looks and acts decidedly miserable throughout and one gets the impression he wished he were somehere else. Also Frasers son has no charisma whatsoever , he's truly cardboard, dead as a brick , and his romantic epsodes are totally redundant. Jet Li is also far removed from the more menacing Arnold Vosloo.

All in all this seems like a big cash in on the previous two films which were in a different league to what we have here.The film feels and looks like a cheat on the mummy idea as well. None of this properly relates to Egypt which is surely what one thinks of first when it comes to mummies and what we would expect.

ROTTEN EGG

LOST IN SPACE ( Season 3 )

For those that enjoyed the first series of Lost in Space, by the time of the third season, things had taken on a very different tone indeed, and became much more childish and predictable with stock situations being repeated over and over again. As many have qouted as sayng, the Space campiness had irrevocably crept in, and Smith had become an increasingly irritatingly cowardly persona, which was far from the scheming and darker smith as portrayed in the first season, which is by far the most enjoyable especially if you like your science fiction on the more serious side. 

It's sad really , but it's true of most of Irwin Allens shows that they started off very promising, but gradually went down hill, untill the plug was eventually pulled.

The Third season though did have some redeeming factors in that it was a little better than the second series which to my mind contained some of the worst episodes. The third season even did on occasion harken back to the first.

At best most of the acting in lost in space was forgettable except for Jonathan Harris, but there's something very nostalgic about the whole series and somehow demands repeated viewings ,which given it's age, is much more entertaining than many Sci Fi series made today, which although containing  much more expensive special  effects are mostly totally devoid of atmosphere and characters. Lost in Space certainly still has a lot more going for it.

SERIES 1    GOOD EGG

SERIES 2    PAR BOILED

SERIES 3    PAR BOILED

JOHN RAMBO (2008)

John Rambo the indestructable Vietnam vet returns once again to our screens. This time around , the fourth in the series , a group of Christian aid workers in Thailand recruit John Rambo to guide them up the Salween River to deliver medical supplies to the Karen tribe of neighboring Burma (aka Myanmar). When the missionaries fail to return, Rambo is persuaded to take a group of mercenaries back into the war-torn border region to find them. What follows is a descent into hell on earth.

The body count is high and the violence extreme. Stallone pulls out all the stops here . Older he may be ,and more intensely morose than ever, but for his age Stallone still maintains a presence to be reckoned with and quite literally towers over everybody else. His charisma and sheer star quality shine through as ever and makes for possibly the best film in the series. There's some cool flashbacks to the earlier Rambo films included, and the ending ( without giving too much away ) is a nice touch which kind of ends where First blood began. One thing i found missing though was Richard Crenna who died in 2003 sadly.









GOOD EGG

The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada ( 2005 )

Tommy Lee Jones desrvedly won the 2005 Cannes Film Festival best actor award for this film , which he also directed. Showing there's more to his talent than acting which has gained him a strong presence in the movies for 35 years.

Although Three Burials has a rather unmemorable title , the film certainly is VERY memorable.Jones plays Pete Perkins, a laconic, weathered cattle ranch foreman inthe
bordercommunity of Van Horn, Texas. He has formed a closefriendship with Melquiades Estrada (Julio César

Cedillo), a cowboy from Mexico. Meanwhile, Mike Norton (Barry Pepper) and his beautiful if vapid blond wife Lou Ann (January Jones) have just come from Cincinnati to Van Horn, where Mike has a taken a job as a border patrolman. He reports to Dwight Yoakam's hard-nosed Capt. Frank Belmont, who refers to undocumented workers with a racial slur.


Mike and Lou Ann's lives peaked in high school, and the swiftly bored Lou Ann has little to sustain her. Mike is a mindless macho type who pores over Hustler magazine on the job and immediately displays a propensity for excessive violence in capturing illegal immigrants. When
Melquiades spots a fox menacing a herd of sheep he takes aim, and trigger-happy Mike, on duty nearby, returns fire, killing the cowboy.

Pete promised Mel that should Mel die he would see that his body was buried in his village in Mexico. With Pete, a man's word is taken seriously, and acting on a tip, he kidnaps Mike into accompanying him.


Arriaga backs into his story, alternating among its variousstrands, moving between past and present without warning; it's his way of plunging the audience into the lives of the various people who will soon interact in convoluted and unexpected ways.

The trek south of the border, which holds a climactic surprise revealing the depth of Melquiades' yearning for family ties and a life in an idyllic setting close to nature, is crucial in that it forces a
reevaluation of Mike, heretofore easily dismissed as a lethal jerk. The adventures and hardships become a transforming experience for him and reveal Pepper as a young actor of range and depth.

Beautifully photographed throughout , ' Three Burials ' recalls the gritty westerns of Bud Boetticher and there's more than a passing resemblance to Sam Peckinpahs ' Bring Me The Head of Alfredo Garcia ' . Besides Tommy Lee Jones , Brad Pepper turns in a fine performance too. Definitely one to watch!


CRYSTAL EGG