This week is hardly going to make it into the history books as far as cinema is concerned. With the exception of the new Mission: Impossible film (which, granted, is a big exception) there are no films coming out that look particularly exciting. Reese Witherspoon performs an about turn on her performance last year in Wild, and some Belgian kid stumbles into a woodland monster; maybe you’d be better off ignoring all these films and just watching Inside Out again.
On Monday you can see the first of several films released this week that can only be described as “under the radar”. The Last Sparks of Sundown tells the story of two American brothers who make the trip across the pond to sell their grandfather’s house, only to find that some strangers have inhabited it, and that they have a sinister man on their tail. Yes, this is copied almost verbatim from IMDb, there is really that little publicised about this film and its limited release.
The only release of note this week is, thankfully, a biggie. Everyone’s favourite scientologist is hanging from a plane, or swimming in lava, or just, I don’t know, breathing in space? That seems like something he’d do. Anyway, Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation, the fifth instalment of America’s answer to James Bond, takes us back into the farfetched adventures of Ethan Hunt as he and his team are pitted against a mysterious group of assassins and operatives known only as ‘The Syndicate’. Alongside leading man Tom Cruise, the film stars Jeremy Renner, Simon Pegg, Alec Baldwin, and Rebecca Ferguson (no, not the one from The X Factor) and premieres in IMAX as well as standard-form 2D this Thursday.
Up next is part one of possibly the most boring Friday in cinema history – Beyond the Reach. The film, starring Michael Douglas (The Game, Basic Instinct) and Jeremy Irvine (War Horse, Railway Man), is based on a novel named Deathwatch by Robb White, and follows two men who become stranded in the Mojave Desert while hunting game. The film has received lacklustre reviews, so go watch it if you must, but don’t expect the world.
Also available from Friday is The Cobbler, a film with one of the most uninspiring titles in existence. The film stars Adam Sandler (and will therefore rival Citizen Kane and The Godfather in its excellence(!)) as he takes on the role of a cobbler who can step into the lives of his customers by wearing their shoes. As has been widely speculated, it would appear that Sandler truly does not give a shit about what his films are about anymore.
Following her Academy Award nominated performance in Wild last year, Reese Witherspoon has seemingly made the smart career move of continuing to chase an Oscar by starring in Hot Pursuit. Billed as a slapstick comedy (always a good start for any budding awards-hopeful) the film sees Witherspoon take on the role of a police officer tasked with escorting “a wisecracking Colombian beauty” (Sofia Vergara) to Dallas so that she can testify against a drug lord. Obviously hoping to maintain her momentum by moving from an in-depth, emotionally-fraught study of character and the human condition to whatever the hell this film is, expect to see Witherspoon in a big way during awards season for her work on this film. Yes that is sarcasm you detect.
Wrapping up our week, and providing a mercy-killing for a tortuous Friday, is Cub, a (wait for it) Belgian horror film following a twelve year-old boy as he journeys into the woods intent on meeting a monster. Starring and directed by no-one of particular note, along with the additional obstacles of being in a foreign language (not necessarily a bad thing in itself, but hardly a massive positive) and receiving largely poor reviews, Cub will no doubt do just as well as all the other films released this Friday.
