The Man (2005) was my most recent movie watch, I discovered it through advertisement from another rental I had made. The trailer made it look hilariously funny which was probably a dead cert given it stars Eugene Levy. Of course you can also tell there is going to be a slightly serious element to it with big Samuel L Jackson’s presence. For the first time in my movie reviews you have the option of purchasing the DVD and helping support my site, simply click on the DVD cover to the left.

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Wahlberg plays an ex USA marines sniper who is recruited to foil a plot to assassinate the president. Essentially the film shows how he is double crossed by the people that have hired him and framed for the assignation. He goes on the run and tries to find the people that have double crossed him.

Shooteris a gripping film that is full of action. It’s one of those movies that unravels and things start to slowly drop into place. Acting by Wahlberg is very good, one of the first movies I have seen him in, the other being the 2003 Italian Job. 

Shooteris based on the 1993 novel Point of Impact, by Washington Post film critic Stephen Hunter, who used Bob Lee Swagger (Wahlberg) in two of his other books, Shooter benefits greatly from having Training Day director Antoine Fuqua who at least has some experience with similar movies.

Michael Pena (Crash, World Trade Centre) who plays Nick Memphis the newbie FBI agent who learns to side with Swagger and become his spotter. Kate Mara (We Are Marshall, 24, Brokeback Mountain) acts as amazing eye candy and as the girlfriend of his dead marines partner who Swagger turns to for help. Still, it’s the villains played by Danny Glover, Ned Beatty, Elias Koteas and Rade Sherbedzija who get the most out of the movie by diving off the deep end along with the script, by Jonathan Lemkin (Lethal Weapon 4).  

In all I think Shooter is a worthy watch if you like action films, something you won’t be blown away by but will enjoy watching.

Released just over one year ago (19th January 2007), Rocky Balboa arrive as part of my movie rentals. Having always enjoyed the Rocky films I was sure I would enjoy this one despite it being the 6th Rocky movie, and with the 5th being what we all thought to be the end!

So what is the film about if Rocky has retired? Well old Rocky comes out of retirement to box the latest world champion one more time. The film spends a long time setting the scene, going through the usual emotional things given the fact Rocky’s wife is now dead. Eventually we get to the usual Rocky fight preparation followed by the big fight. So what is my verdict on this movie?

Stallone is very good in the movie and really plays the emotional scenes well, he interacts well with the other actors. On the flip side, this didn’t have the usual fire a Rocky film has. The training scenes didn’t really get you fired up and the fight scenes didn’t leave you screaming ‘Go Rocky’ at the screen like the previous movies did. In all its a worthy watch but I think the previous movies really set the tone and this Rocky movie has a big history to follow which I don’t really think it did.