Reviews by Martin Gray

Order by: Date, A–Z

• 
  American Horror Story: Asylum - The Complete Second Season (2012)

  Review preview for American Horror Story: Asylum - The Complete Second Season

  The ingredients are perfect for an over-the-top frightfest, as monsters of the inhuman and human variety fight for control of the hospital, and the residents' souls.

  A reporter looking for a scoop gets impounded with patients at a mental institution.
• 
  Antichrist (2002)

  Review preview for Antichrist

  Don't think for one second you won't spot where this is going after five minutes.

  Boys plays dangerous games in a post-apocalyptic Polish quarry.
• 
  Bandslam (2009)

  Review preview for Bandslam

  What makes this film so good is writer/director Todd Graff, who coaxes terrific performances from his young cast and really makes you care about them and their silly teenage travails.

  High-minded school musical.
• 
  Bite (1997)

  Review preview for Bite

  The story is a good one, the ending sharp.

  Postman gets to grips with the problem females in his life.
• 
  Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs (2009)

  Review preview for Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs

  Meatballs doesn't bother throwing much at the audience, it uses 3D technology mainly to add depth rather than extend the action outwards.

  Will a weather wonder spell the end of the world?
• The Choir (2002)

  A boy called Les is bullied at school, until he joins the choir.
• 
  Coincide (2002)

  A day in the life of a ten dollar note.
• 
  Dante's Cove: Season Three (2007)

  Review preview for Dante's Cove: Season Three

  The real power in the town of Dante's Cove is cheese... and if you're in the mood for campy smut, it's a pretty decent cheese.

  Schlock jock horror in the Caribbean.
• 
  Dark Star (1974)

  Parody of early sci-fi epics, especially 2001: A Space Odyssey
• 
  Deck The Halls (2006)

  Review preview for Deck The Halls

  This is no classic, it's formulaic stuff, but the quality performers prevent things getting to saccharine and preachy.

  Two neighbours fall out over who is the local king of Christmas in forgettable but fun seasonal family comedy.
• Dysenchanted (2004)

  Happy endings take work.
• 
  Eating Out (2004)

  Gay/straight comedy of errors.
• 
  Fame (2009)

  Review preview for Fame

  To say the characterisation in Fame is cursory would be like calling Titanic short.

  It's not all glitter at the High School for the Performing Arts.
• 
  Fantastic Four (2005)

  Cosmic rays unleash four new super heroes on the box office.
• 
  Four Christmases (2008)

  Review preview for Four Christmases

  This is the time of year when I want buckets of forced sentiment with my overpriced cola, but this film felt cold despite the lack of snow

  A couple are forced to visit the relatives they hate over Christmas.
• 
  The Final Destination (2009)

  Review preview for The Final Destination

  I don't believe this is the end. We've not had Finally, Finaller or Finalest Destination yet

  Death has a design. And it's ever so repetitive.
• 
  Flight Of The Living Dead (2007)

  Review preview for Flight Of The Living Dead

  This has everything you could want from a film set in the air. Except originality.

  Zombies on a plane.
• 
  The Fourth Kind (2009)

  Review preview for The Fourth Kind

  An absorbing time passer.

  A widow gets close to the truth about alien abductions. Too close...
• 
  Gash (2004)

  Review preview for Gash

  It's nice to see that someone has been paying attention in Film Studies.

  A step-by-step comedy guide to social realist film-making.
• 
  The Green Hornet (2011)

  Review preview for The Green Hornet

  What we get insults the intelligence - no one would follow Britt Reid into a donut shop, never mind a life or death battle.

  After his father dies a man decides to fight crime.
• 
  The Haunting In Connecticut (2009)

  Review preview for The Haunting In Connecticut

  Elevated by sharp direction from Peter Cornwell in his feature debut.

  A family move into a house with a gory past and face a horrific future.
• 
  He's Just Not That Into You (2009)

  Review preview for He's Just Not That Into You

  A warm, wise and witty examination of male/female relations so grounded in the real that makes Sex and the City look as insightful as a stool softener TV ad.

  Love is all around, but saccharine's kept at bay.
• 
  Hey, Mr. Producer! The Musical World of Cameron Mackintosh (1998)

  Review preview for Hey, Mr. Producer! The Musical World of Cameron Mackintosh

  A gem for lovers of great show tunes.

  Celebration of 30 years of musical theatre, with Julie Andrews and a galaxy of stars.
• 
  It's A Casual Life (2003)

  Review preview for It's A Casual Life

  If there's a message to be had it's that outwardly respectable men can be violent tossers, but that's hardly a revelation.

  A footy hooligan reveals his motivations.
• Lift (2002)

  Man suffers phone difficulties in lift.
• Linda Green: The Complete First Series (2002)

  Review preview for Linda Green: The Complete First Series

  It doesn't go all out for laughs, as in the sainted MTM, but there are great lines aplenty, with at least a couple of out-louds per episode.

  Liza Tarbuck plays a sassy, sexy single Manchester girl in a well-written BBC TV series.
• 
  Made Of Honour (2008)

  Review preview for Made Of Honour

  If you're in the mood for a nicely crafted, well-acted, thoroughly entertaining time-filler featuring familiar faces who are well within their comfort zone, you could do far worse.

  Commitment- phobe realises who he wants - too late?
• 
  Married Life (2007)

  Review preview for Married Life

  The feel of this film is sumptuous - convincingly recreated mid-century sets, an evocative soundtrack, gorgeous gowns for the women and smart suits for the guys.

  How do you avoid humiliating you wife with a divorce? Kill her.
• 
  The Masseur (2005)

  Review preview for The Masseur

  Gaying by numbers.

  A masseur in the Phillippines tries to come to terms with his father's death.
• 
  Nativity! (2009)

  Review preview for Nativity!

  Martin Freeman is such a great actor that no matter how outlandish the film's events, it's grounded.

  Can a school's Christmas play succeed when it's directed by The Grinch?
• 
  National Lampoon's Animal House (1978)

  Review preview for National Lampoon's Animal House

  'Pedestrian' is too racy a word to describe it.

  Grandaddy of teen gross-out comedies takes a chainsaw to college frat house conformity.
• 
  Night At The Museum (2006)

  Review preview for Night At The Museum

  There are a couple of pretty funny moments but for the most part director Shawn Levy's comedy struggles to raise a wry smile.

  Exhibits come alive in comic romp.
• 
  Nobody's Life (2002)

  Review preview for Nobody's Life

  The only real surprise is that the story follows such a predictable pattern. Some might call this tragedy; I call it lazy.

  Flying by deceit of his pants.
• 
  Orphan (2009)

  Review preview for Orphan

  Director Jaume Collet-Serra proves a master of pace, beginning slowly and ratcheting up the tension, rendering any part of the cinema seat other than the edge irrelevant.

  She was meant to complete their family; she may destroy it.
• 
  Percy Jackson And The Lightning Thief (2010)

  Review preview for Percy Jackson And The Lightning Thief

  This is an entertaining time passer which should keep the kids happy.

  Teenage gods and monsters - classical, but not a classic
• 
  Perfect (2002)

  Review preview for Perfect

  It's stylish stuff, professionally put together in a post-Taggart way, with a brooding score by Mike Hewer. Man-on-the-edge Stephen Moyer does intensity well and looks lovely naked.

  Scottish estate agent works hard showing clients and colleagues the stairway to heaven.
• 
  The Plot (2002)

  Review preview for The Plot

  The Plot has the authentic looking website, but it's authenticity of the most banal kind, a tie-in that both fails to illuminate the parent film, or provide entertainment of its own.

  An intruder in an empty house leads to the discovery of a website address.
• 
  Poltergay (2006)

  Review preview for Poltergay

  A little gem... one of the best comedies around.

  They're here . . . and they're queer. The ghosts of Disco Past cause trouble for a young couple.
• 
  Pork Chop (2002)

  Review preview for Pork Chop

  This is one to watch and enjoy.

  An old lady goes to the butchers - twice - and has a night in with a pal.
• 
  Perfect Stranger (2007)

  Review preview for Perfect Stranger

  It's not high art, but it's highly entertaining.

  A journalist goes undercover in search of a murderer.
• 
  Pink Narcissus (1971)

  Review preview for Pink Narcissus

  While interesting from a historical point of view... it's not a great watch.

  A young hustler fantasises about a world of matadors, sultans, centurians and bad decor.
• 
  Premonition (2007)

  Review preview for Premonition

  There are two main problems with this film - firstly, you can see the emotional resolution coming a mile off, secondly, you're not actually sure what's happened by the end of play.

  A young mother wakes to find her newly dead husband is alive again. Was it a premonition?
• 
  Rent (2005)

  Review preview for Rent

  One of Rent's better-known songs, Seasons of Love, tells us that a year is 525,600 minutes, but believe me, this film seemed an awful lot longer than that.

  Big-screen adaptation of the award-winning musical.
• 
  Shade (2004)

  Review preview for Shade

  Slight but sweet.

  A boy comes to terms with his new baby sister.
• Shallow Ground (2004)

  Review preview for Shallow Ground

  We never know what's at stake for the characters, none of whom works as a sympathetic point of view protaganist.

  Bloody kids!
• 
  Shooter (2007)

  Review preview for Shooter

  That's not beer in the Marky Mark fridge, it's testosterone. And he's going to share it with you.

  A disgruntled ex-US marine fights a conspiracy at the heart of government. With guns. Big guns.
• 
  Snoopy And Charlie Brown: The Peanuts Movie (2015)

  Review preview for Snoopy And Charlie Brown: The Peanuts Movie

  If you're a fan of the strips, there's nothing much new here, but that's part of the charm - seeing favourite sequences come to 'life'.

  The firm friends embark on a dual adventure.
• 
  Socket (2007)

  Review preview for Socket

  I know this sounds mean, but this is one of the worst films I've ever had to sit through.

  Bolt hits dolt, craves volts.
• 
  Song For Marion (2012)

  Review preview for Song For Marion

  Truth be told, I wept buckets.

  An elderly man struggles to deal with his terminally ill wife's desire to be part of her local choir.
• 
  The Skin Game (1931)

  Review preview for The Skin Game

  If you didn't know this was Hitchcock you'd be hard-pressed to guess, with little of his classic cinematic vocabulary in evidence.

  Morality tale of class and conscience sees aristos battle new money over land.