Silent Runner

I really liked Michael Coxs first book so I'm grabbing that. Thanks for the heads up.

Community is on there now. Think I'll rewatch.

Blindspotting https://www.imdb.com/title/tt7242142/ Netflix Set in Oakland. A young man is released from prison and is put on probation for a year. This follows him for the last 3 days of probation as he tries to stay out of trouble. I thought this was really impressive - reminded me a lot of early Spike Lee, the same inventiveness and energy. It's tense and funny and looks great. It's trying to say something about race relations, police violence and gentrification but it's never heavy-handed in getting it's message accross. The two leads are excellent, it looks great and the music is fantastic. It loses it's way slightly near the end and needs a slightly weak plot contrivance to bring the various plot-threads together. But otherwise this was fantastic. 4/5

The Debt Collector - https://www.imdb.com/title/tt7448180/ On Netflix Scott Adkins and Jesse Johnson take their shtick to America. Adkins is a traditional martial arts guy running a traditional dojo in California. It's not doing well, no one wants traditional training any more it's all about MMA. He takes a job as an enforcer for the mob and gets teamed up with a grizzled enforcer. They're sent to collect money from various colourful characters around California. Needless to say this leads to a load of punch-ups and brawls. I thought this was really good. There's a great chemistry between Adkins and Louis Mandylor as the other enforcer - lots of bickering dialogue and funny back and forths between them. The American setting is nicely done and the violence is excellent. The soundtrack is trash though - it reminded me of the GTA 3 soundtrack, lots of generic 'rock' sounding songs but no 'real' artists, just sound-a-likes. 3.5/5

Is Maniac any good? I've watched two and love the look and style of it but the story isn't hooking me and Johan Hill is a bit annoying. Worth sticking with?

It's a great but pretty grim read. Reminded me a lot of The Terror by Dan Simmons.

I enjoyed this. Steve going through some of his favourite roles - plenty of Alan of course.

I needed a break from all this virus panic this week. So what better way to escape than with a Scott Adkins/Jesse V. Johnson double bill? Trick question, these is no better way. First up..... Accident Man https://www.imdb.com/title/tt6237612/ Based on a Pat Mills comic Adkins plays a hitman who specialises in murdering people and making it look like an accident. He works with a colourful crew of murderers and psychopaths and has seemingly cast morality aside for his job. Then his ex-girlfriend gets killed by one of his own crew! Is nothing sacred? So Scott has to use his punching skills to solve this mystery. This was pretty good. Adkins isn't a great actor but he's handsome and charismatic and can do some outrageous stunts. He batters his way through the rest of his squad and there are some decent fight scenes. The rest of the cast are fine, Ray Stevenson is the pick of the bunch, it flies along, there's some laughs, it's well filmed and the violence is crunchy. 3.5/5 Next up we have..... Avengement https://www.imdb.com/title/tt8836988/?ref_=nm_flmg_act_8 Is 'avengement' even a word? That doesn't matter here. This is about two cockney brothers - Adkins and Craig Fairbrass. They have a bit of a falling out and Adkins ends up in prison. He gets out and goes looking for revenge (avengement??). But he's going to have to go through Fairbrasses gang to get to him. You know what you're getting with a Johnson/Adkins colab but this was a cut above the usual fare. The cast are pretty decent - Thomas Turgoose and Nick Moran also star - it flies along and is done inside 85 minutes. It's pretty funny in places and has a soundtrack that rips off both Morricone and Goblin shamelessly. But the real reason to watch these films is to see Scott Adkins batter some punks and we get a LOT of that here. Fights in lifts, prisons, community centres - anywhere you can swing a club/axe or iron bar they have a scrap. The highlight is a 10 minutes sequence in a pub where Adkins takes on all comers. And while it's not The Raid the fights are well choreographed, the action is clearly shot and they have a real weight to them. I really enjoyed this and these two films surely took my mind away from the lockdown this week. 4/5

Up to episode 4 now and I'm really into this. It reminds me a little of Breaking Bad - sometimes not much happens in an episode but it looks so good and the craft of it is proper quality that the running time zips past. Episode 4 constantly wrong-footed me and the ending left me twitching for next week.

Yeah, I can dig that. I rarely go to the cinema these days because it's too easy for your experience to be ruined by some dope in the audience. I saw this at the art cinema here so the crowds are normally well behaved. I think it's a BBC production so it should be on home release soon.

Little Joe A slow-moving and low-key British, horror/sci-fi film. A plant-breeder develops a new breed of plant that can release a drug to make it’s owners happy. She takes one of these plants home to her son but her actions have unexpected consequences. I thought this was really impressive despite it’s flaws. The cast are great (Emily Beecham in particular) it looks superb with a really cold, sci-fi aesthetic and it has a pretty interesting central idea. And like the best films it leaves you thinking about it long after it’s over. The problem is that it feels like an episode of a TV show, Black Mirror or something, stretched out to feature length. I’ll watch out for films from this director in future. 3.5/5

Arteta has Covid 19. https://www.arsenal.com/news/club-statement-covid-19

Lloris is trash. At fault for both goals.

2015 1. Mad Max 2. Carol 3. Spotlight 2016 1. American Honey 2. Paterson 3. Arrival 2017 1. Call me By Your Name 2. Death of Stalin 3. Get Out 2018 1. Sorry to Bother You 2. Hereditary 3. Mandy 2019 1. Parasite 2. Midsomar 3. Us 2017, 2018 and 2019 were the hardest years to reduce to just 3 films.

Villa holding out well against Leicester then Pepe Reina loses his mind and hands them a goal.